Personal Demon

by Susan Sizemore

  A very powerful old vampire. Ivy could tell by looking at her. She was a queen.

  “She is the Legacy. The only strigoi in England. By her choice. At her command. She makes children every now and then, but those children are sent out in the world. She will have none at her side. None threatening her people.”

  “And you are telling me this, why? I’m not supposed to know about her, remember?”

  Christopher held Ivy tightly against his side, but he didn’t offer an explanation.

  The Legacy spoke to Christopher. She caught him in her unbreakable gaze. She took him with her back into the dark alley. Into the dark altogether.

  “No one volunteers to be made into a vampire,” the Christopher beside her said. “But sometimes to be cursed is an honor. She gifted me with that honor.”

  It was bullshit. They both knew it was bullshit, but Ivy didn’t call him on it. She put both arms around him and held him close, her ear against his heart. He’d showed her this part of himself because he cared about her knowing who and what he was.

  “Not the most romantic of first dates,” he said.

  “Thank you for showing me this, Captain Christopher Bell.”

  Ivy woke up with her head on Christopher’s chest. Her ear was over his heart. Its slow beat was reassuring somehow. How very, very odd. It had been a lovely dream, with murder and vampire kidnapping. She lifted her head to look at Christopher’s sleeping face. He certainly didn’t look vulnerable, but there was something gentler about his relaxed features. Features that were stark, spare, fascinating.

  “I like your hair better now,” she told the unconscious male. She rubbed her palm across his short, bristly scalp.

  Then she put her head back on his chest and thought about numbers until she went back to sleep, back to dreaming. Back to sharing.

  Numbers. Digits. Fingers on a keypad.

  “Thank you, darling,” she said when she woke up again. She kissed Christopher’s lips, got up, got dressed, and went to the door’s keypad.

  Pickpocket! Thief! Gypsy con artist! rang in her head.

  “Don’t be politically incorrect. The proper name is Roma. We prefer Traveler. But guilty as charged.”

  Witch!

  “Not an insult.”

  I’ll have you!

  “You have to wake up first. Rest, dear,” she said as she punched in the code she’d managed to pluck from his head. “I have places to go, things to do. I’ll be careful,” she added.

  And got stubborn silence as an answer.

  chapter twenty-eight

  You’ve completely lost the girl you’re hunting?” Ted was incredulous, just on the edge of mocking. “How could you lose her? You know where she lives. You know where she goes, who she knows, where she works.”

  Jack had been sitting alone in a booth in the crowded diner. The biscuit with sausage gravy on the plate in front of him was ignored, going cold as he kept his attention on the busy swinging of the door. There was a deep line in front of the to-go counter. She wasn’t in it. The tables and booths filled, emptied, filled. She wasn’t one of the customers. She came here a lot, but not that day.

  Ted had found him while he waited. Jack hated Ted at the moment. Jack had a purpose, a plan. Ted killed as the opportunity presented. There was no art to what he did, only gratification. Maybe that was how it should be. Jack was breaking his heart in his quest for perfection.

  The perfect kill. Oh, how he wanted to give his Master the perfect kill! To lay the girl before the Master, take out her heart, and hand it to the demon to eat. Valentine’s Day in November.

  “You’re in it for yourself,” he mumbled to Ted. “That’s all you care about. The Master doesn’t love you,” he added viciously.

  Ted laughed. “Why should I care? I give him what he wants, that’s what matters.” He leaned across the table and added in a nasty whisper, “Who have you sacrificed lately?”

  Jack hung his head in shame. “The Master sent you, didn’t he? To remind me of my failure.”

  “He knew I’d enjoy tormenting you, yeah.” Ted smiled at the waitress who showed up to pour fresh coffee. She smiled back. Charm was a very useful commodity. “Maybe it’s a good thing you didn’t hunt last night,” Ted continued whispering after the waitress left, her hips swinging invitingly.

