by L. L. Frost
“I’m ready!” I run for the front door, where my sneakers wait. “Let’s go!”
“We need to work on your strip tease,” Kellen grumbles as he follows at a slower pace. “That was the most pathetic show I’ve ever seen.”
I ignore him as I lace on my shoes. Scuff marks mar the toes, turning the once white leather gray in places. They’re not the best fit for the high-class outfit, but I’m too impatient to go back upstairs to dig out something more suitable.
Running my fingers through my hair, I work out the knots. “Whose car are we taking?”
“Mine, of course.” Kellen spins a set of keys on his finger for emphasis. “No way I’m riding in that piece of junk you call a car.”
“It gets me where I need to go.” His disparagement over my vehicle slides off, unable to find traction in my good mood. Eager, I pull open the front door. The sunshine surprises me, and I throw a hand up to shield my eyes. “What time is it?”
“Three o’clock.” His hand on my back moves me onto the porch so he can step out of the house and close the door.
My face feels bare without my sunglasses, but I don’t want to go back for them. I’ll have to be careful if there’s any humans around. Thankfully my eye color falls within the human spectrum, unlike some of my cousins.
A dark gray sports car waits in front of the house, the windows tinted black against prying eyes.
I twist around. “What are you doing home so early?”
“Since I had to cancel my meetings for the day, I figured we could still get some work done.” He presses a button on the fob on his keychain, and the car lights flash as the doors unlock. “Go ahead, and get in.”
Inside the car, his butter soft, leather seats hug my ass. I’ve never been in a car this nice outside of dreamland. I wiggle in appreciation. A girl could get used to this.
Kellen slides behind the steering wheel, and the car rumbles to life. “I’ve seen the map of where you want to open a shop, and I think I have the perfect place.”
I shift until I face him, my knees pressed up against the center console. “Does it have a kitchen?”
“Yep.” We pull out of the driveway and onto the street, heading toward the business district of town.
My fingers tap against my legs in excitement. “Are there clubs nearby?”
“Yep.” He shifts quickly, and the car leaps forward fast enough to press me back into my seat.
“What did it used to be?”
“A sandwich shop.”
“Why did they close?”
“I don’t know.” Kellen shifts again, speeding up to make it through a yellow light. “Now hush, we’ll be there soon.”
My stomach twists as Kellen zips around the slower cars on the road, blowing through all the lights, regardless of color. But he handles the steering wheel with finesse, used to driving since cars were invented.
“I’m surprised you don’t ride a motorcycle,” I say to break the silence.
He glances at me in surprise. “Why would you say that?”
I shrug. “You just seem like you’d like the wind in your hair.”
He drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “I have a couple in the garage. But I thought you’d be more comfortable in this.”
“It’s a horrible car.” I keep my face serious, voice nonchalant. “You should probably abandon the rights to it.”
He barks out a laugh. “Can you even drive a stick?”
My palms brush over the leather seat in appreciation. “I can learn.”
“I’ll have to teach you.”
“You’d do that?”
“Everyone should know how.” Whipping around a purple mini-van, he pulls over to the side of the road and slides into an open spot at the curb. “We’re here.”
I fling off my seatbelt to scramble out of the car, gaze fixed on the boarded-up shop we parked in front of. A rectangle of discolored paint fills the space over the door where a sign once hung, while sheets of plywood cover the windows on either side of the entrance.
An alley on the right hints at a back parking lot, most likely shared with the optometrist on that side of the business. A Thai restaurant shares the wall on the left, with a check cashing place a little farther down.
Kellen joins me on the sidewalk. “What do you think?”
I step back to see to the end of the block. “Is Fulcrum around here?”
“Around the corner and one block over.” Kellen points in the opposite direction. “There’s a cab pick-up point at the corner, so you’ll get a lot of passersby at night.”
Excited, I bounce on my toes. “Can we go inside?”
“Wouldn’t be much point if we didn’t.” Kellen walks to the alley with me close on his heels.
As I suspected, it’s wide enough for a car to drive down, and I spot the parking lot at the back. We stop halfway down, next to a side entrance, and Kellen unlocks the door. He pushes it open, then reaches through to flip on a light before gesturing me inside.
