by Mary Calmes
He nodded. “You have the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen. I could drown in them.”
Which was a very cheesy thing to say, but he was just a baby, after all. I remembered talking like that when I was young and dramatic too. “Well, yours aren’t bad either.” I grinned at him, moving to the couch to grab my jacket and pulling it on before I turned around. “So you take care, Dylan, and try an’ be a little more discriminating about who you say yes to in clubs, all right?”
“Could I maybe call you sometime?”
“Sure,” I told him, because it was all I could do for him.
“Can I get the number?” he asked me as he pulled out his cell phone.
After I gave it to him, he stood there looking up at me, his hands shoved down into the pockets of his leather pants. He never took his eyes off me.
“Can I call you anytime, Malic? Day or night? Whenever I want?”
I nodded and squeezed his shoulder before I put my hand gently on his cheek. He was so sweet; I was worried about him.
He pushed his cheek into my hand like a cat does when you pet it, and I saw him shiver hard. I wasn’t helping. I was giving out mixed signals, and that was a shitty thing to do. I just needed to go already.
“Malic.” He swallowed hard. “I could just––”
“I’ll see ya,” I said gently, turning to leave.
“Oh.”
You had to be made of much stronger stuff than flesh and bone not to respond when someone made a noise like that. Halfway between a moan and whimper, he sounded like he was going to cry. I twisted back and caught him in a tight hug, where he ended up with his face in my chest and his arms wrapped around me. He was tiny, all five nine of him, maybe a hundred and forty pounds, and as my chin rested on the top of his head, I realized that he fit really well against me.
“Listen, we don’t hafta have sex to be pals, Dylan. Gimme a call, and we’ll get some food, all right? Anytime you like.”
He nodded, lifting his head so his face was against my throat. He let out a deep breath.
“Okay?”
“Okay, Malic.”
I let him go and he stepped back from me, his eyes flicking up to mine, locking there. “So I’m gonna call you, all right?”
“Yeah.”
“Malic?” he said when I got to the door.
“Yeah?”
He rushed across the room and threw himself at me so fast that I had to scramble to get ahold of him.
“Dylan,” I said gently as he whimpered and twisted in my arms, pulling his shirt off, his hands suddenly on me, on my cashmere sweater, under the T-shirt underneath, tugging it up before I could grab him, pressing his smooth skin to mine.
“Malic,” he breathed out, moaning as he shoved me back against the wall, his fingers fumbling on my belt buckle. “Jesus, your skin is so hot.”
“Baby,” I said softly, cupping his face in my hands, lifting his chin so I could look down into his eyes. “Baby, stop, this isn’t going to make us close. Being friends is gonna make us close.”
His eyes filled, and I sighed deeply before I grabbed him tight and hugged him again. I put my face down onto his shoulder and rubbed his back. The boy was just starved for physical contact, and though I didn’t need it, he really did. I doubted that there was anyone in Dylan’s life that would just hold him. Wherever home was, he maybe needed to visit and have some family time. He needed his mother to love on him a little.
“You okay?”
He nodded against my chest, but when I went to move, he clung to me. I let out a deep breath and held on. At that moment there was no one who needed me more.
The sobbing came fast, and he clutched at me and tried to breathe. I held him until he was drained and sat down with him on the couch. He wanted to sit in my lap, but I sat on the floor beside him and stroked his hair.
“Malic what?” he asked softly, his eyes heavy-lidded as he stared at me.
“Sunden. You?”
“Shaw.”
I nodded. “Dylan Shaw, I got it.”
He closed his eyes as I massaged his scalp.
“What kinda name is Sunden?”
“Swedish.”
“I like it. I could be Dylan Sunden.”
He was really just edible. It was too bad he was so completely off-limits.
“Would you sleep with me when I’m twenty?”
“No.”
“Twenty-one?”
I chuckled. “No.”
“But for sure when I’m twenty-five?”
