"Why can't you go back?"
"Because we weren't supposed to be here in the first place. Something to do with the balance of power. I don't really know. Ace is the expert. Come on, ask me questions while you cook. You're looking skinny," he said, grimacing.
I should have stayed put.
I knew it was what was going to allow me to stay objective, to stay angry.
But I'd been in the room left alone with my own thoughts, going half-crazy, for days.
So I accepted.
And I found the pantry and fridge much fuller than the last time. I actually got to make myself boxed macaroni and cheese, eating the entire thing by myself while Daemon prattled on and on about his adventures since coming to "the human plane" a little over a year and a half before.
"Hey, Daemon?" I asked as he immediately started washing my dishes for me.
"Yeah, pretty lady?"
"Can you bring me to Ace?" I asked, then rushed to clarify. "He said that if I wanted to know more about, well, you know... all of you, that I could come to him, and he would tell me."
"I can do that," he agreed. "Here, you will probably need some coffee," he said, pouring two cups. "It's going to be a lot," he clarified.
With that, he led me through to the front of the house, passing the second mug he'd been carrying that I'd thought was his into my free hand. "And this is where we part," he said, giving me an encouraging smile. "Go get your education on," he added, giving me a little nudge before going back toward the kitchen, leaving me with nothing else to do but move into the library.
That was where I found Ace, sitting in on the tufted leather couch, wearing his usual grandpa sweater, holding a book open in his lap.
Seeming to sense my presence, his gaze lifted slowly, pinning me with his intense gaze.
It sounded completely irrational even in my own head, but I could have sworn he looked pleased. And relieved.
"I, ah, I asked Daemon to bring me here," I explained, shuffling my feet. "He made some good points that made me think."
"Daemon did?" he asked, brow raising.
"I was as shocked as you," I admitted, getting a lip twitch from Ace. "Is that for me?" he asked, nodding toward the extra mug in my hand.
"Oh, ah, yeah. Daemon made it," I explained, not wanting him to think I was thinking about him. Even though I absolutely had been, whether I wanted to or not. And when I tried to suppress the thoughts, they just came back with a vengeance when I fell asleep.
Moving forward, I held out the mug. When Ace reached for it, his big hand slid over mine. And I hate to admit it, but there was no denying the electric shock I felt through my system at his touch.
If I wasn't completely mistaken, Ace seemed to feel it too, his body stiffening, his jaw going tight. "So," he said, pulling the mug from my hand. "You want to learn."
"Yes," I admitted.
"Okay," he said, waving toward the other side of the couch. "Have a seat."
So I did.
And he launched into it.
Daemon had been right. There was a lot to it. So much so that we'd barely scratched the surface by the end of that first day.
By the second, I was actively asking questions.
By the third, the concept stopped feeling so scary because they were no longer so foreign.
And, really, it all threw a lot of what I thought I knew about the nature of good and evil on its head. Because, yes, there was hell and there were demons. But the purpose of that place and those demons was to make people pay in the afterlife for things they often got away with on Earth. A cosmic justice system, if you will. Demons didn't come to Earth to rape and impregnate us. Even though Ace and his club all did do evil work while they were here, all they did was bring the evil to the surface.
"No," he told me, shaking his head. "It doesn't work if they are mostly good. Everyone has a little bit of wickedness in them. But we don't deal in slashing your cheating husband's tires type of shit. The worst thing you have ever done is the nicest thing others have done. Look at it that way, and it isn't so scary. Everyone gets their comeuppance for being complete and utter dicks while they are here. And the punishment fits, too."
He'd touched on all of that as well. The circles of hell, the levels of torment.
"Where did you fall?" I asked, catching him off-guard.
"Hm?"
"When you worked down there, where did you work? Which level of evil did you punish?"
"Me and Ly and Bael, we all worked pretty high up. Serial killers and rapists were our forte."