Crimes of Cupidity (Heart Hassle Book 3)

I instantly jump up like my fight or flight instinct is about to kick in. It’s silly, since I’m pretty awful at both of those things.

I hold my hands out in front of me. “Let’s not be hasty. Yes, I may suck at my job, but let’s face it, this cupidity gig isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and I’m not the only one who thinks so. Ask any of those cupids out there in the waiting room,” I say, pointing towards the door. “Yeah, I screwed up. I suck, I get it. But I didn’t intentionally break any laws. I was forced into a physical body. Did I take advantage of it? Yes,” I admit. “I get to have a body now. A life. Love. Do you really want to take that away from me and my new mates? I just got to have sex for the first time ever. I’d like to do more of that. My mates are super good at it,” I confide. “Their tails are not just for balance, if you catch my drift,” I say, wagging my brows.

As soon as I mention love and mates and sex, Seedy’s pupils dilate. Cupids just can’t help but get jazzed up about that stuff.

“Seedy, don’t terminate me. We can work something out. Like a nine-to-five kind of gig. Or part-time, even? That way I’m doing my job, but I still can have a life, you know?” He doesn’t look convinced. I raise my right hand, ready to take an oath. “I solemnly swear on cupid’s bow that I will do my job. I’ll smack lots of people with Flirt-Touches and blow a whole crap-load of Lust into their faces. I’ll make sure my Love Arrows are appropriately shot. Just…please don’t terminate me. Please.”

Seedy shakes his head, and my stomach plummets right down to my ghost-like toes. “I cannot allow this to go unpunished. I’m sorry.”

His words echo in my head, and suddenly time is going far too fast.

He snaps his fingers, and the terminate button appears on the desk. It’s big and round and red, shining with the word, “TERMINATE” in bold letters. His hand moves automatically, reaching toward it, and I swear, my life flashes before my eyes.

This can’t be happening.

I will not go poof.

I watch his fingers closing over the button, and in the blink of an eye, I turn corporeal and launch myself at him from across the table.

I plough into him, and a surprised shriek escapes both of us as I tackle him to the ground. We start to awkwardly wrestle, each of us trying to get control of the button, but he’s just as terrible at physical altercation as I am. We fumble and even accidentally fondle each other as we try to gain the upper hand. By some lucky miracle, I manage to pin him down.

The angel and demon stand over us with matching frowns.

I look up, my pink hair in my face, my chest heaving, one of my hands shoved against Seedy’s nose and the other precariously close to his groin. Icky.

In our scuffle, the terminate button has landed beside us on the floor. We both notice it at the same time. Our eyes meet, and then we dive for it.

Our hands land on it at the same time, pressing down, and then…

Poof!

Pink smoke envelopes me.

Oh shit. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!

“I’ve been poofed,” I squeak out as terror and despair fills me. “I wanted to keep living!” I yell at the bubblegum smoke that is now my world. “I wanted more time with my mates. And more sex with them. And to eat, like, cartons of chocolates.” Tears start dripping down my cheeks. “This isn’t fair,” I lament, as I wrap my arms around my legs and drop my head to my knees. “I was gonna try anal, and maybe get a tattoo, and I would’ve even exercised if Ronak wanted me to. Probably. Maybe. At least for, like, five minutes,” I cry to the termination universe of nothingness.

“Did she say anal?”

I shriek and flinch upright, nearly coming out of my skin. The pink smoke has dissipated, and I blink up through wet lashes to see Jerkahf and Raziel staring down at me. Raziel is frowning, but Jerkahf has a terrific grin on his face.

I stumble to my feet and look around the office wildly. “Oh my gods. I didn’t get poofed!” I jump up and down excitedly.

“No, but it seems your superior did,” Raziel says, still frowning.

I follow his gaze and look down at the strange pink body outline on the floor where Seedy had been sprawled out just moments before.

I blink repeatedly at the space as realization pieces together. I must’ve hit the termination button before him. “Well, that was lucky.”

Luck be a lady tonight, bitches.

