His gaze darted around the yard. Jasmine glanced at him and frowned. Brady shouted, “Cria!”
“Cria to you, too!” I shouted. “What the hell is Cria?”
“Die!” somebody else shouted, and instantly snagged my attention.
“That is Cria!” Brady called.
I whirled around again, my heart in my throat, and watched a demon vault the fence into my backyard. A woman this time, she was wearing black leather pants, a black leather jacket zipped up to her throat and black boots with a spiked heel.
Demon Barbie.
Her eyes were blue with a tinge of red fire. Her hair was blond with dark roots (tacky). And then she came at me, teeth gleaming in the early morning sunlight—and those teeth were pretty impressive. Her canines had to be two inches long. Instantly I flashed to Buffy and Angel, ’cause this babe looked like a vampire, and I was sure Jasmine had told me that vampires weren’t real. Okay, fine. Vampire-like demon then. She still had to go.
She was running full-bore at me while these stupid thoughts were flashing through my mind. But even while I was distracting myself, my body was getting ready for the attack. I crouched down, held my arms out, fists clenched, and waited for it. She hit me like a freight train and bowled me over. I hit the ground hard and felt my teeth rattle. But I kept a grip on her leather jacket while we went down and used her own momentum to toss her over my head. (And good for me!) I got up pretty fast, but Barbie was already on her feet. Her blond hair was in a long braid that hung down over her left shoulder. She had a nice tan that really set off the whites of her fangs.
“What’s the deal?” I asked, walking in a tight circle, keeping her right in front of me the whole time.
“Don’t talk to it,” Jasmine shouted from the sidelines. “Kill it!” “I’m getting there!”
Nothing worse than a backseat Duster.
“She fights for the queen!” Brady shouted, but I didn’t care who she was fighting for. The only thing I cared about was the fact that this bitch had hopped into my yard and was making my dog howl in terror. Hell, Thea could have been home. What if she had been?
It seriously pissed me off. Bad enough that I had to deal with the whole demon thing. But damned if I wanted my kid dragged into the mix.
I blew my hair out of my eyes and focused on the demon dominatrix fixed on me. “What’s the deal with coming to my house?”
“I go where I will, when I will,” she said, and ran the tip of her tongue across her fangs. That had to hurt.
“Yeah, well. Spread the word: No more coming to the house. You want me, get me out on the street somewhere.” Way to go, Cass. Invite the demons to attack you.
She swiped out one long leg and caught my knee with the spiked heel of her boot.
“OW!” I hopped a little, giving in to the pain, and ignored Jasmine’s tsk of disgust.
“The queen has sent Cria to steal me away!” Brady was shouting, but I think he was just projecting. See, the demon bitch hadn’t even looked at him. As far as I could tell she was there to kill me, and if she got the queen’s Faery, then she’d call that a bonus.
“I kill you for my own glory,” Demon Girl said, letting me know I was right, even while she smiled at the thought of my ugly death. Good to love your work.
I looked around for a bottle of demon spray, but naturally there wasn’t any out there. I’d been training. I wasn’t really expecting to be attacked in my backyard. Okay, maybe I should have been, since this wasn’t the first time it had happened.
“Look, Cria,” I said, still limping a little from the heel to my knee. New bruise. “If you take off now, you get to live.”
“You won’t kill me, Duster. I’ve been alive for centuries.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything, but yeah, I can see that. Mostly around your eyes.”
She hissed in a breath. No woman, demon or human, likes to think she’s got wrinkles.
She leaped at me, but this time I was ready. I managed to dodge the sharp fingernails she had aimed at my eyes, felt her hot, rank breath on my cheeks and slapped my hand through her black leather–covered chest. She was still flying when she went to dust and what was left of Cria sprinkled down on top of me like a flurry of brown snow.
Ick.
I held my breath. Secondhand demon dust couldn’t be healthy.
“You are a powerful Duster.” Brady applauded from the threshold. “You defeated Cria, one of the queen’s top warriors.”
“Yeah?” Well, yay, me.