“Yes,” I said, placating him.
“I can’t believe you’re just sitting here with me, not wanting anything.”
I leaned over close to him. “Don’t be so jaded; you’re too young.”
He shivered, and I couldn’t resist kissing his temple.
“Please don’t go.”
“Just rest.”
“I’m gonna call you, don’t think I won’t,” he promised, reaching out to take hold of my jacket. “I will have you, Malic.”
I smiled as his eyes drifted closed. When I left, he was sleeping. I hoped his hangover wouldn’t be too horrible.
II
I COULD tell just from how the man was looking at me that he was confused about why I was there.
“What exactly is it that you do, Mr. Sunden?”
I turned my head, looking for Detective Tanaka, not in the mood to talk as I was still raw physically, mentally, and emotionally from fighting earlier in the day. I had gone alone to battle a demon possessing a lovely coed, and it had gone bad like it always did when I was alone and never did when I had backup. Everything always went perfectly when there was someone else there to watch. But because I was by myself, I ended up exorcising the demon, yes, but not without getting sliced to ribbons in the process. It would easily take a week to heal the damage. And then I got the call from Tanaka.
I was really hoping that I would not need to call for help now, because then I’d be in trouble. If one of my fellow warders saw me and told Jael, I doubted that I would be any use to anyone for a month. It would take that long to convince my sentinel to let me out of my own house.
“Hello?” The man snapped his fingers in front of my face.
“Sir,” Detective Tanaka barked, walking up beside me, putting out a hand to move the man back. “What’s going on, Mr. Everett?”
“I want to know who this man is,” he said, his voice rising as he pointed a finger at me. “I want to know why he’s in my house.”
“He’s a specialist in this area,” Detective Tanaka’s partner, Detective Curtis, said as he, too, joined us, moving Mr. Everett back away even further. “He finds people.”
“Oh.” His voice broke suddenly, and I looked up. There was a hand thrust out to me, and my eyes settled on the father of the missing girl. “I’m sorry––if you can help me find my baby… I’m sorry, Mr. Sunden…. Jason Everett.”
I took the offered hand. “Call me Mal.”
He forced a smile, nodding. “Please, Mal, come take a look around my house.”
It was so much easier when they invited me than when Tanaka and Curtis had to lie to get me in places.
A year ago Detective James Tanaka had found strange symbols at a murder site. When he had gone to the county museum to research what he thought were Celtic runes, the assistant curator of antiquities, Joshua Black, had sent him to see me at my club. He and his partner had been way more than hesitant; I owned a strip club, a high profile, lucrative strip club, and they were uncomfortable being there.
Unease turned to flat-out disbelief when I informed them that they were not looking at symbols but demonic writing. Tanaka and his partner, Detective Curtis, had both thought I was nuts. But a week later when we discovered the lair of a demon together, along with Marcus, a fellow warder, they both became converts. The four of us saved a kidnapped mother of three and in the process sent the creature back to hell. Since then, if whatever they were looking at seemed odd to them, I got a call.
I was at the home of Jason and Kellie Everett because their six-year-old daughter had been taken from a crowded room. The lights had flickered momentarily, and when the power came back on, Sophie Everett was gone, having disappeared in plain sight. It made no sense, and after finding no trace of the little girl anywhere—no tracks, no forensic evidence, nothing—they called me.
Walking into the house, I was overwhelmed by the too sweet smell of flowers.
“Christ,” I groaned, turning to look at Tanaka. “Don’t you smell that?”
“What?” he asked me seriously, his dark black eyes squinting at me, broad shoulders hunched like they did when he was nervous.
“The flowers,” I told him, smelling magnolia and honeysuckle and gardenia. Normally I liked the smell, but not under the circumstances. The scent was meant to mask other, harder, scents.
“So I told Mr. Everett you were with the FBI,” Curtis said as he joined us, “since I didn’t think he’d be too excited to learn that you own Romeo’s Basement.”
