A Shot in the Dark

by K. A. Stewart

  I guess, no matter what kind of badass you think you are, having someone try to murder you kinda takes a toll on your mental processes. More than one person had mentioned PTSD, but never where they thought I could hear.

  I caught Cole handing Will a five-dollar bill as we came back to the patio, and raised a brow at my little brother. “Et tu, Bruté?”

  “Someday, that kid’s gonna take you.”

  “Not today.” I wiped the tongs on a towel and went about flipping the burgers over. “Hey, can you grab me the—” A chorus of new voices interrupted my train of thought, and I looked up to find Dr. Bridget arriving with date in tow.

  At least, I assumed it was a date. It was a strange person of the male persuasion. A date? Since when was she dating? Granted, she was my wife’s best friend, but only my doctor. I guess she wasn’t required to file her itinerary with me, but . . . A date? Really?

  “Who the hell’s that?” Will asked as we all turned to watch this new male in our territory.

  “No clue. She didn’t say she was bringing anyone . . .”

  This new fellow was . . . not like us. That much was obvious. We were proudly part of the long-hair-andtattoos club, my brother excluded. Marty had a kilt on and his tattooed arms were proudly displayed. Will’s mop of curly hair was barely confined under his ball cap, and my own ponytail was there only to keep my hair out of the grill.

  This new guy was clean cut (okay, I can’t hold that against him given that Cole keeps his hair cop-short too) and there was gel in his dark hair. And a polo shirt? Khaki shorts? Loafers, for the love of little fishes! The moment he accepted a mango daiquiri from my wife, we knew this was a creature unlike any we knew. I mean, no straight guy drinks a daiquiri, let alone anything in mango. Not in Kansas City, the most “mid” of Midwestern cities.

  “Guys, this is Cam.” Bridget presented him with a smile, but there was that hint of unease lurking in her eyes. She knew how ruthless we could be, if provoked. “He just moved to the area recently, and he doesn’t really know a lot of people yet, so be nice.” Her eyes were fixed on me at that point, and I held my hands up defensively.

  “I’m a perfect angel!” Will and Marty both took turns choking, and I glared at them. Dr. Bridget glared back at me.

  “I mean it, Jess. Oh, and he used to be a priest. Watch your language.” And with that she abandoned the newly dubbed “Cam” and retreated back to the female section of the patio. He watched her go for long moments. If he was smart, he was willing her to come back and save him.

  The five of us looked at him, and he looked back, all of us trying to figure out the other. Finally, Will broke the silence. “So . . . Cam?”

  “Short for Cameron.”

  “And you were . . . a priest?”

  Cam-short-for-Cameron fidgeted with his glass uncomfortably. “Not really. I went to seminary, but I left before I took my vows.”

  The burgers were going to burn if I didn’t start paying attention, so reluctantly, I went back to tending the food and left the interrogation to my buddies.

  “Does that mean you automatically go to Hell?”

  “Will!”

  “What?” He looked at Marty, all bewildered-like, truly having no idea that it wasn’t an appropriate question. I often think that Will was born without that little voice in his head that says “don’t.”

  “Welcome to the area.” Cole finally took the role of responsible (and sane) adult, and stepped forward to offer his hand. Cameron shook it with a grateful smile, obviously pegging my little brother as a kindred spirit.

  “Thanks. It’s hard, moving when you don’t know anybody.”

  That led to the questions of why he moved, yadda yadda, and I might have actually listened with more than token interest if the last party guest hadn’t turned up just then. A totally uninvited party guest that I was not at all happy to see.

  I didn’t know the name of the man who walked around the corner of my house with a broad smile, but I’d always called him Axel. Y’know, like “Sympathy for the Devil”? He wasn’t a Jagger, for sure, and that just left . . . oh never mind. It made sense when I did it, trust me.

  On the surface, he looked rather normal. He wore faded blue jeans, a plain white T-shirt, and scuffed black boots. Granted, there was the blond Mohawk, the totally excessive piercings, but when you work at the kind of clothing store that I do, his appearance was rather tame. I knew it was a mask, a cover for what was truly underneath.

