by Julie Kenner
This new surge of demon activity, however, had reinforced exactly how much I couldn’t afford to let my training slide. I hadn’t been to Cutter’s studio for over two weeks, but somehow I’d manage to squeeze a trip into today’s busy schedule.
“Okay, buddy,” I said to Timmy as I pulled back out onto the street. “You ready for the day?”
“Rock and roll, Mommy!” he yelled, shoving a little fist high into the air.
And that, I thought, pretty much summed it up.
I keep a giant family-event calendar in the kitchen, but other than that, I’m not disciplined enough to keep an organizer. Instead, I keep a list scribbled on one of those little spiral-bound pads you find in the checkout line at Wal-Mart. Many of the essentials of my life, in fact, were acquired while waiting in the checkout line.
Today’s list was pretty basic. A quick run to the grocery store for milk, an ever-dwindling staple in our house. Home for a shower. Review what I knew about Eric’s death and try to decide where to start tackling the mystery at this late date. Run the vacuum once through the house in anticipation of the play date scheduled at our house for one-thirty. Shop the post-holiday sales with Timmy for new shoes since the kid was growing at an astounding rate. Wait patiently— ha!-for Ben to call me with more info about Andramelech and the mysterious hunter. Visit Cutter for a quick workout. Cook dinner. Eat dinner.
Normal life stuff (well, except for the murder and demon parts), and we whipped through them pretty quickly. I still had a good hour before we had guests and—remarkably enough—the living room and play room were both clean enough for company. Truly, miracles do happen, and I ended up on the floor with Timmy, playing with Duplo blocks while we waited for play date time to arrive.
That quiet interval lasted all of fifteen minutes before Timmy started begging for a snack. I obliged, putting a few grapes and apple slices in a bowl and then sending him back to the living room and Eddie. While he munched, I parked myself by the sink and started to cut up some more fruit and arrange it decoratively on a plate. Laura had promised to bring by some of her famous chocolate chip cookies later, but I wanted at least the illusion of good nutrition gracing my play date table.
I was leaning against the sink, sneaking a few grapes, when I heard the scraping outside, a faint noise, like the rustling of branches against the house. Immediately, I was on alert. The noise was coming from the breakfast area, and I was quite aware that the picture window that dominates that wall is not a sufficient barrier to prevent a determined demon.
I’d stocked up on ice picks during a recent sale, and now I grabbed one out of the childproofed utility drawer. I eased toward the window, keeping my back to the wall so that I was mostly out of view of anyone who might be looking in.
Scrape, scrape.
I froze, the sound coming again, this time less muffled. I peeked out the window, my entire body primed to expect an explosion of glass as a demon came crashing through.
Nothing.
Shit.
I stood there, debating what to do, David’s warning fresh on my mind. In the end, there really was no debate, though. If there was a demon out there, I needed to nip that little problem in the bud right now. Because if I didn’t—and if Mr. Hellbound himself decided to barge in during Timmy’s play date—well, that would put quite a damper on the kid-does’ fun.
The window in the breakfast room looks out over the side of the house rather than the backyard, at an angle that also offers a view of our neighbor’s backyard and fence. Since there’s no access to that side of the house from the backyard, I slipped into the living room and headed for the front door.
“Keep Timmy in here with you,” I said. “Right beside you.” I added the last with extra force and a significant look. To his credit, Eddie understood right away.
“You rolling the trash can up from the curb, girlie?”
“Something like that,” I said.
“Need any help?”
I lifted a brow. “You can stay with him,” I said, pointing to Timmy. “After all, taking care of the trash isn’t your job anymore, is it?”
He leaned back in the recliner. “Right you are,” he said, grabbing the remote and clicking on the television. “Go get ’em, Tiger.”
I rolled my eyes and continued to the front door. I slipped out quietly, then made my way around the side of the house to the window and the shrubs growing just below the glass. From the corner of the house by the garage door, I could tell that he was still there. The shrubs were moving, and not with the wind. Which meant we either had a demon problem or a nest of feisty raccoons.
