The Trouble With Black Cats and Demons

by Kat Simons

  She groaned as she settled on the cushions and closed her eyes, leaning her head back. “Don’t answer my questions if you don’t want to,” she muttered. “Since Sheldon is dead, I don’t suppose it matters anymore.”

  “He’s dead?”

  The surprise in Jaxer’s voice had her opening her eyes. “You didn’t go clean up?”

  “I did. I didn’t see Sheldon.”

  “We left his body in the doorway,” Deacon said, frowning.

  Cary sat up. “You swear you didn’t see it?” she asked Jaxer.

  “I’d hardly lie about that.” But he was frowning too.

  “Shit.” She looked at Deacon. “He was dead, right?”

  “You didn’t check?” Jaxer had the audacity to sound annoyed.

  She gave him a deadpan stare. “Broken ribs. Remember?”

  “I didn’t check closely, either,” Deacon said. “I assumed, but was too worried about Cary to double check. I didn’t hear a heartbeat or breathing, though.”

  “Oh, this can’t be good,” she said mostly to herself. That little shit knew what she was.

  “I’ll handle it,” Jaxer assured, sitting on the couch next to her, casually dropping an arm around her shoulders.

  She scowled at him but was too tired to shrug him off.

  The sound of Deacon’s growl raised the hairs on the back of her neck. She turned to see a scary dangerous glare hardening his handsome feature. Oh boy.

  “Take your hands off my mate,” he said to Jaxer.

  “You’re what?” Jaxer said, his voice deepening.

  To her surprise, he actually did move his arm, but mostly to stand up and face off with Deacon.

  She groaned. There was way too much testosterone poisoning in the room. She really didn’t feel up to this. “Guys, guys. Dial it down or get out of my house. You’re scaring the dogs.” She could here Buck growling, and Pickles had started to howl.

  Since Buck was a demon dog and Pickles a foo lion, upsetting them was not a good idea. Though she suspected Fred, the mundane mutt, would be the most dangerous one of the pack.

  Jaxer let some of the tension ease from his body and smirked. Deacon remained ridged and glaring.

  She rolled her eyes. “Maybe someone might want to go look into the missing wizard while I heal?” she suggested.

  “Don’t worry, sweetie, I’ll handle him.”

  Sweetie from Jaxer again. What the hell was wrong with everyone today? She turned into a lust-crazed idiot around Deacon. Jaxer called her sweetie and kissed her on the mouth. Deacon had this bizarre idea she was his mate. Next thing she knew the Nags would stop…well, nagging.

  Then she’d know for sure the End Times were upon them.

  With a slight head shake, she relaxed back into the couch. She was too tired for all this. She needed to rest so her ribs would stitch back together. She might heal faster than a normal human, but it still took some time. After that, she’d work out the tangled strangeness. There had to be a reason for it all, she was just too achy to think clearly right now.

  “Why are you here, Deacon?” Jaxer asked.

  Couldn’t they take a hint a go away? She opened her eyes. “Jaxer, let it go. Deacon, thanks for checking on me. Now, could the two of you please leave? I have sleep I need to get to.”

  Deacon lifted a bag in his hand she hadn’t noticed before. “You forgot your prescription.”

  “Oh.” Oops. She must be getting too used to pain that she’d completely forgotten the extra drugs. “Thanks.”

  He smiled as he set the bag down on the coffee table and Cary had to blink a few times. Wow. With a grin like that, he could rule the world.

  Jaxer cleared his throat when the silence between her and Deacon carried on just a little too long for company. “Do you need anything else before we go, sweetie?”

  “Yes. Stop calling me sweetie.”

  Jaxer gave her a heavy-lidded, crooked smile that had probably felled stronger women than her. Though why he was flashing that at her, she had no idea. Maybe it was just because Deacon was here. From the very quiet growl the shifter let out, she suspected that was the real reason behind Jaxer’s suddenly flirty behavior.

  “Back off, faery. She’s mine.”

