The Unlikeable Demon Hunter Collection: Books 1-6: A Complete Paranormal Romantic Comedy Series

by Deborah Wilde

  “Is my son treating you well?” Dev fixed an expectant eye on me.

  Rohan tilted his head, trying not to smirk.

  “He is,” I said brightly. Then, for Rohan’s ears only I added: “Dependent on his remembrance of certain cosmically important imminent events.”

  “Maybe when Rohan comes back for the tournament, you can accompany him,” Dev said.

  “Great idea,” Rohan said as I gave my best non-committal smile.

  The other men laughed. We said our goodbyes and hung up.

  I facepalmed. Then groaned and rubbed my face. “I can’t believe you let me meet your dad and godfather with cinnamon sugar on my nose.”

  “Relax.” Rohan tugged my hand away from my face. “They loved you. I know it was unexpected, but thank you for being so nice.”

  I brushed the remaining sugar off my nose. “I wasn’t being nice. I liked them. Hanging with them is probably like watching a comedy routine.”

  “Too true. Thanks, anyway. It means a lot to me that you get along and you don’t mind sharing me with them.”

  Sure, harmony between the girlfriend and the parental units was a good thing but his words fed into the low-grade ball of unease churning me up these days. Ro had whole-heartedly always embraced who he was. It was an amazing quality and a lot of why, as a rock star, he was so passionate and such a great singer-songwriter. He’d owned every inch of his identity.

  Then he’d walked away cold turkey. Yes, he’d been messed up after Asha’s death and he’d become Rasha, and those were both valid reasons, but it was like he’d totally shed something essential about himself for something else. He was a rock star until he wasn’t. Then he was a hunter. Now he was inviting me to Los Angeles and really pleased that I got along with his family. That was super sweet, but I was terrified that with his faith in the Brotherhood crumbling, our really new relationship was his latest extreme, because damn, he was just going all in at warp speed.

  I fixed my ponytail. “I’m gonna take a shower before we go demon hunting. Then I’ll make us both dinner. There’s still some Chickeny Delight.”

  “Yum.”

  I waited.

  “I’m looking forward to it.”

  I waited some more.

  Rohan pushed me toward the house. “Yes, I’ll make us dinner.”

  I blew him a kiss, braced myself, and headed inside to pick up my show and tell. After today’s zizu visit, Dr. Gelman didn’t get to be off the radar anymore.

  I wiped my palms off on my shorts and knocked on Rabbi Abram’s office door on the ground floor.

  “Hello?” His voice floated out from Ms. Clara’s office.

  I switched directions and pushed her door open. My Jewish Dumbledore was ransacking Ms. Clara’s desk drawers. He wore one of his many black suits, a kippah bobby-pinned to his thinning white hair.

  Ms. Clara’s office was a shrine to order and symmetry, from the striking framed photos of Vancouver that were never even a millimeter crooked to her custom-made drawer organizers. “You mess up her desk, Rabbi, and she’ll kill you.”

  Our resident administrator moonlighted as an in-demand dominatrix, though if Rabbi Abrams didn’t know that about her, I wasn’t going to enlighten him. Ms. Clara was currently in Jerusalem, ostensibly at a meeting of Brotherhood admins. Wild, unfulfilled sexual tension with Tree Trunk, a.k.a. Baruch Ya’ari, weapons specialist and my adored mentor and friend who was based there at Brotherhood HQ, was a totally secondary agenda.

  Rabbi Abrams stroked his longish, white beard with gnarled fingers. “Help me find my Kit Kats, Navela. A good Kosher treat.”

  The faint smell of butterscotch wrapped around him so he’d already dipped into the candy today. “No way. I got the run-down. Diabetes runs in your family.”

  “Et tu, Brute?”

  I dropped my glance to my feet, ashamed.

  “What’s wrong?” He squinted at the hard cannonball saxophone case in my hand, containing all my evidence that I’d retrieved from upstairs. “What is that?”

  I perched on the edge of the seat across the desk from him and motioned for him to sit. “I have some stuff to catch you up on.”

  He lowered his ancient, frail body into Ms. Clara’s Aeron chair. “And you think I need to be seated?” He chuckled, his laughter dying off at my somber expression, and nodded for me to continue.

