Holy shit, my skin was smoking. Literally.

I tore my right hand away from her and flattened my palm before driving it into her nose. The impact with her cartilage sent warm crimson fluid spurting over my hand at the same time a popping noise sounded in her nose.

She let my cuffs go and I released her neck, and then we were falling.

“All right, that’s enough!” Lincoln shouted.

My cuffs were still hot as hell, so I clawed at the edges and ripped them off, letting them drop to the floor.

“Noah!” Tiffany shrieked behind me. “She broke my nose!”

Noah sauntered over slowly. “I see that. Bummer.”

Tiffany glared at him with murder in her eyes. “You better be able to put it back the way it was.”

Shea and Tiffany #2 looked bruised and bloodied, but nothing too bad.

My boyfriend was trying to contain his smirk. “Thank you, Tiffany, for agreeing to this exercise.”

She gave him a sugary smile, dripping with malice. “I hope your girlfriend loses and stays in Demon City where she belongs.” Then she spun on her heel and left the room. But not before shouting Noah’s name to follow.

Once we were alone, I sighed. “Oh man, that felt good!”

Shea limped over to me. “Please tell me you ripped a little chunk of her hair out.”

“Okay, okay, enough evil plotting. That was really great. It gave me a sense of what to expect for Fight Night, but….” Lincoln turned on me. “You held back. She’s your archnemesis, and yet you held back.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?” Did he expect me to produce the dark energy whip and cut her head off? Because that could definitely be arranged.

He tapped my necklace. “Your Light Magic. I was hoping to get a good show. Maybe even see an orb.”

Yeah, my Light Magic. Whoops.

I hadn’t actually used it since I’d returned from Hell with Sera. I technically wasn’t sure it still worked, and Mr. Rincor agreed that we shouldn’t really mess with it too much after what happened. So we’d been working on other things, things Sera could do with light and commands I could give her to help my fighting. Ever since I’d taken the necklace off and gone into that dark place… well, it felt like maybe what Noah had said was true. Like maybe my darkness was scared of getting pushed back again, so it rose to the surface and fought for space or whatever.

“Oh yeah.” I didn’t know what to say. “I didn’t want to make an orb and crash for the next few days.” That was true, as it did knock out my energy. He knew that from last time, so maybe I could just play that up and he’d be none the wiser.

Lincoln looked skeptically at me. “But you still feel it, right? Your light magic?”

What was normal for Lincoln wasn’t normal for me. I was sure he could just close his eyes and ‘feel’ his light magic, but I couldn’t really. I didn’t work like that. I’d been given both light and dark magic, and that was my normal. But he wouldn’t understand that.

“Yep.” I gave him a cheery smile.

“So,” Shea interjected, “I know my ex-boss. He’ll go back on his word the second he can. I think we should have a blood contract written up so we both agree to the terms of your mom’s release. Otherwise, we might just be giving him a million dollars, with him telling us to screw off.”

Lincoln nodded. “I was thinking the same thing, and I’ve spoken to Raph and Mr. Claymore about it. They have agreed to draft one up. Blood contracts are magically binding, so they take a lot of work.”

Damn. I was glad they were on the ball, because if it was just me in charge, I’d probably get myself screwed over.

“Okay,” I told them both. “Just let me know if you need my blood or whatever.”

Lincoln swallowed hard and nodded. When he did that, it was like a nervous tic. The hard swallow, his Adam’s apple bobbing—all signs he was hiding something.

“Out with it! What are you hiding?” I put a hand on my sore hip.

He groaned. “You know me too well. That’s not fair.”

I did the time in this relationship, and now I knew him well enough to catch him in lies. Perfectly fair.

He sighed. “I won’t be needing your blood. I’m the one signing the contract. If it all goes wrong, I want the fallout to be on me, not you girls.”

I clenched my jaw. “No way!”

Lincoln nodded. “Yes way. I looked at the rules last night. Fights end in either death or submission. If you girls submit, you walk away with your life, and what does Grim get for letting you fight? He’ll want some type of collateral. They always do. So I’m the collateral.”

Shea was staring at him with her mouth open, as was I.

“If we lose, we’ll give him Sera.” I hated it the moment the words left my mouth, but Lincoln wasn’t something I could afford to lose, and I had faith I would win.

‘I understand,’ Sera said in a melancholy tone. She was part of me, and she loved Lincoln too.

Lincoln reached out and put a hand on my shoulder. That was his let-down pose; he was about to let me down, and the hand on shoulder was my consolation prize.

“I suggested that, but the archangels agreed that a seraph blade should never be allowed in the hands of the demons.”

I mean, I loved Sera, and I knew she was powerful but… she was just a weapon.

‘Hey,’ she retorted.

‘Sorry.’

