“I’ll need about half a million dollars.”
“A half-million dollars?” The flesh where Mammon’s eyebrows should have been rose almost to his hairline. He rubbed his hands on his cape, leaving greasy streaks on the fabric. “That’s a lot of money, demon. Exactly what do you propose to do with it?” He said the words like they caused him physical pain.
“I plan to award it as a grant.”
Mammon picked up his pen, but Lilith asked, “What kind of grant?”
Belial clenched his jaw. He could lie and say the grant was to increase the use of tobacco products or the availability of heroin, but not with Lilith standing there. She’d take too much pleasure in outing him.
“It’s funding for a free clinic.”
“Are you insane?” Mammon’s fat jowls trembled. “The operations of free clinics are diametrically opposed to everything we stand for.”
“I don’t need a lecture on the mission of Hell,” Belial said. “I need money for the boss’s top priority.”
Mammon lifted a sheet of paper from a wire in-basket. It said MEMO across the top in glowing red letters. Dated the day before, it was from Satan, instructing Mammon to contain expenses, no matter how important the demon requesting extra funding claimed his mission to be.
Belial pulled out his cell phone and dialed 666. The boss didn’t pick up.
“He never answers when Jerry Springer is on,” Lilith said. “It’s his favorite.”
Oh, for Hell’s sake.
Lilith turned to Mammon. “How about this? How about if he returns the Lamborghini? You can sell it and return the money to his budget.”
Belial didn’t want to give up the Lamborghini, but with Dara as his target, the car was probably counterproductive. She was not a woman who would understand spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a beautiful piece of machinery when you could waste it helping the poor.
“Who will want a second-hand Aventador?” Mammon said.
“I know a B-list celebrity.” Lilith’s answer came out so pat Belial knew she’d been waiting for this opportunity. “A minor prince. He’s been wanting one of that model. I’m pretty sure he’ll take it off our hands.”
Mammon pinched his thick lower lip for a moment before he spoke. “It won’t bring anywhere near what we paid for it. There’s a huge penalty for just driving one of those things off the lot.”
Lilith shrugged. “It should fetch at least a quarter of a million.”
“A quarter of a million?” Belial was outraged. “How am I supposed to complete my mission with that pittance?”
Mammon, who been known to crawl into a sewer to retrieve a penny that had fallen through the grate, drew himself up. “You need to learn the value of a dollar, demon. Take it or leave it.”
“What will I drive for the remainder of the mission?” Belial was probably back to that pathetic Porsche.
“Whatever’s left in the garage,” said Mammon. He snapped his fingers, and one of the clerks hurried over with a tablet computer. The small screen displayed closed-circuit footage of the motor pool. All but one of the stalls were empty. The lone remaining vehicle was a beat-up Hyundai Accent.
Belial eyed it with repulsion. “You don’t expect me to drive that?”
“Take it or leave it,” Mammon said again.
Belial took it.
Lilith followed him out the door of Accounting.
Now that he had money, he could execute his planned snare. He didn’t need her help for that.
“If you want a thank-you,” he said, “I’ll drop you a card. Why don’t you stay here and wait for it?”
“Satan’s blood, but you’re are an ungrateful prick,” Lilith said.
That was her constant craving for recognition talking.
“This is why everyone down here hates you,” she added.
He frowned. “That’s ridiculous. They don’t hate me.”
“They do.” Her tone was matter-of-fact. “You’ve been voted Least Popular Demon for the last thousand years running. Unanimously.”
“That’s not true.”
“I can show you the trophy room, if you like. Your name is on a whole lot of trophies.”
“You must be mistaken. I’m known as Hell’s Politician.”
“And you just proved my point. Politicians are only popular when they’re doing favors for someone. And you only do favors for yourself and Satan.”
He decided to take her word for it. The way his current mission was going, the last thing his ego needed was a room full of evidence showing how unlikeable he was. “Why do they dislike me so much?”
“They don’t dislike you. They hate you.”
“Fine. Why do they hate me so much?”
“Because you don’t care about anyone but yourself.”
“This is Hell! No one here cares about anyone else.”
“Not true. Have you ever heard of the term ‘a cadre of demons’?”
“Of course.”
“What cadre do you belong to?”
He opened his mouth to say only a weakling relies on others, but that would make her case. “I’m not a joiner.”
“Exactly. Everyone else down here is in a cadre. We know that our friends will eventually betray us—that’s the nature of Hell—but for the short term, we have other demons to pal around with.”
He glared at her, offended to his core. What she was saying was ridiculous. He had, if not friends, at least close acquaintances in Hell. Other demons he could play handball with, or cribbage. He tried to remember the last time he’d played handball.
“Even you don’t like you,” she said.
He wanted to roar a denial, but she was enjoying this conversation far too much already, so he kept his tone mild. “Why do you say that?”
“You’ve never gotten over falling. You hate being in Hell.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. If I hate it so much, why am I so successful?”
“You’re successful because you’re a workaholic.”
He shrugged. He was all right with that.
“And you’re a workaholic because you’re a narcissist.”