“You were sloppy.” This from Jasmine. Ooh. Color me surprised. The woman was never satisfied.
“You know,” I said, as Brady’s applause petered out, “a little appreciation wouldn’t be out of line.”
“You should have been prepared. She should not have been able to draw you into a prolonged fight.”
“That wasn’t prolonged. And I won, didn’t I?”
“Lucky.”
Jeeezzz…
“Okay, you know what?” I said, already heading for the house. “Training over. I want a shower; then I’ve got to go to work.”
“Training is not complete.”
I looked at her, and Jasmine threw her hands up and hissed out an exasperated sigh. I’d pissed her off. Again. My work here was done.
I limped up the steps to the back door, and when I got close enough Brady brushed demon dust off my shoulder. He shook his head. “At least when Faeries die, we leave behind sparkling dust.”
Logan didn’t come by that night. Apparently even he could figure out that I wouldn’t be in the mood to talk to him. By the time dinner was over and the house had quieted down, I knew it was time to talk to Thea. Now, I love my girl. We’ve been a team since the beginning. The two of us were like the Lone Ranger and Tonto. Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. Bert and Ernie.
So why was I worried about talking to my baby girl about guys? Hello? I’m not the best role model in town. I had Thea when I was sixteen. Although it worked out great for us, it wasn’t something I wanted Thea to try out for herself.
But it wasn’t just the candle-lighting, pray-like-crazy fear of teenage parenthood that threw me. It was worrying about Thea getting her heart crushed by some jock bozo who wouldn’t recognize a great girl until he was probably thirty. High school boys—not really known for looking at a girl’s personality.
I knocked on her door and waited. There was some rustling, and I was guessing she was sticking her journal back into her secret hiding place under the loose floorboard. What can I say? I grew up in that house, and Thea’s room used to be my room. I knew all about the “secrets” in there.
“Come in, Mom.”
When I opened the door, she was stretched out on her bed, trying to look casual. I half expected her to whistle.
“So,” I said, strolling around the room (I can pretend casual too). The room had changed a lot over the years. At the moment Thea had a blue theme going on. The walls were slate blue and then she’d sponged on a lighter blue so that they looked like cloud-filled skies. There were posters on the wall that changed with her tastes, everything from Taylor Hicks (did not get the attraction) to Orlando Bloom (which I totally got). There was a desk, a dresser, a comfy reading chair by the window and clothes scattered all over the floor.
She’s a genius.
Not neat.
“What’s new?”
“I got an A on my physics test today.”
That was not news. Thea getting a C would be news. As? Not so much. “Great, honey. So, who’s the football player?”
Her eyes went wide and then narrowed, and if I weren’t so sore from the fight with Demon Barbie that morning, I would have kicked myself in the ass. Way to go, Cass. Real casual.
“How do you know…” She sighed. “Zoe.”
“Don’t be mad at Zoe,” I said really fast. Because if Thea got mad at Zoe, Zoe would yell at her mom, and then Rachel would yell at me—a vicious cycle no one wanted to get started.
“Actually, Brady told me.�
� There. Throw our Faery to the wolves. He’s magical. He’ll be fine.
“How did Brady know?”
“He reads minds.”
“Cool,” was her first reaction and then a second later she looked worried. Like mother, like daughter. She was probably trying to remember what she’d been thinking around him and if she’d revealed too much. Then I started wondering what else she might have to reveal. Hmm. Okay, worry about that later.
“So, who’s the guy?”
Thea scowled at me, folded her long legs up Indian-style and said, “His name is Ryan.”
“Does Ryan have a last name?” See? Calm. Cool. Collected. I could do this.
“Butler. Happy now?”
“Delirious. So, is he cute?”
“MOTHER.”
“I’m guessing cute.” I sat down on the edge of her bed and looked at her. Amazing to me that I had this gorgeous, nearly grown-up daughter. I know it’s a cliché that Carmen would have loved, but it’s really true: Time does fly.
