Heroes and a Hellhound: Book One Read online

  Eleanor Rousseau

  Heroes and a Hellhound

  Book One

  Copyright © 2021 by Eleanor Rousseau

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  First edition

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  Contents

  Praise for Heroes and a Hellhound

  1. 1 - Hero Time

  2. 2 - Day Job

  3. 3 - The Eye of Mirbane

  4. 4 - Books and Coffee

  5. 5 - Kidnapping

  6. 6 - Purgatory

  7. 7 - Flashback

  8. 8 - Ghost Stories

  9. 9 - Bar fight

  10. 10 - Blackout

  11. 11 - Office Party

  12. 12 - Archenemy

  13. 13 - Enthralled

  14. 14 - Best Behaviour

  15. 15 - Steak Out

  16. 16 - Mystery Solved

  17. 17 - Hold My Soul

  18. 18 - My Motto

  19. 19 - Cupid

  20. 20 - Domestic Bliss

  21. 21 - Debt Collector

  22. 22 - Anniversary

  23. 23 - Shopping Trip

  24. 24 - Marital Dispute, Part 1

  25. 25 - Marital Dispute, Part 2

  26. 26 - Study Group

  27. 27 - Weather Witch

  28. 28 - Revenge

  29. 29 - Beneath the Snow

  30. 30 - Consequence

  Epilogue - A Day in the Life of Timothy

  Other Books by Eleanor Rousseau

  Demons and Hellholes

  Praise for Heroes and a Hellhound

  “Nevaeh is amazing and I would die for her.”

  - my friend Meg

  “It’s fine, but have you gotten a real job yet?”

  - my mum

  “I’m not reading your book, and no, you can’t legally change my last name to King.”

  - Stephen King Robson

  “Talk to me when the Netflix original series comes out. Until then, **** off.”

  - Nevaeh St. Claire

  1

  1 - Hero Time

  Nevaeh -

  The night was dark, and full of monsters…

  Well, one monster at least. And the full moon shone bright in the sky, so it wasn’t really all that dark. But, according to my Introduction to Lit tutor, bastardising quotes was becoming my thing. Tonight I didn’t need to worry about Yeats, Byron, or L.L.Martin, or whoever those wordy bastards were. However, I did need to remain vigilant.

  My plans to binge watch Agent Carter had taken a backseat to… well, explaining what I had to do would be a little complicated. I tried not to think too hard about these kinds of things. If I did, thoughts like ‘why did you leave your warm, cosy dorm room and take a stroll down to the industrial park in the middle of the night?’ might enter my head and try to talk sense into me.

  Sense and I were not on speaking terms.

  The industrial park was not my favourite place to be. I didn’t particularly dislike the large abandoned buildings, or the encroaching darkness. But, on my first day here, I’d gotten really lost on my way back from the shop, and what should have been a twenty minute walk had taken well over an hour. I had a shitty sense of direction.

  Which was why I had scoped this place out earlier.

  Because I was on a mission, and I was going in alone. Usually, I would have had a team behind me, and at least one of them would have been able to get google maps on their phone, but I was confident I could handle this. I just had to remember that, to find my way back to campus, I just needed to go up. The town of Penryn was pretty much built entirely on a slope, and the campus was conveniently located at the peak. Wish I’d realised that on my first day.

  Oh, and I also had to remember we wanted minimum casualties. My friends were very firm on that point. It wasn’t that I couldn’t do minimum casualties… it just wasn’t my speciality.

  And, if all went to shit, I could always think ‘what would Peggy Carter do?’ Which usually surmounted to ‘watch her male co-workers fuck everything up, then go in and fix it’.

  I was a big fan of Peggy.

  I found what I assumed was the right building, and pulled the picture I’d printed off from google to double check. I did have a smartphone, I just wasn’t very good at using it. After confirming I wasn’t in the wrong place, I called the darkness to me and it curled around me like a loyal pet. It wasn’t a power I used often—most people had that whole, irrational fear of the dark thing, so they sometimes freaked out—but it could come in handy.

  My foot landed in a puddle of something icky and I grimaced. Something about bad guys just made them love dim, dank, grimy locations. Maybe that’s why I wasn’t a bad guy. I like darkness as much as the next girl but I drew the line at grimy.

  Their current location was a warehouse that had, at one point, been converted into office space. Given time and motivation I could pick a lock but why bother when you can just knock?

  I knocked, letting the shadows slip from me. After all, it was only polite to let them see me in all my glory.

  There was a long pause before the door opened, creaking loudly enough to make me wince. It was a good thing I hadn’t gone for stealth; just opening the door would have announced my entrance to anyone in the building.

  A large man opened the door, surveying me with suspicion, and a hint of interest. I smiled. “Hey, handsome,” I purred.

  He quirked a brow. “What you want?”

  “Now that you mention it, I’d love a pay rise.”

  He blinked. Sometimes humans are easily confused so I gave him a few moments before I introduced his face to the door frame. Didn’t even see it coming. Admittedly, I wasn’t in the best mood today. I’d had a nine o’clock lecture and I hadn’t been able to find time to take a nap in the afternoon, so maybe I’d hit him harder than I’d needed to. But I checked to make sure he was breathing before I stepped inside.

