I sat behind the wheel of some car I'd hijacked, driving along a rain-soaked highway in the dark. Beside me, my phone started to ring, Dean's name flashing on the screen. Reaching over, I picked it up and stared for a second before answering it.

"I left you an open tab at the bar. Knock yourself out."

"Well, hell, I might just take you up on that," a foreign voice answered.

"And who is this?"

"Me? Well, I'm karma, sister."

"On my husband's phone?"

"On your husband's phone," the man echoed.

"Is he dead?" I asked, not caring either way.

"No. Not yet," he replied. "And as long as you show up where I tell you to show up, your husband will be just fine."

"And how do I know he's still alive?"

"Speak," the man said, sounding a bit fainter.

There was no response, and then the sound of a punch being thrown and the tell-tale grunt of Dean's voice.

"Aah!"

"Proof of life," the mystery man said, sounding closer to the phone.

"Ellie!" Dean yelled in the background.

"Got a pen?" the man asked.

"No," I snarled, "you listen to me. There's no trade. There's no meet up. There's no nothing- except the one-hundred percent guarantee that, somewhere down the road, I will find you, and I will kill you."

"Well, that will be a cold comfort to your dead husband."

"I told him to let me go. So whatever jam he's in now, that is his problem."

"Yeah, well, I'll be sure to pass that on to him while I'm slitting his throat."

"Yeah, you do that, 'cause he knows me. And he knows damn sure that if I'm one thing, I'm a woman of my word."

I hung up the phone without letting him get in another word.

⁘

I made a stop in Kill Deer, North Dakota where I proceeded to get in a bar fight and knocked out one of the bouncers before leaving. As I stepped out of the bar, a couple teenage boys ran past me, one of them bumping into me.

"Move, grandma," he said.

"Kids, am I right?" a familiar voice asked as the boys continued down the sidewalk. "In my day, we respected our elders. Of course, back then, anyone over 30 was ancient. Now 40-year-olds are still living with Mommy, lying on OKCupid, and taking pictures of their food."

"What do you want, Crowley?" I snarled, not looking at him.

"A chat," he replied. "We need to talk about your... anger management issues."

Rolling my eyes, I followed him to another bar where we could talk without any problems.

"Two shots here. And he'll have something fancy, with your tiniest umbrella," I ordered from the bartender.

"So... How you been feeling? On edge? Pent up? Unfulfilled?"

"You sound like a Viagra commercial," I quipped. "You know that, right?"

"I'm talking about the Mark," Crowley huffed in frustration. "It changed you."

"I've noticed," I smirked, flashing my black eyes.

"And I know you want to keep the party going," the other demon continued as I blinked the black away. "You want to have fun, fun, fun, till Daddy takes the black eyes away. The fact is... you need to kill now. Not want to, not choose to- need to."

The bartender came back with our drinks then, setting them down in front of us.

"There you go."

"Dánke," Crowley thanked him, then addressed me once more. "Face it, darling. You're an addict. Death is your drug. And you're gonna spend the rest of your life chasing that dragon."

"So?" I downed a shot.

"So... I'm here to facilitate."

I downed my other shot, then looked over at him.

"You want me to kill for you."

"I want you to kill for us. Look... you're going to snap eventually. The anger, the bloodlust is gonna build up in you until you can't take it anymore, and then... So, the question is, do you want to spike a civilian or someone who has it coming?"

"Like who?"

Crowley pulled out his phone, setting it down on the bar so I could see the picture of a woman.

"Like... Mindy Morris. Caring mother... Loving wife... Cheating trollop. After her husband, Lester, discovered Mindy's liaison amoureuse, heated words were exchanged. In the end, Mindy wanted a divorce... fifty percent of everything. But Lester-"

"Lester would rather give up his soul than half of his junk," I finished.

"We live in a very materialistic world," Crowley nodded. "Mindy's gonna die one way or the other. Why not take the job- feed the beast."

"Fine," I agreed. "One time deal."

I stood up to leave and Crowley turned, grabbing my attention once more.

"Oh, there's something else that I need to share with you."

⁘

I watched Mindy through the window of Lester's house, the First Blade clutched in my hand. Just as I was about to make my move, however, I became distracted by a pair of headlights. Ducking out of sight, I observed for a moment as Lester sat in the driver's seat of the car in the driveway, waiting. Rolling my eyes, I made my way over to car and climbed into the passenger seat.

"Hey! Hey!" he protested.

"Let me guess- Lester," I looked over at him.

"I... Who are you?"

"Who do you think?" I asked him, showing off my demon eyes.

"Whoa," Lester said, then pointed back at the house. "Ohh!"

"Ohh!" I chorused with him mockingly. "What the hell are you doing here, man?"

"Well, my contact..." Lester looked at me and winked. "Yeah, he, uh- he told me that, uh, this was happening, so I just wanted to come down and make sure it gets done right."

He emphasized the last three words with his hand.

"Ah. 'Cause you're the expert, huh?" I jabbed at him. "Listen- and this is murder 101- when you hire someone to kill your wife, you don't want to be around when the hit goes down. It's called an alibi."

"Yeah, I know what an alibi is. I watch 'Franklin & Bash'."

"Super," I rolled my eyes. "Listen, you sold your soul for this crap, so-"

I jabbed a thumb over my shoulder as he cut me off.

"It's not crap. It's my life. And she flushed it down the toilet."

"Les..." I turned in my seat to face him, "I'm going to say something to you. I need you to really listen to me. You're a loser. Your lady in there- she's a North Dakota 8. You're a 4 1/2, max. Now, I don't blame her for stepping out- especially if she found you were messing around first."

"No. Oh, no," he denied, shaking his head. "I- I wasn't... Uh- how'd you know?"

"Well, you just got that, uh, pervy, 'I'd do anything to nail my secretary' look."

"Oh. No. T-that's- it's different when guys do it."

"Really?" I asked, not buying his crap.

"Yeah," he said like I was stupid. "It's called 'science'."

"Oh," I nodded my head mockingly.

"Men aren't built for monogamy... because of evolution. We're- we're- we're programmed, you know, to- to spread our seed."

I punched him in anger, making his mouth bleed as his face hit the window.

"Ohh! Ow!"

"Like I said- loser with a capital 'L'- rhymes with 'you suck'."

"Yeah, well, you're a punk-ass demon!" Lester growled, growing angry. "And you work for me now. So get in there and do your job, you freak!"

I fixed him with an icy glare, voice menacing.

"And what are you gonna do? You gonna watch, huh? Is that what you like to do, Lester? Watch? Well, watch this."

In one fluid motion, I brought out the First Blade, burying it in his chest.