Lincoln leaned close to whisper in my ear. “I overheard Michael saying Sera could open the gates of Heaven. She has that much power. Can you imagine if the demons had the key to Heaven?”

My whole body went rigid, and chills broke out on my arms.

“Secrets don’t make friends,” Shea pouted from a few feet away, but I was still spinning his words in my head.

‘Is that true? Can you open the gates of Heaven?’ I asked my infinity weapon.

‘How should I know? I’ve been stuck in a cabinet for over a decade waiting for you, with little memory of before that. But it feels right,’ she told me.

Wow. I didn’t even know what to say to that.

“Okay, well, we’re going to win, so…” We had to win now. There was no way I could let Lincoln work off my mom’s debt.

He leaned down and kissed my forehead. “I have faith in you.”

For some reason, those words made me feel worse. Lincoln was putting his life in my hands, and I wasn’t sure that was such a good idea.

Chapter Sixteen

“I feel sick,” Shea said as she paced Lincoln’s carpet.

“Me too,” I admitted.

Chloe, Luke, Lincoln, and Noah were all sitting around, waiting with us until it was time to leave for Fight Night.

Lincoln stood. “You’ve trained, we’ve gotten Grim to agree to the contract, and your mother is on board with the plan. You got this.”

Hearing his logical words should have made me feel better, but it didn’t. This wasn’t Angel City we were going to, it was Demon City. Home of the rule breakers, risk takers, and stab you in the backers. They weren’t going to play by the rules. We had to be ready for every dirty trick in the book.

Shea pulled a baggie out of her pocket. “Magic is allowed. I made these energy lozenges. As we weaken with each fight, we’ll take one and get an adrenaline surge. It’ll carry us through to the end. Hopefully.”

I nodded. The lozenges would be much needed in the end I was sure.

Chloe cleared her throat. “How many fights are there?”

Chloe’s dad, owner of the Third Eye Moon club and basically vampire overlord, was sending some of his men to the fight to make sure Grim kept his word if we won.

“Seven.” Noah stood. “Lincoln and I won’t make it through all of them, so we’re going to go in shifts. Lincoln will go for the first four fights. I’ll go for the last three. You’re allowed to get healings, so we’ll both be healing you between the fights.”

It was a good plan. I had Sera, and we’d been training like crazy. At this point, Shea and I could join some elite supernatural assassin force if there were one. We were killing machine badasses, but I still felt a lump in my throat.

“Yeah,” I answered absentmindedly.

“And Chloe and Luke will be able to be there the whole time because….” He rubbed the back of his neck.

“Because we’re demon gifted, born of the demons’ loins.” Chloe smirked at Noah.

Lincoln was watching me, assessing, and sizing me up with those ocean blue eyes.

“Can I speak to you privately for a minute?” my boyfriend asked me, nodding toward his room.

My stomach became a ball of nerves, as I started to walk in that direction. Once he’d closed the door behind him, he snapped around to face me.

“Stop that!” he hissed.

My eyes widened. “Stop what?”

His shirt was so tight I could see the bulging muscles just underneath. Lincoln was a warrior through and through. He crossed the space between us, cradling my face.

“Stop doubting yourself. What the hell is there to be nervous about? You’ve got this,” he declared.

My body melted at his touch, my nerves chased away by his words.

“How many other kids there do you think have had round-the-clock training from some of the best military officers in the field?” he asked.

I grinned. “Isn’t Noah supposed to be the cocky one?”

He chuckled. “Just think about it. They’ll be scrappy, dirty, but you and Shea are well trained, precise, and you’re both very, very powerful.”

He was right. Shea and I were born scrappy, but we’d also learned how to be diligent and purposeful in our attacks. We’d also been field trained in the Fallen Army on our weekends out. We were ready.

I’m getting my mom back. Tonight.

Lincoln brushed his thumb along my lower lip. “Do you honestly think I’d let you sign up for something I didn’t believe you could do?”

I shook my head. “No.”

His lips tugged into a radiant smile. “Then you need to believe in yourself. All the big athletes say half the game is played and won in their heads. No more negative thoughts, okay?”

I smirked. “I’m usually the positive one.”

He leaned in and dropped a kiss on my neck. “Well, I’m happy to be of service.”

I moaned. Speaking of service, I could think of something that needed a little servicing to get the tension out. It was so nice now that Lincoln had his own big apartment. No more rocking the trailer.

My eyes snapped open and I pushed him back as a thought struck me. “Oh my God! My mom has nowhere to live! If I bring her back, she’ll need a place until she can get on her feet. Is your trailer still available? Do you think…?” I felt bad for even asking, but I had no other options.

Lincoln looked down at me with a knowing gaze. “I’m surprised it took you this long to think about it.”