He looked back at me and said, “Rough night?”
“You could say that.” Guess I hadn’t cleaned up as well as I thought.
I sipped my beer, hoppy and bitter, letting it roll over my tongue and wash away the remaining tension in my shoulders. I wasn’t used to fighting with mages on the street. That was weird. And I really wasn’t used to the shaky after-effects of using demon fire. That was a trick I tried to keep under my hat.
My burger arrived in a timely manner, overcooked to medium-well and smothered in cheese. I was too hungry to complain, and besides, it was cheap. All of the food here was, which was the other reason it was my favorite haunt.
I’d gotten half-way through my plate of food when Conor Ramsey sauntered in. I nearly choked on the fried pickle I’d been chewing.
My heart pounded against my ribs. All I could think was that he’d come to arrest me. Had the punk mages turned me in? No, that wasn’t possible. For one thing, they didn’t have a clue who I was. And for another, they didn’t seem to recognize my magic as demon magic.
Even if they did, what would they say to the Watchers? “Hi, we were trying to buy super illegal brimstone and this witch threw demon fire at us!” Yeah, that’d go over well.
I managed to swallow the lump of food in my mouth even though my throat had gone dry.
Conor didn’t make a move toward me. Instead, he waited until Riley indicated that he could sit anywhere, and then he took a seat in one of the booths lining the wall behind me. I watched him in the mirror behind the bar. He wore the charcoal-colored Watcher uniform: gray pants, gray long-sleeved t-shirt, and darker gray cargo vest that was lined with iron. Iron was anathema to fae magic, and might help a Watcher ward off a faerie glamour. The look shouldn’t have been sexy but on Conor, with his rippling muscles and inky black hair, it was.
Unfortunately, Conor was also the poster boy for why I’d never wanted to join the Watchers, even before I had demon magic that would get me a quick trip to the Council’s dungeon. He was uptight, cocky, and extremely by-the-book. Despite their gray outfits, the Watchers tended to see things in stark black and white terms.
He caught me looking at him and glowered. He knew who I was. Everyone did. I was Dani Warren, the only witch PI in the Pacific Northwest. Most witches who wanted to go into my line of work joined the Council and worked for the Watchers instead of striking out on their own. And plenty of Watchers resented my choice. From what I knew about Conor, a heroic demon hunter and one of the Watcher’s best, he was a good guy. Trouble was, he was so good that he’d turn me over the Council in a heartbeat if he ever learned my secret.
I turned back to my plate, pushing it toward the end of the bar, my appetite gone. What was Conor Ramsey doing here in a mundane dive bar? It definitely wasn’t his speed. Had he been sent to watch me? Why?
I sipped my beer and surreptitiously glanced around, trying to tell if any of my compatriots were supernaturals that I’d missed. Maybe he was here for someone else. I seriously hoped so.
Riley took Conor’s order: gin and tonic. Huh. I’d have taken Conor for a teetotaler. The Magic Council didn’t have any laws about alcohol consumption but the Watchers tended to abstain.
On his way back from delivering Conor’s drink, Riley gestured to my plate. “Everything okay? Usually you don’t leave a crumb.”
“I’m just not as hungry as I thought.” Hell, with a Watcher seated behind me, I couldn’t relax. They couldn’t sense my demon magic if I wasn’t using it—as far as I knew—but I still wanted to spend as little time around them and other Council members as possible.
Common knowledge said it was impossible for a witch to have demon magic and I’d like everyone to keep thinking so. I certainly wouldn’t have believed it was possible until it happened to me.
I’d opened a circle in an attempt to summon the spirit of my grandmother, in order to fill in some blanks in her spellbook. I’d used brimstone to increase the circle’s power, because summoning spirits was difficult and I needed all the help I could get. Somehow, I ended up summoning a demon. It possessed me and took over my body. For three hellish days, I was a prisoner in my own skin, trapped in a watery well inside my own mind. When I finally managed to push the demon out, it left behind magic. I slowly learned how to access and control it.
And hide it.
I paid my tab and pushed off my stool, thanking Riley and heading outside into the dark, cool night. Despite being June, the midnight air was frigid and I pulled my leather coat tighter.
The door to the bar banged open behind me and I turned to see Conor exiting. I quickly turned away but he marched right up to me. My heart leapt into my throat and my mind reeled, wondering what I might have done to draw his attention.
“Dani Warren.” The way he said my name made it sound like an accusation. He was only half a foot taller than me but he loomed over me like a giant.
I bristled and copied his tone. “Conor Ramsey.”
He smirked. “Here on business?”
My pulse raced as I tried to keep from shaking. “That’s none of yours. But for the record, I’m just here for dinner and a drink.”
Across the street, a woman exited the closed sushi restaurant, careful to lock the door behind her before she scurried down the sidewalk. I watched her, ignoring the heat of Conor’s presence behind me. He smelled of clove and cinnamon, herbs used in a protection ritual the Watchers often engaged in before patrol.
“It is my business if there’s trouble around,” he said, still watching me with hard, accusing eyes.
“There’s no trouble.”
The woman passed the mouth of an alley. Shadowy figures jumped out, blocking her path. She screamed, her terror ringing through the air.
