by D V Wolfe
“Fancy seeing you here,” I said, raising an eyebrow. I knew Gabe too well to question how he always knew where I was. He did the leg work for an Order of oracles, seers, diviners, and prophetic monks that basically twiddled their thumbs in their cloisters when they weren’t sending him out on a job. He probably placed one phone call and got my coordinates from one of them. It used to creep me out that his sources could always find me, but it’s come in handy before, so I didn’t think it would be good for my karma to complain.
Gabe paused at the table as if unsure if he’d be welcome. I leaned closer to the window, hoping Gabe would get my meaning but Noah wouldn’t notice. One for two. Gabe understood I was inviting him to sit down next to me, but Noah seemed to get it too and he grinned down at his waffles. I was going to pay for this later.
“I was in the neighborhood,” Gabe said. He’d slid into the booth and being a bear of a man, we were now hip to hip and knee to knee. I tried to push down the sudden dip in my stomach as I reached for the glass of water in front of me.
“Really?” I asked. I cut my eyes to him as I drank, using my prop to cover any flush of color that might be mistaken for blushing.
“Well. No,” Gabe said. He rubbed the back of his neck in a classic “Gabe tell” of awkwardness.
“Shocker,” I said. “Well, what’s the story, Morning Glory?”
Gabe sighed. He looked like he was mentally shuffling note cards with talking points, but he was saved, momentarily, by the waitress approaching. He ordered and when she left, he looked almost as if he’d lost his nerve.
“Out with it, Gracie,” I said.
“I have to head north for some Order business,” Gabe said.
“Ok,” I said. “Well, have a nice trip? Make sure and get a commemorative shot glass for Brother Paulus. Wait, can monks do shots of sacramental wine?”
Gabe put a finger to my lips. That got my dander up. I was torn between biting his finger and grabbing it to shove up his nose, but he quickly pulled it away and looked at me apologetically.
“Sorry,” Gabe said, “for a minute, I forgot who I was talking to.” What the hell did that mean? Did he have other people that he hung around with who put up with that stuff? Other women, who would just cower and apologize when he put a finger against their lips? It was probably a good thing that things were not getting serious between us. There probably would have been missing appendages involved.
“Anyway,” Gabe said, now looking so far beyond “awkward” that he probably couldn’t see “awkward” in his rearview mirror. “I just wanted you to know. It should only take a few days, but I heard on the radio that there was a warning out about Pennsylvania. I know that you’re a bit like a toddler and if someone tells you not to do something, then it will be the first thing that you do.”
“Not really a revelation,” I muttered.
“So when I got your coordinates and proved myself right,” Gabe paused and Noah and I just looked at him. “What?” He asked. “No snide comment about me being right?”
I shrugged. “You’re here, aren’t you? I’d say you were right and I won’t fault you this early in the morning for stating the obvious.”
Gabe blinked at me, a little surprised, but then continued. “Ok. Well, when it became obvious that you were making a beeline for Bellum, I thought I would come this way to beg for the impossible.” His tone had gone from conversational to serious and he turned, moving one arm to the back of the seat, penning me in, and focusing those blue eyes on me. The leather squeak of his jacket and the fact that it opened up when he moved, releasing a wave of the leather, pine and bacon smell in my direction was distracting enough, without the added view of dark chest hair curling out of the loose collar on his black t-shirt that hung over his barrel chest. Flashes of memory were trying to get a toehold and I bit the inside of my cheek and tightened my grip on the water glass to knock them back down. “Please,” Gabe said. “Please Bane, don’t go to Bellum.”
I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t look at Noah either. I stared at the table surface and shook my head. “I have to. It could be Be-,” dishes rattled and there was a surprised yell from the kitchen. “The Duke could be in Bellum.”
“Bane,” Gabe said, a hint of frustration clouding his voice.
“Gabe,” I said. I was determined to head this train off at the pass before he could get much steam behind it. “He’s the demon behind Ornias. I just know it. He killed Nya. I’m not going to sit on the sidelines while a single one of the bastards involved in her death walks around. I didn’t start this bullshit, but I’m sure as hell going to finish it.”
