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Chapter One

One chance.

That was all he had, and Caleb Lockwood knew he needed to seize it…or be stuck in Hell forever.

As soon as he saw the red-haired woman stab her slender blade into Belial’s black heart, there was only a second when Caleb could act.

When he and the other demon-kind had begun to swim their way up from Hell, he’d caught a glimpse of two other red-haired women lying dead on the floor of the huge candlelit room he’d seen just beyond the huge gates the demon lord had summoned, women he guessed must have given their lives to provide the enormous power necessary to unlock a portal to the underworld. Once fully open, those gates would have allowed the denizens of the netherworld to escape their prison permanently and begin new lives on Earth.

Until then, though, they were vulnerable.

No one nearby in the cavernous chamber — not the redhead with the sword, not the group of people huddled on the floor a few yards past her, people he couldn’t see clearly because of the dimness of the room, not Belial himself — had been paying any particular attention to the pair of dead bodies…or to Caleb.

Why would they? He and his kind were considered the lowest of the low in the underworld’s hierarchy, those who’d had the misfortune to have their demon blood mixed with that of humans.

And that meant he didn’t owe the demons swarming in the Stygian blackness behind him a damn thing. They could stay in Hell and rot.

Just as the hellgate fell to nothing around him as Belial drew his last, unlamented breath, Caleb made the leap into the body of the nearest woman. Maybe he was only a quarter-demon, but he could still possess a human being. Not for days or months or even years the way some of Hell’s citizens could if they were sufficiently motivated, but he didn’t need nearly that long.

Just an hour or so.

It was horribly confining in there, though, giving him the sensation of being trapped in a room with the walls closing in from all sides. He’d never possessed a dead person before, and the feeling of the woman’s body shutting down cell by cell made him feel as if he couldn’t quite breathe.

Don’t panic, he told himself. You’ll be out of here soon enough.

Which he was. Because he couldn’t open the dead woman’s eyes, he was unable to see what exactly had happened in the aftermath of the confrontation with Belial. A confusion of voices, some that were brisk and official, obviously police and paramedics and anyone else who’d appeared to clean up a scene that even Caleb had to admit must have been a colossal mess.

He was placed on a gurney — well, the woman’s body was, anyway — and wheeled out to an ambulance, then roughly loaded inside. It wasn’t as if they had to worry about jarring their patient, not when she was already dead.

No sirens, either, no frenzied rush to the hospital to try to save her. She’d been dead for at least ten or fifteen minutes when Caleb leaped into her body, far past any need for heroic efforts.

But then he got what he wanted, which was to have her moved off the gurney and into a locker at the morgue so they could perform an autopsy at their leisure.

No sound that anyone else was working right then, either. He really hadn’t expected anyone to be, not when he could tell it was the middle of the night — or rather, the very early morning, maybe around three or four.

Time to get out of there.

He let his consciousness flow away from the woman’s body and take form outside the storage locker, then paused to gulp in some air. Before now, he’d never had any reason to possess someone, much preferring to use his demonic shapeshifting abilities to further his goals — well, to be fair, those had been his father’s goals, and he’d only been an unwilling pawn in his schemes — and he thought he’d do whatever he could to avoid possessing a person in the future.

It had been way too cramped in there.

No clothes except the tattered pants he’d worn in Hell, and it was goddamn freezing in here. That was all right, though.

He knew exactly where he needed to go.

The room hadn’t changed a bit since he’d lived here, which would be going on ten years now. Caleb wished that he hadn’t been able to detect the passage of time while he was in Hell, but part of the torture was knowing exactly how many years and months and days…and minutes and seconds…he’d been trapped there.

Two years, two weeks, and one day, plus a couple of hours.

But who was counting?

Anyway, he’d moved out of the house where he’d grown up as soon as he turned twenty and had bought a place of his own, but his mother didn’t seem to have touched a single thing in his former bedroom. Same dark blue-gray paint on the walls, same modern metal and glass furniture. God, she’d hated it when he redecorated the room on his eighteenth birthday, even though his parents had told him he could do whatever he liked with the space.

She probably hadn’t believed that he would choose something so jarringly at odds with the Ethan Allen aesthetic of the rest of the house…which was exactly why Caleb had picked out the decor in the first place. Brooke Lockwood never had wanted to acknowledge that the world might not always go her way.

How had she fared these past two years, with both her husband and her only son presumed dead?

