Marked For Death: A Dark Urban Fantasy Novel by Becca Blake (english novels to improve english .txt) 📕

to see what it was. It disappeared again only a few seconds later, leaving behind a deep red gash across Alexis’s throat.

Her mouth fell open, as though she might scream, but only a sickening gurgle came out. She slumped forward, and her body dropped to the ground.

Before Jacob and I could make it to her, the figure returned. He was shaped like a dark-haired human male, but his demonic presence felt wrong, as though his existence corrupted the very air around him.

“Who are you?” I asked.

As he looked over his shoulder, his glowing green eyes peered out of a pale face. He smiled, but said nothing.

My skin crawled as I realized I’d seen him once before, on the day of Jacob’s evaluation.

I pulled out my gun and repeated the question.

When he didn’t respond, I squeezed the trigger.

He disappeared again, and at first, I thought he’d gone invisible—not that it would save him from an enchanted bullet.

But instead of connecting with the demon, the bullet struck the driver’s side window of Jacob’s SUV and shattered the glass.

“Nice shot,” a smooth voice whispered in my ear.

When I spun around, gun in hand, there was nothing behind me but air.

With rising panic, I realized this wasn’t invisibility at all. This was something else—something I’d never seen or even heard of a demon being able to do.

He was teleporting, without ever opening a portal to shift across planes.

“Where did he go?” I asked Jacob.

“I don’t know,” he said, spinning around.

We stood back-to-back, waiting for the demon to reappear.

He returned to Alexis’s body only a moment later to pick her up and sling her over his shoulder. “Put the guns away. I’m not here for you.”

He flashed another menacing smile, and in the time it took me to blink, he was gone.

This time, he didn’t return.

***

After waiting a short while to be sure the demon really had left us alone, we drove straight to the address Alexis gave us for the church. We didn’t have time to worry about him. There were people who needed our help.

Jacob parked his Toyota further down the street, and we waited for a group of teenagers to pass by before getting out. After retrieving our gear from the trunk and making sure we were ready to go, we approached the old building.

Ivy crept up along the stone walls, and tall weeds grew around it and through cracks in the stained glass windows. The words NO TRESPASSING had been spray painted on rotting wood next to the front doors, which were chained together.

Abandoned or not, churches gave me the creeps. Maybe there was a god out there—I had no idea. All I knew was that I’d seen plenty of demons, but I’d never even heard of an angel. Growing up in a family of demon hunters left me wary of the idea of a deity, especially one that would allow its people to be overrun by hellish creatures from the infernal plane.

Just as I was about to start up the stairs to the front entrance, Jacob took me by the arm and pulled me into the alleyway next to the building.

I opened my mouth to protest, but he cut me off with a rough shake of his head.

“There’s someone coming,” he whispered, pointing around the corner.

He let go of my wrists, and I turned to peek through the ivy-covered railing. The man walking up the stairs wore a black sweatshirt under a leather jacket, with the sweatshirt’s hood pulled up to cover his face. He held a protective arm over the black messenger bag at his hip.

“Do you think that’s Maki?” I asked.

“Only one way to find out,” Jacob said.

The man didn’t let go of his bag as he removed the thick chain that held the doors together and pushed them open.

“We should see if that’s another way in,” I whispered, pointing at a door in the alleyway. “We need to figure out what we’re walking into.”

“Lead the way.”

I tried the rusted handle, but the door wouldn’t budge. “It’s stuck.”

“Let me try.” Jacob leaned his shoulder into the door and pushed. The weak wood gave way with little resistance, though its hinges squeaked in protest.

The dimming light of early evening leaked into the room through the opening, offering just enough light to make out the rough details of a small office. Dated green carpet covered the floor beneath an old desk that was falling apart. Bookcases around the edges of the office looked like they’d been cleared out long ago, judging by the amount of dust coating the empty shelves.

There were two doors on the wall across from the rear entrance. I motioned to Jacob that I was going to check the one on the right first. Beyond the door, pale light from dying bulbs flickered on the wall and down the stairs to the basement.

As soon as I crossed the threshold, the sounds of anguished cries assaulted me. I stumbled backward, clutching at my ears. The horrifying noise stopped as soon as I stepped into the office, disappearing as though it had never existed at all.

“What is it?” Jacob whispered.

“That must be where they’re keeping the victims. There’s an enchantment trapping the sound in.”

I steeled myself before entering again and crept down the stairs, choking back vomit at the stench of human waste.

Nearly a hundred people huddled together in a space that was much too small for them, all of them chained to the walls. Some appeared as though they had been there for weeks, or possibly even months, their clothes tattered and their hair wild. Others were still clean enough that they could have been snatched off the streets that morning.

My gaze fell on a young woman sitting near the base of the staircase, her ankles chained to the wall. She couldn’t have been much older than sixteen, though her sunken, malnourished body made it hard to tell. As her head tilted up, her glazed eyes met mine, and she held out a shaking hand. Her chapped