  Axel was a demon. He was my demon, actually, intent on collecting my soul if he could. I hadn’t seen him in months, since I cast him out of my yard last spring. To say we were not speaking was putting it lightly.

  He spotted me and made a beeline in my direction. “Jesse! I tried ringing the doorbell, but no one answered . . . Are we having a party?” For one horrifying moment, I thought he was going to hug me, but he stopped short. “Ooh, burgers!”

  Everyone was giving me that “Who’s this guy?” look. Everyone but Mira. She was on her feet, watching me with tension on her face. She knew. She knew, and she was waiting to see what I wanted her to do.

  For a brief (very brief) moment, I wanted to see what would happen if my wife the witch threw down against my own personal demon. But Axel was more powerful than I wanted to truly admit, and any kind of major magic work would take a horrible toll on Mira. So, no, not really an option.

  Not to mention that there were civilians here, people who had no idea that real demons walked the world. My sister-in-law, the kids, Dr. Bridget and her new boyfriend . . . All potentially collateral damage.

  I pasted a smile on my face and jerked my head toward Marty. “Beer me, Marty.” My stocky friend tossed me a bottle and I passed it to Axel. “This is Axel. I work with him at It.” Lies suck, and I hate doing it, but sometimes they come in handy. And Axel could pass for one of my tattooed, pierced, punk coworkers easily enough.

  The man-demon twisted the bottle open and took a long drink, then sighed with satisfaction. “Good stuff.” He looked around at the crowd, which was still mostly staring at him. “Do I have something on my face?” He felt around on his face with mock alarm, touching the gold rings in both eyebrows, the stud in his nose, the labret piercing just below his lower lip.

  The buffoonery worked, and everyone laughed. Well, almost everyone. Mira and I exchanged worried looks, but what was I supposed to do? Any tussle I started here would be in full view of people I didn’t want hurt. There was no choice but to leave him be, for now.

  And my day just got weirder after that. For no reason I could discern, Axel stuck around, introducing himself to my friends and family with a charming smile and witty conversation. He avoided Mira without seeming to do so, and after straying too near my daughter once and coming face-to-face with my wife’s cold expression, he avoided the little kids, too. That worried me. He was being entirely too accommodating. And what the hell did he even want? He wasn’t the “social call” kind of demon.

  Estéban was too perceptive for his own damn good, too. He caught me when everyone else was distracted. “I’ve seen him before. At It, but he doesn’t work there.” He raised one dark brow at me, daring me to disagree with him.

  “You’re a smart kid.” I handed him the first platter of burgers. “If I say move, you grab Anna and Nicky and get your ass in the house, entiendes?”

  “Entiendo.” His jaw firmed, taking his duty very seriously.

  “And Estéban? If that happens, I’m gonna need my sword.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Estéban was a good kid, from a good family. A good family who also happened to be demon hunters for generations going back. It felt a little weird, relying on a teenager to be my backup, but of everyone here, I knew I could trust the kid to follow orders, and to never back down. We’d fought demons together before.

  Cam-short-for-Cameron tried to blend too, making small talk with Cole mostly, while I went through the motions of rustling up grub for everyone. I tried to keep an eye on both him and Ax
el until I gave myself a headache.

  The almost-priest seemed like an all right sort of guy, if a little strange. More than once, I caught him watching me, though he’d look away the moment he realized I was looking back at him. It did also occur to me that maybe he was just watching me to figure out why I was staring at him, too.

  He had a very faint limp when he walked, like maybe his right leg wasn’t entirely sound, and when he wasn’t staring at me, he was very attentive to Dr. Bridget. The smiles they exchanged from time to time made me feel like a peeping Tom. It was that smile that said, “I’m totally head-over-heels in love with this person.”

  I had to admit, it was a bizarre feeling, watching them, and I finally decided that this was how I’d feel when Annabelle started dating someday. If Bridget had warned me, I could have been cleaning a shotgun or something when they came in. “She’s my only daughter . . .” Which is probably why she didn’t warn me.