  He’d been hunting all night, seeking his perfect kill. There had been a police car parked near her apartment. There had been more police at her aunt’s magic shop, dispersing an angry mob. It was good to read the energy from the angry mob. He knew that the Master was drinking in the city’s fear. Jack had gone by the medical building where she worked at her day job. To the health club where she moonlighted as a personal trainer. He’d ended up here at her breakfast hangout. It was as though she’d left town, but he knew in his soul that she was still in Chicago.

  While sitting there waiting for her to come in, Jack faded into a nasty daydream of getting his neck broken. Then Ted joined him. The daydream had been more welcome. Jack forced himself to concentrate on his fellow killer.

  “Why is that?” he asked. “Why was it good not to have struck last night?”

  “The triple in the park.”

  The waitress came back before he could go on. She left a square of paper with a phone number and offered to freshen their still-full cups.

  Ted pocketed the girl’s number. Jack left cash on the table, and they walked out without saying any more.

  “A night off increased the tension, the fear,” Ted said when they were on the street. He stuck out his tongue. “Taste it.”

  Jack nodded. He felt the fear of the city pressing against him. He smiled. “It’s a beautiful morning.”

  “Come on.” They waited at a bus stop until the number Ted wanted stopped. The bus took them south. It was too crowded on board for conversation. Jack didn’t particularly like talking to anyone but the Master anyway.

  They got off south of downtown, in an area of bare concrete-and-steel high-rise apartment buildings. Broken windows gaped on lower floors.

  “Where are we, and why are we here?” Jack asked, after the bus pulled away.

  “It’s pretty obvious,” Ted said. He thrust his hands in his coat pockets and began walking.

  Jack followed. They made their way into a neighborhood where every wall was full of tagged graffiti, where drug dealers occupied every corner. Gang colors and tattoos decorated the suspicious, staring men on the streets, sitting on the stoops. There were plenty of women on the sidewalks, leaning into cars paused and blocking traffic, conducting business with the drivers.

  It seemed a bit early in the day for hooking to Jack, but he supposed he was too old-fashioned.

  “The perfect hunting ground,” Ted said, gesturing at a group of young women across the street from where they stood. One scantily dressed girl slid into a front seat, and the driver pulled away.

  Jack was too aware of the men sitting on steps behind them, watching. “Maybe if we had a car,” Jack said. “We could go back to the house and drive back.”

  “John’s got the car. He’s checking out his old hunting grounds in Des Plaines.”

  They walked on. Several blocks away from the high-rises, they turned onto a street of dilapidated houses. Barking dogs, German shepherds and pit bulls, patrolled the fenced yards.

  “We are going to be shot by gangbangers at any moment,” Jack predicted.

  Ted laughed. He was totally fearless no matter how out of place the two of them were in this run-down neighborhood. “We’re the monsters, dude. Remember that.”

  Monsters? Certainly. Jack was proud of it. But they weren’t invincible. He would be, when the Master drew in enough power for their final transformations. But he wasn’t invincible yet. He rubbed the back of his neck, remembering the death he kept reliving lately.

  They passed a house where a pair of young women stood on the porch. The girls were not dressed for the cool weather. The women called to them. Ted stopped and waved.

  “Whores
looking for business. You should be a happy man, Jack. Got your knife with you?”

  Of course he had his knife. And a sense of something wrong. He followed Ted up the walk toward the house. Ted’s eagerness to bring death glowed around him. Jack had to concentrate hard to get around Ted’s evil aura.

  To find an aura even more evil. Sleeping evil.

  He stopped Ted with a hand on his shoulder. “If you want to fuck the bitches, fine,” he said, when Ted looked at him over his shoulder. “But they aren’t for killing.”

  “What the hell is the matter with you?” Ted demanded.

  A dog came up and sniffed them warily. A girl started down the porch stairs. She was pretty, plump, and stank of vampire.

  “The whore’s a strig’s slave,” Jack told Ted quietly. “We can’t kill anything that belongs to a vampire, even a renegade one.”

  “What?”

  The next thing he knew, Ted grabbed his arm and led him out of the yard. They walked a long ways without speaking. When they finally reached a less threatening neighborhood, they went into a small park and sat on a bench. No one was nearby.

