The Unlikeable Demon Hunter

by Deborah Wilde

  What Asmodeus had done to me had merely been a taste, weak enough that my anger at Rohan’s assholeness had snapped it. Well, these guys were furious and that wasn’t snapping shit. Asmodeus had baked the memory loss into them.

  “Lock them up,” Rohan directed. “Then meet us in the library.”

  Drio seized Leo and I each by the arm.

  Damn it! Why had I told Asmodeus to come after me?

  “As your demon master isn’t here right now,” Drio murmured into my ear, “you’ll have to contend with me.” He shoved Leo and me out the door. “Resist me, access your power, I so much as feel your muscles tense, and I’ll make things very unpleasant for you.”

  He frog-marched us down to the Vault.

  “Drio,” I reasoned, half twisting around to face him, despite the pain lancing up my arm, “how could I wear this hamsa if I wasn’t Rasha? You think a demon would be able to wear the ring without repercussion? Isn’t the simplest explanation the most logical? That I am a hunter and you’re all suffering from some kind of demonic spell? I’m telling you, Asmodeus did this. You have to believe me.”

  He slowed for a second then wrenched my arm up higher. “The simplest explanation is a human obeying a demon,” he countered. “Since female Rasha don’t exist.”

  Trying to prove my hunter identity was pointless. I had history and misogyny working against me. I’d have to save Ari another way. Problem was, if everyone believed that Ari was dead, they’d no longer be looking for him.

  I had to escape.

  Leo broke into a coughing fit halfway down the stairs to the basement. While she looked like staying upright required her full concentration, I’d swear the coughing was fake.

  “You okay?” My thoughts were occupied with how we were going to get out of this. Even if I lit up to attack, the chances of Drio zipping away before I could hurt him were high. Payback would not be pretty. I needed to catch him off-guard.

  “No talking.” Drio tightened his hold on us.

  Leo glanced pointedly down at her bag, slung across her chest. It took me a minute to clue in. The switchblade.

  I gave the tiniest shake of my head.

  Drio locked us up in the room where the kumiho demon had been. There was no longer any trace to show she’d existed. That was creepy and didn’t bear thinking about.

  He left us there, sealing us in with only a dim bulb for light.

  Leo sunk to the ground with a moan. I ran over to her but she held me off. “I’ll puke if you touch me.” She pressed a hand to her head, the skin at the corners of her eyes tight.

  “It’s the wards,” I said. “I’m sorry. If Drio hadn’t pulled you through and you’d been outed?” Unable to punch the solid iron wall for fear of breaking my fist, I gave a loud “fuuck!”

  “Forget it. I should have remembered this place was warded.” She gave me a faint grin through her pain. “Rohan distracted me.”

  “He does that.”

  “Why didn’t we take Drio down?” Leo asked.

  “He’d have gotten away before you had the knife out. Then we’d really have been screwed.” I slid down the wall. “All I wanted was to keep Ari safe until I could give him back his destiny. I failed. Where’s the gray area now, Leo?”

  She was seated with her arms curled around her knees in a tight ball, as if trying to make the least contact with all the iron, taking deep, even breaths. “Your brother spent his life training to be a hero. Not an insurance agent. He was never going to be safe.”

  I leaned my head back against the wall, defeated. “But if he’d become a hunter he would have had magic. A fighting chance. He’s helpless against them.”

  “And there will come a time, more than one I bet, that you face demons when you’re helpless,” she said. I already had with Asmodeus. “Whose fault will it be then? The Brotherhood screwed up with Ari. Not you. Stop being so committed to your guilt over this.”

  “How do you do it?” I asked. “Live in the gray and still have such a strong sense of yourself? You’re a good person and yet you still have to balance a demon heritage. No offense.”

  “None taken. I’ve known what I was since I was tiny. The goblin used to come visit me when I was small, telling me who I was, what to expect. What I could have if I embraced it. I didn’t want it. I like being human. The trick has been figuring out how to use my goblin side to enhance my humanity. Just like you’ll have to do as a hunter.” She shrugged, her voice growing weaker. “It’s a work in progress.”