  She looked at Deacon, eyebrows raised. Oh really? She was about to comment aloud on his presumptuousness when a familiar shiver moved down her spine and dread settled in her gut.

  “Oh no.” She narrowed her eyes and rose slowly. “Not now.”

  4

  Cary glared at the two exquisitely stunning newcomers standing in the center of her living room. She flicked a quick glance at Jaxer who was leaning against the fireplace mantle, his gaze trained on the arrivals, his expression impossible to read. She knew her own was not so neutral as she faced her unwelcome visitors.

  Mutinous was probably the most apt description.

  Her bosses. The beings who’d tricked her into becoming a Protector more than six years ago.

  They made only a minimal effort to appear human, but they were incredibly beautiful in a way she always found hard to describe. Like the beauty of nature itself, but turned up. They belonged to a species of Fae native to North America and had been known to different Native American tribes by different names. Her favorite came from the Passamaquoddy. They called them the Nagumwasuck, which Cary had taken great delight in shortening to the Nags. Since they were.

  She had a real love-hate relationship with them. They tried to do good, and for that she admired them. But she wasn’t all that happy with their sense of timing.

  “No,” she told them before either could say a word. “I’m hurt, I’m tired, and I’m not doing anything for at least forty-eight hours, so just go away and come back when my ribs have healed.” She held their gazes, ignoring Deacon—with a great deal of effort—when she felt him move up behind her.

  “Protector,” Wisat said, in a patient tone that set her teeth on edge. He was all black and red, his skin a shade of red not typically found in nature, his robe and short hair black as midnight. His eyes were an unreal green that stood out like glowing glass against his skin. Two interwoven red halos covered in soft, velvet-like fuzz crowned his scalp. “Would we come to you if the need wasn’t great?” he asked.

  Yes, yes they would. “Wisat, I need time to recover.”

  “And whose fault is that?” Liruk said, her tone significantly less patient. She had long white hair, hanging to the ground like a veil against the shimmering pearl of her robe. Her skin was a deep, golden brown, her eyes the same green as Wisat’s. Where Wisat had halos, Liruk had two little golden horns sticking out through the mass of her hair.

  Liruk had never understood Cary’s reluctance to fully embrace the job of Protector, so her intolerance for what she considered Cary’s stubborn eccentricities colored most of their dealings. Occasionally, Cary could say she got along with Liruk. But she preferred Wisat.

  Except at the moment. Right then, she didn’t want to see either one of them. Not when they were pointing out—again!—that she wasn’t good enough at her job to avoid injury. It was their fault she was doing this job. Telling her repeatedly that she sucked at it was not a good way to endear them to her.

  “It’s my fault Cary got hurt,” Jaxer volunteered. “I didn’t tell her everything I should have about Sheldon when I sent her in.”

  Cary glanced sharply at her mentor. He usually left her to take the heat from the Nags on her own. Having Jaxer come to her defense now was a surprise. But she hated being under-informed in front of the Nags. Liruk gave her enough grief as it was because Cary had spent the last six years studying and still didn’t know everything she needed to know to do her job.

  “And she saved my life,” Deacon said from behind her. “While I was doing a favor for you and Jaxer. She deserves a rest. And she needs a lot more than forty-eight hours.”

  “She heals fast,” Liruk said to Deacon, her tone matter-of-fact. “She will be better soon.”

  “We need her today,�
� Wisat said. “There is someone who will require your protection, Cary.”

  “Today?” She let out a little sigh. What could she do? This was her job, Portland her territory.

  Technically, she had to do what the Nags required of her. They were her bosses. Whether she’d actually applied for her current position or not was beside the point. Saying no when she could probably still manage to protect someone wasn’t an option.

  Which irritated the hell out of her.

  “For the moment, we just need you to keep an eye on him,” Wisat said with his usual patience.

  “He isn’t in immediate danger,” Liruk added, her voice softening as well. “But we are sure he will be. Very soon.”

  “Fine.” She blew out a resigned breath. “What do you know about him? Where do I find him?”

