A Darker Past (The Darker Agency #2)(42)

She sighed, and with a sideways glance at Dad as he got into the driver’s seat, said, “Why does this not surprise me?”

“Right after you went down outside the Archway, I was summoned to the Shadow Realm for a meeting. That’s why I wasn’t with you…”

“I figured that’s what happened. What kind of a meeting?” She glanced at Dad again, but it was obvious that he was staying out of it. He started the engine and pulled out of the lot without saying a word.

How much should I tell her? How much was too much? The thing about being Valefar’s Regent was going to set her off like a match to a pile of dead leaves, so that was out. It was the same job that kept her and Dad apart. I was half human, so he couldn’t make me stay in the Shadow Realm, but still… The idea of having her little girl follow in Daddy’s footsteps was going to go over as well as Smokey drool in her favorite boots.

“With Valefar’s boss.” I took a deep breath. “Lucifer.”

Mom’s mouth fell open. “Lucifer? The Lucifer is Valefar’s boss?”

Hah. I knew it. The exact same reaction I’d had. “Yep. He’s the one who trapped Asmodeus.”

Dad, who’d been silent until now, chuckled. He reached across the seat and took her hand. “I knew that’d get you going.”

Mom squeezed his hand and flashed him a grin that made the butterflies in my stomach go nuts. They were perfect for each other, my parents. Two twisted peas in a pod. Seeing them together at last made everything right in my world.

With a grin, Dad said, “I asked around, since it was well before my time, but apparently Lucifer grew tired of his brothers’ squabbling and rule breaking. Their thirst for power tore the Shadow Realm apart over the course of several centuries. He gathered his army, imprisoned his brothers, and took over as the High King.”

“Yep. And Asmodeus, being one of the demons Lucifer stashed away, is pretty pissed about it. The meeting was to discuss the…situation.”

“There’s a bit more to it than that, though,” he added. He looked at me through the rearview mirror, and for a second I was sure he meant the Regent thing. Then I remembered Lucifer’s threat. “Isn’t there?”

I’d been hoping we could skip that part. “Oh. Yeah. There kinda is…”

Mom shifted back around to look at me. “Why does it sound like I’m not going to like this?”

“You’re not,” Dad said. He pulled the car into the driveway and killed the engine. “They’re holding the kids responsible for releasing him—”

“Which so isn’t fair by the way—” I interjected quickly.

“—so it’s their job to recapture him. They have to do it without the aid of Shadow Realm resources.”

“Resources,” Mom repeated, glaring at him. She unfastened her seat belt. “What does that mean, exactly?”

“It means Dad can’t help me. Valefar either.”

“Okay,” she said carefully. “Well, Charles trapped him once without help from the Shadow Realm. We can do it again.”

A can-do attitude was one of the things us Darker girls were known for, but she was forgetting a crucial piece of history. “Charles had Lorna Belfair help him, remember? Cassidy isn’t going to jump through hoops to repeat her ancestor’s mistake.” My heart hammered against my ribs. Still one piece of info to go. “Lucifer was obviously pissed about…that thing we accidentally did, sort of, but he said we wouldn’t be punished as long as we fixed our mistake…”

Mom closed her eyes and sighed. “How much time?”

“He didn’t say exactly, but you know… Soon.” I held back a shiver. “I doubt Lucifer is known for patience.”

…

After we got back to the office, we went straight into planning mode. Two hours into it, and we were no closer to figuring a way to fix things. Dad excused himself—he wasn’t technically allowed to help, so he couldn’t do much anyway—and took Lukas to run an errand with him, while Mom made another attempt to talk to Cassidy. Me? I got asked to do the most awesome job ever.

Research.

I’d been curled up on the office couch for about an hour, contemplating ways to make the whole thing less boring, when Kendra let herself in.

“Hey,” she said, sinking onto the couch next to me and grabbing the corner of the journal I was forcing myself to skim. “Bestseller material?”

I slammed the book closed, sneezing when a puff of dust exploded. “More like one for the Razzies. Charles Darker’s journal reads more boring that Simon’s, and trust me, that’s saying a lot.”

She frowned. “Nothing useful at all?”

“He mentions our guy, and says something about making grave sacrifices in order to take the demon down—” I looked up and rolled my eyes. “Shocking, right? But that’s about it. Nothing on how they did it, or what. The later pages are even worse. Less Monster Mashing and more mushy gunk about his family, particularly his nephew, Samuel.”

Kendra nodded to the door. “We could try the archives. I don’t know much because Mom is keeping quiet, but we know Lorna helped box up Gressil. Our historical documentation is insane. If there’s a chance of finding out what she did, that’s where we’ll find it.”