I was betting on demon.
Slowly, slowly, I moved down the length of the house until I was just inches from the shrubs. I couldn’t see who was back there—the foliage was too thick—but the leaves had quit moving. The demon knew I was out there, and he’d gone still as death.
The world seemed just as stagnant, and I barely breathed as I waited for some sign—some hint of where to attack. Dive in now, and I couldn’t be certain. And if I was off by even a centimeter, I’d lose the advantage of height and leverage.
No, the best plan was to wait him out. A movement, a sound, and I could target my attack.
And I was going to attack. No way was a demon stalking my house going to come out of this fray alive.
There!
Just the slightest of movements, but it was enough. I launched myself in, reaching through the brush to pull the demon out. The limbs and leaves scraped against my bare arms, but the fingers of my left hand closed around flesh. The branches slapped back against the demon as I tugged, and his wail rang in my ears.
I had the ice pick ready in my right hand, and as soon as the demon emerged, I slammed it forward.
“Aaaaaiaiiiggghhhh!”
I froze, the pick only inches from his face, and my fingers released the grip on his arm even as I jumped back. “Brian? Brian Dufresne? What the devil are you doing hiding in my shrubs?”
In front of me, nine-year-old Brian stared google-eyed at the ice pick that had just about done him in. “I—I—”
I cursed, then slipped the thing into my back pocket. “For heaven’s sake, Brian! I thought you were a— I could have killed you!”
“You thought I was a what?” he whispered, still looking at the hand that earlier held the pick.
“A coyote,” I said, which was the best I could come up with. “A coyote’s been terrorizing Kabit. I thought you...” I stopped, put my hands on my hips, and tried to remember who was supposed to be in charge here. “This isn’t about what I thought, young man. It’s about what you were doing.” I pointed to the shrubs and raised my eyebrows in question. “Why didn’t you come out? You were deliberately hiding from me.”
His face turned bright red. “You’re not going to tell my mom, are you?”
“Brian...”
He sighed and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I hit my baseball over our fence. And I’m not supposed to go into the neighbors’ yards, so I didn’t want to say anything. I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“I know you didn’t.” I sighed, feeling extremely relieved I hadn’t impaled the kid, and more than a little foolish. I gestured back at the shrubs. “Is the ball in there?”
One quick nod.
“Well, go get it.”
He started to, then stopped, looking up at me with puppydog eyes.
“I won’t tell your mom,” I said. “But Brian, she’s right.” I looked him straight in the eye. “You need to stay in your own yard, okay? Venture out, and you might get hurt.”
After all, there were scary things out there. Bad drivers, muggers, thieves, demons. And, yes, there were also crazy women with ice picks.
And those, I thought, should be avoided at all costs.
My heartbeat hadn’t yet returned to normal when Fran arrived with her three-year-old daughter Elena, who is a little angel. Fran and I have gotten in the habit of getting to each other’s play dates ten or so
minutes early, just so we can chat before the other moms show up and shift the conversation around to nail salons and new high-end boutiques.
While Timmy and Elena played in the inflatable ball corral that had been a present from Santa, Fran and I loitered in the kitchen. Kabit snaked through my legs, and I bent down to scratch him on the head.
“So how is Allie doing?” Fran asked, her expression appropriately sympathetic. “That nightmare at the museum. So horrible.”
“She’s doing pretty good,” I said. “She’s a resilient girl. I’m worried, of course, but honestly, she seems to be okay.” Certainly more so than I’d expected, I thought wryly.
“I’m glad. I can’t believe we had that kind of gang and drug activity going on right here in San Diablo,” she went on, warming to the subject. “I mean, who would have thought?”
“I know exactly what you mean,” I said. And then, because I couldn’t think of a graceful way to shift conversational gears, I simply picked an entirely different topic. “Remember the last time we were here? How much Elena loved that pink rocking pony?”
