Demons: A Hunter's Novel, Book 1 (6 page)

“From my haunted past, comes the daunting task of living through
memory…”

– City and Colour, Little Hell

Anie
searched frantically through the numerous pockets in her black cargo pants
trying to find the keys to her place as we stood on her doorstep. She still
gripped my hand tightly. I tried to get her attention with an “Anie” here and
there on our way to her house, but had failed. I decided now would be a good
time to step up the volume since we were almost inside anyway.

“Anie!
Wouldn’t two hands be better than one!?” She looked down at our clasped hands.

“You
would think that wouldn’t you!? But you’re a disaster. If I let you go I’m afraid
you’re going to end up flagging down a horde of Vamps or a pack of Weres, and
then your Father would kill me for allowing you to be turned.”

“Nah,
he’d probably be relieved.”

“Even
if that’s true, it’s the principle that he put you in my custody. I can’t let
anything happen to you, or else it’s my head. So, just shut up and keep holding
my hand. Act like I’m Brad Pitt if you have to. Just let me find my keys and
get you inside. Then, you can climb the walls in there until this is all sorted
out.”

“I’d
rather picture you as Joe Manganiello.”

Anie
was on the verge of a complete melt down. I knew my best option was going to be
to let her simmer until she could get herself together. But it took everything
I had not to mess with her a little. For instance, act like something invisible
was attacking me while I tried to get away from it. But I knew she might just kill
me herself if I did something like that in our current situation.

 We
hadn’t talked about what had happened back at my place, either. I had no idea. I
had never seen anything or heard of anything like it. I was hoping that she had
a better idea than I did.

She
finally found her keys and shook them out finding the one to her front door. She
opened the door and pushed me inside in front of her. She shut the door and
locked all fourteen bolts she had on the inside. I had once asked her why she
had one key for the outside but fourteen locks for the inside of the door. She
said “Well, if I’m not here, who cares who comes in? If I am I want the
security.” It actually made a weird kind of sense.

Anie
just stood with her back on the locked door.

“You
gonna be okay?” I asked her.

“Of
course! Why wouldn’t I be?! Wonderful!” Okay, she had still not simmered down. “What
the fuck was that Laney?!”

“I
thought you’d know! He had his hands on you, not me!”

“How’d
you know it was a he?!”

We
really needed to stop yelling at each other. I took a breath and calmed my next
words.

“I
could see him more clearly with my eyes closed, and he had a penis. I could barely
see him or his Johnson when my eyes were open. It was weird.”

“Well,
my eyes were closed and all I saw was darkness, but he was speaking to me. He
had a very Barry Williams voice. Sexy. But he was telling me to do not so nice
things to you. Which wasn’t really a surprise considering the amount of Hunters
and supes you piss off.”

“I
never. How rude. I’ve been a saint over the past six months.”

“How
can we know that? To be a Saint, you’d have to be around, doing something! Absence
does not equal sainthood.” Touché.

“I
was around…in spirit anyway.”

“I
can’t believe I have to keep an eye on you. This is going to be impossible!”

“Speaking
of, where can I put my stuff? Then we’ll talk more in depth about what the hell
just happened. Since so far all we know is he’s got a sexy deep voice, I can
see him with my eyes closed, but you can’t, he’s a he, and he burned my house
down in less than a second.”

Anie
turned and stomped up the staircase. I looked down to make sure there wasn’t a
herd of ants she was trying to kill. There wasn’t so I let it go. I was pumped
to finally get up to the second floor.

Her
tailor shop was in the basement, and I thought for sure that is where she was
going to have me sleeping. Her first floor held the kitchen, her dining room,
her living room, a bathroom and the porch. I had seen all of those things. We’d
been friends since we were kids, but in all the time she’d lived here she had
never let me upstairs. She said she wasn’t ready to share her upstairs with
anyone.

After
she was changed she refused to even consider letting anyone up there, saying
that it was as close to heaven as she was ever going to get. She had become so
weird about it I didn’t want to intrude on her personal space and stopped
asking. Of course I didn’t have any personal space of my own anymore so I could
definitely understand where she was coming from.

There
was a little sitting area next to a window at the top of the stairs. It was
nice with two big overstuffed chairs and a table with books and magazines on
it. Every other door, which there were six, not that I was counting or
anything, was closed. Not even a hint of what was behind the doors. The only
things I could see were the paintings on the walls. They were nondescript
splashes of brightly colored paint in frames all down the walls.

She
stopped at the first door after the sitting area on the left hand side. She swung
it open and motioned me in.

“This
is your stop.”

It
was actually very cozy. It had a queen sized bed with a comforter in dark blue
and green and three floor to ceiling windows. I cocked an eyebrow at her and
looked at the windows and back to her. Windows normally didn’t bother me, but
with a crazy pyromaniac and every other supe tracking me I needed to feel
secure. Having everyone be able to see in on me wasn’t my idea of safe. I also
didn’t want everyone seeing my girly bits.

“No
one can see in Laney. I had a friend of mine come in and block it with a spell.
The windows can’t even be broken. So don’t get stuck in here. If there’s an emergency
for any reason the window next to the sitting area is breakable.” The way Anie
said it was breakable made it sound like it
may
be breakable. Like maybe
I’d have to get some armor piercing rounds in the near future.

I
had a gun. A lot of things could be killed by a gun, and if not, definitely
maimed. Just because I was a Hunter and tried to kill things with my blades,
didn’t mean I was stupid. A gun was a gun no matter what type of creature you
were.