“But what if it’s not him?” Gabe asked. “What if it’s something worse?”
I shrugged and leaned back in the seat. Maybe it was the fact that Berith and Ornias had come directly after me that made them feel like more of a threat, but the thought that it could be something worse, like a pageant-queen titled demon, didn’t really bother me. “All the more reason to hunt the thing down and kick its ass. Or at least get my ass kicked trying. It’s all pros, Gabe. It’s Noah’s hometown,” I said, nodding at Noah. “So his friends and his mom are in danger. If we kill it, win-win there. I also have this little annoying soul count I have to fulfill and the bigger the baddie, the bigger the soul money, another win-win. And if it is the Duke and we kill him, Nya will be avenged. Another win-win.”
“And if you die?” Gabe asked. His arm was still along the back of the seat and either I’d been slowly inching towards him or he’d been leaning into me, but there was almost a magnetic pull happening that I had to fight back if I was going to hold my ground.
“Just another day at the office,” I said. We both knew I didn’t mean it. I didn’t have time to go back downstairs and get in line for Empty House number four and then come back up to re-save all six hundred and seventy-nine souls with only three months left. It had taken me almost four years to get down to only needing two hundred and thirty-one this time around. And if something happened to Noah because I died and wasn’t there to protect him… The pain in my gut at the thought was palpable, feeling like an old wound, opening up again. The wound caused when Nya died, finally had a scab on it. Thinking about Noah dying was picking at it. I was bluffing. Thankfully, Gabe saw something in my face that begged him not to call me on it.
I saw my opening and I took it, steering the conversation back into Gabe. “Does your Order have any leads on Sister Smile and Joel?” Speaking of things that stabbed me in the gut to think about.
Gabe nodded. “Maybe. I’ve got a lead in Wisconsin. I’m going there first to check it out before the real trip for the Order.”
I sat up a little straighter and turned my full attention on Gabe. I was about to ask when Gabe said. “I promise I’ll call you if anything breaks.” The waitress returned and dropped a platter of eggs, sausage, and hashbrowns in front of him.
We all made small talk while Gabe ate. Well, Noah and Gabe made small talk. He’d removed his arm from the back of the booth but he was still so close to me. His leather was brushing against the bare skin of my arm and every time he moved, the jacket released more of the combo of scents I’d come to associate with Gabe. Between that, his low voice, and the warmth of his thigh pressed against mine, I was getting heart palpitations. I had started giving myself an inner pep talk, telling my heart, and other parts of me to calm the hell down. I hadn’t even noticed the waitress clearing the table and it took Noah saying my name twice before I looked up and realized they were ready to go.
“Earth to space cadet,” Noah said, grinning at me. “I’m hitting the head. Don’t leave without me.”
I nodded and Noah hustled off towards the bathrooms. Gabe slid out and I followed him to the front. He paid his ticket and the waitress grinned at me when I asked for mine and said that Gabe had already gotten it. I turned to glare at him, but he was already heading outside. I caught up to him just as we turned the corner of the building. He’d parked next to Lucy at the back of the restaur
ant. There were no windows here, just the kitchen and the very loud exhaust fan from the stove hood.
We stood together, between his bike and Lucy’s driver side door. Noah and I had parked back here so we could back in. I’d noticed that always seemed to put Noah more at ease. We’d had a lot of close calls and I thought that knowing we had a quick means of escape gave Noah back some peace of mind which was the least I could do.
“Expecting trouble?” Gabe asked, nodding at Lucy, backed into the spot.
I shrugged. “When do we not expect it?” Gabe raised an eyebrow at me and I blew out a sigh. “I think it makes Noah feel better. We’ve had some pretty close scrapes. I think his feelings about going back to his hometown are a mixed bag.”
