Along Came a Demon (21 page)

“
Demon? You call us demons?”

Uh oh.
I watched my feet pace the smooth ceramic tiles. “Well, it’s the pointy teeth and glittering eyes, you see.”

I kept my head down, but rolled my eyes up to see his face. I expected I had at least irritated him, at most insulted him, but he tilted his chin up and let out a laugh. Grinning, he met my eyes. “Then it’s as well I don’t have pointed teeth.”

“
I’m sorry.”

“
No, it’s okay.” He shook his head. “Men with pointed teeth can be nothing else but demons.” And he chortled again.

“
They’re only a tiny bit pointed,” I said defensively. “It’s not like your guys have fangs.”

Another rising stair, then we passed three arched openings which looked in on one enormous kitchen. The appliances looked state of the art, and they filled the perimeter of the room. Next came two big pantries, a room stuffed with huge freezers, another room equipped with washing machines, tumble dryers and sinks.

We took a left to a blank-walled passage. A question came into my mind. “How did you know where to find me?”

His fingers tightened on mine. “A hunch, or call it deductive reasoning. You called Mike, and the line went dead before he could say a word. We looked for you. I found your phone on the ground near the apartment block, but I took it before Mike saw. We split up and I went to your house. Your car was still outside. It looked bad.”

He looked at me. “I believe in you, Tiff. I read up on your cases. You’re the real thing, you are no quack. You said Charlie Geary identified me, but I did not kill him. I knew you would not accuse me out of spite.”

“
You did, did you?”

His smile was gentle. “You are a stubborn, hot-headed, argumentative woman, but you are a
good
woman. You would not falsely accuse an innocent man. You and Charlie gave me the identity of the killer.”

“
And you thought maybe he took me?”

His smile dropped away. “Thank the Lady I was right.”

“
Guess I should be glad Mike didn’t stow you in lockup and throw away the key.”

“
He returned my gun and badge when we got back to the precinct.”

Although I was joking about Mike putting him in a cell, the truth was a letdown. I mean, I didn’t want Royal arrested and thrown in jail and I didn’t reckon Mike would go that far anyway, maybe put him on paid leave, but he waited till I left the PD and acted like nothing happened in Granby! “I wasn’t sure he believed me, but I thought he would at least go through the formalities.”

My feelings must have been apparent. “Be realistic, Tiff. Your word against mine? Did you really think he would lock me up while he looked for proof?”

“
Yes. No. But he one-hundred-percent ignored what I told him. If he did that with every case I worked for him, there’d - “

“
Mike is a clever and intuitive man. Perhaps he has a little latent psychic ability himself. He gets a feeling about the people you give him. He did not get the same feeling about me.”

He could be right. Perhaps Mike’s intuition told him to listen to me the second time I marched in his office and said he had to. He threw me out the first time. I went back six months later and gave him information I shouldn’t know on a murder victim, and this time he heard me out. My input placed a murderer behind bars, but still, it was a leap of faith on Mike’s part if ever there was one.

I was so tired, and all those glowing blue tiles made my head ache, and Royal walked so fast. I tried to keep up so he didn’t have to haul me along, but as we took another turn and he led me to yet another stairwell, I stumbled.

Before I knew what was happening, he bent, put one arm around my back, the other beneath my knees, and whisked me up in his arms.

I let out a tiny, surprised shriek. I had never been gathered up and held to a man’s chest before. I flung my arms around his neck and held on tight, my cheek on his silken hair. He strode up the steps with me tightly hugged to him. Being held closely and carefully felt really nice, so I decided not to object. After a minute I let go one of my hands and laid my palm on his chest, on skin as smooth and silken as his hair. I thought I’d stay there for a while. Maybe a week or two.

Royal paced the floor with a stride so smooth we seemed to float. “Don’t be frightened, Tiff. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Not
the reason my fingers couldn’t stop exploring his chest.

He went on, his tone deepening, “You shouldn’t be here. I should have protected you.”

“
Not your fault.”

“
It was my fault. I knew the danger you were in; I should have been with you. I will not leave your side again, Tiff.”

Aw,
I thought, then rethought. My voice rose. “Now just one minute—”

He touched my lips with his index finger. “Not so loud,” he cautioned.

Okay, I would save it till later, because if he meant that literally and thought he could be with me every minute of the day, voices
would
be raised. I didn’t need a watchdog.

We were in a high-ceilinged passage, the ceiling a deep blood-red, the walls covered in red flocked wallpaper, the floor carpeted in a flowing red and black design. “Why do we have to be quiet? I thought they couldn’t touch us for an hour.”

He spoke softly in my ear. “Our hour is almost up. We must take care now. If they know where we are, they will converge, hoping our time runs out.”

Anxiety crawled a slimy trail through my gut. I couldn’t go back to that basement.

When we stepped inside a large room, it looked as if the demons had already converged. An impression of high ceilings, huge windows letting in swathes of sunlight, the sparkle of gilt and crystal, space and airiness, railed galleries up high, but mostly I saw demons, watching us with glimmering eyes. Some of them wore tights and tunics and I recognized the demons from the cavern below among them. Others wore modern clothing you see on Americans walking the streets of Clarion. All were male, and I wondered if they kept their women hidden away, or if the room was strictly a male domain.

“
Put me down,” I said in Royal’s ear. I wanted my feet on the ground and control over my movements.

He took no notice, and I did not dare make a scene.

I saw Caesar at the back of the room, looking at me with hard sapphire eyes. I couldn’t suppress a shudder. Royal’s arms tightened on me.

“
Hold on, Tiff,” he said.

