That was disturbing.

“But when your body dies,” he continued, lowering his head in warning, “you’re fair game.”

“The boy?” I asked.

He smiled. “Rey’aziel.”

“Reyes is hunting you?”

“You didn’t know?”

I shook my head. It seemed the only movement I could manage. “No.”

“Did you think he just happened upon my soldiers at that ridiculous contest?”

“You mean the fights?” I asked, frowning. “I hadn’t given it that much thought.”

“He has been hunting us down like dogs.”

“Not like dogs.” I shook my head once more. “You don’t deserve the high praise of such a comparison.”

A lecherous grin stole across his face. “There she is. The girl with no fear. It is no wonder he is obsessed. He always was such a clever boy.”

Surely he was talking about someone else. Reyes was no more obsessed with me than he was with dryer lint. He just needed me alive for this war that supposedly hovered on the horizon. He’d told me so on several occasions. “So let me get this straight,” I said, trying to wrap my head around the goings-on of the underworld. “He stops hunting you, and you stop attacking him.”

“We have never attacked him, dear girl. We have no need of him just yet.”

“I would beg to differ. I saw what your demons did to him in that basement.”

“Touché, but that was only to get to you. We can get to him anytime. Those tattoos are there for a reason, love. You, on the other hand, are protected. A treasure not so easily gained. But you do have part of it correct. If he stops hunting us, he’ll live much longer in his physical form, fragile as it is. No more stab wounds. No more gashes of which to tend.”

I jerked to attention. “Gashes?” The bandages he had at the fights.

“You have no idea what the boy has been up to, do you? He’s grown up. Become quite the warrior, if his ability to down my soldiers while hardly breaking a sweat is any indication. But you care for him.” He turned a curious gaze on me. “Perhaps I could make a deal with you instead.”

“What?” I asked, realizing I was actually negotiating with the devil. Or, at the very least, one of his minions.

He unfolded a hand and held it out to me, palm up. “Come with me now. Your death will be quick, and you will rule by my master’s side.”

“Your master? Meaning Satan.”

“That is one colloquialism, yes.”

“Why on all that is holy would I do something like that?”

“Because you have no idea what you’re capable of. What you can do defies everything you have ever known. But right now, you are just a silly girl running about in an ape suit. You’ll be so much more powerful when you shed it. You will shine like the brightest star and you will have just as much power as one.”

Okay, so this guy seemed to know what he was talking about. “Tell me what I’m capable of.”

He leaned in, his eyes black caverns behind the light brown of the human’s he inhabited. “Anything you can imagine.”

Again? Really? “Why do you want me so bad? There have been other reapers.”

“But none like you, my dear. We want you, but we need both of you to gain the advantage. You are so close to doing our jobs for us anyway, we’d just like to be around when the gate is actually opened.” When I questioned him with my eyes, he asked, “What do you think happens when the key of darkness is inserted into the locket of light?”

He raked a salacious gaze from the top of my head to the tips of my booted toes. I felt violated. And repulsed.

“It’s like opening a door directly from hell and straight into the heart of heaven. How many soldiers do you think can slip through before that door is closed? We just have to be at the ready when it happens.”

He couldn’t possibly be saying what I thought. “So, you mean if Reyes and I get together?”

“Yes, well, there’s a bit more to it than that, but that’s the basic idea. Why do you think the master made the son? It wasn’t because he longed for a family, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

I was starting to feel sick. The acrid smell of him made me dizzy. That combined with the constant surge of fear had me almost doubled over with nausea. But I didn’t dare take my eyes off him.

“I’m going to have to turn down your kind offer,” I said, praying he’d leave so I could run to the bathroom.

“Pity. But I do understand. The human mind is so limited, it’s hard to see past the rotting flesh of humanity to bigger and better things.” He seemed so civilized, so educated.

“Is the accent yours?” I asked.

“No, it belongs to the ape I’m wearing. But I like it. I think it suits me.” He rose and adjusted his tie almost joyously. Then he walked around, bent over, and whispered in my ear, the acrid smell of him overpowering. “Tell Rey’aziel hello from Hedeshi.” He straightened and pointed to the coupon book on my table. The one I’d just won. “That was my gift to you, by the way. A token of my admiration.”

When he turned to walk away, a handful of college kids a couple tables away started clapping, their faces alight with appreciation. He stopped and offered them a regal grin. They were applauding as though we’d just given them a theatrical production. But that’s exactly how it would look from their end. Anyone watching would think we were actors, probably rehearsing for a performance at the university. How could the conversation we’d just had been real?