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

The elevator lurched to a stop after its slow descent and opened up into the Arbiters’ underground base of operations. The space felt like a huge aircraft hanger, wide and open enough that it was sometimes easy to forget that we were underground. Screens with information and public notices about the organization’s current objectives lined the walls, with all the usual types of headlines.

Incubus running a sex ring out of Vegas.

Doppelganger demons allegedly impersonating US senators.

Ongoing and increasing demonic presence in Omaha.

Omaha. That was where I’d been with Ayla.

I shook that thought away as I followed Orion back to the rooms for his unit. He led me back into his private office, which was strangely clean. Most of the time, he had paperwork and file folders scattered all over his desk, but he seemed to have made an attempt at organizing. Instead of being strewn about haphazardly, the papers were stacked into distinct, if sloppy, piles. Orion had never been one to waste time on tidying up, so someone more important than the hunters on his team must have stopped by for a meeting.

The only decoration in the plain room was a framed drawing made with crayons. The picture of Orion and a young, red-haired girl was signed RILEY with a backward E. I smiled at the memory. Not at the memory of creating the drawing for him—I’d probably made hundreds just like it when I was a kid, and I didn’t remember this one in particular. No, what tugged at my lips was the memory of the way I’d felt about him as a child, the way I’d looked up to him.

The way I still looked up to him, all these years later.

My smile didn’t last long. If he cared about me enough to hang my stupid childhood drawing in his office, he could at least give me some answers to the questions that had been eating away at me since the evaluation incident a week ago.

“What ended up happening with the rest of the evaluations? Were there more hellhounds, or was that the only one? Why—”

Orion closed the door behind us and leaned against it. “It was bad.”

When he didn’t elaborate, I pressed again. “So there were more. Did people die?”

He nodded.

“How many?”

“Too many. Their parents are all pretty unhappy with the Council right now.”

“Why in the infernal hells would the Council use such a dangerous trial? What was the point of it? Most experienced veterans couldn’t even take on a hellhound alone. Did they want these guys to die?”

“I don’t know. The Council didn’t exactly open the topic for discussion.”

“I thought they trusted you with things like this.” I eyed him warily, looking for any hints that he was hiding something.

“Not this time. Believe me—I tried. It seems like it was an experiment that went poorly, from what I can tell.”

I scoffed. “Marcus Thorne decided to experiment with the life of his own son?”

“I can’t explain why Marcus does anything. But speaking of his son,” Orion said, changing the subject abruptly, “he should get here soon. You two are going to head out today after we go over your assignment.”

“He’s an idiot.”

Orion shrugged. “He reported here yesterday for a chat. Seemed nice enough to me.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t do him the disservice of saving his life. If you have the opportunity to do so in the future, I’d suggest doing literally anything else instead.”

“Play nice, Riley. You’re lucky you got out of that with nothing but a warning and a new partner.”

I crossed my arms and met him with a level stare. Even if he was right, the condescending tone when he used my full name like that, like I was still a kid, pissed me off.

“All I’m saying is, it’s your own fault you’re stuck with him. I know you’re upset about Ayla, and I don’t blame you for that. But you can’t do things like that in front of the Council, and especially not in front of Marcus.” Orion sipped at his coffee, then set it down on his desk. He pointed at the sword I carried. “I see your dad gave you your birthday present early.”

“He said it was because he thought he’d be gone awhile this time, but I think he was just trying to cheer me up.”

“That does sound like Owen,” Orion said.

“It hasn’t even been enchanted yet, so I can’t take it with me today, anyway.”

“Leave it with me. I can drop it off at the alchemy lab for you while you’re gone.”

“Thanks.” I set the sword on his desk, careful to avoid the stacks of paperwork. “So, where am I headed?”

Orion checked his watch. “Jacob is probably out in the briefing room now, and we shouldn’t keep him waiting. Let’s head out there so I don’t have to repeat myself.”

Let him wait.

Orion had already scolded me for a snide remark, so I knew better than to say it aloud. Still, I probably needed to make more of an effort to not think nasty things about him. Whether we liked it or not, Jacob Thorne and I were partners now, and our lives would depend on our ability to work together.

We found Jacob waiting in the conference room with his feet kicked up on the table. He was decked out in gear that looked like it must have cost at least three times as much as mine. Perks of being the son of a Council member, I supposed.

“Hey, partner!” I offered Jacob a fake smile I hoped came across as friendly as I took the seat across from him.

All I got in return was a glare.

Orion tossed a manila file folder on the table between us.

I leaned forward and started digging through the folder’s contents. “What have we got, Commander?”

“We’ve been monitoring an unusual amount of demonic activity in Omaha, Nebraska. Particularly notable because the city is only a couple hours away from us. It’s mostly been small things—petty crimes, a few violent ones here and there—but it’s