by Nina Bangs
Brynn followed the logic path. “But if the demon’s possessing a human body, they’ll destroy the host, too.”
“Doesn’t matter to them.” His smile returned. “I don’t think the little lady in there is one of the fanatics. But watch out for the loose cannons in that family.”
“Yeah, I’ll do that.” Brynn tried to gather his scattered thoughts. The Vaughn family sounded like scary people. “So what brings you to the Castle of Dark Dreams?”
“What am I doing here? I’m staying in a cool castle with a Gulf view while I get ready for my next fishing tournament. Bay fishing. Trailered my boat in from Louisiana. Love to fish. Do any fishing yourself?” Wade looked eager for some male bonding.
“A little. But it’s more of an excuse to be alone. No one’s going to walk out to talk to you in the middle of a lake.” A demon who entered fishing tournaments. A first as far as Brynn knew.
“Any excuse is a good excuse to go fishing.” He slapped Brynn on the shoulder. “I’m on my way down to breakfast. I’ll be here for a week, so if you feel the need to get away and don’t mind country music, give a shout.” He started toward the elevator but stopped and turned around. “I can’t make you, man. You’re not human, but damned if I can figure out where you belong.” He shrugged. “Guess that’s none of my business.” Then he stepped into the elevator, and the doors closed.
I don’t belong anywhere. No, that wasn’t true anymore. For the first time in five hundred years he had some real friends, so he belonged right here in the castle. And no woman like Liz or the hundreds of others who’d taken what they’d wanted from his body would drive him away.
He’d confront Kim with what he knew about Fo and her. This was his home, and no one would make him cower or hide in it. Brynn knocked on her door.
Silence fell inside the room, and then Kim pulled open the door. He slid his gaze the length of her body, taking in the boots, brown pants, and cream-colored top. She was studying him with the unblinking, wide-eyed stare he’d seen on women’s faces down through the centuries. They loved the shiny wrapping paper, but they’d hate the ugly gift that passed for his heart locked inside the box. Lucky for them, they never got that far.
“I’m walking over to the candy store. Thought you might want to go with me. I could answer any questions you have, and you might even be able to answer a few of mine.” He smiled at her. Brynn didn’t use his smile too often, because women liked to see him smile. That was reason enough to wear a perpetual scowl. But he wanted something from Kim, so he smiled.
“Candy store?” She blinked. “Oh, sure. Sounds like fun. Let me get my jacket, and I’ll be right with you.”
She turned away. Probably thought he’d wait outside the door. He didn’t. Brynn followed her into the room and stopped beside the bureau where Fo lay open, her purple eyes narrowed with temper. “Not taking Fo?”
Kim spun around with her leather jacket in her hand. “Why are you in my room? And are you talking about my phone?”
Time to play hardball. “Let’s cut the it’s-a-cell-phone story. I was standing outside your door. Fo isn’t a quiet little being.” He ignored her question about why he was in her room.
He had to give her credit. Once she realized she wouldn’t be able to lie her way out of this one, she didn’t go all sullen on him.
Instead, she flung her jacket over a chair and sat down. “What do you want to know, and how will what I tell you impact this job?”
Brynn almost smiled. She’d sure gotten over her wide-eyed reaction to him fast. Her gaze was now direct and cold. He didn’t smile. “I know Fo is some kind of combination demon detector and destroyer. And I know demon destroying is a family business. What you tell me here stays here. The owner won’t find out.” Okay, so he was lying. But considering what he was, lying was almost a positive character trait. He wouldn’t tell the owner because he didn’t know who the damned owner was, but he’d tell Eric and Conall. He wouldn’t have to tell Holgarth, because Holgarth probably already knew.
A small smile played at the corners of her sexy mouth. He slipped into her mind. She didn’t think he’d believe her story, thereby saving her butt. Her small, perfectly rounded, and made-to-be-kneaded butt.
Made-to-be-kneaded butt? Where had that come from? When he wasn’t under the compulsion, Brynn could objectively admire a woman’s body, but the admiration was emotionless and analytical. The sway of Kim’s behind stirred the beginnings of definite sensual interest. Something that never happened, that he didn’t allow to happen.
