Saint Peter's Gate

Fran Comesanas

Description

You'll never look at the journey to Heaven the same way.
Darkness once again approaches Saint Peter’s Gate. This horrible threat has not been seen since the First War. Some believe that the creature is a manifestation of pure evil, and Whisper has dared to enter into an alliance with it. How the rogue general escaped his last brush with the Angel of Death, no one can say, but in his attempt to seize control of Saint Peter’s Gate Whisper may have doomed all of Heaven and Earth to eternal damnation.

Sujets

• Dragons
• Fantasy (canción de Mariah Carey)
• Demonios (película)
• Ángel (desambiguación)
• Demon
• Angels
• Dark
• Heaven
• Hell
• Fiction
• Dragon
• Fantasy

Informations

• Publié par: Trafford Publishing
• Date de parution: 09 août 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781490796680
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

SAINT PETER’S GATE
WAVE OF DARKNESS
FRAN COMESANAS

 
© Copyright 2019 Fran Comesanas. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.
 
ISBN: 978-1-4907-9670-3 (sc) ISBN: 978-1-4907-9669-7 (hc) ISBN: 978-1-4907-9668-0 (e)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2019911034
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only. Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
Trafford rev. 08/06/2019
www.trafford.com North America & international toll-free: 844-688-6899 (USA & Canada) fax: [phone]
Contents
Dedication
Ascension of Character
Prologue
Book I
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
IX
Book II
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
IX
X
XI
XII
Epilogue
Message from the Author
Dedication
In honor of our brothers and sisters who have fallen doing their duty. Rest easy. There are still others willing to strap on that gun belt and step out into this world full of darkness.
This story is dedicated to everyone who is or was a law enforcement professional. You are the wall that rises between us and the worst that society has to offer. You are taken for granted, invisible. You are taken advantage of by the very people you are sworn to protect as well as the media and the politicians.
It is terrible to know firsthand that there are those who care nothing for you. Yet you still show up for roll call, still show up for your shift, still go to that call you know could be your last.
As for me, you have my unending loyalty and respect. I will always wave when you pass by or say hello on the street. I will always have your six because I know if the call ever comes, you will have mine.
You honor us all for wearing that uniform every day regardless of what the ungrateful think. Keep one another safe and go home at the end of your shift.
Thank you for your service and your sacrifice.

Ascension of Character
There is so much beauty in the world, yet all I could see was hate. All I could feel was pain. They called me a monster. No matter how hard I tried, I could not convince them otherwise. So I became the monster they wanted to believe I was. I excelled at violence. Cold and calculating, I became proficient at maiming and killing. If there was a need for hostility, I was summoned. Violence became my calling card. I forgot my humanity, forgot my origin.
I watched what may have been my only friend give her life to save me, and yet I nearly threw away her sacrifice in an attempt at vengeance. In a moment of clarity, I chose to escape, taking and saving a child’s soul in the process. In the end, I realized that in truth, the child had saved me on that bittersweet day.
I still see hate and pain in the world, but now I can also see the beauty and love that fill it. It is their world, and I realize now that I am not here to punish or judge them. We are their protectors. Judgment is Heaven’s dominion, not mine.
— Ember

Prologue
Ember lay unconscious, unaware that the rogue stood mere inches away from the terrible chains that had ensnared her. She was dreaming, but her captor could only guess why the guardian suffered the occasional muscle spasm. The dream would have been sweet if she had still been a hunter demon. Now it was a nightmare, a terrorizing dream of what she might have become had she slipped into the ever-enticing world of darkness.

