Rourke shot awake instantly. “Jessica, Jessica,” he cried, his hands grabbing on to my arms, sweet energy rushing through me. “You have to get out of here right now. You don’t know she’s capable of now—”
“Shh.” I lowered my face to his, inhaling his rich scent. “I’m not leaving until you’re fully healed, so you can forget that right now.” His smell brought all the hairs on my body to a delicious peak. His body began to thrum with a current of power that hadn’t been there a moment before. Whatever Selene had spelled him with had inhibited most of his power, but it was gleefully returning. “But first I need to take care of Selene.” Before I could stand and go to Naomi, Rourke grabbed on to my face, pulling me down quickly, his lips hitting mine, hot and frantic. I didn’t have time to register it until his tongue entered my mouth.
Emotion raced through me, the taste of him overpowering anything else in the room. I moaned into his lips, gripping his shoulders with both hands, pulling myself closer to him. He snarled into my mouth. Our bond rang through me, his body and soul pouring into mine. My arms and legs began to shake.
He broke away from me slowly and I stifled a cry. “Jessica,” he said roughly. “Please tell me this is not a dream.” His beautiful clear green eyes blazed as he ran his hands along my arms and face.
“It’s me,” I said. “I’m here and Selene is down, but only for a moment. I have to finish this before we can finally go home.”
“No.” He shook his head emphatically. “Listen to me: you have to ignore her and get out. Go now. There’s no reasoning with her any longer.” There was a time you could reason with her? “She’s sold her soul. There’s no stopping her. Nothing we can do can defeat her. You need to leave here as quickly as possible and I’ll be right behind you.” He angled his body upward, a grimace of pain on his face.
“We have to try.” I rested my hands on his shoulders and tried to calm him. “I’m not leaving here unless I try. I refuse to look over my shoulder for her once we leave here. She will hound us to the death. She will never give up.” I pressed him gently back to the ground, hovering over him with concern. “Naomi just hit her with another spell. If I can’t kill her, we can at the very least incapacitate her for a very long time. I’m thinking fire might work if we disassemble her first.”
“It won’t work,” he said urgently, his face intent, his hands closing tightly over my forearms. “Jessica, please, you have to listen to me.” When he said my name it made my insides tingle. I pushed it out of my mind. I needed to stay focused. “She can’t be killed or even be incapacitated for long. I’ve tried. Once I got here, I broke her spells and managed to hold her down until the demons came. They did something to her, and everything changed. She must’ve struck a deal, because her essence morphed. Once that happened, she was able to secure me easily. I want you to get out before she wakes. I will follow you as soon as I can.”
“There’s no way I’m leaving you,” I said. “If she’s as strong as you’re saying, she’ll be after us as soon as she heals. It won’t matter where we run.” I glanced at Selene’s body, still inert. “If Tally’s spell can knock her out, she’s clearly not invincible. I’m betting we can do some damage.”
Naomi murmured her agreement. “Oui. The only thing that can bring a demon down is a powerful witch. The spells of blood and earth are natural agents against each other. If this is true, what he is saying, and Selene’s blood is now tainted with demon, this is likely the only reason she has been out this long. We’ve been lucky and nothing else.”
“And that was the last bloody spell we had.” Danny nodded toward the dart still lodged in her stomach. “If she’s full of demon essence, once she slakes this bit off, it will be impossible to secure her for long.”
I stood. “Then we take her apart now. There has to be a way.” I walked over to Selene, laser focused. She would not win. “The demons want her soul as soon as they can get it, so there has to be a way for her to die on this plane or they never would’ve struck a bargain—as in, if she can’t revive herself within minutes here they are free to pick her up.” I didn’t know much about demons, but I did know they collected on their debts immediately. A debt like Selene’s had to be something to celebrate in the Underworld. It’s not every day you landed a goddess. I glanced around to the group, my face hard. “Getting her a ticket to the Underworld will have to suffice. How long do you think she’ll be bound there?” I asked Naomi.
“I think nothing short of a millennium,” Naomi replied. “Selling a part of your soul is a steep payment.”
“That sounds good to me,” Tyler said as he grabbed a pickax off the wall. Who had a pickax handy, dangling on a wall?