  I lay the large sax case across my lap, fiddling with the clasps.

  “Tell me.”

  So I did. It wasn’t exactly Once Upon a Time, but there were plenty of monsters. It had all started when we’d been in Prague tracking Samson King to prove he was a demon and not just an A-list celebrity. Rabbi Abrams had confirmed that Ari was still an initiate but the regular Brotherhood induction ritual hadn’t worked so he’d told me to contact Dr. Gelman, also visiting the city for a physics conference.

  Dr. Gelman had a way to induct Ari and we’d had a couple meetings. During one of them, she’d slipped me a swirled green glass amulet, fairly unremarkable except for the etching of a hamsa on the inside.

  Soon after, I’d been attacked by a gogota demon sporting the spiffy new modification of a metal spine. Kind of like stegosaurus spikes attached to its back that made it harder to hit its kill spot. The demon had been gunning for me, crying “Vashar!” which I later learned was the amulet’s name. When I went to see Dr. Gelman, her hotel room was trashed and gogota slime crusted the curtains. She’d gone off-grid after that, contacting me once via letter with the instructions for the induction ritual. I’d been trying to find her ever since.

  Demons weren’t team players at the best of times, and they certainly weren’t going to aid and abet the Brotherhood. The only way the gogota had come after me was because it was bound and forced to do someone’s bidding. I’d still had to prove it though, so I’d traded a demonic dog collar for the actual gogota demon that had attacked Dr. Gelman, since I’d killed the one that had gone after me. Then I’d tracked down a spell to test for magic signatures. Magic came in three colors: red for witches, pink for Rasha, and blue for demons and this spell let the caster determine which had been used on an object.

  There were no traces of magic on the metal spine, meaning the modification had been manual not magic. However, Rohan had dusted the spine for prints and come up with a partial print matching a Rasha, now deceased, called Ferdinand Alves. When we’d tested the gogota itself, however, the spell revealed purple magic.

  The spell also turned a yaksas horn that had come from Rohan’s Askuchar mission in Pakistan purple. That assignment had been brutal with the entire village being slaughtered and the Brotherhood ordering Ro and the other Rasha to burn the bodies and destroy the evidence. The attacks hadn’t made sense; gogota were simple demons who wouldn’t think big picture enough to care about an amulet that stopped Rasha induction rituals, and the yaksas’ assault had been too targeted and out of their normal hunting ground to fall within a normal pattern for them. Factor in a witch binding demons, however, and you got a simple, plausible solution.

  Rabbi Abrams listened without interruption to my story, his face growing whiter than his hair.

  I faltered a couple of times, concerned the man was going to croak, but I continued through to the grand finale of the ticking clock prophecy. I’d opened the sax case and spread the spine, the gogota’s fingertip, and the fragment of horn out on the desk. “Rohan already has the name of the Rasha whose print it was. He’s investigating that angle but I need to find Dr. Gelman. I need her help to figure out who this witch is. I was hoping you’d talk to her sister and find out–”

  “You think my Executive is behind this?” Rabbi Abrams touched his finger to a metal spike with a shaking hand. “That they would deliberately send demons to destroy an innocent village? Demons that need no encouragement to be bloodthirsty?”

  I bit my lip. “I didn’t say–”

  He spun his chair around, his back to me.

  I waited, hoping he just needed a moment to digest all of this, but
no, I’d been dismissed. Out in the corridor, I pressed my forehead into the cool plaster, wondering if I’d just made a horrible mistake.

  Chapter 5

  “What a dump.” I rubbed gum off the bottom of my shoe, standing in the doorway to the empty back room in the run-down diner that Elliot had sworn was the only place he’d ever met up with Aida.

  As we stepped into the main part of the restaurant, my stomach lurched at the smell of rancid frying oil. Two guys in blue mechanic’s overalls sat in one of the booths, but the rest of the ten tables were unoccupied. Faded B-movie posters hung on beige walls in need of repainting.

  The grizzled cook flipped pancakes. “Help you?”

  Rohan marched up to the counter. “We’re supposed to meet Aida.”

  “She’s not here.”