She had no idea how long she’d been lying in the stairwell. In reality, it had been merely twenty minutes, twenty minutes of him trying to draw perfect circles with the tip of his tongue around the more sensitive parts of her anatomy. Just when she thought she could no longer draw breath, he would begin anew his maddening attempts at perfection, causing her to squirm and convulse.
Satisfied that she was numb with pleasure, he carried her up the remainder of the winding staircase. He lifted her easily, like an oversized rag doll whose clothes had been only half-removed without care. Once at the top of the stairs, he set her down and grasped her by the wrist, almost dragging her into the bedroom. It was almost too dark, too disconcerting to be in a stranger’s bedroom for the first time. She didn’t really know anything about him, did she?
A single candle burned atop a tall dark wood dresser. The flame danced as the air currents forced it to sway without rhythm, making their shadows contort against the opposite wall. In the center of the room, a four-poster bed loomed with at least half a dozen pillows. The silken bed covers looked blood red in the candlelight, but that wasn’t what had truly caught her attention. There appeared to be an enormous spiderweb stretched out across the two bedposts on the right side of the bed. This was where he was pulling her to now. She was nearly trembling with anticipation, not to mention the nervousness that accompanied a one-night stand.
He helped her onto a small step and then had her turn back to him, facing away from the bed. Her back was to the spiderweb, which appeared in the gloom to be made of black silk rope. He stepped closer to her and kissed her slowly, deeply, wanting to draw every ounce of passion from her mouth. She felt he was ready, but a trickle of uneasiness tried to jar her instincts awake. She began shaking, not understanding the warning.
A small click distracted her. She was fumbling with his trousers, the dim light forcing her to clumsily work on them, when he leaned forward and whispered, “Why are you shaking?”
She apologized with a smile and said she was just a little out of her comfort zone. The candle flickered, making her stumble over the words, the shadows beckoning her to submit. He smiled and kissed her, tying one wrist and then the other. It wasn’t tight, which helped her relax. He slid down her body and then tied her legs by the ankles. Now she knew she was the fly caught in the spider’s web.
She bit her lip and asked, “What now?”
He looked up at her from his knees and yanked the little step out from under her feet. She felt a quick burst of panic as she thought she would fall, but the spiderweb held her firmly in place, hanging just above the floor, her thighs just level with the edge of the bed.
“Now? Now we begin.”
He moved to the wall directly across from her and uncovered a large mirror. She could see herself in the dim candlelight as the shadows continued their contortions across the room. She watched as he moved around behind her, sliding up on the bed with the grace of a predatory cat. He lay on his back and slid his head in between her thighs, just over the edge of the bed.
He looked up at her as she watched in the mirror and said, “I hope you are ready.”

The hunter demon slipped in through the ethereal barrier, taking her physical form just behind the two humans. Fools , she thought. One of the humans, the male, had just made the shortlist and had a one-way ticket to the Liquefiers. It had become routine for this arrogant piece of trash to kill the women he was attracted to. The cretin truly believed that he was entitled to the power he exerted over his victims. This would require a bit of skill. The stupid female had allowed this wretch to tie her up like livestock. She was lucky. She would survive this encounter—physically, anyway.
The male human, if left unchecked, would have made this woman his fourth kill in less than a six-week period. Her commands had been clear: take him before the death of the next human. The Angel of Death had been definitive on that point, but as always, the Old One left her some wiggle room to work with.
She touched down without a sound, taking the form of an attractive female. The single candle created plenty of shadows. Neither human would see her unless she wished it. The hunter demon had time. The male would not be ready to kill until after he had fulfilled his desire to dominate his victim. The demon slid silently along the wall, crouching past the doorway that led to a bathroom, lest she catch the attention of the fly trapped in the spider’s web.

The killer thought himself so clever. He was rich and attractive. It was so easy to attract and tease and flirt. Women practically threw themselves at him. He had needed a challenge though. Life was becoming so dull, so boring that he was beginning to lose interest in the things that got him where he was today, and he couldn’t have that. Everything had always come so easy—money, success, popularity. Material things just weren’t satisfying any longer. He found that killing a person required things he didn’t really have—courage, boldness, and even a little hate was needed.
His first kill took all his considerable intelligence to pull off. He remembered her now. The way she had screamed almost forced him to vomit, but he managed to maintain his nerve. The first cut was awful. She struggled to get out of the spider’s web. Again and again, he slid the sharp surgical knife along her thigh, across the fibers of the muscle. He thought there would be more blood. The screams were almost deafening.
Thinking of his first always aroused such passion in him, not for sex but for the kill.