Pure & Sinful (Pure Souls) - By Killian McRae Page 0,2

brain, shot down her spine, and landed squarely in her hoo-haw.

And damn, he knew how to tie up a woman proper, achieving just the right balance of tension and slack.

Marc leaned in and whispered into her ear. “Watch yourself. Remember, he’s sampled your flesh, he knows your thoughts.”

His proximity and concern both disturbed and surprised her, leaving her more confused than a Republican at a Pride Parade. When he added a reassuring squeeze of her elbow, embarrassment engulfed her at the way her checks flushed. Usually, the good priest was a conceited ass. Things must look really bad from his vantage point if he was ministering to her.

“He’s sampled a lot more than just my flesh.”

Riona felt the familiar frustration tug at her again. How was she supposed to know that lying with a demon gave him the ability to read a human’s mind? No wonder he had been such a good lay, though. He could anticipate her every desire the moment she felt it.

“You can block him, you have the power,” Dee reminded her. “You just have to decide to do it. Resist your urges. Use your strength as the Keystone.”

She nodded and closed her eyes again, momentarily blocking out the hum of the chattering demon crowd, the clinking of glasses at the bar, and clanking of bottles on the tables. Pulling her self-control together, she recalled the facts of the matter.

Fact: she was a Pure Soul, one of the trinity entrusted by the Council of Archangels to ferret out and fight the minions working on Lucifer’s behalf to corrupt men’s souls and spread evil and hate. She’d also heard that they moonlighted at the DMV. Demons represented the enemy: the souls of mortal men damned to Hell for their sins, given new bodies to house those corrupt souls while they walked the earth. A demon’s physical body could only be destroyed by magic, which released his soul and returned it to Hell. Riona as the Keystone could wield this power to its full extent, assisted by Marc and Dee. Both her partners, her pillars, had spent years learning the ways of witchcraft through perilous training and dedicated study. Riona had been given a Red Bull and sent to read the Cliffs Notes version.

Yeah, no big whoop.

She felt her mind lighten, as though someone had been gently massaging her temples and now withdrew. Jerry was no longer in her head. Which, given the way he growled, showing each of his pearly whites, really must have ticked him off.

She leaned to the side, angling her hip and crossing her arms over her chest. “If you know why I’m here, why all the chitchat, Jer-Bear? Lie down like a nice little scumbag and go peacefully.”

“So desperate to get me horizontal, Riona? That can easily be arranged, if you ask nicely.”

Without warning, a pig-headed behemoth barreled in their direction at full force. Jerry, easily outranking all the other riffraff in the joint, made no movement to recall the banger demon that jumped into the fray without order. Instead, he observed, with what looked like demented pride, as Riona reached out her hand and invoked a lower-tiered vanquishing charm.

“Fornox tierna!”

With a huff and a puff, she blew his house down, making a nice little pile of demon dust as the banger disintegrated. The others witnessing the scene felt their grog-filled bellies turn in fear, but Jerry only smiled wryly.

“Impressive,” he commented, adding a round of mock clapping. “See? I was right about you. Chuck, there,” he pointed to the heap of purple-black Rorschach on the floor, “thought you were just another Willow Wannabe. But me? I saw you for what you really are.”

“Smokin’ hot and way too good for you?” Riona returned. “Thanks, but I didn’t need you to tell me that.”

In a dazzling blur of speed, Riona found herself pinned to the wall, a good twelve feet away, at the back of the bar, leaving a sea of demonkind between her pillars and she.

Marc and Dee gawked as they witnessed their favorite witch, scared broomless, her demon ex-lover choking the life from her, her feet dangling dangerously above the floor. Demon magic, properly wielded, could destroy a witch of Riona’s caliber, but the old-fashioned, mortal methods still worked just as well.

Luckily, that bus stopped on both sides of the street, and Riona had not forgotten how sensitive Jerry’s giblets were. She swung her boot point blank into his demonic assets, sending him on an impromptu one-on-one with the floor. A sound akin