Demon Marked

“Ash!”
    There, by the fence. The demon had her by the throat, was looking at her face, pulling back the collar of her jacket. She shrieked, rammed up her knee. The demon blocked it.
    Nicholas ran to them, slowed by the heavy snow. “Let her go!”
    The demon didn’t even look at him, just angled his body to keep Ash between his and the crossbow. “The symbols, this spell. Is this for a Gate? Does Lucifer think he can return early? No, no, ha! No. Not if you’re dead, halfling.”
    Gone again. Nicholas slid to a stop, chest heaving. Fuck. Where?
    Up. Ash’s scream pierced the air—abruptly cut off. Silhouetted against the dark sky, her limp body dropped to the ground. Lungs aching with effort and cold, Nicholas raced to catch her. Not fast enough. God. The snow billowed around her when she landed. She didn’t move.
    Rage gripped him, gave him speed. Almost to her—and no, not dead. Thank God. No blood on her chest, her head still attached. Her eyes open and staring. Her neck, twisted.
    The demon had broken her neck.
    “I like to play with them.”
    Leathery wings spread wide, the demon glided to a stop beside Ash’s motionless body. His feet sank into the snow as he landed, facing Nicholas. The malevolent glee on his face churned bile through Nicholas’s stomach.
    Stay in place for one second, fucker. I’ll give you something to play with.
    He fired the crossbow. Too late. The bolt passed through air, and detonated thirty yards beyond the target in a muffled geyser of snow. Ash’s body was gone, too—but a trail through the snow showed where the demon had dragged her. Nicholas turned, aimed again at the demon’s grin.
    And realized the demon wasn’t just playing with Ash. It was playing with him .
    “Aw. Is the human going to quit now? You were doing so well.” The demon bent over Ash’s body. “How about this: I’ll give her back to you a piece at a time. You just have to ask nicely—”
    The ground beneath the demon suddenly erupted, tossing him off balance. He recovered, just as the snow in front of Nicholas seemed to explode in a frenzy of metal and white feathers. The Guardians. Thank God.
    Swords clashed. Demon and Guardian moved too fast—Nicholas couldn’t see what was happening, only the blur of feathers and shapes. The dark-haired Guardian male was fighting the demon, he realized. And Taylor was . . . bending over Ash.
    “No!” Nicholas plowed forward through the snow, finger tightening on the crossbow trigger. He’d kill the Guardian first. “Don’t—fucking—touch her!”
    Taylor looked up. Eyes of pure black stared back at him, like a glistening abyss. No . . . that wasn’t Taylor. That was Michael. Nicholas had seen this before in Rome. He knew how Michael protected the woman . . . and Nicholas held an explosive bolt pointed at her head. Shock and dread rammed through Nicholas’s chest, but he didn’t stop.
    “Let her go!”
    The voice that came from Taylor’s mouth wasn’t hers, either, but a terrifying harmony of many voices, man and woman. “She’s ours.”
    “She’s bound to me!”
    “She’s bound to a demon. With you, she’s a danger to all.”
    Fuck that. Nicholas dropped to his knee beside Ash, blindly searching for her wrist, holding the crossbow aimed at the Guardian. “Let Ash go, Michael, or by God I will shoot Taylor with this.”
    A grunt of pain came from behind them. Taylor turned her head.
    Nicholas didn’t look, but he could guess. “Your friend needs a little help, Michael.”
    Those obsidian eyes looked into Nicholas’s for a long second. Then Taylor was gone, swinging her sword into the fray.
    Not daring to put the crossbow down, Nicholas got his arm around Ash as best he could, began dragging her back to the car. Through the snow, it was like pulling a sack of lead. Two hours in a gym every day hadn’t prepared him for this battle. His chest ached. His muscles felt ready to rip in half.
    Behind him, the sounds of fighting stopped. He turned to look. The demon lay on the ground in two pieces. Taylor—herself again—was holding up an injured Revoire, who wore a bashful grin and was saying something about how goddamned slippery blood made the snow. Her eyes met Nicholas’s.
    He raised the crossbow again. “Explosive broadheads. You take your friend somewhere to be healed, and don’t come back until we’re gone. Or I’ll blow you both to Hell.”
    Taylor began, “You don’t even know—”
    “GO!”
    Firming her lips, Taylor