Demons are Forever: Confessions of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom (25 page)

I shook my head, determined not to cave. I needed to understand, and I needed my head, not my heart. Because no matter how much I didn’t want to believe them, Eddie’s accusations of black magic lingered.

“You lied, Eric. You said you didn’t know anything about the damn stone. How am I supposed to trust you when you lied about that? Allie got attacked. I almost got killed. And you stand there and tell me that you still love me?”

“Dammit, Kate, are you suggesting I would ever do anything to harm you? To harm Allie? I would never—”

“Then why didn’t you say something? Why didn’t you tell us what was going on from the very beginning?”

“Because I didn’t know what was going on. I still don’t. Kate,” he said earnestly, “you have to believe me. I would never hurt you. I’d die before I’d let anything happen to you or to Allie.”

I blinked back tears, the force of his words pulling me in, and yet his past actions keeping me far away. “The ring,” I said, as one tear snaked down my cheek. “You should have told us about the ring.”

“Wait ... what?” His brow furrowed, and he took a step closer. “What ring? What the hell are you talking about?”

I blew out a frustrated breath. “Don’t play games with me, Eric. I know you better than anyone.” Or, I thought, I used to. “Wilson’s ring.
Solomon’s
ring.”

He shook his head slowly. “The ruby ring? With the diamonds?”

I watched his face, trying to see the truth. I saw confusion there, and I saw hurt. Hurt that I would doubt him.

Damn it all, he really didn’t know.

I ran my fingers through my hair and dropped onto his couch, then put my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands. After a moment, I felt the cushions shift, and then Eric’s arm around me. I leaned against him, my eyes still closed.

“Tell me what happened in San Francisco,” I said.

“I went there because another Hunter had contacted me. She said she had a lead. A clue as to why Wilson was murdered.”

“Nadia,” I said, starting to seethe a bit all over again, since he’d denied knowing her as well.

“No,” he said. “I’ve never heard of Nadia Aiken. I swear, Kate.”

“Go on.”

“We talked a few times, and she wanted to see the things that Wilson had sent me.”

“Things you’d never told me about.”

“You were pregnant. He didn’t want to disturb you.”

“And after I wasn’t pregnant anymore?”

He sighed. “Then I didn’t want to disturb you. Wilson was dead, and I’d set the things aside. I forgot about them, honestly, even after I’d started
alimentatore
training. It wasn’t until I heard from Diana that I remembered the packet from Wilson and thought there might be something relevant in there.”

“From Diana? She was the Hunter?”

“Right.”

“So what happened?”

He got up, started pacing his living room. “I went to see her. But I didn’t trust her. I’m not sure why. So I told her I’d given everything of value to a charity, that Wilson would have wanted the stuff sold to support the Church.”

He paused, turning back to look at my face, examining my eyes the way he always had, as if he could tell just by looking what I was thinking. I stayed silent, waiting for him to continue, and when he did, he seemed far away, as if talking about it had pulled him back to that dreary night so many years ago.

“She was irritated, I remember that. She said that she’d been counting on me having the things. That she really believed that the key to Wilson’s death was in the things he’d sent me.”

“So why didn’t you give them to her?”

He shook his head slowly. “Honestly? There wasn’t anything specific I could point to. But something made me hesitate. So I left. I told her I’d see if I could track them down, but I never really planned to.”

“But you did take the stuff with you to San Francisco,” I said. “You were wearing the ring when ...” I swallowed. “When they found your body.”

“I took it on the chance I changed my mind. I don’t know. I wanted to know what happened to Wilson, so part of me hoped I’d be convinced. But ...”

“And when you put the ring on, it attracted the demons,” I said. “It attracted Andramelech, who’d been looking for that very ring.”

“I’m thinking it must have, but I don’t remember a thing. I remember leaving Diana and walking back to my hotel. I remember pain,” he said, and I winced, hating the thought that he had to go through that. “And then I remember nothing.”

“Until?”

He looked at me, his eyes serious. “Until I became David.”

“That was years later,” I said.