Brynn could feel a line of worry forming between his eyes. It would be great if the crease became permanent. He needed some character lines in his face. But he knew from past experience that his face would remain unlined, forever freakin’ perfect.
“You’re right. The Vaughn family has hunted demons for centuries. My true love is architecture, but I have an obligation to destroy any evil entities I happen to stumble across.” She shrugged. “Over the years, the family has lost its sensitivity to demons, so it had to turn to technology. Fo was the first combination detector and destroyer created. She’s not like the other detectors, she’s . . .” For the first time, Kim seemed unsure what to say.
Brynn finished for her. “She’s a bust at finding demons, but she’s developed emotions and the ability to think for herself.” Artificial intelligence. Although Kim would probably argue the intelligence part.
Kim looked suspicious. “You got all that from standing outside my door?”
“Fo’s volume control was turned way up.” He glanced down at Fo who was staring up at him with those huge purple eyes.
“You don’t believe my story, right?” Kim looked hopeful. “It’s just too far out there to be real, right?”
“I believe in what I see and hear.” And in a lot of things that are so far out there they would blow you away, sweetheart. “From the little I heard you say, Fo thinks anything that walks and talks is a demon.”
Fo’s eyes narrowed slightly. Amazing. A machine that showed an emotional response to a perceived insult.
“That’s about it.” Kim looked worried.
A quick peek into her thoughts revealed her concern that not only had she found the one person who’d swallow her story, but that he might have the ear of the owner, who wouldn’t be quite so accepting of his architect moonlighting as a demon destroyer. She didn’t believe Brynn wouldn’t tell anyone. Smart lady.
What to do? He should try to get rid of them, because Kim might eventually believe Fo when she said he was a demon. Funny, because just a few years ago he would’ve pressed Fo’s red button himself. Now? He had friends and an interesting job. And as hard as it was for him to believe, he was enjoying Kim and Fo.
“Do you mind if I ask Fo a few questions?” Who better to ask about her take on demon detecting?
“I guess it’s okay.” Kim looked confused. Probably no one had ever asked to talk to Fo.
Fo, on the other hand, looked ecstatic. He’d bet no one except Kim had ever treated her as a sentient being.
“Scan your systems, Fo, and tell me how your creator programmed you to recognize demons.” It was a shot in the dark, but if his idea was right, it would explain why she was seeing demons everywhere.
Fo blinked at him. It amazed him that she could express puzzlement with only her eyes. “The one who made me believed as the Greeks believed. Daimons are minor deities, not necessarily good or evil. So he chose to program me to recognize all nonhuman entities, just to be safe.”
Beside him, Kim gasped. “That’s it? It was that simple all along? Fo, you identify any being that isn’t human?”
“Yes. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to do?” Fo sounded hesitant. “Did the one who created me make a mistake?”
“No, no.” Kim raked her fingers through all that thick red hair. “I can’t believe this. The family had Fo checked out at least three times, but no one came up with anything. Why didn’t I know this?”
“They didn’t believe
Fo was a sentient being, so they never talked to her. They never asked her the right questions.” To take his mind from her hair and his sudden desire to bury his fingers in the silken mass, he glanced at his watch. If he timed things perfectly, he could walk with her to the candy store and back in less than an hour. “Fo, if Kim agrees to take you with her, will you promise to keep quiet?” Tell me I’m not feeling sorry for a demon destroyer.
“Not one word. I promise.” Fo’s eyes gleamed with excitement. “I won’t even point out to Kimmie again that you’re a demon.”
“Thanks. I think.” Kim had remained silent for a little too long. Whatever she was thinking might not be good. “Let’s get moving. There’s a bag of candy calling my name.”
Kim nodded absently as she slipped into her jacket and put Fo in her pocket. She said nothing until they’d almost reached Sweet Indulgence. When she did speak, he realized he was right to think that a quiet woman was a dangerous woman.
“All right, I guess I have things figured out.” She cast him a suspicious sidelong glance. “Everyone Fo has identified as a demon since last night is nonhuman but not necessarily a demon in the strictest sense of how demon is defined in today’s culture.”