Most likely, she’d sailed on serenely as she always had. She’d never been the type to lean toward introspection.

But because she hadn’t touched anything, Caleb figured the clothes he’d left behind would still be here as well. He was under no illusions that the loft where he’d been living ever since he moved out had been just as untouched, mainly because Brooke had never approved of the space and thought he should have bought a nice house the way the other quarter-demons of his generation had done.

Not that she’d known they had demon blood running through their veins. No, those guys were only his friends, part of the popular, well-off group that had dominated their high school and then DePauw, the liberal arts college they’d all attended, mostly because it hadn’t been considered safe for them to leave Greencastle to get their degrees.

Or maybe that was what Caleb and his friends had been told because it was easier for them to stay where the older generation could keep an eye on them.

After all, those diplomas had just been for show. They’d all known they would get work from either their half-demon fathers or their fathers’ half-demon buddies, and wouldn’t ever have to worry about making ends meet.

Expression darkening, Caleb went to the dresser and got out some jeans and underwear, a T-shirt, and a pullover hoodie. He’d left these clothes behind when he moved into his loft because they’d been a little too small, but after being trapped in Hell for two years, he’d lost enough weight that they fit him just fine.

He’d need to do something to get that muscle back on his body. Luckily, the demonic blood in his veins would allow him to build it up without too much work.

The clock on the bedside table told him it was a little past five in the morning. While he briefly considered going to wake up his mother now, he knew she wouldn’t appreciate being roused before her usual time for getting out of bed, which had always been eight-thirty for as long as he could remember. When he was younger, they’d had a live-in nanny who drove him to school and made sure he had breakfast, and once he was old enough, his parents both told him he was responsible for getting to school on time.

Nurturing they were not.

Rather than put on one of the old pairs of sneakers he found in the closet, he went over to the bed and climbed on top, even though he didn’t bother to pull up the covers. No, he’d just wait here and rest his eyes for a bit, and soon enough, it would be eight-thirty, and he could go downstairs and reveal that he wasn’t quite as dead as everyone had thought.

He must have been more tired than he wanted to admit, because when Caleb opened his eyes again, it was now past nine o’clock, much later than he’d wanted to sleep.

Well, Hell could definitely suck the strength right out of you.

Those few hours of sleep had helped, though. He already felt stronger and more awake.

And was that the scent of coffee seeping under the closed bedroom door?

No, he was probably imagining it. Not because he didn’t remember that his mother always made coffee as soon as she came downstairs, but just because the house was too big for any smells like that to find their way up to his room on the second floor.

Sunlight slipped past the blinds, and after he got out of bed and tied on his tennis shoes, he went to the window so he could look outside. The sky was half covered in clouds, and all the trees were now bare, the lawn yellow from frost, but Caleb thought the bleak, late autumn landscape was still the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen.

He took a quick detour into the bathroom to splash some water on his face and run damp fingers through his hair. Even though he did his best not to look in the mirror, he couldn’t quite avoid catching a glimpse of his face anyway — cheekbones sharper than he remembered, dark eyes shadowed despite those hours of sleep he’d just enjoyed, sandy blond hair a mess.

Hell could definitely do a number on a person.

Scowling a little, he left the bathroom and headed downstairs to the kitchen. Because his father and the rest of that generation had known they might disappear at any time if Belial decided to call them all back to Hell, they’d cooked up several different cover stories to explain such a mass vanishing. The problem was, Caleb didn’t know which one Daniel might have left in place with his attorney to cover such a contingency, so he’d have to play this by ear. Even so, he had a feeling there wasn’t much he could say to adequately explain where he’d been for the past two years — or where his father had disappeared to.

Unlike his son, Daniel Lockwood appeared to be stuck in Hell permanently.

Good riddance.

Down here, Caleb could definitely smell coffee, although there were no other scents of food being prepared, no eggs or bacon or pancakes or even toast. Brooke Lockwood ate half a grapefruit every damn morning no matter what, and rarely if ever allowed a complex carb or a piece of red meat to pass her lips.

Too bad, because he was damn hungry.

When he entered the kitchen, he saw that she stood with her back to him as she sipped from a china coffee cup and stared out into their backyard, where the pool was covered for the winter and everything looked bare and dead.

No big mugs for her, that was for sure. He recalled the time when he was in third grade and still trying to pretend his family was normal, and he’d bought her a pretty coffee mug painted with roses.