“Probably not,” I sighed, walking into the girl’s bedroom, having toured the rest of the house with Tanaka. I noticed her stuffed animals instantly. “Look.”
Both men turned to look where I was pointing.
“What?” Tanaka asked me, annoyed, unsure what he was supposed to be seeing.
I crossed to the bed, looked at the toys, and then turned, following their blind gazes to the closet door. “She was afraid of whatever’s in here. All her animals are watching it for her.”
“Please, all kids are freaked out about their closets.”
“Not like that,” I assured him, pointing at the animals. “Can’t you see this?”
“I don’t get why the animals are important,” Curtis told me.
“A child believes in the power of their totems,” I told him, picking up a stuffed German shepherd. “The dog is not a dog but a friend ready to rip out the throat of whomever or whatever would come to hurt her. The animals are like a ring of protection; the demon wouldn’t have been able to touch her on the bed.”
“You’re serious,” Detective Curtis said, picking up a fluffy black-and-white wolf with big blue glass eyes. “This is scary?”
“Not to you, but to the little girl he would be her protective spirit.”
He grunted, dropped the wolf back on the bed, and tipped his head at the closet. “I’m gonna tell you again that all little kids get creeped out by their closets.”
“And again I say, not like that,” I disagreed, walking to the door and putting my hand flat on the wood. “She was afraid of whatever is in there.” The touch sent a sliver of ice straight to my stomach. It felt like when you drink cold water when you’re hungry and you can feel it go all the way down, illustrating how empty you are. “Shit,” I groaned, taking a step back.
“What?”
“I’m pretty sure I found your missing girl. I just hope she’s in one piece when I go in there.” I took a breath.
“In where?” Curtis asked me. “In the closet?”
“It’s not a closet.”
“What is it?”
“A passage.”
“Like in Poltergeist?”
I looked over my shoulder at him. “Movie references?”
“I’m just tryin’ to get a handle on this shit, Malic. I still have trouble processing half the shit I’ve seen.”
I understood that. “Okay, listen, I’m gonna go in here, but you guys need to find the person in this house who is trafficking with a demon. They’re doing it in trade for something… money, power, love… I dunno, but the demon was called and allowed to take the child, which is why we have a doorway. You allow it in, you have a passage to its lair; that’s how it works.”
“Okay, I’ll hafta take your word for that.”
The look I was getting, the trust, I appreciated it.
“And so what?” Curtis asked me. “Do we pull our guns and go in there with––”
I shook my head, reached over my left shoulder, and pulled the spatha, the straight sword with a long point that I needed for fighting in close quarters, from the sheath strapped to my back. Under my heavy leather jacket, it had gone unnoticed when I walked in. I had a greatsword, or Zweihänder, that I used as well, but I would have never smuggled it into the house. That sword was for when stealth was not important.
Tanaka smiled at me. “That is some cool shit, man.”
The gladiator sword never failed to impress once it was drawn.
“I wouldn’t want to mess with you.”
But I was being stupid and I knew it. It was one thing to fight a lower-class demon alone, but whatever had the little girl… and I was hurt from earlier and I was going into its lair… but I didn’t have time to wait. She didn’t have time for me to wait. I opened the door.
“Hold on,” Detective Tanaka said, hand on my shoulder. “Mal, we’re not gonna let you go in there by––”
“You can’t come with me,” I assured him. “You’re not strong enough. But while I’m gone, find the person responsible for trafficking with the demon. It has permission to be here, a deal was made…. I just need to see if I can reason with it or if I have to kill it.”
“Of course you kill it,” Tanaka said, his grip on my shoulder tightening. “Don’t be stupid.”
“Tell everyone in the house that you found a summoning stone.”
“What the hell is that?” Curtis squinted at me.
“My guess would be it’s what you use to call a demon.” Tanaka gave him a look that spoke volumes about his brain process.
I watched Curtis scowl at his partner.