“Or maybe there is,” I said, and darted across the empty street. I was halfway there when I reached for my sword and remembered I’d left it at home. I cursed my optimism and checked my pockets for charms. Empty.
Great.
“Hey!” I yelled as I approached. Four coyote shifters still in human form had surrounded the poor woman and were snarling at her as they closed in. I could tell what they were because of their reddish blond hair and the scent of forest and fur that clung to them.
“Go away, witch,” said the man directly in the poor woman’s face. The leader, I presumed. “This is none of your concern.”
“You’re harassing that woman. That makes it my concern.” I folded my arms over my chest and stared at him. He growled at me, low and steady, and the sound shook my bones. But I brushed it off. I’d encountered shifter packs worse than this before. Hell, even the werewolves would give these punks a run for their money.
“She’s ours,” the guy to the left said, tugging on the woman’s arm.
She pulled away. “I am not. I dumped you, David!”
“You heard her, David,” I said. “Get out of here.”
David curled his lips in disgust. “Or what? You’ll cast a spell on me.” He scoffed and his cohorts laughed.
“Or I’ll show you what a witch can do.” My fingers tingled but Conor was still near. In fact, he was standing across the street doing nothing. Real helpful. But he was watching, which meant I couldn’t use my demon magic to take these guys out. Conor was a renowned demon hunter and he’d recognize demon fire for what it was.
The coyotes laughed like a pack of hyenas, one of them crowing at the sky like they’d already won a fight. Why hadn’t I brought my sword? Trouble always managed to find me when I was least prepared.
I took a deep breath and stepped closer, moving in on the Leader. He stopped laughing but his idiotic grin remained plastered to his face. “If you want a piece of this, sweetheart, you just have to say. I bet Jenny here won’t mind sharing.”
“Go to hell,” Jenny spat. Good for her.
I got up in David’s face, uncomfortably close. Enough that I could smell rotten meat on his breath. “Here’s the deal, asshole. See that guy across the street? He’s a Watcher and he’s the o
nly reason I’m not burning you and your little puppies to a crisp. So if I were you, I’d back off before he decides come over and drag your asses to the dungeon for the night. The Council would love to make an example out of you and your pack.”
David’s smirk slipped as he looked over my shoulder and saw Conor in his unmistakable uniform. At least the Watcher was good for something more than eye candy. David immediately stepped back, whistled, and gestured for his boys to follow. They moved down the street and turned the corner.
Jenny’s shoulders sank and she practically collapsed before catching herself. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ve been refusing to walk to my car alone but closing the restaurant took longer tonight and…” She shook her head, trailing off. And we both knew what had happened.
I walked to her car around the block, making sure the coyote crew was truly gone. I gave her my card. “I’m a PI. You ever need help, just give me a ring.”
I crossed the street and ran smack dab into Conor, who had followed us down the block.
“Impressive,” he said. From his mild expression, I thought he might actually mean it.
I shrugged. “Not really. Best way to handle assholes is to let them know you won’t take their shit.” And to point out the very real Watcher who was carefully assessing the situation. Not that I was going to let Conor know he deserved partial credit for scaring them off.
He watched me for a long moment. I swallowed, heat creeping into my cheeks under his scrutiny. It was shame such a handsome guy worked for the Council because as much as part of me loved this attention, the rest of me knew how dangerous it was to catch a Watcher’s eye.
“You’re not what I expected,” he said. I must have looked as confused as I felt because he added, “I’ve heard plenty about you, Miss Warren.”
Now I swallowed uneasily for a new reason. I didn’t like the idea that the Watchers talked about me. I’d prefer they mostly ignored my existence.
His phone buzzed in his vest pocket and he pulled it out, studied the screen, and nodded sharply, as if the screen could see his reaction. He put the phone away and met my eyes again. “Duty calls.”
With that, he pivoted on his heel and walked in the direction opposite my apartment.
Relieved, I hurried home, took a long shower, and crawled into bed.
Chapter 3
The next evening, I headed to my office around six o’clock. That was the one upside of taking on mostly supernatural clients: they were night owls and that allowed me to keep the kind of hours I wanted.
Of course, with less than a week remaining until I had to pay my rent, I needed to stop being picky and take whatever cases I could get, even if it meant tracking down a lost puppy or following around a cheating husband.
Because the retail spaces in the building were walled off from the apartment areas, I had to go through the lobby and walk around the corner to get to my office. At least I was close to work.
I turned the corner and hesitated, my hackles rising. A woman stood outside my office. That alone wasn’t odd—as much as I tried to encourage people to make appointments via phone or text so I could be sure to be at the office, most people didn’t come to me until they were desperate. I was a last resort.
The surprising and somewhat mystifying part was that I recognized the woman. She was Savannah Goldsmith, of the Salem Goldsmiths, one of the oldest witch families in the nation. She wore a back pencil skirt that stopped at her knee, a pearl-colored blouse that matched the actual pearls around her neck, strappy black heels, and bouncy blonde curls. She was dressed almost opposite of me: I wore jeans, my Sketchers, and a t-shirt beneath a leather jacket, with my straight brown hair falling loose around my shoulders.