Maybe she’d said thank you. But that mug had disappeared into the cupboard, never to be used a single time.

“Hi, Mom,” he said.

Brooke Lockwood turned and stared at him. Some women might have dropped the cup they held out of pure shock, but she was far too disciplined for that.

Very slowly, she set the cup down on the table in the nook.

“You’ve come back.”

Against all odds. However, as much as Caleb might have liked to up-end her carefully ordered world, he knew this wasn’t the time for the truth. He’d come here to get what he needed and then disappear again.

“Sort of,” he allowed. “I need your help, Mom.”

Her mouth thinned. It looked fuller than he remembered, but, considering how much time — and money — she’d spent at medi-spas and had done whatever she could to hold back the march of time, he supposed it wasn’t so strange that she might have gotten some more fillers and other work over the past two years.

Still not overdone, though. Brooke Lockwood would never be one of those women with horribly exaggerated lips and brows raised almost to her hairline. No, she looked like herself, albeit a self a good ten or fifteen years younger than her current fifty-five.

“I thought you were dead,” she said, ignoring his previous comment. “Where’s your father?”

Rotting in Hell where he should be passed through Caleb’s mind, although he knew better than to utter those words to his mother. She needed to continue to live in safe ignorance; Daniel Lockwood had never told her the truth about himself or his compatriots, and Caleb saw no reason to tell her the real story now.

Honestly, he didn’t think she deserved it.

“Gone,” he said briefly. The less he said, the better, since she hadn’t revealed what made-up tale had been in play to explain his disappearance. “And he won’t be coming back. I assume he left everything in order, though.”

Because although the Greencastle demons had been living the high life here on Earth, they’d all known that their tenure in the mortal realm might come to an abrupt end at any time, and therefore they’d been careful to have iron-clad wills set up to ensure that those they left behind would have access to the wealth their families had accumulated over the last several generations. His father had been first among equals, president of the local bank and a millionaire many times over.

Caleb knew his mother wouldn’t have been hurting financially these past two years. Whether she’d grieved over the apparent loss of her husband and son was an entirely different matter.

If she had, she showed no sign of it now. Then again, he didn’t know why he should have expected anything else from her.

“Of course he made sure everything was taken care of,” she said, and her eyes — the same dark brown as his own — narrowed for a moment. “But you still haven’t told me where you’ve been. How is it that you survived the sinking of the boat but stayed away for two years?”

Ah, so that was the story his father had used. A group expedition to go fishing in the Gulf of Mexico, a tragic shipwreck with all hands lost. Very neat, very clean…and no pesky dead bodies to worry about.

“It’s better if I don’t talk about that,” he replied, mostly because he hadn’t completely figured out his personal cover story.

For a moment, Brooke only looked at him. Then she said, “You need money, is that it?”

“I do,” he replied simply. “I can’t stay here. It isn’t safe.”

Whether that was strictly true, he couldn’t say for sure. However, he had to believe that the authorities would have investigated the supposed shipwreck and the disappearance of all the other half- and quarter-demons who’d made Greencastle their home base. Reappearing after so much time had elapsed would only stir up the sort of questions he really didn’t want to answer.

For a moment, Brooke was silent. Then she reached for her cup of coffee and took a sip.

She hadn’t offered him any, which didn’t surprise Caleb too much. Because she wouldn’t have been expecting to entertain guests this morning, she would have prepared just enough for herself and no one else.

He made himself wait, knowing this was just another of the endless games she’d played throughout his entire life. Yes, he supposed he could have used his demonic powers to lay hands on the safe he knew was hidden in his parents’ bedroom closet and unlock it himself, and yet he still preferred to ask for the money rather than take it without permission.

It would be nice to see if his mother could manage one selfless act.

If not, then he’d empty the safe and disappear before she even had a chance to figure out what had happened.

“How much?” she asked at length.

Caleb wouldn’t allow himself to relax, although he did permit himself an inner sigh of relief. “How much do you have on hand?”

Her mouth compressed again. “Around fifty thousand, give or take. If you want any more than that, then we’ll have to wait until the bank opens.”

Which was the last thing he wanted to do. Although he knew he could stay hidden at the house while she went to the bank and made the withdrawal, he couldn’t help thinking that the sooner he was away from here, the better.

“Fifty grand is fine,” he said. “That’ll be enough to get me started.”

Her dark eyes searched his face. “Get you started where?”