He was a narcissist? She forced clients to wear sunglasses so she could see herself in the lenses.
“And that’s why everyone hates you,” Lilith finished.
“So why did you help me out?”
“Because I want this mission to succeed,” she said. Her eyes were wide.
He stared at her until she finally said, “Okay. At first, I wanted your mission to succeed in a way I could take credit for. I figured if we made a go of it, the boss might award me some little token of appreciation. It’s not much, but it’s all a woman is likely to ever get in this place.”
That, at least, sounded like the truth. “If you’re so hot to see me succeed, why did you just sabotage my effort to increase my budget?”
“If I hadn’t been there, Mammon wouldn’t have given you that much.”
That was probably true, but he refused to give her the satisfaction of agreeing.
“If you’re so big on seeing me triumph, loan me some money.”
“I’m not that invested, but I did manage to get an extra ten thousand for the car.”
That was surprising. He would have expected the opposite. “Why are you helping me? You said you were originally hoping to get a little spotlight from this. Did something change?”
Her mouth twisted in an expression of revulsion. “I met that smarmy little do-gooder, Dara Strong. Those whack-job grandparents of hers shoved a giant stick so far up her ass when she was a kid that it’s never coming back out.”
She clasped her hands in front of her in an imitation of the heroine in a cheap melodrama. “‘Even though God has taken my husband and my baby, I’m still his loving child.’“ She raised her eyes toward Heaven. “‘And no matter how much abuse he heaps on my head, I won’t think a word against him.’“
He blinked at the depth of the loathing in Lilith’s voice. Her depiction of Dara
didn’t strike him as accurate. Dara had unplumbed depths of anger that made her a more likely convert than Lilith recognized. That had to be the case.
Because if it weren’t, he was well and truly screwed.
Chapter 17
By the time Dara finished paying bills on Saturday, the clinic’s cash reserves had dwindled to almost nothing. Maybe it was time to take out a loan. They had a line of credit with the local bank they’d used in the past when cash flow got tight. The problem was that any money they borrowed, they would have to pay back. Between the rent increase and their impending funding cut, she didn’t see where the principal for the loan repayment would come from, never mind the interest.
When she left the clinic, she stopped in to see Nana. Even though Dara didn’t mention the demon doctor’s house call, the old woman was beside herself.
“You need to close down that clinic and move away.” Nana’s arthritic hands squeezed into shaky fists. Immediately, she insisted. Leaving no forwarding address.
She was deaf to counterarguments that taking such a dramatic step would do nothing to rid Dara of the demon pursuing her. If they had the technology to find her in the first place, they would find her wherever she went.
“Well, you have to do something,” Nana said. Worry had sent her blood pressure skyrocketing. That felt like a much greater threat than any the demon posed.
On Sunday, Dara went shopping with Lilith. She hadn’t planned to spend any money, but she’d gotten paid Friday and she was sick of looking dowdy next to Lilith’s chic elegance. She bought a new outfit and a pair of strappy black patent-leather sandals with four-inch heels. She initially resisted buying the shoes. They looked great, but she couldn’t imagine wearing them in the clinic. She spent far too many hours on her feet.
“Don’t be such a prude,” Lilith said. “Every woman needs at least one pair of slutty shoes. What if you meet a hot guy who’s into feet?”
An image of Dr. Demon rubbing her feet sprang to Dara’s mind. She pushed it away but, cheeks flaming, took the shoes to the cash register and paid for them. Lilith didn’t say anything, but her grin said she knew exactly what Dara was thinking.
After shopping, they hung out on the patio at Slyders until after eleven, drinking wine and swapping stories, though Dara refused to allow herself to get drunk. To her relief, Lilith didn’t even mention Dr. Lyle. Whatever curiosity Lilith felt about Dara’s reaction to the supernaturally handsome doctor, she must have put it behind her. They talked and laughed until the sky was black as ink. It was the latest Dara had been out in years.
Now it was Monday morning and she felt exhausted and overwhelmed. No more going out on school nights.
She stared at her computer. Maybe changing to a larger font would magnify potential donor names to the point where they’d become visible to the naked eye. If not, she had no idea where the money would come from. She was about to give up and go for another cup of coffee when Kelsey appeared in the doorway, bouncing on the balls of her feet. In her hand was a sheaf of papers. It was the first time she’d smiled at Dara since the incident with Dr. Lyle. Dara hoped this wasn’t another attempt to change her mind.
“You’ll never believe what I found.” The words bubbled from Kelsey like soda pop from a shaken bottle. “An operational grant for two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
“An operational grant?” It was relatively easy to find grants to fund new programs, but grants to pay operational expenses were practically nonexistent.
“It’s a healthcare grant, specifically for a small clinic in the southeastern United States.” Kelsey bounced a little faster. “It says that at least fifty percent of the labor must be volunteers.” She held out the stack of papers. “It’s like it was designed specifically for us.”
Dara skimmed through the document. It looked like a dream come true. Preference would be given to a clinic serving a demographically diverse population living below the federal poverty line, with special emphasis on clinics carrying a large number of chronic patients. That was them. There were no restrictions on how the money could be spent—rent, utilities, payroll, anything. The deadline for applying was in two days and the money would be awarded within a week after that. Her breathing sped up. It was the answer to her prayers.