  “When’s she back?” I asked.

  He shrugged, scraping some black grease off the edge of his metal spatula, and not bothering to look at me.

  I rapped on the laminate counter. “I asked you a question.”

  It wasn’t so much the tone of my voice when I spoke as the fact that he saw the crescent-shaped birthmark on my cheek that made him jump to attention. Painted-on, but he didn’t know that. If wreta didn’t enthrall you with their secretion, they enjoyed a good intimidation. I was counting on him having experienced the latter firsthand.

  “She’s not coming back. Told me last night she was wrapping things up and leaving.”

  “Where to?” Rohan said.

  “No clue.” He wiped his hands on his grimy apron.

  I strode around the counter and the cook shrank back against the grill. “Got a home address for her?”

  One of the men glanced our way but the customers were more interested in shoveling food into their mouths than being good Samaritans.

  The cook held the spatula out against me like a shield and shook his head. “No clue. I swear.”

  We patrolled bustling downtown thoroughfares, sketchy alleyways reeking of urine with men and women shooting up next to dumpsters, upscale clubs with ESL students from the numerous schools in the downtown core dancing in large groups, and those bars you only went to when you were already really drunk and couldn’t get in anywhere else. There was no sign of Aida.

  Or any other demon.

  “I refuse to believe that every demon in the city simultaneously took the night off.” The scarcity of evil spawn was troubling. There hadn’t even been any sign of those demons that flew at your face in a blur in the summer twilight that most people mistook for asshole wasps, who sucked seconds off your life as they zipped past. I seriously hated demons.

  I plodded along like the walking dead, my head woozy and my shoulders weighted down like a lead jacket, passing two dudes in Henleys, ripped jeans, and distressed buckle boots, who’d probably spent way too many hours playing Guitar Hero. They screamed drunken obscenities at each other, their faces inches apart, spittle flying, as a group of girls in miniskirts, arms thrown around their crying, raccoon-eyed friend, weighed in on the relative assholery of one of the men.

  Watching the heartbroken girl, sobs wracking her slender frame, was physically painful. I reached for Rohan’s hand.

  The guy on the right stumbled back, his hands outstretched to the crying girl, his expression pleading as he told he loved her.

  She dashed away her tears with short angry jabs. “You love the idea of me.”

  Rohan squeezed my fingers; I’d let go of him.

  The couple held a look that bore no sign of recrimination from either of them, just tragic acknowledgment of an ending. My heart twisted; a black-and-white bad guy would have made this easier.

  He half-raised his hand in a wave. The girl nodded, and her friends sprung into motion, ushering her away and leaving him alone in the middle of the street.

  Rohan pulled me tight against him as we turned off the bright lights and noisy crush of the Granville strip. “Let’s not ever be them, okay?” He blinked too slowly, bleary-eyed and unshaven. “Nava?”

  I slid my arm around his waist matching my strides to his. “Of course not.” I looked up at him. “Want to call it a night?”

  “Yeah.”

  We blasted the A/C and I made Ro sing along to my dad’s favorite shitty soft rock station to prove he was still awake while driving. After the third 70s power ballad about imploding love, I changed it to talk radio and feigned a deep interest in the state of toll bridges here in the Lower Mainland.

  Back at the mansion, I flung my clothes off and collapsed into Rohan’s bed. This was my second night of a lack of sleep and I hadn’t had the energy to climb my stairs. The boyfriend had refused my reasonable request to carry me, so his bed it was.

  I stared up at the ceiling, hating this entire day. “You think Rabbi Abrams still likes me?”

  “Yes.” Rohan turned off the lamp, moonlight streaming in through his blinds. He motioned for me to turn on to my side, then spooned me. “He won’t sic the Brotherhood on you.”

  Ro shifted to let me stuff my feet between his legs and I twisted my hair up tight so it didn’t attack him.

  I pulled his arm across me. “I know none of what’s happened is my fault, but it’s all blowing open because of me.” I sighed. “He’s not answering my calls.”

  “Mine either. But he needed to know.”

  “And if he didn’t, it’s too late now.” I rubbed my eyes, taking the edge off the curl of fatigue that clawed behind my eyeballs. Tossing and turning, I sank into a sweaty sleep.