  “I’ll take care of the initial watch,” Jaxer said, pushing away from the fireplace. “She won’t be any good to you exhausted and hurt. I can look after this guy until she’s healed.”

  Cary tilted her head to one side. For the first time since last night, she didn’t feel like killing her mentor. “Jaxer. That’s really nice of you.”

  He shrugged, a graceful lifting of the shoulders, and grinned with his usual charming arrogance. “I got you hurt sending you to rescue the leopard boy. I can watch one human for a day to pay you back.”

  She rolled her eyes at his leopard boy comment but was glad he’d finally apologized. Sort of. As much as Jaxer usually did. And since he was helping her, she let her murderous plans for his future ease back to something less final.

  The Nags gave her a brief rundown on the person she needed to protect—a thirteen-year-old boy with a very interesting talent.

  “He can speak with animals and call them to him? What a cool skill. Why is he in need of protection?” she asked.

  Liruk and Wisat exchanged a look, and Cary frowned. That look didn’t bode well for her.

  “We aren’t entirely sure where the danger is coming from,” Wisat admitted after a moment. “Only that there is danger.”

  “The boy is innocent now,” Liruk added. “His gift is neutral, neither good nor bad. He could still go either way.”

  “We wouldn’t want him exposed to the wrong influences,” Wisat said.

  “At thirteen?” Cary snorted. “The entire world is a bad influence on a kid that age. Anything else I need to know?”

  “The danger will be to the boy, not to others because of the boy. At first.” Liruk frowned, a very slight expression that did nothing to mar her incredible beauty. “The omens have been vague on the exact nature of the danger.”

  That was the problem with omens and premonitions. They were frequently too vague to be useful. The Nags were very good at looking after humans and other magical beings. It’s what they did. What they’d done for centuries. Cary had never fully understood why, but the fact that they tried counted for something.

  They created the Protectors, who were mostly humans, and assigned them mentors, mostly from the magical races, who had experience in all aspects of the preternatural world. Her mentor was a faery. Another Protector’s mentor could be a goblin, a leprechaun, an elf, a witch—any creature experienced with working in the mystical realms. She wasn’t sure how they picked the mentors. Jaxer had never told her how he’d met the Nags nonetheless how he’d started working with them—even when she’d ask him point blank.

  For their part, her bosses detected danger to other creatures through omens, premonitions, and sometimes a little old-fashioned research. Then they sent the Protectors in to save the day.

  Obviously, the system wasn’t flawless or there’d never be another child abuse case or murder in the world. They couldn’t take care of everything, everywhere, all the time, for everyone. Often the signs of danger were so ephemeral they weren’t able to pinpoint a person or place to send help. And there were a limited number of Protectors.

  But the Nags tried. For what it was worth. And because they continued to do what they did century after century, Cary had always admired them. She wasn’t too crazy about the way they’d tricked her into her current job, but that was another issue.

  Wisat gave Jaxer the boy’s address, a not great but not rotten neighborhood in the southwest part of the city. “If something happens, I’ll contact Cary.” Jaxer winked at her. “I could probably manage a little magic of my own in the meantime.”

  She snorted. Jaxer’s best magic was glamour. He was better even than most other faeries at making people see and experience what he wanted them to. His illusions were so potent, they felt real. Through careful use of his talent, Jaxer could get almost anyone to do anything he wanted. For a short period of time anyway. A scary enough power all by itself. But he definitely had other tricks up his sleeve.

  “The boy’s name is Jonathon Webber,” Wisat said, and started a short lecture on the proper ways to protect someone without revealing oneself. Jaxer cut him off with a rude comment and the official briefing came to an abrupt end as Liruk and Jaxer got into a word duel.

  Once everyone was out of her house—Deacon, to her surprise, going with Jaxer to help watch the boy—Cary made sure the dogs were happy in the backyard, then went to bed. She slept for ten hours, got up long enough to eat a bowl of soup, kick a ball around in the yard with the dogs, carefully, so as not to hurt her ribs, took another painkiller, and went back to bed.