  “I think you’re amazing as is.”

  She swayed slightly and I caught her, propping her up with my hand on her back.

  “Apparently this much iron and me don’t get along,” she whispered.

  I wasn’t ready to absolve myself, but I was more than ready to save my twin and, more immediately, my best friend. I took stock of our surroundings. No windows, a bare bulb, nothing in here other than that chair bolted to the floor. One door that required–

  I could have kissed Drio, that “females can’t be Rasha” nonbeliever, for putting us in here. Informing Leo I was letting go of her, I scrambled to my feet, blood pumping and pressed my ear to the door, straining to hear if he was gone, but the walls were soundproof.

  “Here goes everything.” I lay my hand against the scanner, hoping my access had gone through and that I still existed for Demon Club administration.

  After the longest second in the world, the light turned green and the door opened, releasing us back into the Vault. We crept up to the ground floor office level. It was slow going because Leo was still shaky but we made it to the outside door without mishap. “Go.” I whispered, one eye on Ms. Clara’s office.

  Leo shook her head.

  Still keeping my voice low, I said, “I can be found here. You can’t.”

  “Nee, I told you, you won’t find Asmodeus.”

  “I don’t have to. Do you need me to take you back across the wards?”

  “No. I’ll be okay leaving. It’s entering that’s the problem.”

  I hugged her. “I appreciate everything you did. Call me if you learn anything. Now get.”

  “Call if you need me,” she whispered back, and left.

  Soon as she’d safely made it across the yard to the trees, I inched my way up the stairs, holding the bannister so it would take most of my weight in case any of the treads were prone to creaking. I expected to be caught at any second, but no hand came down on my shoulder, allowing me to reach the library door, crouch down, and listen.

  “I’m sorry about Ari,” Rohan was saying.

  I peeked through the crack between the open door and the frame to see Rohan lay a hand on Kane’s shoulder. Yeah, he was the one who needed consoling.

  “I’ll confirm the demons’ location. Then we do clean up.” That was Drio. I didn’t begrudge him his bloodthirsty tone, though I worried they’d be so focused on killing they’d fail to find Ari. Or worse, hurt him in the carnage.

  “Meantime, I’m off to confront Montague.” By the growl of Rohan’s voice, this wasn’t going to be a friendly meeting.

  “Nothing he says can justify betraying fellow Rasha,” Drio said. “Undoing our wards and letting Asmodeus in.”

  A Rasha had taken down the wards?

  Baruch’s blink of fury made my stomach plummet into my toes.

  “Even though Ari wasn’t Rasha…” Kane trailed off.

  “He was still a Brother.” Really, Baruch? Because he wasn’t when I’d been pleading my case to get Ari’s initiate status confirmed. Bogus death revisionist history.

  Not that Ari was dead. Still, I’d had it with these guys.

  “Ms. Clara tapped Montague’s phone for GPS inactivity,” Rohan said. “We’ve got his location.”

  I didn’t stick around to hear more. Five minutes later, I was hiding on the floor of the cramped backseat of Rohan’s Shelby, curled tight into a ball and silent as a mouse, tagging along to go confront our rogue Rasha. Rohan leadfooted it to our destination, but despit
e being tossed around, I didn’t make a sound.

  I gave him some time after he cut the engine to get inside wherever we were before unfolding my stiff joints and scrambling out of the car. I was back in the Motel Shangri-Lola parking lot, site of my reunion with Leo last night. “Fuuuck!” I kicked at the car tire.

  Rohan grabbed me by the waist. “How the hell did you get free?”

  “I want first crack to see what he knows about Ari.” I jerked free. “Room 205.”

  Rohan stepped around to face me, a dangerous flicker in his icy eyes. “You know this, how?”

  I opened my mouth, then snapped it shut, not having a lie ready. If I said I’d met the snitch here, he’d demand to meet him. Her. I would too if I was Rohan. It was an awfully big coincidence on the face of things and I’d need to find out what led Leo to this case. But she was not the bad guy here.

  Rohan pinned me against the hood, the warmth of the engine against my back at odds with the cool blade along his forearm pressed across my throat. “Explain.”