Except, of course, that she hadn’t done any praying. Not for years. Not that God—or the randomness of the universe—wasn’t capable of sending some good luck without being asked but, given their current state of siege, she had to consider the alternative.
“That’s amazing.” She injected enthusiasm into her voice. On the off chance that the grant was the answer to a prayer she hadn’t even prayed, she didn’t want to spoil Kelsey’s triumph. “How did you find out about this?”
“I got an email this morning.” Kelsey’s pretty face was flushed with pride.
“Really?” It was pleasant not to have Kelsey sulking at her. “Who from?”
“Grantfinders.org.”
The name was unfamiliar. “Are we registered with them?”
“Not yet.” The pace of Kelsey’s bounce increased. “To tell you the truth, I’d never heard of them before today. I registered our name, though, so we’ll get future notifications.”
With every word Kelsey spoke, Dara’s suspicions rose a little higher and her spirits sank a little lower.
“Great work.” She gave Kelsey a broad smile and gathered up the sheaf of papers. “Would you mind leaving these with me so I can look them over?”
“Sure,” Kelsey said. “I’ll start working on the proposal. We’ve only got two days.” And she hustled away, happier than she’d been in the past week.
Dara’s first read-through revealed nothing out of the ordinary. Other than the fact that her search engine couldn’t find anything about Grantfinders.org, everything seemed to be in order. They weren’t requesting a processing fee or asking for the clinic’s checking account information. It wasn’t until her second read-through that she found the poison pill. It was tucked away in a huge paragraph so long and boring she’d skimmed it the first time and nearly did so again.
All volunteer recruitment for the recipient organization shall be subject to final decision by the organization’s board of trustees.
Is there no one to whom I can appeal your decision? Dr. Demon had asked in the grocery store. No, she had told him, the buck stopped with her.
He must be behind the grant.
She tried to imagine telling Kelsey that they were walking away from the opportunity to win a grant they desperately needed. Given the clinic’s current circumstances, Kelsey would think she was insane.
Dara groaned. Nana had warned her that once the demon had her in his sights, he wouldn’t give up. Once again, Nana was right. Dara mentally reviewed each member of the board of trustees. She had cordial business relationships with all of them, but none were what she would call a friend.
Except for one. Recent, but a friend all the same. Having one person to back her up might not ensure she could keep Dr. Demon out of her clinic, but at least she would have someone in her corner. She made the call. Lilith answered on the first ring.
“Hey, girlfriend. Are you wearing those kicking shoes we picked out?”
“Not today.”
“Why not?”
“I’m saving them for Friday,” Dara said. “We are going out Friday, aren’t we?” She hadn’t planned on it, but it seemed tactical to throw out the offer.
“Sure. Was that why you called?”
Dara explained about the grant Kelsey had found. “Right now, I have final say on all volunteers. If a proposed volunteer approached the board but I recommended against him, could I count on you to side with me?”
Lilith didn’t beat around the bush. “This is about Dr. Lyle, isn’t it?”
Dara sighed. “Yes. He might cause trouble if he gets wind of the grant.”
There was silence at the other end of the line.
“Lilith?” she said.
“I hate to do th
is to you,” Lilith said, “but there’s no way I can back you on this. Not when you’ve never provided an adequate reason why you’re so opposed to having him volunteer. The man has impeccable credentials. He’s exactly what you need at the clinic.”
Listening to Lilith praise Dr. Lyle made Dara want to vomit. How neatly he’d snared her. He had blocked every exit, cutting off every possible escape, before springing his trap. If she couldn’t count on Lilith, who knew her personally, to take her word about Dr. Lyle, how could she expect anyone else to?
It had come down to two choices: either she allowed the demon access to her clinic, where he would create who knew what sort of mayhem, or she closed the doors forever, abandoning her patients and walking away from the clinic she had worked so hard to build.
“Thank you for your honesty,” she managed to say through numb lips.
“Are you okay? You sound upset. If you hate him that much, why don’t you let another nurse work with him? Give yourself a night off when he’s there so you won’t have to be around him.”
There was no way on earth she would allow that spawn of Satan to roam her clinic unsupervised.
It was time for a new strategy.
Chapter 18
“I don’t have any choice, Nana. Either I take his money or I shut down the clinic.” Dara perched on Nana’s bed. Nana sat in her usual chair.
“Then shut down the clinic.” Nana thumped her fist on the Bible in her lap. If she didn’t calm down, she would fret herself into a stroke.
Dara tried to be patient. “The clinic employs six people. It would put them all out of work.”
“When people came to your granddaddy for counseling when they’d lost their jobs, he used to tell them, ‘If you found one job, you can find another.’“
Empathy was never Granddad’s strong suit.
“If I close the doors, lots of people in town won’t have any way to see a doctor—people with diabetes and hypertension and asthma. People who could die without treatment.”
The Demon Always Wins: Touched by a Demon, Book 1 Page 10