She hadn’t reacted to his name, but she should know exactly who he was. It was always possible she was telling the truth, that she didn’t remember anything. He’d been watching her for the last five years, and her behavior had been odd, supporting what she said. By the time he’d finally taken her, she’d already lived under four different names in four different cities. He’d assumed it was an effort to avoid him, but there was the slight chance she really didn’t remember. He could sense very real distress coming from her, and he needed to fight it.
Demons were expert at clouding expectations. And most creatures felt distress when they saw death staring down at them. He had no room for pity or second thoughts.
The landscape had gotten scrubbier as the day wore on. They’d reach their destination well before nightfall—he’d have more than enough time to take care of things. He wondered vaguely if he’d return afterward, to see if there was anything left. The idea should have filled him with grim satisfaction. For some reason it was no longer as soothing.
She—it—was doing too good a job.
“Azazel?” she said, obviously trying to sound normal. “That’s an odd name. Is it Middle Eastern?”
“Biblical,” he said briefly.
“My name is Rachel Fitzpatrick.” At his uncontrolled snort, she changed tacks. “All right, so Fitzpatrick isn’t my real last name. Since you seem to know more about me than I do, why don’t you tell me what my real last name is?”
He said nothing. Richard Thompson was on the radio, and he leaned forward to turn it up, wanting his mournful voice and stinging guitar. The moment he pulled his hand away, she reached out and turned it off.
He glared at her. “If you want to be able to move and talk,” he growled, turning it back on, “you will keep your hands off the radio.”
She sat back, folding her hands in her lap. They were normal hands—pretty, even. Odd—she wore no rings, no polish, none of the adornments women had used since the beginning of time. Yet he could almost imagine those hands on his body.
He shuddered, fighting it. It was so easy to forget, to see her as a desirable female, when he’d done his best to submerge his sexual nature. He glanced at her face. Her curling red hair was the same as always, a snake’s tangle to ensnare men, to make them want to bury their faces in the silken strands. He was immune—the moment he felt even the slightest pull, he was able to slam a lid on it. She wouldn’t reach him as she had so many men. He couldn’t let her.
RT was singing “Can’t Win,” which seemed absurdly prescient. When it was over he turned the radio down again, glancing over at her. “That isn’t your name.”
“Then what is it?” she said, her voice breaking with frustration. “For God’s sake, if I’m going to die, don’t I deserve some answers first? At least to know why I’ve been targeted by a killer? I’ve done my best to be a good person. If I did something bad in the past, something that deserves punishment, then at least I should know what it was.”
“Your crimes are too numerous and horrific to detail.”
Her forehead creased, and he wanted to smooth it. She was working her wiles, and he forced down his reaction. “That’s wrong,” she said. “Now I know you’ve got the wrong person. If I committed horrible crimes, I’d know it. I couldn’t commit … atrocities and then live a normal life. You’ve got the wrong person. You’ve got me confused with someone else.”
“I’m not confused.”
“Then who am I? What did I do?” she cried.
And tired of her whining, he finally answered.
“You are evil, a succubus and a murderer of infants. You are a nightmare, a horror, a monster.” He looked into her dazed face. “You are the Lilith.”
CHAPTER THREE
YOU’RE OUT OF YOUR MIND,” I said. My voice shook, even as I tried to be firm. I felt as if the universe were suddenly made of sand and everything were shifting beneath me. “Not that that’s news—I already figured you had to be demented to want to kill me. So who told you I was Lilith? Your neighbor’s dog?”
He stared at me. “What are you talking about?”
“Son of Sam,” I said briefly. “You know, the serial killer? I imagine you’ve studied his work.”
He shook his head. “I am not a serial killer. Think of me as an executioner.”
“Oh, that’s extremely comforting.” I was clenching my hands tightly together, so tightly they were cramping. I was getting nowhere with my whines—I needed to work on this logically. “Look, assuming by some wild chance I actually were this Lilith, why would you want to kill me? She was Adam’s first wife, wasn’t she? Trust me, I don’t feel anywhere near that old. For that matter, I don’t think I believe in Adam and Eve. It’s a nice story, but that’s about it. And even if I were Lilith, is that any reason to kill me?”
“Do I need to tell you all this?” he said, ignoring my protests. “You were Adam’s first wife and you refused to lie beneath him. You ran away, and when he begged you to return you refused. You chose to consort with devils and take the souls of babies, as bloody and terrible as Kali the Destroyer or any of the bloodthirsty demons that have roamed the universe. You fornicate with beasts, you seduce men in their dreams, and you slaughter newborns.”
I stared at him, stunned, and managed to pull one last ounce of attitude from my weary soul, not quite ready to give up. “Honey,” I drawled, “I don’t seduce anyone, in dreams or out. Nor do I fuck animals or murder children.”
“I said beasts. Other demons, neither animal nor human. And you can argue all you want—I know who and what you are, and you have admitted you do not.”
“In that case, don’t you think you should think twice about killing me?”
‘“No.”
There was something implacable in that short, cool word, and I gave up, staring out into the scrubby, deserted brush. None of this made any sense—he might as well be talking about a stranger.
Except for the part about newborns. Why had I felt the desperate need to get as far away as I could from my newborn goddaughter? It had been nothing but instinct, strong enough to make me throw everything away and vanish.
And what exactly had I thrown away? No memory, no history, no family. Could he possibly be right? I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, closing out everything, doubts and stray thoughts and fear. I closed my eyes and waited for what would come to pass.
It must have been hours later when the car came to a stop. I sat up, looking around me with dazed acceptance. The sun was close to the horizon, and we had pulled up to a deserted building that might once have been some kind of farmhouse. The windows, doors, and most of the roof were long gone, and it looked as if no one had been anywhere near it in decades.
Azazel looked over at me. He must have sensed that I was past fighting him. I unfastened the seat belt I’d been wearing, the seat belt I’d been silly enough to wear, considering I was going to die anyway, and slid out of the front seat to stand in the scorching heat of the late afternoon, waiting for him to come around the car.
“Inside,” he said. I went. I was past romanticized visions like Marie Antoinette on the scaffold. Impossible as it seemed, what he’d said made an eerie amount of sense. I knew there had to be some reasonable explanation, but I couldn’t find it, and I was tired of running. If there was any truth to his crazy allegations, and I was beginning to believe there might be, then … then I wasn’t going to fight it. If I had somehow been involved in the deaths of babies, of innocent newborns, I would rather die than risk doing it again.
The inside of the house was empty, nothing but a single chair bolted to the floor in the center of the main room. There were chains and ropes in a neat pile beside it, and belated panic swept through me. “No,” I said. “You’re not going to burn me alive.”