He nodded. “Time meant nothing to me, and once I was ... well, David, I found you. I saw Stuart, I saw Timmy.” He closed his eyes, and I watched the rise and fall of his chest as he drew in a long breath. “I saw the life you now have.”

I hugged myself, as if by keeping my arms tight against my body, I could keep the emotions from bursting forth. I wanted to run away, wanted to simply pretend I didn’t know any of this, and that Eric was still David and I’d never known the truth. But I did know it. I knew it and, so help me, I couldn’t handle it.

“Kate?”

I held up a hand, as if I could ward off all the hurt. “I can’t see you,” I said, my voice shaking. “It’s too hard. You were right not to tell me.” Tears spilled down my cheeks, but I didn’t bother to wipe them away. “I do have a family, and I can’t mess that up. I can’t hurt Stuart. He’s innocent in all of this. And more, I love him.”

“I know. That’s what I was trying to do, remember?”

I managed I smile. “I know. Thank you.”

“The demons, though,” he said, his expression grave. “You do need someone watching your back.”

“I’ve managed alone just fine.”

“You have. But for how much longer?”

I turned away, refusing to acknowledge the question. “Maybe it’s a moot point. If the demons have the ring, chances are good they’ve left San Diablo.”

“And you’re good with that?”

I shook my head. “But I’m not chasing around the globe anymore, Eric. I have a family. They come first.”

“All right,” he said, nodding slowly. “But what if the demons don’t have the ring? What if they’re still looking for it?”

I sighed, acknowledging the point. “Then I’ll do what I’ve been doing. And I’ll do it alone.”

I turned for the door. I needed to get out of there before he saw my heart breaking.

“Allie,” he said, his voice a whisper behind me.

I didn’t turn around; I couldn’t bear to look him in the eye. “You’ll see her at school. As for the truth ... I don’t know. I’m ... I’m going to have to think about it.”

He put his hand on my shoulder, and I closed my eyes. “I never stopped loving you, Kate.”

“I know,” I said, my voice thick. “I never stopped loving you, either.”

Fifteen

About the same time that I was confessing to my first husband that I still loved him, my second husband was standing behind a podium announcing his candidacy for county attorney.

Too bad for me, I didn’t remember any of that until I was driving home from Eric’s. Just one more tickey mark on my ever-growing guilt tally.

To his credit, Stuart took it okay once I told him (more guilt) that I’d had to rush to the high school for an emergency involving Allie, and that the announcement had completely slipped my mind. The emergency, I’d told him, was girl-related, a lie that I correctly assumed would prevent him from probing for more details.

“I’ve got some campaign functions to go to next week,” he’d said after I’d apologized for the nine hundredth time.

“I’m so there,” I’d promised, which smoothed the way even more, but not completely. I knew there were still a few bumps because instead of coming home, Stuart informed me that he’d be working late at the office.

I almost begged him to reconsider. At the moment, I really needed to feel my husband’s arms around me. But the truth was that his absence was convenient. And that was a truth that made me feel even guiltier.

Wallowing, however, wasn’t on the agenda. And so while Eddie dozed in the recliner and Timmy sat far too close to the television, I power-dialed every pawnshop in the Yellow Pages. If it was a student who stole the ring, I couldn’t imagine that he or she would want to actually wear the hideous thing. It wasn’t much of a lead, but at the moment, it was the only one I had.

Unfortunately, it went nowhere. None of the pawnshops had received a ring matching my description, and by the time the closing credits rolled on Timmy’s ninety millionth viewing of Frosty, I was trying to decide if I should give up or expand my search to include pawnshops in the adjacent counties.

“What’s for dinner?” Allie asked, bounding in from Stuart’s study, where she’d been camped out in front of his computer, researching Andramelech and other demon-related things for the last hour or so.

“Whatever you want,” I said. “Want to order a pizza?”

“On a Wednesday?” She cocked her head and looked at me. “Why?”

I tapped the phone book and explained what I was doing. “Why don’t you make a list of everyone who takes gym at the same time you do. Then circle anyone you think might have it in them to steal jewelry.”