  I could totally do minimum casualties.

  I stepped carefully over the corpse. No, the body—he was still alive. I glanced down to check. Yup, I was already nailing this.

  The entrance vaguely resembled a lobby, if only in the size and shape of the room, and on the other side, it narrowed to a hallway. That was probably where I needed to go. Two men shot up from where they’d been sitting at a beaten-up, old metal fold-out table.

  I opened my mouth to speak but, before I could get a word out, they brought up their handguns and started shooting. The sound of gunfire punched through the room, the noise shockingly sudden in the quiet of the night. I felt bullets tear into me and hot blood spill from the wounds.

  It hurt.

  Then they stopped shooting and, somehow, the ensuing silence seemed twice as loud as the sound of gunfire had been. Time seemed to slow as we stared at each other.

  “Okay, ow!” Getting shot hurt, ask anyone who’s ever been shot and they’ll tell you that it hurts. Shooting someone is a dick move, that’s why I didn’t carry guns. That and because I didn’t need a gun to kill. But I wasn’t killing anyone, only incapacitating and possibly maiming, if necessary.

  And suddenly maiming d
id seem rather necessary—they had shot me after all. I had to have at least six bullets lodged in me. I felt that definitely warranted some light maiming. “That was totally uncalled for!” I snapped, letting them hear my outrage.

  Their eyes were wide and their mouths hung open, right up until the moment they both kissed the pavement, knocked out. It didn’t take much.

  Did I have time to maim them? I guess I could always do it on the way out. Now they were out cold, I was feeling like the situation was a grey area. The truth was, humans were so slow and fragile that maiming was rarely required, which was probably for the best, because some people frowned on that sort of thing. Apparently.

  A game of poker was set up on the table, three piles of cards, three glasses and a clear bottle without a label containing a clear liquid. I sniffed. Vodka, very strong vodka, and it was almost empty. Classy.

  No wonder none of the shots had hit anything vital. There were three glasses, for the doorman and these two bozos, but they likely had at least one more guarding the victim. I glanced down the hall. Searching this place would take forever. Luckily, I still had more than a few tricks up my sleeve.

  I walked down the hall, straining my hearing. At times—for example when one is surrounded by the cries of the eternally damned—having supernatural hearing can have its drawbacks but, with enough practice, you learned to block out most things and focus on what you’re searching for.

  There.

  A heartbeat. Two actually, I thought. Behind door number five, at the end of the hall. Both were faster than normal. From there, even a human would have probably heard the gunshots. It wasn’t ideal. As a general rule, I typically preferred sneak attacks.

  I stepped aside with my back to the wall beside the door and reached for the handle. I hadn’t even gotten it open before a spray of bullets burst through the door.

  Ha. I didn’t even get hit that time. Not once.

  I was getting better at this shit. The shooting stopped and I waited a brief moment before tossing the door wide open, while still keeping out of the sight of whoever was inside.

  I stayed still, not even breathing as I waited to see what he would do next. Wow, that was sexist of me. While I waited to see what the crazy person with the gun would do. Better.

  “Step into the doorway, hands up, or I shoot the girl!” It was a man’s voice. Oh well. These probably weren’t the type of people we should be wanting equality with anyway.

  I considered his offer, but I didn’t want the girl to get shot so I stepped into the doorway and moved forward slightly, into the light of the room, both hands in the air. See, I was capable of doing as I was told, Jason didn’t know what he was talking about. I wasn’t sure why the hand thing was necessary. If he was close enough, I could easily pull back for a punch. I guess it proved that I didn’t have a weapon, but I hadn’t been carrying one anyway.

  His eyes dropped to my chest. “Fuck.” Yes, I was a sexy fiend. I was proud of my C’s so I allowed him a moment to gain his composure. Then it occurred to me that his eyes weren’t directed solely at my breasts and I remembered the bullet wounds. Well… that was slightly disappointing.

  He pointed the gun back at the girl, maybe figuring she was less likely to shake off a bullet. That move pissed me off for a number of reasons. First of all, by killing her, all of their work would have been for nothing. She was their meal ticket. It was stupid. Secondly, why aim it at her head? By aiming it there he was guaranteed a death shot, whereas if he shot her in the leg I could be distracted trying to help her and let him get away. He was putting all his eggs in one suicidal basket. And, lastly, he was a large man with a gun and she was a defenceless human child who was strapped to a chair. She was not a threat and it was not a fair fight.

  I like stacked odds as much as the next girl, but where’s the fun in that?

  His eyes finally made it to my face and he gasped, “Vampire!”

  I laughed and felt my teeth prick my lower lip. “Vampires don’t exist, you fool.” However, I was the creature that the whole vampyre mythos was based on, so it was an easy mistake to make. But I wasn’t flattered by the comparison. I didn’t glitter. Strippers glittered. Occasionally, I gleamed, if I worked up enough of a sweat, but I didn’t glitter, and anyone who suggested otherwise would soon find themselves on the business end of a very sharp object.