Funny, but I could look at Thea and see her both as a girl and a woman. She was beautiful, but then, you’d expect any mom to think her kid was beautiful. There was way more to Thea than that, though. Genius, like I’ve said before. The kid was balancing my checkbook when she was six, and started doing my quarterly taxes when she was ten. But she’s also funny, warm, kind, and so tenderhearted it makes me want to run in front of her with a shield.
I wanted to keep her safe. Make sure she was happy. Give her a life filled with roses and puppies and—
“Mom, you’re acting like a big freak here.”
Okay, then, hearts-and-flowers time was over. “So, who is this guy?”
“He’s a football player.”
“That much I know. Is he a demon?”
“MOOOOOMMMMMM…”
Outrage, teenage style. “Is that a yes?”
“No, it’s an I-can’t-believe-this.”
“Let’s pause to remember the last boy you had a thing for.”
She got all huffy, and let me tell you, Thea can do huffy like nobody else. “Jett is ancient history.”
“Gee, yeah. A month now.”
“MOTHER.”
“Is. Ryan. A. Demon?”
“No.”
“Okay, good. One problem solved.”
“There’s another?” Thea asked, reaching out for Einstein, the bedraggled one-eared, one-eyed, three-limbed teddy bear she’d had since she was five. (Sugar ate one of the bear’s legs when she was a puppy—our first clue that Sugar was capable of digesting the universe.) Thea wrapped her arms around Einstein, and in that moment she looked about five again. And frankly, life was a lot easier on me when she was five. She’d thought boys were yucky and I was great.
The good old days.
“There’s the problem where if Ryan breaks your heart I have to kill him.”
A smile curved Thea’s mouth, and she dipped her head to hide it. “He won’t.”
I scooted around on the bed until I was sitting beside her, my back against her padded headboard. Then I wrapped one arm around her and dragged her up against me. She tried to hold out for a second. Hey, fifteen-year-olds have standards. But an instant later she sighed and leaned into me, putting her head on my shoulder. Her hair smelled like apples, and I loved her so much my heart hurt with it. “He’d better not.”
She hugged her bear and shrugged into me. “Trust me, Mom, he doesn’t know I’m alive.”
“This is what the cheerleader thing is for then?” I asked. “To make him notice you?”
“Sort of.”
“And if you don’t make the squad?” I waited, wondering whether she was prepared for disappointment.
“Then I’ll find another way.”
I had to smile. Nobody stops a Burke woman once she’s made up her mind. “That’s my girl.”
Chapter Nine
Later that night I was looking for some alone time. Not so easy to find in my house. Even when Thea wasn’t speaking to me, she liked to be in the same room telling me she wasn’t speaking to me. Otherwise there’s no torture. And Sugar…well, I’m the key to the fridge, so she never wants me far from sight. Not that I think my dog loves me only for my Pup-Peroni, but food’s a big motivator in our house.
Anyway, with Brady at the house now, I figured it would be even harder to hide. Nope. Turns out none of them wanted to hang with me. Brady, Thea and Sugar were in the backyard working on routines—yeah, I know, another demon could be right around the corner. But what was I supposed to do, lock Thea in a closet till she was thirty?
Hmm. Actually, I’ve considered that. But she’d find a way out. Besides, I didn’t think demons were going to come back so soon. They probably wanted to give Cria a little time to blow off the yard.
So I was taking a little personal time on my front porch swing. The chains were a bit rusty, and they squeaked every time I gave myself a push off the cold cement porch with my bare toes. But sitting in the dark on the swing my father made always helped me feel better. Almost as if Dad were there giving me a hug, telling me everything was going to be okay and that I was a great person. Denial? Maybe.
But what the hell, it worked.
The street was quiet. Even the Marchetti boys had to keep it down after nine—a year ago most of the block showed up at their house and said, “Shut off the music by nine or die.” Their mother agreed she’d rather have the boys alive, so no more noisy nights. Anyway, it was almost ten, and I could hear Brady and Thea chanting in the backyard. I smiled, enjoying the chill air that almost tasted like real autumn. The Sanchez’s dog was howling at the moon, and the heavy plop of a basketball carried from a distance like a giant’s heartbeat.