“You just terminated the Head of Cupidity,” Raziel points out dryly.

I grimace. “Whoops.”

The demon cocks a brow. “You say that a lot.”

I pick up the termination button from the floor and gingerly place it on the table. When I do, I notice that the heart and arrow symbol that marked Seedy is now on the inside of my wrist, right below my number. As I stare at it with bewilderment, I realize that I feel…strange. Like I just got a shot of cupid adrenaline or something.

I hear Raziel sigh exaggeratedly. “Great. I cannot believe that this imbecile is now in charge.”

I swing my gaze over at him. I’m going to ignore the imbecile comment for now, but… “You mean I’m the cupid boss of all cupid bosses?”

“It would appear so,” he says, giving a pointedly unhappy look at the marking on my wrist.

I feel bad about unintentionally poofing Seedy, but…holy heartcakes, I’m so relieved. I wasn’t expecting to be the new boss, but…it’s a hell of a lot better than being terminated. I fist pump a bit because I can’t help myself. “Yeah! I’m the boss, bitches!”

The angel and demon look at me with matching expressions of “oh, for fuck sake-ness.”

“What are we supposed to do now?” Jerkahf asks the angel.

“The hell if I know,” Raziel says.

Are angels allowed to say that? I’m not sure, but it doesn’t seem like the best time to ask him.

“I guess this solves her little issue of Veil perversion,” Raziel says.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

He shrugs a shoulder. “Veil Majors in top positions are permitted to enter and exit the Veil at will. The Veil shouldn’t have a problem with you doing it now.”

“Oh, so I’m not gonna pervert it anymore! That’s good. Looks like all our problems are solved,” I say, clapping my hands.

“For hellfire’s sake. Her wings have changed,” Jerkahf comments.

I look over my shoulder and realize that he’s right. Instead of having random black and white feathers cropped up on me, now, my red feathers are gilded with black and white edges on the bottom of my wings. My lips tilt up with a smile. “Oh, come on, you have to admit that looks badass.”

Raziel just shakes his head at me, but Jerkahf cocks his head and says, “Okay, you’re right.” Raziel huffs at him with frustration, but Jerkahf just shrugs. “What? It does look badass.”

Raziel grinds his perfect teeth together. “In any case, it seems as though her malfunctioning has…solidified. Whatever powers she has now will probably be permanent.”

A light catches my attention out of the corner of my eye, and when I look down, I notice that my new cupid boss tattoo is shining with neon pink light. “Aww. It’s all pretty and glowy.”

Jerkahf snorts. “You being Head of Cupidity ought to be good.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “Don’t be so negative.”

“Can you turn that off?” Raziel says testily.

I rub at the mark, as if I can get the glow to magically wipe off. When that doesn’t work, I shake my arm, because for some reason, that seems like the next thing to do in a situation like this, but it just starts glowing more brightly like it’s some sort of weird light stick.

When I leave my arm still for a few moments, the pink slowly fades away. I smirk with satisfaction and then gesture to the chairs. I totally have a handle on this new boss stuff already.

“Boys, take a seat,” I say with authority. They surprise me when they actually sit down. I try not to look smug as shit, but…yeah, a little bit of smugness slips out. It’s kind of like Lust. Sometimes it’s just hard to contain.

I take a moment to study the angel and demon. Since I’m no longer in danger of being poofed, I can relax a bit. Now, I’m a total wing-snob. I admit it. I’ve always been partial to my cupid wings, and now I’m even more of a wing snob because I have some badass angel-demon gilding going on, but even I have to admit that the angel’s wings are beautiful.

“You have nice wings,” I tell him seriously. “They look like they’re shining. Are they shining?”

He preens. “Yes. They shine with the light of heaven.”

“Wow, that’s awesome. Really. Cupids and angels totally win in the wing department.” I lean in conspiratorially. “I mean, at least we didn’t get stuck with demon wings, am I right?” I whisper over to him, and give him a little elbow action.

“I heard that,” the demon says behind me.

I turn and smile at him innocently. “Hmm? Heard what?”