  “How do you know all this stuff about vampires?” Ted asked. “Why’d the Master tell you all this?”

  The Master hadn’t told him much about vampires. What Jack knew came from information inside his host’s suppressed mind. “We must protect the Master from vampires. Vampires won’t interfere with demons as long as demons don’t interfere with vampires. To kill a strig’s slave would violate the treaty between them.”

  Ted stretched his arms out along the back of the bench. “I like that word slave. Those whores were a vampire’s sex slaves?”

  “They belong to a strig. If the strig wants them to whore, that’s what they do. I suppose that’s how the strig makes a living—as a pimp.”

  “A strig’s a vampire?”

  “Yes, of course. I thought you already knew this. Strigs are vampires that live outside the Laws of the Blood. They’re rogue.”

  “So, I could have killed his bitches, and our demon wouldn’t be in trouble with the vamps?”

  “We’d be in trouble with that vampire. You don’t want a vampire coming after you, Ted. Trust me on this.”

  Ted laughed. It was a totally insane sound, but full of confidence. He slapped Jack on the shoulder. “You never know. I just might be interested in meeting a vampire sometime.”

  “Our Master wouldn’t like that. We’re slaves as much as that strig’s whores. Remember that.”

  Ted stood. “I can’t ever forget it,” he said as he angrily walked away.

  chapter twenty-nine

  A surprise waited for Ivy just outside the front door of Ariel’s house. Her jacket and her purse were waiting there for her. No notes or anything, but someone had left her the stuff she’d taken with her to Selena’s. She slipped on the coat and checked inside her purse.

  The obsidian knife was still there. “Thanks, Aunt Cate.”

  But so was her fully charged cell phone.

  Ivy sat down on Ariel’s front steps and typed out a text message. She might be the one tasked to find the demon behind the killings, but she saw no reason to keep everything she learned to herself. The more people hunting for the killers, the sooner the bastards would be stopped. She accepted her responsibility, but there was no reason for stupid pride when lives were at stake.

  Ivy explained as concisely as possible about the theory of the killers being under a compulsion to murder, and how one of them was probably dead because the spell had worn off. She sent the message to Aunt Cate and Selena.

  The info might not help Selena with the investigation for the physical murderers—it wasn’t exactly forensic evidence. It wasn’t eyewitness evidence, either, but Ivy hoped any info on motive might help.

  That done, Ivy finally did what she should have done, and would have done, days ago, if a vampire hadn’t interfered with her life. It wasn’t something she wanted to do, Goddess knew, but it was necessary.

  She took a cab. It let her off in front of a gated estate in Kenilwood. She stood outside the gate for several minutes. The eye of a security camera watched her in a way she found downright creepy. She was sure she was being studied from inside, and not just by the camera. She finally worked up the courage to press the intercom button on the side of the gate.

  “It’s not locked,” a woman’s voice came out of the speaker.

  Ivy’d been hoping no one was home.

  She pushed the gate open. It locked behind her. Lovely. It was a long walk up the diagonal brick walk to the house. She didn’t hurry along. She admired the gardens as she walked through them. Even so late in the autumn, the plantings were lovely. She knew there was much more than magnificent landscaping going on out here. There wasn’t a plant on the exclusive three-acre property that didn’t have specific magical uses. Wicked witching paid very well.

  No one answered the door when she rang the bell. That would have been too normal. Of course, the door swung open for her. It even creaked.

  “Oh, for crying out loud, Grandma!” Ivy shouted as she stepped into the entrance hall. Her words echoed in the huge space.

  A normal person might seek out a grandmother in the comfort and warmth of her kitchen. Ivy headed upstairs to Brianna McCoy’s chemistry lab. If the neighbors only knew…

  “Grandma, are you in there?” she called when she reached the lab door. There was no way she would, or could, walk in there uninvited. A cackle of mad laughter answered her from inside the lab. “Oh, please!” Ivy took this as permission to enter and pushed open the door.