“Just be careful,” I said, squeezing the man’s shoulder. “Whoever called the demon will want to protect that secret. Watch your backs.”
“Same to you,” Curtis told me. “Be careful.”
It was easier said than done. The second I stepped into the closet and closed the door behind me, I saw stairs, saw a light flickering in the distance, and heard words chanted in Latin. I heard the whimpering as well, that was not to be missed. Taking a breath—this was what I did, after all, what I had been chosen to do—I rushed forward, taking the stairs by twos.
The descent was endless; my hands on the wall were slimy with wet mold, sliding on the goo, my feet stumbling occasionally because the stairs were ancient and worn. I was no longer in the house in Marin, and I knew if Curtis or Tanaka opened the door now, I would be gone, having completely disappeared to where they could neither see nor hear me. If they opened the door, all they would see would be whatever was normally in the closet: clothes, shoes, toys. When I heard the crying, I sped up.
I found Sophie alone in a huge hall. The little girl was in a daze, I could tell that as soon as I saw her. I couldn’t see what she was looking at for a minute, but then I concentrated, took a breath, and the empty walls filled in with her memory. I was looking at the night she had been abducted. She was walking through the dining room in her home, but where there should have been noise, party sounds, there was only silence. No clinking glasses, no music, no low buzz of conversation, no one calling her name. Everyone but her was frozen, people like statues poised to speak to one another with no one moving. She looked around the room and saw men and women silent and still, suspended in time. All was stopped but for her and now me.
“Sophie?”
The sound of her name being called out startled the child, and she whirled around to face me.
“Hi,” I said softly, squatting down, holding out my hand for her to take. “How’re you?”
Her face scrunched up, dirty, wet with tears, she was so scared, so exhausted, and there were scratches where the demon’s claws had gotten her without even trying. Her party dress was in disarray with drooping bows, soiled skirt, and ripped lace. She was terrified and I was tall. Even down on the ground, I was much bigger than she was, and I was armed. I wished I had remembered to bring her stuffed wolf. But I had… what did I have I could give her?
I searched the pockets o
f my jeans and my leather jacket and… a feather. I had one of the white feathers from Dylan Shaw’s costume on me. I had found it in the passenger seat of my car and shoved it, for whatever reason, in my pocket.
“Look.” I held it up for her. “You know what this is?”
Quick shake of her head, short red curls falling into her dirt-smudged face, huge baby-blue eyes absorbing me, wanting so much to trust and so terrified to at the same time. It was heartbreaking.
“It’s an angel feather,” I assured her. “I got it from an angel.”
She was unsure.
“I promise. He’s an angel.”
“What’s the angel’s name?”
“Dylan.”
She took a quivering breath. “Dylan’s a funny name for an angel.”
“I think it’s a really good name, actually.”
Her eyes were studying everything about me, not missing a thing.
“You want it?”
Quick nod.
“Is it okay if I bring it to you?”
Second nod.
I rose to my full height, which was not short on a good day but to her had to be huge. I was careful with how I moved, and when I was a few feet from her, I knelt down and held out the three-inch white feather dusted with gold glitter. Why in the world I had held onto it was beyond me, but it was perfect that I had.
She took the feather and stayed close, which was a start.
I made a face. “It stinks in here, huh?”
She nodded.
“Maybe we should go?” I asked, tilting my head and smiling at her.
She took a big breath, like she was jumping into the deep end of a pool, and then flung herself at me. Trust was just like that; you had to take the leap of faith.
“Oh, there’s my girl.” I smiled, holding her, rubbing her back as she trembled against me. “My name’s Malic, but you can call me Mal.”
“Mal,” she repeated, clutching me with her skinny arms. “Did you bring that sword to fight the scary man?”
She meant the spatha. “Yes.”
“He wants me to stay here, and I think he wants to eat me.”
I grunted. “He’s not going to eat you. I won’t let him.”
“Promise?”