  Sometime in the middle of the night, Deacon’s scent invaded her dreams. Without opening her eyes, she could picture him in the dark, near her bedroom door, watching her. And because she was still asleep, she wasn’t the least bit afraid. Why shouldn’t Deacon be in her room in the middle of the night? He was her mate.

  “What are you doing here?” she murmured.

  “I wanted to make sure you were okay. Still breathing.”

  “That’s nice.” She felt the bed dip next to her.

  “Are you?” he asked.

  A feather touch glided across her cheek. “Am I what?”

  “Okay?” Humor crept into his deep voice.

  “Mmm… Yes. Sleepy. You smell nice.”

  “You do, too.”

  She felt the press of firm lips on her forehead, the wash of warm breath across her cheek. “Did you find Jonathon?” she murmured even as the feel of his lips made her hum in the back of her throat.

  “We did. Jaxer is watching him tonight.”

  “You aren’t with him?”

  “I needed to check on you.”

  “Oh. I’m fine. Sleepy.”

  “I’ll let you get back to sleep now.”

  “Stay. You’re warm.” She shifted closer to his heat, curling around his body where he sat on the bed next to her. She drifted for a moment, savoring the warmth. She couldn’t feel her damaged ribs and her brain floated in a wash of contentment.

  “I wish I could stay,” he murmured into her hair. “But you need your rest. I’ll come back in the morning. Should I bring you breakfast?”

  “Yes. Bagels.”

  “With cream cheese and lox?”

  “No fish. Cream cheese. Donuts.”

  “You want donuts, too?”

  “Mmm… Donuts.”

  “Bagels and donuts it is, then.”

  Cary pressed her face into his heat, breathing deep to pull in his scent, and drifted into another dream.

  When she finally woke, light streamed in through a crack in the curtains and the clock on her cellphone told her it was ten in the morning. She groaned, stretched, then sat up, testing her ribs and bruises. Better. Much better. Sleeping for most of a twenty-four hour period could do that for a girl.

  Good dreams helped, too.

  She stared at the sage green curtains covering her window. He was sneaking into her dreams already. She shook her head. She was in a world of trouble were that man was concerned. And she had no idea what to do about it or why it was even happening.

  She’d hoped to wake up and miraculously understand why she reacted to him the way she did, why she wanted h
im around, why thoughts of him made her stomach tighten with anticipation. They’d met two nights ago. She knew nothing about him beyond his job, that he was a leopard shifter, and that he looked delicious naked. The mate business seemed too far-fetched. Some weird shifter pickup line maybe? But there was something different about Deacon and her reaction to him.

  On the plus side, she’d be able to talk to him about her day. That was unique. There were only a handful of people she trusted with her secret identity. Even her parents didn’t know what she really did. They thought she was a research assistant for one of her old college professors who was working on a series of popular science books. Her younger sister Valerie knew. And her three best friends knew. Jaxer, of course, though she wasn’t sure he counted. Her computer guru Chris knew, but that was because Chris worked for the Nags, too.

  But never a partner, never a man she could be completely open with.

  She groaned and turned to stare up at the ceiling. She couldn’t even find a good doctor. What made her think she’d be able to find a man to fit into her weird, chaotic life?

  With a grunt of irritation, she swung out of bed and wandered into the bathroom, determined to put Deacon out of her mind for the morning. She had a job to do. That meant she had to be awake and focused.

  Which meant coffee.

  On her way to the kitchen, the dogs jumped from their beds in the living room under the big picture window that looked out into her backyard and follow her. All three sat patiently waiting to be let out as she crossed to the coffee machine.

  “Be with you in just a sec, guys,” she said as she got her required caffeine fix ready. “You all hungry?”

  Fred the mutt, a cross between a collie and a terrier, barked and jumped up, his smallish size belying his large and energetic personality. Her basset hound who was actually a retired foo lion, Pickles, scratched her ear. Buck, the demon dog currently in the shape of a normal sized blond Labrador, thumped his tail on the floor twice. Chuckling, she flicked the coffeemaker on and went through the mudroom to the back door. She opened the screen, then screeched in shock.