Poker Face

Chapter Four

Raise

Patty crouched as Lady fired at the demon who reached out of the wall to crush her head. Her ears gave her a splitting agony at the sound of it, still stabbing with pain over Dante's guns rupturing her eardrum. She smelt ozone and heard a crack, lightning flashing overhead to finish the demon off. It was barely four seconds before it was replaced by three more.

"What's going on?" Patty demanded as anyone that was out on the street outside the hotel ran for their lives.

"What's it look like?" Lady snapped, pulling a massive missile launcher off of her bike and loading to fire. Trish covered her with her bullets wrapped in electricity. "Whoever wants to summon Mundus wants you!" She fired it down the throat of another three armed, muscly and mucusy opponent, causing it's insides to explode outside.

"Stay down," Trish ordered, summoning another thunderbolt and frying another demon to a charry mess.

"You ladies have your hands full?" a voice asked calmly.

"You idiot, would you lend a hand already?" Lady demanded.

"You're doing it wrong," Dante chuckled, lifting his hands as if it were obvious.

"Make with the doing it right then, genius!"

"Sure." Dante lifted Patty up and put a gun to her head.

"What are you doing?" she hissed.

"Dante, what the hell?" Lady snapped.

"Look," Trish said, pointing to the forces of the Underworld.

They were retreating.

"Wha...?" Patty breathed, nearly swooning from the intoxicating smell of Dante's coat and the strength of his hands. Flashbacks to the hot tub streaked across her memory and warmed her face, but after an eternal instant, the contact ended as Dante replaced the gun into it's hidden holster under his coat.

"They want her alive," Dante explained. "Looks like the seals need to be taken care of."

"You're going to need help with this one," Lady laughed.

"And get into deeper debt with you? No thank you."

"You can't stop Mundus by yourself," Trish said quietly. "Last time even you needed that extra boost of my power."

"I'm not hiring either one of you."

"We're partners on occasion, I don't see the problem," Trish reminded him with a wink.

"I suppose our interest runs in the same vein," Lady finally said begrudgingly. "This isn't free work, this is necessity after all..."

"I'm confused, just what exactly did you find out, Dante?" Patty asked.

"You've got a leech, Posh."

"I have no idea what that means."

"Come on, I'll explain in Patty's suite. There's a mini bar there, right?"

The women groaned as they followed him to the elevator, not looking forward to his "I told you so" explanation. It wouldn't have been so bad if he wasn't always so goddamn right. Lady looked as if she were ready to pout, Trish wouldn't make eye contact, and Patty concentrated on her feet, ashamed and thrilled at how aroused just a benign touch from Dante had made her.

Dante could only suppress a smug smirk for so long.

Patty let them into her suite and they sat around a large couch at a curve, then she went to make coffee for the Devil-Hunters to try and keep herself occupied as her mind reeled. Dante was already inspecting the minibar with curiosity.

"Are you going to explain in that smug tone of yours?" Lady finally asked.

"Gladly. You see, Mundus has placed a servant of his or something in this world to awaken twelve seals so he can have a shot at obliterating the earth again."

"We gathered that," Trish told him as he pulled out his cellphone.

"Morrison, what did you find out? … Eleven donations, right? … I thought so. Forward me the locations." He hung up and spiked his coffee with some vodka. "Somebody has been using Patty's name to make donations from her antique stash around the country."

"Why?" Patty asked. "And if this is identity theft, why are my bank accounts in perfect shape?"

"They don't want money," Dante told her. "They want to hide any seals they find from you. If you found out too soon, it would be easy work for you to go through your own inventory to sniff the seals out to destroy them. So they've been making small time donations in your name to scatter them, not in amounts noticeable to you."

"So what, we find the seals and destroy them?" Lady asked.

"Not if we want to keep Posh alive," Dante said, pointing to Patty's chest. With a blush, she buttoned her top button, forgetting that her breasts were practically hanging out in front of him.

"So what do we do?" Trish asked.

"Two things we can do," Dante said with a smirk. "But Posh won't like one of them."

"Try me," Patty snapped.

"Well we go on a wild goose chase for all these seals and I know a ritual that can deactivate them without destroying them," he explained. "Problem is we need them all in one place for that."

"That could take weeks of digging!" Patty complained.

"What's the other option?" Lady asked.

Dante only smirked again.

Trish smiled, covering her face with her hand to try and hide it. Then Lady realized what option two was and outright laughed out loud.

"I hate it when you guys know something I don't," Patty told them darkly. "What's the other way?"

Dante leaned in close over her so his lips were tickling her ear, making her want to shrink into herself with want. He whispered something in her ear and by sheer shock, received a slap across the face. "ABSOLUTELY NOT."

The Devil-Hunters all burst out laughing, even Dante, who rubbed his cheek in amusement.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh come on, you're practically drooling over him anyway!" Lady chuckled.

"That's preposterous – !"

"That's okay, one of us ladies could do it," Trish teased. "A woman knows what a woman wants anyway."

Patty could only stammer as she turned a bright red.

"What's the matter?" Dante asked. "Didn't I tell you I'd take you on a real date when you were all grown up?"

"Th-that's not..."

"Too funny," Lady jabbed.

"Well?"

Patty sort of jutted her chin a bit and then pulled out her cellphone. "Vidar? Yes, it's Patricia. I'd like a list of all the donations made from the company in the last four months. … Details please, addresses and names."

"Damn," Trish laughed.

Dante only smiled.

"You know if you suck it up and screw him, it's the easy way out," Lady told her. Patty ignored her, still burning in embarrassment.

"You could volunteer," Trish told her.

"I'm actually strait," Lady said with a smile.

"I'm not screwing anybody!" Patty snapped, hanging up her phone. "Are you guys helping me find these seals or not?"

Dante sighed and took a strait shot of tequila. "That's another five thousand up front. But if you decide to take the easy way, no charge haha..."

"Shut up!"

"You're doing this for free, asshat," Lady told him.

"No I'm not."

"Then you'll take it out of what you owe me."

"Fine, fine. But like I said, this is going to be a wild goose chase."

"Then it'll be a wild goose chase," Patty said firmly.

Dante shrugged. "Pity. But if that's the way you want it, so be it. Let's rest up and begin our search tomorrow, yeah?"

"Dibs on the couch," Lady called, throwing her feet up.

"Chair," Trish seconded.

Dante grinned. "Hey Patty – "

"No."

The hunters laughed as Patty got up and locked herself in her room, flustered.

"You have no luck in women, Dante," Lady mocked.

"I'm too nice," Dante replied.

"Too nice to seduce the girl?" Trish demanded. "It wouldn't be that hard you know. I can smell her want from here."

"Don't think I haven't noticed."

"So what's the issue?"

Dante just stared out the floor to ceiling windows as the moon rose over the city. "I'm just too nice," he repeated.

Patty leaned her back against the door and let out air through her nose slowly, heart fluttering.

"Dante..."