  I woke up an hour later by myself in a cold bed. The thin red file folder on Rohan’s dresser with the little bit of information he’d amassed on Ferdinand Alves was gone. I threw my “Karma is like 69. You get what you give.” T-shirt on over boyshorts and crept through the house towards the voices filtering out from the library.

  I peered in at Kane and Rohan from the safety of the shadows by the door. Through Kane’s pink mesh tank top, I glimpsed the black wings tattooed on his back, though not their flame-licked tips or the scorched feathers fallen to the base of his spine.

  Rohan twisted the folder. “His print was on that damn spine. There’s got to be something we can follow up. Look again.”

  I winced. Wrong tone, Snowflake. Ro knew better. He was a performer; he could read his audience no problem.

  Kane planted his hands on his denim-clad hips. “I have looked. Date of birth and current status listed as deceased. There was a list of his missions and all the chapter houses Alves was assigned to, with Los Angeles as the one on record for the past year. Standard info. That’s it.”

  “Impossible. I’ve never heard of him. It’s a lie.”

  “Then it’s a lie. Look, I’m sweaty, tired, and this pink body glitter itches. So–”

  “Sure. Wash off. Sleep. Don’t let some Rasha’s betrayal interfere with you fucking your way through every guy in Vancouver.”

  The scent of salt that flooded the air was so strong that my eyes watered. Kane’s skin turned iridescent purple, coated with his magic poison. “Come again?”

  Rohan stepped back. He rubbed the back of his neck. “Sorry, man. I just–fuck.”

  I pressed against the wall, letting the shadows cover me as Rohan blew past, headed downstairs. He was bound for the Vault to blow off steam. Again.

  I crawled back into bed but sleep was a long time coming.

  Waking up Sunday morning was a painful experience. I stomped into the kitchen, prepared to snarl at anyone that got between me and coffee. I flung open a cupboard, grabbed a mug, and did a double take.

  The paintbrush on the counter was back to its original color.

  “I’m guessing you heard our little chat?” Kane braced his hands at the top of the door-frame, leaning into the kitchen. His lime green pajama bottoms slid a tantalizing smidge down his hip and his bare chest showed off his perfect six-pack and the barbell jewelry in each nipple. His spiky hair was a bed-headed snarl. “Stop objectifying me. It’ll only depress you that you can’t have any of my magnif
icence.” He slapped his rock-hard abs.

  I mustered up a weak smile, worried that my relationship with Kane had been damaged by Rohan being a jerk. “About last night. I’m–”

  Kane plucked my empty mug out of my hands, effectively shutting me up. “Ro’s his own person. Just because you’re dating doesn’t mean you have to apologize for him. You’re not responsible for him.” He poured himself coffee.

  Wasn’t that what happened when you were in a couple? You apologized for the other person? Or had that just been me for my ex, Cole, especially near the end? I had all of one whopping teen relationship to draw on, and given how strong a personality Ro was and where we were in our lives, it wasn’t much of a guide. “I’m not sure how responsible he is for himself right now.”

  Kane took a stupid long time hogging the sugar. “He’s hyper-sensitive about anyone failing him. Don’t care. We’ve all got our hot buttons. He doesn’t have to keep repeating the same script.”

  Mature me did not point out his hypocrisy as he went into week three of not speaking to my brother. Besides, antagonizing him wasn’t going to get me the sugar any faster. I dumped a splash of milk in my coffee, then stood pressed up against him until he got annoyed enough to hand the green-glazed sugar jug over.

  I finally got that first delicious taste of caffeine, picked up the paintbrush, and ruffled my thumb through the bristles.

  “What’s so fascinating, babyslay?”

  “Last night this paintbrush was blue.”

  “Blue how?” Kane snagged a banana out of the bowl on the counter and unpeeled it.

  “Signature spell.”

  “It should still be blue.” He swallowed about half in one bite while I limited my inappropriate thoughts to a scant dozen or so.

  I sipped my coffee. “You’d think.”

  Ari walked in, already dressed in black on black. Shocking. “Morning, Nee.” His eyes flicked over Kane’s chest for the barest second.