Gabe nodded. “I get that.” There was pain in Gabe’s face and I knew why. His entire family was gone. Killed by the crap that we hunt. And I knew from our drunken stitches and cartoons weekend so long ago, that Gabe hated going home. I was different. There wasn’t a home for me to go back and visit. All of Ashley had been swallowed up by Hell. I could go stand on the scar in the ground where it used to be, but it wasn’t the same thing. I still hated going back to Kansas though. The anxiety from what had happened there... A flutter of painful memories crossed Gabe’s face and my chest ached for him. He’d been present when his sister had been killed. He hadn’t been able to stop it.
I got that.
Before I knew what my hand was doing, it was running down the length of Gabe’s arm, my fingers threading through his large square hand, intertwining with his. Our hands weren’t pretty. We both had crooked fingers from multiple breaks and scars from burns and knives and buckshot. It was probably a good thing that the majority of hunters didn’t live to ripe old ages. With how brutal the job was on a body, any hunter past their prime had hell-grade arthritis. But Gabe had to live. Not just live. He had to have a life. A family. A future. Just to keep the protection in place for others.
“You’re thinking,” Gabe said. His voice was low and gravelly and it sent an unexpected heatwave through my gut. “Stop it,” he whispered. Somewhere in my thoughts, I’d leaned forward into him, our hands had broken apart and his hands had caught me around the waist. I had a vague notion that this was a bad idea and I should back the hell up and get out of his reach, but another part of my brain, connected more to my body, was closing the door on the “bad idea” voice. I felt his fingers skimming the skin under the hem of my a-shirt. Hey, this was his stupid plan, who was I to point out what a bad idea it was? And he was the one that told me to stop thinking.
So I stopped, and instead, I stretched up on my toes and nipped at his bottom lip. He growled and I couldn’t stop the grin as I switched to his upper lip and ran my tongue over it, feeling the scar from the banshee that had caught him in the mouth. He was now returning everything I was giving. His lips were so warm and soft and that magnetic feeling was back, almost like a pulse between us. My brain was taking the “not thinking” to a new level when I ran my tongue along his bottom lip and was immediately met by his. His tongue was a muscle and he knew how to use it. It was toned from years of Latin and banter and probably this and much more. I wasn’t delusional. Gabe was experienced. I had a little, but I was bush league in comparison.
He ran his tongue along my bottom lip and then bit gently. An involuntary noise, like a strangled moan, erupted from me. I could feel the warm heat and rough skin of his palms on my waist as his fingertips moved around to my back. Feeling his warm hands on my skin was now making the rest of my body fall in line with the “not thinking” policy. I wrapped a leg around his hips, that magnetic pulse pulling him closer. That seemed to be a signal of some kind. We were moving and Gabe’s breath was heavy. I felt my ass make contact with Lucy’s grille and then he had me sitting on the hood. We were eye level now and I had both legs wrapped around his hips. I couldn’t see straight and there was heat pooling between my legs. I hadn’t felt that in so long and I couldn’t ever remember it feeling so overwhelming. His head was turned towards me and through my blissful haze, I grabbed his earlobe between my teeth and flicked it with my tongue. He moaned into my neck and his hips bucked against me. I let out a long, low moan just as the exhaust fan from the kitchen clicked off.
“Bane!”
Noah’s voice was carrying and it sounded frantic. Gabe pulled back and met my gaze. I dropped my legs from around Gabe and scrambled off of Lucy’s hood, knocking him a step back. He reached out to steady me and I felt his fingers dig into my hips. I drew in a sharp breath and Gabe dropped his hand. I cleared my throat and tugged my shirt back down as Noah came into view. Gabe had gone over to his bike and had his back to Noah and me, messing with the buckle on one of his saddlebags.
“Hey,” I called to Noah, hoping he didn’t hear the crack in my voice. “Where’s the fire?”
“What?” Noah said and then he shook his head. He was jogging towards us and skidded to a halt a few feet in front of me. “Sorry, I thought you would still be at the table. I just thought…”
Noah shook his head and then looked over at Gabe.
“What did I miss?” Noah asked.
“Miss?”I said. “We’ve just been shooting the breeze waiting for you. We thought about taking bets to see if you fell in. Gabe was going to have to check though, I’ve had my fill of men’s rooms for a while.”
“That should be written on your tombstone,” Noah said.
