Read Online Dark Descent - [Nyx Fortuna 02] by Marlene Perez - Free Book Online Page A

wanted to know who he was, really.
    He took off running. Fast for an old guy.
    “Stop!” I said. I took off after him. “I just want to give you some money. I’m not going to hurt you.”
    If anything, that made him run faster.
    I chased him for three blocks, but he gave me the slip.
    “Why are you chasing him?” Talbot asked, panting as he came up behind me. “I told you he was skittish.”
    “I just wanted to ask him some questions,” I said.
    “You probably scared him,” Talbot said.
    “He knows something,” I said.
    “Freaking him out isn’t going to get you answers,” he said.
    He was probably right. “What do you know about him?”
    “He’s been coming around the store since I was little. Dad feeds him, tries to get him to stay, but he always slips away.”
    I was unconvinced. “I need to find him.”
    “Another time,” Talbot urged. “I’ll let you know next time he’s in the store. We have things to do, remember? Finding the gate? Claire?”
    I reluctantly let him point me toward Hell’s Belles. We walked for a block or so in silence.
    “So what was the argument with Naomi about?” I asked.
    He hesitated. “You wouldn’t understand.”
    “Try me.”
    “Hard to believe, but the aunts don’t think I’m good enough for her.” Underneath the joking tone, there was a hint of hurt.
    “Why do you care?”
    “Because I’m in love with her,” Talbot said quietly.
    “You couldn’t have picked a worse future mother-in-law,” I said.
    “I thought you liked Nona,” he objected.
    “She’s the best of the worst,” I admitted. “They probably disapprove of you because we’re friends.”
    “That’s what I thought,” he said. “But it’s more than that.”
    The restaurant was dark, which was strange, since Hell’s Belles was a twenty-four-hour diner.
    Talbot checked his watch. “Now what? Hell’s Belles is closed.”
    “This is our only chance,” I said.
    “We picked the one night Bernie closes,” Talbot said.
    “Even better,” I said. “She won’t be there.”
    When we checked, the main part of the restaurant was dark, but I could still see a light in the kitchen.
    The front door, though, was locked.
    “Let’s check the back,” I said.
    We went around to the rear of the building. There was a smelly Dumpster and the area by the door was littered with cigarettes.
    Talbot put his hand on the knob and turned it slowly. “Door’s unlocked,” Talbot said.
    The back kitchen was in darkness.
    “What now?”
    “I doubt the gate is out in the open. It’s probably somewhere in the kitchen or—”
    “The basement,” Talbot interrupted. He pointed to an interior door.
    From down below, someone was chanting. We followed the sound down stairs lit by rows of lit candles.
    We tried to be as quiet as possible, but the stairs squeaked as I reached the bottom.
    Talbot and I froze, but the guttural chanting continued.
    We hid behind a stack of restaurant supply boxes. Bernie stood before an elaborate wooden altar carved with Tria Prima symbols.
    As we watched, she drew a blade across her hand and spilled drops of blood into a golden goblet.
    “Don’t breathe it in,” I whispered to Talbot. “And whatever you do, don’t get any on your skin.” Demons’ blood wasn’t like ours. It scalded the skin, and if it got into the bloodstream, it did much worse.
    When I turned back again, Bernie was no longer standing there.
    “Did you see where she went?” I asked Talbot.
    He ignored the question and moved closer to the altar. “Look familiar?” he asked. He motioned to the wall. Hanging on a hook by a silken thread was a key, twin to the one I’d found at Gaston’s.
    Talbot went up to the altar, careful to avoid the goblet full of demon blood. “Do you hear that?” he said. “I hear a dog.”
    He pressed his ear to the wall and stayed like that for a long minute. “Definitely a dog.”
    There was only one goddess who came to mind when I thought of dogs. Hecate.
    We went