We didn’t go at full demon speed, but we definitely
moved.
The room became a whirl of glass, flesh and metal, jewel tone colors and glittering eyes. I closed my eyes, unable to cope with a feeling of disorientation and the beginnings of nausea. Thankfully, we slowed and came to a stop before I destroyed the romance of being passionately held to a man’s naked chest by throwing up all over him.

We were in another passageway. He set me down. I clung to him as I looked ahead. I saw nothing but blank stone walls and a dark arch.

I looked back. Demons crowded the passage. Motionless, expressionless, they watched us.

And he opened up his wings and flew us out of there.

Just kidding.

We stepped through a door, and I didn’t realize how hard my nails dug in Royal’s back till they started to hurt. He lowered me to my feet.

Clarion’s Montague Square surrounded us now. No trace of the Otherworld. I got free of his arm and turned to look back at a plain wood door in an otherwise blank brick wall. I couldn’t recall seeing it before.

Two women toting shopping bags walked up from behind us. They passed, and both looked back at Royal over their shoulders. Eyeing me, he buttoned up his jacket.

I checked my watch. Seven-fifteen. Two and a half hours, to be abducted, tortured, and watch Royal cut off his brother’s head. Oh, and I mustn’t forget that included just short of an hour getting out of Morte Tescien.

Royal gently turned me in the other direction. “Hold onto me. We’re going to Clarion Regional.”

“
With what are obviously rope burns and abrasions? I don’t think so. I’ll doctor it at home.”

His mouth set stubbornly. I started walking.

“
Tiff, where are we going?” he asked at my back.

“
To find Lawrence.”

Chapter
Eighteen

A half-hour later and Gorge’s Antique Emporium would have been locked up for the night. We walked in to find Gorge amid antique furniture and display cabinets, chatting to two customers as he wrote them a receipt. He glanced up, smiled, looked back at his customers; then the tan leached from his face as his brain registered exactly who came in his shop.

So demons blanched. I was gathering
so
much information for Lynn.

Paler with each passing second, he chatted with his clients in a stilted way as he walked them to the door. He shut it, flipped the sign and pulled down the blind to let prospective customers know he had closed the shop.

He turned to us and clasped his hands at his waist as he looked at Royal. I don’t think he even noticed me. He dropped his hands to his sides and bowed over, held the pose a few seconds, and straightened up. “My Lord?”

My Lord?

Royal got right to the point. “Do you know the whereabouts of Lawrence Marchant?”

“
Lawrence Marchant?” Gorge asked, not at all convincingly.

I took the paper from my pocket, unfolded it and held it up. “I found receipts and evaluations for furniture you sold to Lindy. And you were their friend. Lawrence even drew a picture of you.”

I held my breath. Gorge continued to stare. He stiffened when Royal walked up to him, and clenched his fists, arms straight at his sides. I tensed. Would he attack Royal? If I ignored his alien features, he looked like a prosperous merchant in his dark-green three-piece suit and leather wing-tipped brogues, but he was a demon, and perhaps a match for Royal in speed and strength.

Royal stopped several paces from Gorge and very slowly swiveled to turn his back on the shorter demon. With one hand, he lifted his long copper-gold hair away from the nape of his neck to reveal a tiny tattoo of a golden creature bordered with black right on his hairline.

Gorge’s shoulders sagged and he relaxed. “Thank the Lady!”

Just who was this Lady everyone liked to thank?

Royal shook his hair back, covering the tat. Gorge gestured to the back of the shop. “This way, my Lord. I kept the boy safe, praying someone from your House would find us.”

“
Does he know?” Royal asked Gorge.

“
That everything in his life has changed?” George nodded confirmation.

I was definitely out of the loop - what the hell just happened? Who was the Lady and was a House more than only a big old home? If I were not mistaken, both had capital letters. Royal turned back to me and I looked askance, but he ignored my expression. He looked different, as if he had gained height, and he held himself stiffly erect. He looked … well … he looked
lordly
, if there is such a word. Regal, maybe?

Regal Royal?
I mused as Gorge went to the back of the shop, wending through the clutter to where a long burgundy velvet curtain hung on the wall. He pulled the curtain aside to reveal a wooden door, opened it on a staircase and gestured us through.

But Royal put his hands on my shoulders, effectively keeping me in place. “I think you should wait here. I do not know how Lawrence will react and the fewer converging on him the better.”

A little boy who saw his mother die, whisked away from everything and everyone he knew. Now complete strangers were poised to tell him something extraordinary. I could see the sense in what Royal said. “Okay.”

Royal gestured for Gorge to lead the way and followed him up the steps.

I sank on a convenient brocade-padded bench and listened to the tick of Gorge’s clocks. I like the soft
tock
of the mantle clock in my bedroom, it lulls me, but listening to the dozen or more in the shop all day long would get on my nerves. I would be gritting my teeth in no time at all. I almost fell off the bench when every one of them chimed the hour.

I looked at the thick curtain, wondering what happened in Gorge’s apartment, and marveled I trusted two demons with the safety of a little boy. I had an issue with trust, one amongst many. I counted on someone once but it ended badly, and since then had distanced myself so I couldn’t make the same mistake. Yet I trusted Royal, I knew that by the staggering relief I experienced when he appeared in Morte Tescien, though he turned out to be Kien in disguise. I knew it when Royal carried me from the cavern. Having faith in another person was something of a novelty.

When did my perception change? When did I see him as a man, not an alien creature with evil intentions; as an honest cop, not a creature posing as one? As someone on whom I could rely?

I couldn’t pinpoint the moment. Perhaps it was as far back as the first night in my bedroom, when he cupped my face in gentle hands and kissed me.