Brynn grimaced. A lot of words to lead up to the punch line. “Sounds logical.”
“Sooo, that means you’re not human.” She sounded calm, but her eyes looked more intensely green in her suddenly pale face. “And if I didn’t have this sudden overwhelming need to eat candy, we’d stop right now so you could explain things to me.”
Thanks to whatever gods cared enough to protect stupid demons, they’d reached the candy store just in time. Brynn grabbed for the door with the same heartfelt relief as a marathoner flinging his body across the finish line.
Saved by Sparkle Stardust.
4
“It’s getting really tough to maintain my sensitive and caring persona when you are so ticking me off, cuddle bunny.” Sparkle Stardust perched with legs crossed on the stool behind the counter of her candy store, Sweet Indulgence.
Holding her cell phone to her ear, she used her free hand to scroll down the page on her laptop to a particularly yummy ring on her fave site, expensivethings.com. Could a woman ever have too many diamonds? Sparkle didn’t think so. The latest issue of Cosmo waited beside the laptop. A dreary Sunday morning in March meant slow candy sales. Sparkle would fill in the blanks with lots of impulse buying.
“Uh-huh. I totally understand. You’re a cosmic troublemaker, and you’re hard at work doing what you do best—causing trouble. So of course you can’t drop everything and rush to my side.” She narrowed her eyes as she flipped the Cosmo open. The more Mede pissed her off, the more money it made her want to spend. Maybe a new car. Hmm. A shiny Jaguar would help rekindle her warm and fuzzy Sunday spirit. “I can tell from the drunken revelry I hear in the background that you’ve been putting in long, hard hours on the job.”
Blah, blah, blah. Mede needed to renew his subscription to Lame Excuses because she’d heard all the old ones. Sighing, she traced the neckline of her black silk top. It didn’t show nearly enough of what was important to a man. And Sparkle was always tuned into what turned men on. So much sexual knowledge, so few to share it with.
“Look, sugar fluff, here’s the deal. Don’t give me all that crap about you being a big bad cosmic troublemaker who’s lived thousands of years, ruined more lives than you can remember, and can’t find the time in your busy schedule to fix one of those lives. I want you here by the end of the week to take care of Brynn.” Sometimes she just had to verbally slap Mede upside his gorgeous head.
Sparkle only half listened to Mede’s dumb-assed reasons why he couldn’t help Brynn, because she’d riveted her attention on the man and woman approaching her store. She allowed herself a brief surge of triumph. Kim and Brynn were together.
Sparkle hadn’t gotten too personal with Kim last night, just an exchange of names and Kim’s reason for visiting Galveston—all of which she’d already known. But this time she’d begin working on the most important strand of the intricate sexual web she intended to weave around Brynn.
While they paused just inside the door to discuss something, Sparkle turned away to deliver her ultimatum to Mede. “You might be Ganymede the Great to all the sorry losers at the bottom of the cosmic troublemaker barrel, but I don’t look up to anyone, Mede.” Damn straight. She was as powerful as he was in her chosen sphere of influence—sex. For more than a thousand years she’d spread sexual chaos throughout the universe by luring unsuspecting couples into playing her favorite game—Sex with the Wrong Stranger. She got off on watching all their roiling emotions churn up lots of erotic action.
She lowered her voice to the husky temptation she knew Mede couldn’t resist. “You’re the hottest being I’ve ever spent quality sexual time with. Do this for me, and I’ll be so grateful that . . .” Sparkle paused to enjoy Mede’s heavy breathing. “Well, I just won’t be able to control myself from dragging you off to one of the Castle of Dark Dreams’ towers so I can try out all the new sensual ways I’ve learned to bring a man to screaming completion.” She sighed her regret. “But I guess if you don’t have time—”
Sparkle took the phone from her ear and stared at it. Wow, was she good or what? Mede had shouted, “I’m coming,” and hung up on her. She paused to consider which meaning of “coming” he’d intended and then shrugged off the thought. It didn’t matter. They were both positive.
With a practiced smile that invited confidences, Sparkle turned back to her victims . . . er customers, who’d finally reached the counter. Kim looked a little dazed. Nothing new there. Every woman’s eyes glazed over when they were around Brynn.