We enter directly into the kitchen. The door to a large refrigerator takes up one wall, with a short hallway leading back to an office space. Stainless steel counter tops fill the kitchen, with matching stainless steel appliances on the left wall. A mixer big enough to crawl inside of rests against the refrigerator wall, with a large scale and a wheeled cart beside it.
A passthrough in the wall opens into the front of the shop. When we venture through a swinging door into the main room, Kellen turns on another set of lights to illuminate the space. A cashier’s station separates the kitchen from the rest of the room, with a glass display case attached. A chalk menu board hangs on the wall above the passthrough, remnants of the previous owners still drawn out on its black surface.
Booths line the walls, with round tables in the center of the room. It has a fifties feel to it, with red and white stripes and a checkerboard floor. With a little rearranging and some new upholstery, I can easily envision the boutique lounge I want to create.
Hands clasped over my chest, I spin to face Kellen. “It’s perfect!”
His gaze travels around the room. “I thought it might be, though there’s a couple other places that need a little more work that I can show you.”
“No, this is it.” My body vibrates with the rightness of it. This will become Boo’s Boutique Bakery. If I play my cards right, I can be open by next month. I throw my arms around Kellen’s waist. “Thank you!”
“The lease isn’t cheap,” he warns as his arms fold around me in a prickly, static filled hug.
I pull back from him to put my hands on my hips. “I know what the location is worth. Don’t think you’ll hoodwink me.”
He points a long finger at me. “And don’t think I’ll cut you a deal just because I want to have electric, demon sex with you.”
“Sounds like we have some negotiating to do.” I gesture to one of the tables. “Shall we?”
Room with a View
It only takes three hours to come to terms on a lease price we both agree on, and Kellen produces the paperwork from out of nowhere for me to sign. After that, the bakery is mine.
Over the next two weeks, I spend most of my time there, arranging for the reconstruction. When I discover one of the ovens is broken, Tobias surprises me and shows up to repair it himself.
Who knew he was handy?
I learn new things about my roommates every day, which is more than I can say for my self-studies. The books I borrowed from the library might as well be doorstops for all the information I can glean from them. The demon language is complex and doesn’t translate well into Latin, which then translates even worse into English, leaving me with notebooks filled with unintelligible gibberish.
But I refuse to give up.
However, there are limits to how much my brain can take in one sitting.
Rolling over in my bed, my shoulder butts up against Tac, who’s decided my room is his while Emil is out of the house. He doesn’t listen to boundaries, though we’d gotten into
a serious discussion that involved my slipper and his nose when I caught him munching on one of my pillows.
I stare up in satisfaction at the twinkle lights that wrap around the overhead beams. They give off a soft glow, and when I lay in just the right place on my bed, they form a shining star, the pentagram form now obvious.
Boxes stack on either side of the horrible dresser to give it more stability. At some point, I’ll need to anchor the damn thing to the wall to keep it from falling over, but at least my clothes now have a place to go. They had reappeared outside my door the day after I signed for the bakery, with a couple new pieces slipped into the basket.
The couch sits off to one side, close to the doorway. I’m biding my time before I drag it downstairs to the living room, where I already scoped out a nice place for it next to the fireplace.
I really should get back to studying. There’s not much else I can do until the flooring people finish at the shop.
But first…
I climb off the bed and grab a box of crackers from my nightstand. The clock beside it reads two in the afternoon. Perfect timing. I walk to the western facing window and crack open the shutter. Kellen’s right, it gives a perfect view into his room.
The red-headed demon strolls in and out of sight as he gets ready to head to the club for the night. His muscles really are magnificent. His golden skin ripples over them, smooth and hairless.
I pop a cracker into my mouth, enjoying the saltiness as Kellen comes back into view, bare ass on full display. Yeah, living here might be tolerable.
Addie’s (mis)adventures continue in November 2017 with:
The Torch (Part One of Succubus Studies)
L.L. Frost lives in the Pacific Northwest and graduated from college with a Bachelor’s in English. She is an avid reader of all things paranormal and can frequently be caught curled up in her favorite chair with a nice cup of coffee, a blanket, and her Kindle.
When not reading or writing, she can be found trying to lure the affection of her grumpy cat, who is very good at being just out of reach for snuggle time.
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Table of Contents
Inside
Copyright
Also By copy
Table of Contents
(un)Professional
Self Educate
Bargain Dessert
The Bakery
Room with a View
The Next Installement
About the Author