  I swallowed. “You wouldn’t kill a fellow Rasha.”

  “If this alleged Rasha posed a larger threat to the Brotherhood? Try me.” He looked a tad too willing for me to take him up on his offer.

  “I met an informant here last night. A demon informant.”

  A muscle jumped in his jaw. “Call him.”

  I jutted out my chin. “No.”

  “I’m sorry?” Despite the barely suppressed fury in his voice, the blade wasn’t hurting me.

  Yet.

  Though the stress of the situation had brought my headache back like the cast of Stomp had set up shop in my skull. Screwing up my face, I fumbled in my pocket for the pills, holding them blindly out to Rohan.

  He took the bottle, releasing me to pop the cap.

  I slumped over the hood, my fingertips pressed to my throat but there wasn’t any bruising.

  Rohan hooked an elbow under me to pull me up. He probed my black eye. “Where’s the demon that did that to you?”

  “Dead,” I said viciously, jerking away from his touch. He’d been gentle but it still hurt.

  “Good. He’s involved with Katz’s death how?” That question would have been brutal to hear spoken aloud if I wasn’t sure that Ari lived.

  “His abduction,” I corrected.

  Rohan tilted his head in acknowledgment. “His abduction.”

  “I’m not sure.” I described the accident. “That’s how I know it was Asmodeus. He’s behind your memory loss, too.” I pointed to the pills. “Can I have?”

  “You shouldn’t need these.”

  “Tell that to my head.”

  “How many have you taken already?” Rohan pressed a tablet into my palm.

  “I’m a good time on over-the-counter-meds.”

  “Expired meds.”

  I held out my hand for the bottle. “Aren’t expiry dates just a suggestion?”

  “Surprisingly, no.” Rohan handed back the bottle, tugging on my ring one more time like he couldn’t believe I was actually Rasha. “Ari really is your twin?”

  “I swear it with every fiber of my being.” I infused my words with as much sincerity as I could and while Rohan studied me, as if weighing their truth, he nodded, convinced. About my sibling connection at least.

  Though he shot me one more hard look before stalking off across the parking lot. Gravel crunched under his feet. He still had the slightest limp, courtesy of his earlier injury. “Why do I get the feeling you are all kinds of trouble?”

  I scurried after him. “Beats me.”

  The front desk was unmanned, just like in my first visit, though I did hear a tinny TV set playing some soap opera in a room off back.

  Rohan pushed me in front of him. “Lead the way.”

  Lola didn’t reek of tuna fish this time, which was a good thing, but the many oddly colored stains on the cheap beige carpeting running the length of the hallways seemed more pronounced today. The walls were too closed in, the dingy green brocade wallpaper exuding wrongness, though maybe that was me projecting.

  It was a good thing that housekeeping was so lax. And that magnetic key cards were an unknown technology in this dump, allowing Rohan to pick the lock. He shouldered open the door, both of us flinging our arms over our noses at the stench. Not from the body. There wasn’t enough of Montague left on the bed to stink: several gnawed-on bones, a curled-up strip of skin hanging off the bed like a discarded towel, and a brownish red squishy that might have been part of an intestine. No, the foul stench came from the giant pile of demon cat piss on a wadded up section of bedding. The creature had soaked half the mattress through with its ungodly urination.

  “Bhenchod!” That sounded like an excellent curse. I’d have to ask him about it later.

  Rohan shoved me out into the hallway, slamming the door closed. “Jax demon. Toxic urine. It ate away the body. This is a relatively fresh kill.”

  “Ate him out, then ate him. Hope it was worth it.”

  Rohan grimaced. “Montague fucked that thing? What is it with people and demon sex?”

  I shrugged. “Couldn’t tell you. Though your subject and object are reversed. Montague being the fuckee and thus the object of the sentence.”

  He made a call. “Drio? I need a clean up.” He filled him in as quickly as possible. “Now,” he said in a voice far too sweet, his phone held out to me, “let’s try this again.”