He’d left his hair loose this morning. A little past shoulder length, it would slide through a woman’s fingers and live in her memory every time silk lay smooth against her breasts, renewing the visual of old gold and warm honey—erotic and incredibly masculine.
But a woman stopped thinking about his hair once they looked into his eyes—dark possibilities backlit by the heated glow of promised passion. Brynn was such a hottie that . . . No, Mede was still her guy. Unless he didn’t help with her latest plan, of course.
“Right on schedule, Brynn.” Sparkle turned a playful glance Kim’s way. She did playful well. “Every Sunday morning, Brynn comes in to buy a week’s supply of Wicked Red Blow Pops. I think that’s endearingly symbolic.”
Kim just stared at her. Sparkle hoped Kim wasn’t one of those women who didn’t get sexual innuendoes. Jeez, how much more in your face could she get? Wicked, blow, hello? Sparkle couldn’t communicate with someone who didn’t understand that it was all about sex. Okay, so maybe that wasn’t quite true. She communicated with Deimos. Sort of.
“Welcome back, Kim. No one stays away from my candy long. Wicked morning out there.” Wicked. One of her favorite words.
“No kidding. It’s starting to rain.” Kim smiled at Sparkle. “Brynn invited me to tag along with him, but I didn’t think I wanted any candy. As soon as I got close to your store, though, this amazing need just grabbed me by the throat. I’ve never felt anything like it.”
That’s because you’ve never been the target of one of Sparkle Stardust’s designer compulsions, sister. Sparkle widened her eyes in the culturally accepted expression of surprise. “Hmm. Strange. But hey, I’m glad you both got here in time. This is the ultimate danger.” She waved her hand over the candy counter to emphasize the total menace of her store. “Unlimited supply of candy plus boredom equals an infinity of hours at the local gym. You saved me from uncontrolled gorging followed closely by exercise hell.”
Sparkle watched as Brynn wandered away to collect his week’s supply of blow pops from the jar she kept at the end of the counter.
“Yeah, I’m trying not to inhale. Just breathing chocolate fumes expands my waist like a helium balloon.” Kim edged away from the section of the long glass case filled with chocolates. “Give me a small bag of lemon drops.”
<
br /> Sparkle blinked. “Lemon drops?” Uh-oh. Any woman who chose lemon drops over chocolate wouldn’t last long in the sensual playground that was the Castle of Dark Dreams. “Where’s your cell phone, the one that decided I was the Candy Demon?” She might have to take care of that little item if it became a pest. “Oops, never mind. Your pocket is vibrating. You must have the phone set on pulse. What brand is it? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pulse that . . . enthusiastic.”
Kim shrugged. “It’s not supposed to do that.” She raised her voice. “In fact, if I can’t get it fixed, I might have to buy a new one.” The pulsing stopped.
She slid her gaze to Sparkle’s hair. Sparkle sensed a convenient change of subject coming. “We have the same shade of red hair, but that’s where the similarity ends. Your hair’s incredible. How do you keep it from frizzing up on a day like this?”
Sparkle tried to keep her smile open and human-friendly as she slipped from her stool to get Kim’s candy, but she was afraid a little slyness was creeping into it. “Magic and good hair products.” Heavy on the magic. “Last night you said the park’s owner hired you to tweak the castle. Any ideas?”
“A few.” Kim frowned as she paid for the candy. “I still don’t know why the owner chose me, but the project sounded too intriguing to turn down.”
The owner chose you because you’re perfect, simply perfect, for the masterful manipulation she’s planning. Sparkle smiled as she handed Kim the bag. “The people in the castle are pretty intriguing, too.” More intriguing than Kim could probably handle, but her good buddy, Sparkle, would be there to guide her in the wrong direction.
Behind Kim, Brynn caught Sparkle’s attention and pointed to his watch. She sighed. Sparkle and the three faux McNair brothers understood each other. Okay, so Brynn and the others could never truly understand all that she was. Only Mede had plumbed her true depths. She allowed herself a small, secret smile. His plumbing skills were excellent.