Hard to believe there was a bounty on my head when everything seemed so normal. Or that there was a demon queen who was trying to kill me to get her Faery sex slave back. Or that Devlin Cole was a lying, cheating, no good, three-boob-humping…Fine. So I was still a little bitter.
A car door slammed, and footsteps started up my walk. I tensed for a second, then relaxed. The footsteps didn’t sound sneaky. I listened to the scrape of shoe leather on the sidewalk and wondered which man it might be. The ex? Or the newest ex? And which one did I want it to be?
Devlin had been great—for the whole month we’d been together. But so was Logan. And we’d had two months. Man, was I a walking poster child for short-term relationships or what?
Logan was a good guy. A cop. Steady. Trying to be a good father to Thea. Trying to worm his way back into my life by inches. He made me think too much and want too much, so it was easier to not think about him at all. Well, not easier, but clearly safer.
Devlin…not such a good guy, apparently. A cheating demon who could make my toes curl with a kiss. He’d been fun. He’d respected my abilities as a Duster (points for him, since I really wasn’t very good at it yet). But then an image of him and Three Boob lurched into my brain, and it was all I could do not to yak up the pot roast Brady had made for dinner.
Hell, I didn’t want to see any of the men in my life. So I kept swinging. Maybe it wasn’t Devlin or Logan. Maybe it was a fiend from Hell come to rip my throat out.
Then I saw my mystery visitor. I sighed even as he lifted a white sack and gave it a shake.
“I brought cinnamon rolls.”
I had to smile. “That’s evil.”
“I know.”
Damn it. Logan knew me too well. He had my weaknesses (of which there are many, I’m forced to admit) down pat. The biggest one, I need hardly add, is food. Food of any kind. But he’d really hit below the belt now.
The town of La Sombra’s known for two things: One, the biggest mental health institution, i.e., Nutcake Hotel, in the state, where Jell-O cups are dessert and joining Popsicle sticks with glue is considered art time; and two, the Sun and Shadow bakery. People drove up the coast from all over for their fancy cookies and cakes.
Me? I was addicted to the cinnamon rolls. Big as Frisbees and drenched in that thi
ck white icing…one bite and your worries went away.
Still…“I don’t really want to talk to you, Logan.”
“Okay,” he said, all Joe Friendly and Mr. Trustworthy, “we won’t talk. We’ll just eat.”
Hmm. I could use a little worry-going-away time. “Fine. Come on up.”
He did, and waited for me to scoot over on the swing before he sat down beside me. The chains really screeched now, sounding like a dying cat.
“You ought to oil this thing,” he said.
“I’ll put it on the list,” I told him, and reached for the bag.
He held it away from me and grinned. “What’ll you give me for it?”
“Be more afraid of what I’ll give you if you don’t hand it over. Besides, don’t toy with me, Logan. You said no talking, only eating.”
“Okay. Jeez. Your sense of humor’s on vacation, huh?”
I bit into my cinnamon roll, let the taste of it fill me as I chewed and then sighed as I swallowed. “God, these things should be illegal.”
“They probably are. The cholesterol alone would be enough to stop a heart.”
“Are you determined to ruin this moment?” I had my legs curled up under me, and I was tucked into the corner of the swing so I could keep an eye on Logan. Hey, I let my guard down around him when I was sixteen and I became a mommy!
“Sorry, sorry.” He held up one hand in surrender. The other hand was filled with cinnamon roll. Finally—a man who could multitask.
“What’re you doing here, Logan?”
One black eyebrow lifted. Thea could do it too. Must be genetic. I’ve tried, but I gave myself a headache and gave up.
“So we’re allowed to talk after all?”
“About you?” I said, feeling more benevolent now with the sugar rush. “Sure. About me? Uh-uh.”
“Okay.” He tore a hunk of his cinnamon roll off and bit into it. “I wanted to see if you were okay. You looked like you were hurting this afternoon.”
“I’m better now.”
“I can see that.” He leaned in closer, squinting at my face like he was trying to see the freckles I used to have. “In fact, I don’t see any bruises at all on you. Good makeup.”
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