  20

  “Leonie is my high school best friend.” I slung an arm around her, the two of us huddled together on her sofa under her giant framed poster of Andy Warhol’s large multi-colored flowers.

  “Best friend since high school,” she clarified. “On my end, I wasn’t on a break.”

  I elbowed her side. Yeah, but she hadn’t called me either so it’s not like my existence mattered. No, I couldn’t let this memory loss bullshit mess with my head.

  “Best friends. With a demon.” Rohan paced in front of us, every now and again stopping to shake his head like he couldn’t believe the level of stupidity in this room. “Demons and Rasha can’t be friends.”

  Finally. I let out a relieved sigh that he’d conceded I was Rasha.

  I threaded my fingers through Leo’s. “That’s the problem with Rasha males. They see everything in black and white. It’s a dangerous way to live.”

  Rohan was turning “Nava Red” so I quickly added, “Leo is only a half-goblin and I didn’t know until last night she was even that. She’s also given the Brotherhood a lot of good intel.” I had no idea if that was true or not but I psychically willed Leo to confirm it.

  She did. “I am a highly valuable informant.”

  “We’ll see.” He grabbed a kitchen chair, since Leo’s funky open concept apartment was not all that big, and doing his backward straddle, sat down. “Tell me everything about how you got this case and I may let you live.”

  “You’ll totally let her live,” I said, squeezing Leo’s hand for support. She’d gone a little pale.

  “I haven’t even decided if I’m going to let you live.” He grinned at me. All teeth, the way a shark would while contemplating which part of your soft underbelly to rip into in the most painful death strike.

  I shrank back into the sofa. “How’d you get the case, Leo?”

  Apparently it had been a routine hire. The jax demon contacted Leo by email, the money wired to her account. She’d been given the time and the place of the meeting and told to record it.

  “Why?” I asked.

  Leo toyed with her long silver necklaces. “He didn’t say, but meeting with a Rasha like that? He probably wanted proof of identity in case the hunter wasn’t feeling cuddly post-coital.”

  “Shouldn’t Montague have been more worried about the jax?” I said.

  Leo shook her head. “It’s rare that jax kill.”

  “He did in this case. On Asmodeus’ orders?” I asked Rohan.

  “That’s my guess. Where’s the recording now?” Rohan’s hands hung loose and casual at
his sides and even his voice sounded relaxed. Pure man candy. But he commanded the room like he was a conquering army of one, so assured of his right and might that all other lesser beings kneeled in his presence.

  I fought the desire to present my throat to him like I was a werewolf and he was my alpha. Okay, yes, I read way too many shapeshifter romances.

  Given Leo’s fidgeting, her desire to obey warred with her determination to stand her ground. “That recording is confidential. I’m not handing it over to Demon Club.”

  Rohan smirked at her as if her little show of defiance was cute. He held up a finger. “One.” A blade snicked out of the end, startlingly loud in our tense silence. “Two.” A second finger and blade followed. There was no doubt in my mind he’d use them on her.

  Leo muttered a bunch of expletives under her breath, but got up from the sofa, squeezing her right fist twice at me.

  “Totally,” I agreed in a low voice, after she’d handed her digital recorder over to him.

  “That was for you,” she said, “for having led him to my door.”

  Rohan held up the device. “We’ll listen to it here. No one will be the wiser.”

  Leo blinked at him. “Oh. You’re very–Well, thank you.”

  Ugh. Rock fuck grin alert. “I am very,” he agreed.

  “I know you are,” she said, all injustice forgiven.

  “For the love of fuck,” I snapped, muscling in between them before they could keep verbally diddling each other, “hit play already.”

  The recording yielded nothing other than confirmation of Montague’s identity and a lot of demon-human porn sounds.

  Dusk was falling as Rohan and I headed back across the parking lot to the Shelby. The heavy gray clouds cast an ominous spell over the fading light. Darkness was going to be a step up.

  “How do we break this compulsion and get your memories back?” I asked on our drive back.

  “The surefire way? Kill Asmodeus.”

  At least that fit in with my plan to help Ari. I twisted my hair into a bun at the nape of my neck. “How do wards work?”