“Need I point out that your wings now have demonic traits?” he asks, giving my black feathers a pointed stare.

I cover my black feathers protectively. “They’re still cupid wings. They’re just…demonesque. My beautiful red feathers are outlined in a demon accent, if you will. And they have some angel flair, too,” I point out. I turn back to Raziel with a thought. “Ooh, maybe mine will start shining, too!”

“Mine are heat-resistant,” Jerkahf grumbles.

“Yeah, that’s neat,” I concede. “But they’re all…bat-like and thorny. Also, they smell like burnt rotten eggs.”

He narrows his eyes at me. “It’s sulfur and smoke from the pits of hell,” he defends.

I pat him on the shoulder. “Sure it is.”

Jerkahf shrugs me off. “Can we move on and stop talking about our fucking wings?”

Raziel smirks at the grumpy demon. “Touchy, touchy. Are all you demons such p-p-p-wussies?”

I cock my head at him. “You can’t say pussy?”

Raziel gives a terse shake of his head. “No, I can’t. But that’s exactly what the demon is.”

Jerkahf glares like he’s about to launch himself at the angel and scald him with hellfire. I press my hands against their chests so that they don’t attack each other. Love is literally getting between life and death right now. I am Major’ing the shit out of this Veil boss stuff. “Hold up. Jerky, I’m sorry. That was mean of me to criticize your wings.” I tell him in a placating tone. “They’re very…hellish looking. I’m sure they’re super impressive in the pits where you’re from.”

He just rolls his eyes, but the fiery glow recedes somewhat.

“And Raziel,” I say, turning to him. “Be nice. You’re the angel. You’re supposed to set a good example.”

He gapes at me. “You expect me, an angel, to be nice to an entity that is literally evil? The very antithesis to my existence?”

I blink at him. “Yes.”

He rubs his eyes. I’m pretty sure they’re both completely exasperated with me, but hey, they no longer look like they’re about to have a battle of good versus evil in my office, so mission accomplished. I drop my hands and lace them in front of me. “Anyway, since I’m the boss now, I am formally rescinding the order for my termination.”

“Shocker,” Jerkahf drawls.

“But as far as these other powers, umm, what should I do about those?”

“How about don’t use them and just be a cupid like you’re supposed to be?” the angel deadpans.

“Yeah, that isn’t gonna work for me,” I admit. “Not full time, at least, but I will stick some Love Arrows where they belong and Lust it up when I see fit. I’ll also keep the soul sucking to a minimum,” I promise Jerkahf.

“No,” Raziel says, pointing at me. “No soul-sucking of any kind. That’s not your job.”

“Sometimes it just happens,” I insist.

“No, it doesn’t.”

“Well, it might.”

“Demon,” Raziel snaps. “You deal with her.”

Jerkahf shakes his head with a chuckle, and a little bit of smoke escapes his mouth. “I don’t believe there’s any way of reversing the Veil powers now that she’s been settled as a cupid boss.”

Raziel laces his fingers together and props them on his crossed knee. “No, I don’t believe that there’s any way to reverse it, either,” he admits, sounding like I stole his favorite seraphic candy.

“So, I’m going to be some sort of boss cupid-angel-demon-sandman-lucklady-karma-other Veil entity…thing?”

“It would seem so.”

I nod slowly. “Well, it’s not ideal, but I think I can live with it.”

Jerkahf snorts. “How noble of you.”

“Can you guys just give me a crash course on angelology and demonology stuff? Preferably the short version? Because I’d like to get back home. I’m doing super important spy stuff. Plus, the sex with my mates. I’d like to get back to that.”

Raziel glances at the demon. “Is she serious?”

The demon picks at his black nails. “It appears so.”

“What’s the big deal? Just tell me how to control the soul-sucking stuff and whatever the heck else I need to know about your powers, so that I know what to expect. I just need a little help,” I tell them.

As soon as the word, “help,” escapes my lips, a puff of pink smoke erupts in front of me and a cupid suddenly appears.