“I looked everywhere for one for Christmas,” Fran admitted. “Where on earth did you find it?”
“It used to be Allie’s,” I said. “But Timmy’s growing so fast he’s already too big for it. Besides, he told me that pink was for girls.”
Fran laughed. “Well, he has a point.”
“I told him it was a girl pony, but that boys could ride her. I’m not sure if he bought it or not, but it doesn’t matter, because he’s over ponies. He’s moved on to jets and rockets. So we bought him a new one for Christmas. A plane, that rocks and has wings that go up and down.”
“Aww,” she said. “It sounds precious.”
I assured her that it was. “But I was wondering if Elena wants the old one? She’s got time to get some good use out of it, and it’s just going to go to waste in our storage shed.”
“Seriously?” Her eyes were bright, and I knew why. Fran’s a single mom who works from home doing medical transcription. She’s never come right out and said it, but I’m sure money is tight. And while I doubted she’d take direct charity, a hand-me-down toy seemed more than reasonable.
“Absolutely. I’ll just end up dragging it to Goodwill in a year or two.”
“Oh, well, if that’s the case. Sure.”
“Great.” And, since I didn’t want the conversation turning back to the museum and the inevitable question of why I happened to be there, I took a step toward the living room. “I’ll go get it now before the others get here.” Because once they did, there was no way Fran would mention the museum. Not in front of Marissa—whose oldest daughter had also been caught in the demonic crossfire. Thankfully JoAnn didn’t remember a thing. A small blessing when compared to the rest of the overall horror, but a blessing nonetheless.
I trotted off before Fran could argue, leaving her to arrange our afternoon snack.
Our yard is half gravel and half grass, which gives us both a nice play area and a nice lawn. The storage shed is in the back of the gravel area, and as soon as I was out on the back porch—having been entirely ignored by both Elena and Timmy as I walked by—I realized I’d forgotten the key. Fortunately, Stuart is both lazy and a creative thinker. After coming out to get lawn equipment and forgetting the key on three separate occasions over the Christmas holidays, he finally got the bright idea to hide a spare in one of those fake rocks.
I circled the shed, ending up on the back side where we keep the ramshackle gardener’s bench. There’s a collection of clay and plastic pots off to one side, a five-month-old pile of topsoil covered with a tarp, and a little flower bed grave-yard tucked up in the corner formed by the shed and the privacy fence. In the spring, I had the best intentions of trying to breathe some life into that garden.
Really.
In the meantime, Timmy’s been using the area to plant his “things.” As in, he uses his plastic shovel and rake to dig holes, then he fills them with a wide variety of toys. I’m not sure what the point is—maybe he thinks he’ll grow a toy tree—but it keeps him occupied on the weekends.
Stuart had hidden his hollowed-out stone under the corner of the storage shed nearest the fence, shoved back behind one of the cinderblocks that forms the shed’s foundation. I picked my way over all the debris—Timmy’s toys, bags of potting soil, chipped clay pots, a coiled garden hose, a rusty watering can—then bent for the key. Above me, a nice wind from the ocean rustled the leaves in the tree, and I thought what a nice day it would be for an outdoor play date. Maybe I’d suggest to Fran that we bring the kids out on the patio.
I was debating whether it was warm enough to fill up Timmy’s sand-and-water play table (and debating how much the other moms would hate me for getting their kids wet and dirty), when I heard gravel crunch behind me.
“Sorry I’m so slow,” I said. “I forgot the—”
But the words died in my throat. Because that wasn’t Fran barreling down on me.
This time, it really was a demon.
Five
The demon launched himself at me, and from my precarious bent-over position, I barely managed to defend myself. An offensive maneuver was out of the question.
Pots clattered as I fell backwards against the potting table, one clay pot cracking and slicing hard against my exposed upper arm. I tried to get my footing, but the ground was damp, and my feet slid in the muck.