Gabe was holding his helmet in both hands when he turned back around. His lips were red and so was his neck which actually blended pretty well with his blush.
“You ok there, Gabe?” Noah asked.
“What? Oh yeah, I just uh pinched my finger in the saddlebag buckle,” he said, nodding at the bags.
“Uh-huh,” Noah said. “Well, safe travels to Wisconsin and on that Order thingy.” Noah approached Gabe with his hand extended and Gabe awkwardly let go of one side of his helmet to shake Noah’s hand, still keeping the helmet in front of him. Noah climbed in the truck and Gabe and I made eye contact. It seemed like our “thinking brains” had re-engaged and both of us had the same thought that skin to skin contact of any kind would not be wise at the moment. My heart was still racing and Gabe’s chest was still rising and falling faster than it usually did. I looked back down at the helmet he was still holding in front of him and raised an eyebrow at him. I expected him to play it off or glare but instead, he just winked and put the helmet on his head. I tore my eyes away from his leather chaps and the jeans beneath and met his gaze.
“Be careful,” Gabe said. He wasn’t playful now. His eyes were pleading with me. I felt myself nodding.
“You too,” I said to him. And I meant it. We had just crossed a line back into physical stupidity that we would have to hash out later, but shoving that aside, I wanted and I needed Gabe to be careful. “Seriously,” I said, “be safe.”
He nodded and I felt a lot of unsaid things pass between us when we locked eyes. A flood of emotions started smacking me in the face. Too much. Too much for right now. I cleared my throat and headed for the driver’s side door.
“I’ll call you from Wisconsin,” Gabe said. “When you get to Bellum, call and let me know, will you?”
I slammed the door shut and leaned towards him out of the open window. “We’ll see,” I said. Gabe looked half-annoyed and I decided to try out the wink. I’m pretty sure it was awkward because Gabe smiled and shook his head.
“Good hunting,” he said and he fired up his bike.
“Good hunting,” Noah and I called back. With a single parting gaze, Gabe backed out and turned, heading out of the lot, not looking back.
“Ok,” Noah said as I turned the engine over. “What did I actually miss out here?”
I shrugged. “Nothing. I told you, we were just waiting for you.”
Noah shook his head as we pulled out of the lot. “Yeah, I hear hickies are a good way to pass the time.”
6
We’d been on the road for about two hours when my cell p
hone rang. It was Stacks.
“Decide to take a break from the lore search and come up for air?” I asked.
“Hardly,” Stacks said. He sounded tired and strung out and I could almost see his hair standing on end and the pizza grease coating his glasses lenses. He was also half-assing this conversation. I could tell that half his brain was still engaged with whatever he’d been reading when he called me. “This shit just keeps getting deeper and deeper.”
“Well that’s what happens when you get completely wrapped up in mannequin porn,” I said.
There was a pause. “Wait, what?” Stacks asked. I could almost hear the sucking sound as he dragged the rest of his brain back from the rabbit hole it was currently scurrying down.
“And you’re back,” I said. “Sorry as riveting as it is to watch you do research, listening to it over the phone causes it to lose something in translation. It doesn’t make a good radio program. Not that I don’t love hearing from you, but why are you calling?”
“Checking in,” Stacks said, “and I have an update.”
“Have you heard from Tessa and Marge? New Covenant hasn’t sprung up a second location somewhere else in town, have they?” I held my breath, waiting for the answer. I didn’t really have time to fight another round of religious-posing demons. It would most likely mean I’d lose this shot at Berith, if he was in Pennsylvania, and probably also doom Noah’s mom and the rest of his town to whatever hellish end he was planning.
“No, thank god,” Stacks said.
“Did you find anything out about Shady Lane Developments in Toledo and the Wolftramanus thing?” I asked.
“Yeah. Shady Lane is fake. After the showdown in Garnett, they just disappeared. And the Wolftramanus has so much disagreeing lore, I finally just gave up,” Stacks said. Ok. So that probably wasn’t the update.
“Are Tags and Rosetta, ok?” I asked automatically. I knew they’d both been working with Stacks on the research while Stacks crashed with them.