Page 5 of Generally Hospitable (Good To The Last Demon #7)

“Blood Eagle texted me that he’d had a wonderful time and that his mom loved me! Wanted to invite me to his basement apartment at his mom’s house for coffee and a cheese Danish the next time. If, and I mean, IF I ever agree to a second date, you’d have my full permission to shoot me in the head.”

Chub Chub Wang’s mouth hung open. He had nothing to say.

“I still have no magic,” Pandora whispered, ventriloquist style. “But that was horrifyingly brilliant. Can you keep going?”

“Does the Pope have a pointy hat?” I whispered back.

“I don’t know,” she replied dryly. “I’m not into that kind of stuff.”

I looked down and grinned. Pandora might be nuts, but she made me laugh. “Yes, I can go all day.”

“Then you’re one up on that dumb ass,” she quipped. “He could barely go ten seconds.”

I stifled a giggle.

“ENOUGH!” Decatalain bellowed, finding his voice.

The walls rattled and the floor shook. “Enough of this nonsense. I was correct. You are a half-breed imbecile. You’re not a Goddess.

A half-human has no rights to the throne.

And you,” he pointed at Pandora. “You are an abomination. You killed a Goddess.”

Pot. Kettle. Black. Chub Chub Wang was the abomination, not Pandora.

And if we wanted to get technical, he was about to kill two Goddesses.

Yes, Pandora had been evil—seriously evil, but the key word in that sentence was had —had been evil.

She’d apologized to Lilith. She’d been forgiven.

She was on the path to hope. My frenemy—kind of my friend at this point, though I wouldn’t admit it out loud—was on the road to redemption.

It would be long and fraught with a whole lot of pushback by those she’d wronged in the past, but she was moving forward.

Chub Chub Wang’s permanent stagnation would only cause more death and destruction.

We just needed to figure out how to live long enough to stop him.

“We shall negotiate,” Pandora ground out with an imperious sneer on her lovely face.

That stopped Chub Chub Wang in his tracks. He liked the sound of that. The slow grin that appeared on his face was terrifying. I hoped that Pandora wasn’t serious. She had to be buying more time.

Right?

“As you wish,” he roared with a diabolical laugh.

White pleather recliners, that had clearly been yanked out of the seventies, appeared behind us. With a wave of his hand, Decatalain unceremoniously seated us. Granted our feet were still suck to the floor.

“So,” the vile man said, with his hands clasped together and his smarmy smile wide. “Shall I begin, or shall you?”

“I shall,” Pandora snapped. “Give me a moment to gather my thoughts.”

“Take your time,” he insisted as he turned his back on us and chuckled. He busied himself checking out the strength of the ling chi pole.

Pandora looked me straight in the eye. “I pledge my loyalty to you, Bitch Goddess Cecily,” she said softly.

A feather could have knocked me over. Was she playing me?

What was the endgame? A sick feeling settled in the pit of my stomach.

I didn’t want to believe it, but my mind raced so fast I couldn’t find another reason.

Was Pandora going to sacrifice me to save herself?

The old Pandora would have done that. It broke my heart to think that the new and slightly improved Pandora might do it too.

“Close your mouth,” she hissed. “You’ll catch flies.”

“Why? Why pledge your loyalty to me?” I choked out. “Explain yourself and do it fast.”

She inhaled deeply, then did as I asked.

“Some of my power is coming back. The only way you’ll make it out of here is if I throw you under the bus and leave with him.

I’ll kill him, and chances are good, it will probably kill me in the process.

It will be painful and violent. But it’ll be worth it.

He’ll rue the day he fucked with me—not literally the day we fucked, but…

You know what I mean. You have my word. And to answer your question directly, by declaring my loyalty to you, I will be able to sense that you’re safe. ”

“Dude,” I snapped, keeping my voice soft. “Are you as stupid as he is? His power is out of control. At best, you’ve got half a tank. You’re going to end up dead, and I’ll have to deal with the idiot on my own. That doesn’t work.”

“I am stronger than you are giving me credit for,” she said. “And it would be my honor to die so you can live.”

The sincerity in her tone and expression was undeniable. It was humbling, and she was nuts. There was no way she was taking out this Demon twat by herself, death or no death.

“I appreciate the sacrificial offer. I really do. But you forgot one very important point,” I said, glancing over at Decatalain to make sure he wasn’t listening.

“There needs to be two Goddesses of the Darkness. Not one. The end will come if we destroy the balance. I don’t accept your plan. It’s bullshit.”

“Not,” she said calmly. Pandora reached over the nasty pleather white arm of my chair and touched my stomach.

“You carry the next Goddess of the Darkness in your body. She will arrive in eight months and ten days. If I die—which may or may not happen—the balance still exists since the child is already alive.”

The breath left my lungs in an anguished gasp. Clapping my hand over hers, I stared at her in shock. “No.”

“Yes,” she said. “There’s no way back for me after what I’ve done.

You know it, and I know it. The only, and I stress the word only , way back for me is to sacrifice myself for the Darkness.

My reputation will always be tainted, but in the end, it’s the way I can go out with honor.

You owe it to me to let me do this. It’s the only way. ”

Finding my voice was difficult. The information that had just dropped in my lap was a lot.

It was almost too much to take in. I couldn’t feel a child inside of me.

Part of me didn’t believe Pandora. There was still a chance I was being played…

but the larger part of me knew she’d just stated the truth.

It was beautiful, messy and horrible all at once.

I’d arrived in this room ready to fight for the lives of two people—Pandora and me. Now it was three.

“I pledge my loyalty to you, Goddess Pandora,” I said.

She looked confused. “Why would you do that?” she hissed, not happy.

“Because,” I replied cryptically. “It will help.”

Unknowingly, or possibly knowingly, Pandora had just set off something that would make our complicated lives a tiny bit easier.

It wasn’t a solution to our deadly situation, but it was something.

At this point, something was better than nothing.

Being able to know that she was still alive was only part of the bonus.

“Very little can help now,” she said flatly. “Just don’t fuck up what I’m about to do.”

I nodded slowly. She warily nodded back.

I wasn’t going to fuck up her plan. I was going full-on improv, and I was going to ‘Yes, and’ Pandora until we completed this final act and destroyed Decatalain in such a thoroughly complete climax that there would be no way he would resurrect for a sequel.

It was the only way I could accomplish my new goal—get the three Goddesses of the Darkness out of the castle alive and save the entire world.

It was a lofty goal. There was no room for error, but I was up for it. I didn’t have a choice.

I dropped Pink and sided with the Bee Gees again. Staying Alive was the only way to go.