The demon took advantage of my poor balance and lunged forward, pressing me backwards so that the edge of the table was digging into my back, just above the waistband of my jeans. A few minutes ago, I’d had an ice pick tucked in my back pocket. But I’d foolishly tossed it into the sink when Fran and Elena had arrived.
Not one of my brighter moves.
With one hand, the demon held my neck, and with the other, he wielded a knife, the tip of it pressed right against the corner of my eye. I stayed perfectly still, my heart pounding against my ribs, and my body screaming in pain from the splintery edge cutting into the exposed skin of my back.
He’d shoved my whole body upward, too, so now my feet barely touched the muck. I wanted to kick, but knew it wasn’t any use. I had no leverage. And he had a large steel point just millimeters from my eye.
“Where?” the demon growled, his voice low and breathy. His dark hair matched the near-black eyes that were now locked on mine. All in all, he looked to be about thirty years old—or the shell of his body did, anyway. And that shell had been in damn good shape when it had died. Considering the grip he had on me, I think it was safe to say the body’s former owner had worked out quite regularly. “Where is the stone? What have you done with the stone?”
I stayed silent, both because I was mentally calculating my odds, and also because I had no idea what stone he was talking about.
“Speak!” he demanded, his sour breath bathing me with the stench of rotting eggs and bile.
I fought a gag, then managed to cough out a response. “What stone?” I asked, completely perplexed.
I kept my eyes on him, watching for his reaction even as much as I was trying to trap him with my attention. Because if he was watching me, then maybe he wasn’t watching my hand. The one that was currently stretching slowly—so slowly—toward the little silver potting trowel.
“Bitch. Do you think you cannot die, Hunter? Do you think we can only find it if you live?”
“Actually,” I said, my fingers finally closing around the handle of the trowel, “it’s you who isn’t going to live.”
As I made my declaration, I kicked up, taking advantage of what little leverage I had. I didn’t need much, just enough to distract. At the same time, I thrust the trowel toward his face, aiming for his eye. I was hyperaware of the knife next to my eye, and I turned my head sharply away at the same time that I thrust, risking choking if he tightened his grip on my neck, but deciding I’d rather gamble with my breath than with my eye.
His scream of pain echoed my own, and I felt the fiery burn as the
point of his knife grazed the soft tissue from the corner of my eye to my hairline.
I could see, though. Better, I could breathe.
Unfortunately, the point of my trowel had missed its mark, smashing against the occular bone rather than the eye itself. The demon wasn’t dead, but he did release his death grip on my throat as he howled in pain.
I scrambled to keep the advantage, throwing myself on top of him, and upsetting the potting bench once again so that it finally collapsed in a clatter. I barely noticed. Instead, I was too busy aiming the silver point of the trowel once again at the demon’s eye.
“Kate!”
Fran’s voice. For a split second, I froze—and that was all it took. The demon twisted sideways, wrested the trowel from me, and put his extra hundred pounds of muscle to good use, shoving me down hard and holding the trowel against my throat.
“Kate?” she tried again. “What was that noise? Are you okay?”
I watched the demon, who nodded and let up on the pressure on the trowel.
“I’m okay,” I yelled back. “I just knocked some stuff over.”
“You need help?”
“No, no,” I said, probably too quickly. “I’m fine.”
In truth, I desperately needed help. I couldn’t believe I’d let myself be distracted like that, but the fact is that I still haven’t gotten used to hunting around civilians. But there was no way I was letting Fran come into the fray. My own life, I’d take responsibility for. The rest of my son’s play group? No way.
“Well, okay,” she said, dubiously.
“The others should be here any minute,” I said. “Grab the door for me, okay? I’ll only be a few more minutes.” I kept my voice cheery as my eyes stayed on the demon.
He didn’t waste any time. The instant Fran shut the door, he was back in my face. “The stone,” he rasped. “You will release the stone.”