  “How’s business?” she asked when she saw her grandmother by a lab table, peering into a bubbling glass beaker. Ivy did not want to inquire what foul spell the black witch was brewing.

  “Don’t get your knickers in a twist, it’s only crystal meth.”

  Ivy hadn’t wanted to know that, either. She took a step back. “Isn’t that dangerous to make?”

  Brianna McCoy gave a derisive snort. “Does this look like some trailer-park kitchenette I’m working in?”

  “No.”

  Grandma did have that doctorate in chemistry and another in botany to go along with all her magical training. Smart woman, Brianna. She was also still absolutely, magnificently beautiful, looking to be in her thirties when she was near seventy. Grandma claimed it was the best plastic surgery money could buy, plus great demon sex, that kept her young. She had the family’s red hair, in a shade of copper, worn short and spiky at the moment. Ivy had inherited her grandmother’s hair color, but dyed it blond just to be different from other Baileys, McCoys, Duchets, Crawfords and the rest of the familia. She’d tried goth black in her teens, but neither the look nor the outlook of goth culture suited her. All of her piercings had long ago healed over.

  “You aren’t planning on calling the cops on me, are you?” Brianna asked, as Ivy continued to stand hesitantly just inside the doorway.

  There wouldn’t be any evidence of illegal activity in the house when the cops arrived, Ivy knew that. “Your secrets are always safe with me, Grandma.”

  If she wanted to get out of there alive, that is.

  “I need to concentrate. Have a seat,” Brianna said. She pointed toward the other side of the room. “Have some tea. I’ll be with you as soon as I’m done here.”

  Ivy went over to the table set in the space by a bay window. An Irish linen tablecloth covered the table, there was a blue-and-white floral china tea set and a plate of cookies sitting on the table. Ginger cookies. Her favorite. And she caught the scent of Earl Grey tea. Also a favorite. She’d been expected. Not that Grandma baked, or brewed tea, that’s what servants and security guards were for.

  Ivy was still pleased at the thoughtfulness. Not that her wariness was in the least bit lulled, but she was still pleased at the familial gesture. She poured herself a cup, took a deep sniff of the bergamot-scented steam.

  “Shall I read your future in the tea leaves?” Ivy asked after she’d finished t
wo cups and checked her watch. A half hour had passed. “I’ve been practicing.”

  “You’ve been drinking a lot of tea lately.” Grandma turned from her work. She took the chair opposite Ivy. “Fi Fie Foe Fum.”

  Smelling the blood of an Englishman, was she?

  “No one has added any foreign matter to the current mix in my veins,” Ivy said.

  “Yet.”

  Ivy took a bit of cookie, savored the flavor, wondered how a synesthete vampire would react to the spice. She tasted it, but did Christopher hear ginger? See it? Did all his extra senses help him survive? Or hinder his chances for immortality? How did even a normal person handle immortality, anyway? It didn’t seem a pleasant prospect to Ivy. Especially when one of the Laws of the Blood was that you couldn’t continue a relationship with a companion after you’d turned them. They were cursed to be forever alone.

  “Stupid curse,” she muttered.

  “They totally need to get over it,” Grandma agreed. When Ivy gave her a confused look, she went on, “You are thinking about your vampire boyfriend, yes?”

  “Yes.” Ivy sighed. She didn’t want to know what her grandmother knew, or how. Crystal ball, maybe. Family spy, more likely. “He’s not why I’m here.”

  Brianna McCoy poured herself a cup of tea. “He should be why you’re here. I’m the only one in the familia who can give you any real, practical advice about romancing the dark side of things. Selena is far too romantic,” she added.

  “It’s hardly a vampire romance when my blood will poison him, now is it?”

  “Has he tasted you? How did he react?”

  “He didn’t spit it out.”

  Or have a seizure. Or throw her out of bed. Or break her neck. She didn’t know what was going on between them. Or even what she wanted to go on.

  Christopher claimed she belonged to him but Ivy didn’t know what that meant. He’d said something about keeping her as a pet. She’d like to think of that as a joke on his part. But involvement with him was a life-or-death matter that she was going to have to confront seriously soon.