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Lulu scooped up another one. “Listen here, hellwoman. Don’t make me tell you again. I’ll pick up a stick next.”
“A stick? What barbarians.” Arzen slowly released her hold and got to her feet. She took a step closer to Lulu, sizing her up. “This one is interesting.”
Catalina’s shoe slapped off the back of Arzen’s head.
She flinched in surprise, her hand reaching for the spot the shoe hit. “Hey!”
Fumbling for the other shoe, Catalina held it up and ran to stand next to Lulu. She held it out with the same menace as someone holding a gun in this world.
Arzen’s hands lifted in mock surrender as her eyes narrowed at me. “Do I kill them?”
“No!” I quickly got to my feet and opened my arms, shielding the women behind me.
Her brow quirked in a way I knew would cost me later as that mischievous smile that set me on edge transformed her face into barely contained darkness. “Asmodeus, just what have you gotten yourself into?”
“Who is this?” Lulu questioned.
“Who are you?” Arzen retorted.
Lulu pulled back her arm, stone in hand.
I quickly grabbed it from her palm as I felt a heat hotter than the depths of our world burning at the back of my neck. “Please, don’t antagonize her.”
Lulu’s lips pressed thin. “And don’t antagonize me! You’re out here playing around in the woods when my grandbaby is missing. Don’t you think just because you’re a demon that is going to save you from me if something happens to my baby! Now stop all this messing around and tell me who in the hell that is and what we are gonna do to get my baby back!”
“You lost a baby? What the hell are you up to?” Arzen smirked. “Should I start keeping an eye on you again, brother?”
“Brother?” Imani, Olivia, Alicia and Sarika said in unison.
Catalina lowered her shoe as she regarded my sister.
“Everyone, this is my older sister, Arzen. Arzen, this is…” the sentence dropped away as I tried to think of the right way to tell her everything.
“This is going to be a story, isn’t it, brother?” Arzen asked.
I nodded.
Her lips pursed before she tilted her head in the direction of Eden’s house. “Alright, well if I’m going to be in this world that I detest so much, I’m going to partake in some of their amenities. Tell me the house up there has spirits.”
“Wine.” Sarika poked her head out from behind me. “Lots of it.”
Arzen eyed her in a way that made me tense. The air heated with her sin — the same one as mine. “Wonderful. Lead the way.”
* * *
My eye twitched as Arzen continued to laugh. Her head was thrown back, her obsidian horns shimmering in the soft light of Eden’s living room as she clutched her belly and laughed. Somehow the misery that befell me at the hands of these mortal women and the binding that followed was amusing to her.
All the women had taken a seat around the room. Olivia, Imani, Sarika and Alicia sat on the sofa together while Catalina sat in the chair and Lulu took a seat on the arm, leaning over her. Their wide eyes all gawked at Arzen and I realized how startling her appearance might be.
“Arzen.”
She continued to laugh, completely ignoring me.
“Arzen.”
A sigh escaped her as she wiped her knuckles under her eyes. “Alright, alright. I can see you’re losing patience with me, but you have to admit this is absolutely comical! You were wed to a mortal woman you’ve never seen before.” She slapped her hand against her knee. “A union performed by these mortal women while drunk on spirits and with no knowledge of your existence. As a joke, no less. Just boredom. A silly mistake has bound you for eternity.”
The urge to roll my eyes was so overpowering I couldn’t fight it off. Maybe Eden was rubbing off on me. “As funny as you find this, may I remind you that my wife has been taken by the witch.”