  The burgers came off the grill and the brats and hotdogs went on, and the party partied on. If not for my own voice carrying across the patio as Axel laughed at someone’s joke, I might have even forgotten that he was there. Did anyone else notice the voice, I wondered. Or did he sound like me to only my own ears? It was almost disorienting, hearing myself speak from yards away.

  Some clouds drifted across the sun, dropping the temperature by a few degrees, and we all started watching the sky warily. Estéban and I in particular had an aversion to stormy weather. That’s what happens once you get a firsthand look at the inside of a tornado.

  The moment the first droplets hit the ground, Mira marshaled the troops into moving the party inside, everyone grabbing what they could. In moments, the backyard was empty, save for me and Axel. He lingered near the patio table, fingers walking across the neat tile squares in the tabletop. Marking out chess positions, I realized, from the last game we played. Before I’d packed the set up and taken it inside, of course. Because I was mad at him.

  Being reminded of that made me feel petty, which then made me feel ashamed. And my response to shame is to get defensive, which comes out in a rather vicious brand of humor.

  I smirked and asked him, “Not coming inside?” knowing full well that he couldn’t. Mira had long ago placed magical wards on the doors and windows, specifically to keep Axel out. I didn’t know what would happen if he tried to pass through them, but I’m sure it wouldn’t be pleasant.

  Axel gave me a smirk in return, but it faded. We both stood uncomfortably in the rain, looking everywhere but at each other. Finally, he said, “How’ve you been, Jesse?”

  “I’m still upright and breathing. Why?”

  He shrugged. “Just asking. Been a while since I’ve had to try to make small talk.”

  The rain picked up, the pleasant shower promising to become a downpour in short order. And since this was getting way too chick-flicky for me, I decided to cut straight to the meat. “What do you want, Axel?”

  “What makes you think I want anything?”

  “Because you always want something.” He always wanted one thing: my soul. Which was why I’d booted him out of my yard about six months ago. Big jerk nearly got me killed with his hints and taunts and sly smirks. “And what’s with the getup?” I gestured at his all-too-human body. Normally, his appearances involved possessed squirrels, and once a really nasty opossum.

  “You ever think maybe I just wanted a burger? And a beer. Oh that beer was wonderful.” He paused a moment, a blissfully dreamy expression on his face until I cleared my throat. “It’s almost impossible to drink out of those bottles when you’re six inches tall, you know. And a beer-drinking squirrel is a bit conspicuous.” I just raised a brow at him. We both knew he hadn’t answered my question yet. “I was in the neighborhood, all right? Thought I’d swing by and say ‘hey’.”

  I had to chuckle at that, and he gave me a surprised look. “Come on. You really expect me to buy that? You used to be better at this.”

  For a moment he tried to find something to say to refute me, but . . . well, you just can’t. He finally chuckled and shrugged again. “Yeah, I did. Guess my heart’s not in it right now.”

  “Maybe you need a vacation.”

  “Ah, wouldn’t that be grand? Somewhere warm, with a beach . . .” There was that wistfulness to his face again, for all of about three seconds. Then something in his eyes became more . . . pointed, somehow. Sharper. “Aren’t you taking a vacation here soon? Your annual camping trip thingy?”

  “Yeah.” He obviously knew, already. It wasn’t like I was revealing trade secrets. “We’re leaving day after tomorrow.” Immediately following the annual Dawson family barbecue and snarky T-shirt contest always came the annual guys’ paintball extravaganza, in the wilds of Colorado. Yet another attempt to make all the amends I needed to.

  “That’s good! You should definitely go do that.” He did everything but clap his hands in glee. “A vacation might do you a world of good, and all that fresh air out in the middle of nowhere should be exhilarating . . .” He paused in his enthusiastic babbling when I frowned at him. “What?”

  “Since when did you become a travel guide?”

  “What, just because I’m a demon, I can’t appreciate nature’s bounty?”

  I winced and glanced behind me, but they’d all gone inside. Only Mira remained in the kitchen, cleaning up and looking over her shoulder to check on me just a little bit more than necessary. I waved to her, but she didn’t wave back. Her gaze went to Axel, then back to me with a very clear “Get him out of here” message.

  Yeah, cause I wanted to be standing out in the rain chitchatting with a demon. “You need to go.”

