T HE DEVIL WAS shorter than she expected.
He had an inch on her, maybe two. Though that may have been his shoes.
"Hmm." A frown graced his face. He'd been silently studying her while she'd done the same to him. "Given the little tailspin you sent our Daphne into, I thought you'd be prettier."
Sam sucked in a sharp breath through her nose and crossed her arms tightly over her chest.
Our Daphne? Oh, devil or no, he could piss right off.
"Funny you should say that." She drew herself up to her full height and looked at him with as much contempt as she could muster. Of which she possessed plenty. "I thought you'd be taller. More, I don't know, imposing."
Behind her, Eithrig, or whatever he had called her, gasped.
He was a beautiful man, she'd grant him that much.
Careless wisps of blue-black hair rested against his pale forehead and curled around his ears, glossy strands brushing the starched collar of his crisp white dress shirt.
His face looked like it had been carved from the finest marble, his skin smooth and unblemished, nary a freckle to be found, his cheekbones high and jaw square and chiseled, balanced by the softness of his full, sensual mouth.
But what was it Mr. Darcy had said? Tolerable but not handsome enough to tempt him? Yeah, that.
He threw his head back and let out a full-throated laugh that sent a flock of birds into flight and several squirrels scurrying from a nearby tree.
"You tickle me, Miss Cooper," he said, and with a thoughtful frown, he added, "It's that dour countenance, I think. It doesn't do you justice. Smile for me a moment, would you?"
She glowered harder and he gave a careless little shrug.
"Ah well. What's that your grandfather used to say?" He drummed his fingers against his chin. "There's a lid for every pot?"
Her frown slipped. "What do you know about my grandfather?"
"You miss him, don't you?" He slipped his hands inside the front pockets of his black slacks and rocked back on his heels. "He misses you. I know he misses you dearly, in fact. And he misses your grandmother, too."
Her chest went cold. "I don't care what you think you know, but my grandfather was a good man. He's not—"
"Oh, he is." He looked pointedly down at his feet, at the ground beneath. "In fact he—"
A crack of thunder wrenched a gasp from her lips, the ground trembling beneath her feet.
The acrid scent of spent gunpowder and sugar just the wrong side of burnt tickled her nose, and Sam strained to see through the thick black smoke in the air.
About two yards away, something rose from the scorched earth.
No—her heart climbed into her throat and another gasp died on her lips—someone. Daphne.
Hands resting on her knees, Daphne stood hunched at the epicenter of what looked like a small blast zone.
Her dress was torn in several places, tattered at the hem, the crinoline ripped to ribbons that hung loose around her legs.
Ash and blood and grime smeared the skin of her hands, her cheeks, even her bare feet.
Tendrils of matted blond hair stained red in places by blood fell into her face, though they did nothing to disguise the fire burning in her black eyes.
"Don't listen to him, Sam."
"What the hell happened to you?" she whispered, horror strangling her voice.
Daphne grunted and with a claw-tipped finger she plucked a—God, what was that?—a feather out of her mouth. "Hell happened."
A slow clap filled the air.
"Oh, Daphne, my dear! You escaped the harpies! Bravo! I wasn't expecting that."
" Harpies? " Sam cried. "Does somebody want to explain to me what's going on here?"
"You know what?" Eithrig jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "I'm just going to excuse myself from—"
"Don't be silly," Lucifer said. "Stay. We do have you to thank for arranging this little tête-à-tête, don't we?"
At that, Eithrig paled considerably, her shoulders slumping like she was trying to make herself small.
Lucifer turned to Sam. "Now, back to what I was saying about your dearly departed grandfather—"
"He's lying, Sam. It's what he does. Don't listen to him. He's trying to upset you."
Upset her? Sam had passed upset a long time ago.
Lucifer tutted softly. "Daphne, Daphne, Daphne. You were my shining glory once. My pride. As you lay dying, dashed against the rocks on the island of Delos, I sensed such beautiful anger in you. Such sweet vengeance in your heart."
"Trust me," Daphne growled, "I'm feeling pretty vengeful at the moment."
Lucifer's lips twisted like he'd bitten into a bad apple.
"What a shame, what a shame." He shook his head, disappointed.
"Alas, gather ye rose-buds while ye may, / Old Time is still a-flying; / And this same flower that smiles today / Tomorrow will be dying.'" He sighed.
