Demon Angel

paunch, thinning hair, a vapid blond cheerleader wife, and ten fat kids by now. When she finished with the nosferatu, she was going to find his address and spend the rest of his life tormenting him. No need to wait for her father to call in her debt; for once, she'd be proactive. Hugh had wanted her to move into the modern era? She'd proactively stick her modern FBI-issue pistol up his ass and tell him to dance.
    The image broke her control, and she was shaking with laughter when she reached the clubhouse. Backing up against the side of the building to protect her rear, she called in her weapons and waited for the nosferatu.
    Judging by the way they slowed in their approach, they hadn't expected to find her giggling hysterically. Most of their prey probably screamed in terror or cried for mercy.
    Lilith was tired of terror and sick of mercy.
    Peacock halted fewer than ten feet from her, grinning. His fangs glistened in the moonlight. For a moment Lilith was tempted to show her own, but shifted to her human form instead. The peacock underestimated her; she might as well capitalize on his assumption and appear as weak as possible.
    The other nosferatu was not fooled. Unlike Peacock, who disregarded the sword in her right hand, he carefully approached Lilith on her left. Did he not recognize the gun in that hand, or just not fear it? After all, a bullet couldn't decapitate him, nor rend his heart in half.
    "Did you think to escape us, little demon?" Peacock asked, his English absurdly over-enunciated. He strutted back and forth, chest puffed out, and his exaggerated musculature rippled with each step. He apparently hadn't been out of his cave very long; Lilith hoped the same was true of his companion. "Look, Mondiel, how the halfling threatens us with her steel."
    Not just steel. Lilith's laughter slipped away, and she repressed her triumphant grin. Ignorant bloodsuckers.
    Mondiel materialized his weapon, a bronze battle-axe. Ancient, but just as efficient as her blade. "Silence, Pandibar." A simple command in the Old Language; it could be an indication of his unfamiliarity with English, or a tactical decision. He might think she lacked fluency in the angelic tongue.
    He would be wrong.
    "Pandibar?" she echoed in the same language, lacing the name with scorn. "My father has spoken of you. How you cowered behind a frozen mountain on Pluto until the victor was declared in the battle between the demon army and the angel horde. How you, wormlike, slunk back to the Throne and declared your fealty. How you sobbed when He cursed you and the others who abstained from taking a side in that war." She pointed her gun at Mondiel, and felt no reaction in his psychic scent. "Mondiel's name is not mocked Below, but we all laugh at Pandibar the Worm."
    "You lie!"
    "Do I?" She did, and the blinding rage that filled him was exactly the response she'd wanted. Now, to blind his companion.
    She squeezed off two shots. Mondiel fell to his knees, howling and clutching at his eyes. Pandibar swung around in surprise and disbelief, vulnerable for an instant, and she scythed his head from his shoulders.
    Moonlight flashed against bronze. Dropping to a crouch just as Mondiel's axe sliced the air above her, she twisted, stabbed upward.
    And missed. She felt her blade cut through flesh, saw the line of blood appear on his chest, vivid against his pale skin— but steel hit bone and was deflected away from the creature's heart.
    Oh, fuck.
    His foot shot out, caught her chin. Luckily, it was only a glancing blow; even so, her head snapped back and pain shot through her jaw and neck. Rolling with the momentum to keep his next kick from taking her skull off, she barely avoided the swing of his axe. It dug into the ground an inch from her left shoulder. Too close.
    She levered her legs under her, tried to push herself upright, but his foot slammed down on the wrist of her sword arm, pinning it against the grass. His hand clamped around her throat, fingernails cutting deep. Her gun slipped from her fingers.
    Mondiel's face twisted into a snarl, revealing his canines. His eyes had partially regenerated; glassy white orbs reflected her moonlit face. This was the end, then. Again. She thought she'd be angry, mortified, but instead a fierce pleasure rose.
    Lucifer wouldn't be able to revive her after this. Nosferatu tore their demon and Guardian adversaries apart. Finally, escape from her role. The nosferatu would thwart Lucifer and his plans for her, as