  He was apparently so stunned by my inhuman features that his aim had faltered, and it was likely the best chance I was going to get. I leapt at him, shoving the arm that wielded the gun away and kicked him in the gut—not hard enough to cause internal bleeding or tear his liver but hard enough for him to feel it. Then I slammed my fist into the side of his head as he bent over.

  The big guy dropped like a sack of potatoes. One of these days I’d find a real challenge, like maybe answering the phone when a telemarketer called. In the meantime, I leaned over the guy and reached for his gun.

  “Are you going to eat him?” a small female voice asked.

  I shot the girl a look. “Don’t be foolish. I may be evil but even I draw the line at cannibalism.” Gross. You wouldn’t find me sucking at some scrub’s neck, or eating his flesh. I didn’t know where that human had been. No, I drank animal blood, from a glass, like a civilised demon spawn.

  Her eyes were still pretty wide; it was creepy. They were too big for her small head. “Are you really not a vampire?”

  “I’m really not. I don’t drink human blood, I rarely brood and I have absolutely no desire to return to high school.” That would seriously impede my nap schedule which was already taking a hit. And other people went to high school; I’d never really been fond of other people.

  I forced my fangs back into hiding and pulled out my phone, checking my reflection in the screen. My eyes were their normal blue. Good. Occasionally they glowed red like the fires of Hell and I didn’t want to freak the child out. For some reason, humans occasionally get touchy about subjects like hellfire. It was weird.

  Pulling out a dagger, I moved over to her and began to carefully cut through the bindings. “Did they harm you in any way?” Rosa had advised that I ask that. She was so smart.

  “They grabbed me and it hurt when I struggled.” Somehow her eyes had gotten wider—perhaps she was inhuman—and they began to water.

  Oh, no.

  I had not been told what to do if the child leaked from her face. “I will take you home. If anyone gets in our way, you can shoot them.” I yanked away the last of the ropes and handed her the gun. All humans like guns, right? And I was only told that I had to avoid casualties, not that I had to deprive the child of a perfectly serviceable weapon.

  She accepted it, although her hands seemed a little unsteady. Never mind, what was the worst that could happen? “Who are you?”

  “Nevaeh- No, wait, I’m not supposed to use my real name.” That was one of Jason’s rules; the guy had a lot of rules and a lot of issues. “I’m… Jane.” That would work. “Follow me,” I added.

  Escaping the building was easy. Only one of the men stirred and a swift kick solved that matter. The front door was propped open by the first body so I just pulled it open further and we walked out. A few streets over, a van sat waiting for us. I knocked and the side door slid open.

  “Just what the hell have you got me out here for? It’s late and I’ve had a long day and… Is that the Evergreens’ daughter? The one that’s currently being held for ransom? And why exactly is she holding a gun?” Officer Michaels asked.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “You ask a lot of questions. Take the child back to her parents and tell your police friends that you heard shots fired at this address.” I pulled out a bright yellow sticky note and handed it to him.

  “Wait, what do I tell them about how I got the girl?”

  “I don’t know, make shit up.” I turned to the girl. “He’ll sort you out but don’t shoot him. He’s human, so he’s probably not going to recover from getting shot.”

  She nodded solemnly. I was so great with
children. I gave her a thumbs up before turning on my heel and jogging away. Yup, I was a real damn hero. Now I just had to find someone willing to cut these bullets out of me.

  2

  2 - Day Job

  Nevaeh -

  I was a killer, a demon’s spawn. I had no mercy. After spending years in Hell, I had always imagined my future to be filled with hellfire, brimstone, and blood. To survive, I’d become an effective killer, a wicked spy, and as deceptive as even the oldest demons. During those years, I never would have imagined that I could have ended up here.

  I stared sternly at the little beast before me. “Now, are we going to do this the easy way or the hard way? Personally, I usually prefer the latter.” The easy way was never any fun.

  The puppy rolled over, baring his tummy. He was a moron. The tummy was a vulnerable place—it was a move of submission as I could have easily torn out his entrails. Fool. The puppy was a Labrador, which seemed an appropriate breed for experimentation. I narrowed my eyes at the pup as his tongue lolled out. “You worthless piece of trash.”

  Typically, I was good with dogs, and not because I was a ‘hound’. In reality, the title wasn’t actually accurate; it was more a derogatory term used by demons. By calling us dogs they implied we were less than them. It was sort of the underworld’s equivalent of calling someone a bitch.

  But, since any real name for my kind had been forgotten centuries ago, the name had stuck. On some level it irked me, but I tried not to dwell on it. It was just a word. The puppy whined, tail wagging.

  I frowned at him and took some notes on my clipboard.

  He walked over to lick my hand.

  I glared at him and muttered, “Yes, Philip, I love you too. Now, do your damn job.” I glanced over at the larger dog, Pete the German Shepherd. “Show him how it’s done.”

  Pete sniffed the puppy, completely ignoring the task at hand. Pete wasn’t technically supposed to be part of these experiments, but he liked to follow me around, and he got sad when I left him behind.