"We had a good run, Daphne, but all good things must come to an end, I suppose."
"Herrick was a prick." Daphne sneered, teeth flashing. "Sam, go home."
"No, Sam, stay ! I'd love to hear what you have to say, little lionheart. Brave enough to summon the devil. Or stupid." He laughed. "Let's find out!"
Sam had three sets of eyes on her and she could feel each of them acutely. She took a deep breath in and released it slowly. "Well, I wanted to see if you could put me in touch with Daphne, but now that she—"
"What do you take me for?" Irritation flashed across his face, his jaw hardening and his eyes turning sharp. "An infernal switchboard operator?"
Sam frowned. Well … "Maybe if y'all had cell phones, pagers, something …
you know what? Never mind." She wasn't looking to get into a middling argument about telecommunications with the devil.
"Can someone please tell me why the hell Daphne looks like she went ten rounds in a cage match with a flock of bloodthirsty birds?"
"That's because she did," Lucifer said, sounding downright chipper, his mercurial mood giving Sam whiplash.
"Harpies." Daphne picked a long black feather from her hair.
"And you were fighting these harpies because …?"
" Because when she left you, she came to me with a request—"
"It wasn't a request. It was a motion," Daphne said, picking her way barefooted across the blighted grass. "I made a motion to have my contract dismissed on the grounds that it had already technically been fulfilled."
"And as I told you, technically , much like close enough , only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades."
"Wait." Sam's head hurt. "What do you mean it's already been fulfilled?"
"It hasn't," Lucifer said. "Daphne was trying to slither out of our deal through a loophole that doesn't exist."
"Upon the thousandth soul I collect for you, mine will be returned to me. Technically , the very first soul I collected for you was my own. You've already gotten one thousand souls out of me."
Lucifer dropped his head back with a low groan. "We have been over this. Once I relinquish your soul, the number drops to nine hundred and ninety-nine, rendering your argument invalid."
"He didn't like what I had to say, so he banished me to the second ring of the seventh circle of Hell to duke it out with a bunch of harpies."
"I spared you an eternity of fending off those harpies when I made you my second offer. But are you grateful? No! You scoff in the face of this gift I've given you because why?
Because you're heartsick. And for a human ," he said with a hint of disgust in his voice.
"I think sixty years spent duking it out, as you so aptly put it, is more than a fitting punishment for your affront."
Sixty— "You're sending her back ?"
Daphne took a step toward her, hands outstretched. "I can hold my own against some feathered Hell beasts, okay? I will be fine ."
Fine, right. That was why she looked like an extra from The Walking Dead .
"It's not forever," Lucifer said. "Just until you die."
Her heart sank. "What?"
Daphne winced, eyes falling shut. "Sam—"
"Daphne could have pined for you from afar. She could have even spent the remainder of your days with you on the mortal plane, un-aging, of course. But no. Daphne flew too close to the sun. She got greedy. Wanted too much. This will be her penance."
Six minutes of torture would have been too much. Sixty years of it? More, maybe?
Sam's stomach churned viciously. She wouldn't be able to live with herself if she didn't do something, anything to stop it.
Her heart thudded a violent tattoo against the cage of her ribs. "I have one wish left."
"Sam, no —" Daphne scowled, stopped dead in her tracks by some invisible barrier between them.
Her fists pounded against it, and when that didn't work she threw herself at it, shoulder first. A frustrated cry escaped her.
"Damn it, Samantha. Don't do this. I told you. It's not worth it. I'm not worth it."
Daphne had been right about a lot of things, but about this, she couldn't have been more wrong.
A sense of calm settled over her. "I wish that—"
" No. " Daphne's chin quivered. "Sam, stop it. Please , don't—"
With a flick of his fingers, Lucifer made it so that Daphne couldn't speak. Thick black threads pierced her lips, sewing her mouth shut. "As you were saying?"
Sam's stomach heaved, bile burning her esophagus. Her mouth was dry but still she licked her lips as if she could wet them. The sooner she made this wish, the sooner this would all be over. For now, at least.
Here went nothing. "I wish that Daphne was free of her contract so that she can be happy—with or without me."
The irony of it, loving being the act that sealed her fate, that would damn her soul, didn't escape her.
The words left her lips, and it felt for a moment as if the whole city held its breath. Eithrig was the first to move, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. She stared at Lucifer. "Can she—"