It was a topic he’d already begun to ponder, knowing that returning to Greencastle permanently wasn’t an option. Too many explanations he’d have to make…too many questions he wouldn’t want to answer. He’d really enjoyed living in L.A., but going back to Southern California also wasn’t feasible, not when he knew the Project Demon Hunters gang still lived there and might be able to sniff him out. Maybe some might say all was well that ended well, considering the way they’d joined forces and sent the entire Greencastle contingent to Hell along with their master Belial, and yet Caleb had to believe they still carried a grudge.

Better to go someplace where he had no connections…and where presumably they didn’t, either.

Hell, contrary to most beliefs, wasn’t a place of eternal fire and unending heat. No, it was a world of cold, bitter winds and no shelter, of emptiness and grief and gnawing loneliness.

Caleb needed the exact opposite of that — a place teeming with life around the clock, a place where he could disappear among the crowds and the tourists and the frenetic activity.

“I don’t think I can tell you that,” he said after a pause.

Brooke regarded him for a moment before she put down her coffee cup once again. “Give me a few minutes.”

She left the kitchen while Caleb made himself stay in the spot where he was standing. It would have been way too easy to head over to the cupboard, get out a mug — maybe the rose-painted one she’d scorned so many years ago, just as a little fuck-you — and pour out the rest of the coffee waiting in the carafe of the fancy Breville machine sitting on the counter, but he wasn’t going to sink to her level.

No, he’d just get the money and bail, and know that he’d never have to come back here after today.

It wasn’t as though she was going to miss that $50K. That much was only pin money to her, and he had no doubt that she’d go to the bank and get what she needed to replace it almost as soon as he was gone.

A few minutes later, Brooke returned, now holding a black briefcase that Caleb recognized as one of his father’s.

“I didn’t count it,” she said as she handed him the briefcase. “But it should be somewhere between forty-five and forty-eight thousand.”

More than enough to get started — and he already had a good idea about how to build that nest egg into something much bigger.

“Thanks,” he replied. “I appreciate it.”

For a second or two, she only looked at him, expression almost blank. “Do you, Caleb?”

He met her gaze, and she blinked and then glanced away. “It’ll help,” he said easily before pausing as a thought crossed his mind.

Maybe he shouldn’t ask, and yet….

“What happened to my loft?”

Brooke waited to reply until she had her coffee cup back in hand and had taken another sip. “You were gone more than a year. I paid the property taxes the first year, but then Larry said I should really sell it.”

Larry Moore, the family attorney. He wasn’t a part-demon, but his instincts were cutthroat enough that he might as well have been.

And Caleb had always gotten the impression that Larry was interested in Brooke, although he’d known the lawyer was way too smart to show any real signs of his attraction when Daniel Lockwood was still around.

With Daniel out of the way, Caleb supposed it had only been a matter of time before the shark started looking for chum.

“How much?”

His mother didn’t pretend to misunderstand the question. “Obviously, much more than what I just gave you. It’s not like I keep that kind of money on hand, you know.”

True enough. All the same, Caleb wanted the real number, just so he could keep his mental accounts straight.

“How much?” he pressed.

“A little over two hundred,” she said. “We got a fair price.”

He supposed she would. Property values in Greencastle weren’t anywhere close to what they were in Los Angeles, so a bit more than two hundred thousand for a loft — even one that had been completely updated — without any land was still pretty good.

When he didn’t reply right away, Brooke said, “If you’ll tell me where you’re going, then I can send you a cashier’s check for that amount. I never intended to keep the money from the sale of the loft.”

It was tempting…but Caleb knew it was better for everyone concerned if she had no idea of where he planned to end up.

“No, I’m good,” he replied.

For the first time, real worry flickered in her eyes. “So…what? You come back after being gone for more than two years and won’t give me a single word of explanation as to where you’ve been all this time or how you survived when no one else did, and you won’t give even a hint of where you plan to go after this?”

He hesitated. A shadow outside the kitchen window caught his eye, and he watched for a few seconds as a crow landed on the dry grass in the backyard and began pecking in the dirt for seeds. Something about the black bird silhouetted against the yellowed grass and surrounded by bare trees made a shiver run down his spine.

Too cold here. After two years in Hell, he never wanted to be cold again.

“You want to know where I’m going?” he asked, and Brooke gave a very small nod.

Maybe the tiniest hint couldn’t hurt.

“Someplace warm, Mom,” he replied.

“Someplace very warm.”