“Good evening,” I said politely, unlocking my office door.
“You’re Dani Warren, right?” she asked. She had a slightly clipped way of speaking. “I’m Savannah Goldsmith and I need to hire you.”
I tried to hide my surprise. Most of the Council’s high-ranking members were from prominent witch families and that included the Goldsmiths. Savannah’s mother was one of the leaders on the Council’s Board of Magic. The Council was largely uninterested in my existence, except when they decided I was getting in their way. But when they did pay attention to me, it was usually to grumble that a witch shouldn’t be allowed to freelance and that I should work for them if I wanted to run around taking cases. They were far more likely to turn to their own problem solvers, the Watchers, than to hire a PI.
“Hire me?” I balked.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “Isn’t that how this works?”
“Sure,” I said. Except I was usually hired by werewolf Alphas who wanted me to drag runaway fledgling werewolves back home or vampires who wanted to track down the descendants of an old friend. I was rarely hired by another witch, let alone one with a mother on the Board of Magic. I held the office door open for her.
My office was small: one room with a tiny bathroom to the left and a small alcove with a kitchenette with a sink, a few cabinets and a small counter that held a coffee pot.
My desk took up the bulk of the space with a shelf, a printer stand, and a filing cabinet against the right wall. The filing cabinet was full, so I had overflow files stacked on the shelves. I kept meaning to get a second filing cabinet but money was always tight.
There were two chairs in front of my desk. I gestured for Savannah to take a seat and then sat on the other side, pulling my computer out of the top drawer and setting it on the desk. I also pulled out a blank manila folder.
“So what’s the case?” I asked.
Savannah sat with her purse in her lap, lips pressed into a thin line as she took in the tiny office with the scuffed floor. Finally, she met my eyes and said flatly, “My brother’s been killed.”
A rock dropped into my stomach. I’d only met Marcus Goldsmith a handful of times, but I could picture his blond curls and charming smile. He’d been one of the witch elite and I couldn’t remember ever exchanging more than a few words with him. But other than being born into a snotty, rich family, he’d always struck me as a decent guy. And he was younger than me, maybe twenty-five, far too young to be dead.
“How?” I asked.
“That’s what I need you to find out.” She opened her purse and pulled out a wad of cash. I stared at it hungrily before pulling my gaze back up to her face. It was no good showing how hard up for money I was. That gave clients way too much power. “He was found dead early this morning in an abandoned house not far from here.” Her voice hitched.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I said.
She blinked back tears and nodded. “It was surprising to say the least.”
“I hadn’t heard.” That was strange because gossip traveled like wildfire through supernatural circles and Penelope, my neighbor, usually showed up to give me the latest as soon as anything mildly interesting happened.
“It’s being kept quiet for now as the circumstances are… confusing.” She swallowed uneasily.
“Confusing how?” I pressed, while opening my laptop. I opened a word processor with a case file template and entered her name while I waited for a response.
She turned her head to the side, studying the few spellbooks I kept on my office shelf. “This is privileged information. If I share it, it must go no further.”
“Of course,” I said. “That’s part of the job. Discretion is spelled out in my contract.” I pulled a contract from the drawer and slid it across the table. “If you’d like to sign before you give me the details…”
She stared at the paper like it might bite her. “I do not enter into contracts.”
I snorted. “Most supernaturals don’t. But it’s worth a shot.”
I made all the mortals I worked for sign a contract. It was harder to get supernaturals to put their name on anything. For one thing, the supernatural world ran on old rules of hospitality, which many would argue didn’t require a written contract. And for another, signing one’s name meant giv
ing up a little bit of yourself, something no one versed in magic was ever keen to do.
I wasn’t trying to collect anything but promises that I’d get paid for work completed and, in the cases of mortals who were unhappy with the answers I gave them, not sued. Luckily for me (or not?), most supernaturals eschewed human courts and filed their grievances in more creative ways. I no longer made an effort to get supernatural clients to sign beyond giving it the ol’ college try.
With a sigh, I pulled the contract back and put it in my desk. “Fine. Tell me what’s up, then. The fee is three hundred for tonight and two hundred for every night after.”
Savannah blinked. “That’s pricy.”
I glanced at her stack of cold, hard cash and then raised an eyebrow. She certainly wasn’t hurting.
She counted off three hundred dollar bills, set them on the desk, and put the rest of her money back into her purse. I took it and shoved it into my pocket. If this case lasted a few more nights, I’d almost be set for rent. Then I’d just need to scrounge up money for the rest of my living expenses.
“So what’s the deal?” I asked.
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Marcus was found dead next to the body of a demon.”
My stomach roiled. Given how illegal demon magic was, being found with a demon—dead or alive—was a huge black mark.
“They’re saying he must have gotten killed by consorting with demons.” She sniffled. “That wasn’t like my brother. He didn’t break the law. I can’t have people thinking he or anyone in my family would stoop so low.”
He might have broken the law, but there was no point in arguing. My job would be to find out what had happened and report it back to Savannah, whether she wanted to hear it or not. There was no use in speculating until I had the facts.
Demon Fire (Brimstone Magic Book 1) Page 2