I
threw down my bag of weapons that now also contained the few articles of
clothing I still owned. Unfortunately, one of the only articles of clothing I
had grabbed was a tank corset in black lace. I had taken it in case I had to do
any undercover recon or I just felt like going out. Looking back now, I should
have picked up more of my jeans and pants. As it was, I had black           t-shirts,
the corset and the pair of jeans I was wearing.

Oh
well, an excuse to get out of Anie’s house to go shopping. And, she’d have to
go with me. Knowing her though, she’d probably end up trying to make me pants
and jeans to keep me in. Honestly, I don’t think I’d mind that either. I bet
she would make me one sweet ass pair of pants.

“Considering
everything I’ve lost, I don’t suppose you’d be willing to help me out with some
clothes would you? We
could
go shopping but –” Anie put her hand up.

“Fine.
I’ll make you some stuff. But you’re paying me.”

I
waited a minute because I knew she’d take pity even though she was pissed at me.
She always was a softy when it came to a person in need. “At least half of it!”

“Done.
Can I tell you what I want or are you just going to surprise me?”

She
smiled like the cat that caught the canary. I loved her sense of style and I
was hoping that she wouldn’t take this opportunity to have any sort of revenge
on me for the little pranks I had played on her over the years.

“I
know your size.” Great. Surprise it would be.

I
looked out the window and before I could turn back around the door was closed. Anie
didn’t tell me where she’d be, but her house couldn’t be that big. I should be
able to find her. Come to think of it, she didn’t tell me where her bedroom was
either. She was closed off, I just didn’t realize how closed off. I was worried
about her. The way she isolated herself couldn’t be healthy. In fact, I knew it
wasn’t.

Those
were all things we could move through after all the other shit. Right now we had
a steaming pile in front of us. All we had to do was figure out how to dig in.

I
unloaded my weapons and stored them all over the room and put a few extra on my
person. Call me paranoid…no, you really could, because I was. There was no way
I was going to be unprotected. My house had been warded by Hunters and look
what happened. But Anie, being in with the supes now, may be better protected
than I was. I was hoping.

I
needed to talk to her about putting up Azrael’s sign. After about twenty
minutes of getting everything sorted through I went out into the hall. Anie was
sitting quietly reading in her overstuffed chair.

She
was reading a book called
Hard Bitten
by Chloe Neill. There was a dark
haired curvy, good looking girl wielding a katana on the front of it. I liked
it already.

“What’re
you reading?”

“What’s
it look like?”

“What
kind of book is it, smartass?”

“Fiction.
How humans perceive Vamps. There is some truth to it, but I read it for the
love story. If I ever had a kid, and it was a boy, I’d call him Ethan.”

I
had no idea what she was talking about, but she was obviously really into what
she was reading. Everything I was seeing of my friend now was telling me she
was a softy. What the hell? She was always such a badass when we were together.
I knew she had a soft side when it came to someone in need. I thought it was
because before she became a Hunter she had been on the streets, alone and
always in need. In need of food, clean clothes, a shower, a place to sleep.

The
Hunters didn’t normally bring people in off the street, but when my Father had
found her she was young enough and desperate enough that he knew she’d be a
good Hunter. He was right. But she was an even better person. She wasn’t as jaded
as I had originally thought and I was glad for her. I didn’t want people to be
like me. I hope she stayed that way.

“So,
you want to try and figure out what happened at my house?” She huffed out a
breath, put her book mark in the book and placed it back on the table.

“I
have a guy I can ask.”

Well,
that was easy.

“What
are we waiting for? Let’s go.”

“He
has to come to us.” Fuck. She was going to ask a Fey. A goddamn Fairy. And if
it was the one I was thinking of, it was not going to be a fun conversation.
“It’s Kai.” Yep. Son of a bitch.

This
Fairy was a pain in the ass. He was as slippery as they came. His name meant “the
keeper of the keys”. He was supposed to have almost any answer when asked
correctly. He was known for it, but only if you asked the right question in the
proper way. He was deceitful and that was clear from his track record with me.

The
first time I had met him and had the opportunity to ask him a question I asked
“Where is the Vamp nest?” I had assumed Kai knew we were looking for the Vamp
nest that had been killing the local children in the area when I asked him the
question, thinking he would know I was asking for the nearest one. It was truly
the definition of what assuming does to someone – it makes an ass out of u and
me. He transported me to a nest of Vamps in Alaska.

When
he dropped me in the beautiful house, it was night time so all of the Vamps
were awake. Many, however, were in other places instead of their home, their
nest. For that one minor thing I was thankful. Because if he had dropped me
when they had all been there, I would have been a very pissed off, very dead Hunter.
Luckily, there was only a couple I had to kill, because they wouldn’t listen to
me about how I had gotten there, before getting out of the house.

 By
the time I got back to Miami, I was filled with ire and ready to kill him.
Unfortunately you only got one question per person per week so I couldn’t
summon him for a week – even though I had tried to get every other Hunter I
knew to summon him for me. When I did, he didn’t show up and simply sent a note
instead that said he knew I didn’t have a real question and that next time I
should “have better form”.

I
had seen the little twit over the years. We had needed his help on occasion
because we couldn’t find something or someone and we needed it/them quickly. I had
wanted to kick his ass from the first question I asked him and usually threw a
comment or two his way, but always made sure I didn’t push him too far. We
needed him, and he knew it.

Even
though I hated that little son of a bitch, I had to give it to him, he knew his
shit. He knew about things that we could only ever guess at. He said it was
because he had been around so long. I had tried to get him to tell me how long
he’d been around for and he simply laughed and said
before there were such
things as Hunters
. And as far as I knew Hunters had been around since B.C… A
little scary.