  “Yeah, figured as much. She hates me.” He leaned to the side to look around me, offering Mira a smile that I know she wasn’t going to return.

  “I hate you.”

  “If you truly hated me, you’d have had her ward the yard.” He grinned at me.

  “I didn’t actually expect you to come back.”

  “We always come back.” His smile vanished instantly, and his eyes flared red for a heartbeat. It seemed more an unconscious thing than his usual posturing. “You should remember that. We always come back, Jesse.” For a moment, I thought he’d say more; then he just stuffed his hands in his pockets and wandered off around the corner of the house, shoulders hunched against the steady rain.

  I waited for longer than was probably necessary, to make sure he was really gone, and Mira handed me a towel as I came inside.

  “What did he want?” Worry warred with outright hostility in her green eyes. My wife was ready to go to war, if need be. God, I loved her.

  “I don’t know. He was . . . being strange.” She raised a brow at me. “Stranger than usual. Did anyone else realize?”

  “No. Why would they?”

  And that was a huge relief, really. Even my friends who knew what I did in my spare time—Will, who patched me up; Marty, who crafted my weapons; and Cole, whose soul I’d saved—knew nothing about Axel. I suppose, deep down, I was ashamed of myself for even talking to him. I’d never told anyone but Mira. And Estéban now, I guess. The circle widens.

  “Here, take these into the living room. They’ve got the football game on.” Mira plopped a bowl of tortilla chips into my hands and shooed me out of the kitchen.

  Over the course of the evening I couldn’t forget Axel, but I did manage to push him to the back of my mind for the most part. I had more important things to do. Things like laughing at Will’s truly horrific impressions, teasing Marty about his upcoming foray into fatherhood, just spending time with my little brother, which seemed to happen so rarely anymore.

  We watched football. We mocked the commercials. We discussed world events like grown-ups ought to. Seemed like there was something going wrong in every corner of the globe, lately. Riots. Droughts. Unrest and discontent, fledgling conflicts that promised to grow into mini-wars and disasters just poised to strike. Is it any wonder that I’d been in a crappy mood for the last few mon
ths? Every time I flipped the TV on, the world was going to hell, and . . .

  See, that’s what I’m talking about right there. The sudden dives into dark thoughts, the overwhelming sense of impending doom. Like there was this giant boot somewhere, and I was just waiting for it to drop on my head. It wasn’t like me, and even I knew it. That’s what I was supposed to be working on. I would enjoy my friends, dammit.

  And if I fell into a brooding silence, I had Anna and Nicky there to clamber into my lap, chattering about anything and everything. It didn’t matter what. It was nearly impossible to be glum with the pair of them in close proximity.

  I had Dr. Bridget there to threaten electroshock therapy (and of course the guys knew just where to get a spare car battery to make that happen, if she was serious). Her keen eyes watched me when she thought I wasn’t looking, the medical professional in her always analyzing, diagnosing. I couldn’t blame her. It’s what she did, and she was good.

  I had Mira. And she was just perfect, hiding her worry much better than I did, touching my shoulder lightly every time she walked past the couch. More than anything, that tiny bit of contact did me a heap of good. Just that reminder that I wasn’t alone, and someone amazing loved me. I glanced over my shoulder to give her a grateful smile.

  And somehow, somewhere, Mira and Bridget got their heads together, and before any of us realized just how it happened, Cam-short-for-Cameron had been invited along on our camping/paintball trip.

  Oh how wonderful.

  3

  Nothing can put a dent in a man’s dignity so quickly as being forced to parade around a doctor’s examination room in nothing but a paper sheet. But after my injuries last spring, Mira insisted that I get Dr. Bridget’s okay before I went traipsing off into the wilds of Colorado. So, here I was doing laps while my friend the doctor watched me critically.

  Not that I mind good-looking women staring at me, normally. Dr. Bridget was curvy in all the right places, even in the tailored suit she was wearing for the day. Funny how she looked so different here at her office, her dark hair all pulled back and tamed, than at my house with her hair in pigtails and wearing shorts and a smart-ass T-shirt. The two sides of Dr. Bridget.