“Okay, cool.” She shifted from one foot to the other.

“What?”

“You said I could only do the research stuff for an hour, and then I had to do homework.”

“So I did.”

She rolled her eyes. “Mom, it’s been an hour. So, like, if you want me to do this list thing, I have to wait on the algebra. Is that okay?”

I couldn’t help my grin. “Yeah,” I said, waiving my firm schoolwork-comes-first policy in favor of potentially saving innocent-though-thieving students from the forces of darkness. “That’s okay.”

“Rock on,” she said, then disappeared to order the pizza. She came back in and announced that dinner would arrive within forty-five minutes, and that she’d be in her room.

“Hold up a sec,” I shouted. “Did you close Stuart’s browser? Did you do that thing ...” I waved my hand in a circle, trying to remember what Laura had told me. “The history and the cookies,” I finally said. “Did you delete them?”

I felt a little ridiculous training my daughter to hide her Internet meanderings from Stuart, but I didn’t want to field the questions that might arise if Stuart saw where she’d been browsing. He might think nothing of it. Or, he might think that our girl was getting involved with the wrong kind of crowd.

In a way, I supposed that she was.

She headed off to do that, and when she returned, I thought to ask the most important question. “Did you learn anything?”

She shook her head. “Not really. I think I got a few leads, maybe. Eddie said he’d help me out, though, after I get my homework done this week. And then we’re going to the library on the weekend.”

“Oh, really?” I’d have to remember that the next time Eddie told me he was out of the game. “And here I thought research wasn’t his thing.”

She stared at me blankly and I waved her off, watching as she barreled up the stairs before I turned back to my phone calls. Santa Barbara County was next on the agenda, and if that didn’t pan out, I just might start with Los Angeles.

Since Timmy was fidgety now that the movie was over, I took the cordless phone and moved to the couch, letting my little boy snuggle in my lap as he oh-so-helpfully flipped through the Yellow Pages for me. I’d managed to call a grand total of three pawnshops when I heard an, “Ohmigod, Mom,” from upstairs.

I was on my feet in a second, Timmy tumbling from my lap and squealing with laughter. “Allie!” I called, racing for the stairs and fearing the worst. “Allie.”

Her door flew open and she leaped out, the address book in her hand as she did a round of cheerleader-style high kicks. “I got it! I got it! I so, so got it!”

“What you’re going to get,” I said, “is trouble. You scared me to death.”

“But I figured it out,” she said.

“Who stole the ring?”

She shook her head as she handed me a list of about thirty names, none of them circled. “I can’t believe any of these guys would steal it,” she said.

“Then what?”

“Daddy’s code!” She grabbed the address book off her bed and tossed it toward me. “And Nadia Aiken’s the first person in the book.”

“See?” she said,
pointing to the entry in the black address book. “That’s got to be her.”

We were at the kitchen table now, and Allie was a bundle of energy, squirming in her seat and waiting for me to confirm her brilliant deduction.

“It says
Aidan,”
I said. “What am I missing?”

She let her head fall back, then blew out a sigh. “Come on, Mom. It’s so obvious.” She stabbed the book with her finger. “Aidan A. That’s totally an anagram. N. A. D. I. A. And the A stands for Aiken.”

“Wow,” I said. “You may be right.”

“I know I’m right. I’m totally right.”

“What if it’s just a coincidence?”

“It’s not,” she said. “Daddy loved anagrams, remember? We used to play them in the car.”

I did remember, actually. I’d always been lousy at them, but Eric had been delighted that his eight-year-old daughter was just as tickled by the damn things as he was.

“It might not be her,” I said, but now I was speaking only for form. Because “Nadia” was also an anagram for “Diana.” And now I had to wonder: Was she lying to Eric about her name? Or was Eric lying to me?

“Just call already,” Allie said, squirming in her chair. “Either way, we’ll know soon enough.”

Apparently I was raising a pragmatist. I drew in a breath, a little nervous about what new secrets of Eric’s were about to be revealed, but determined to stumble forward anyway.

I was just about to pick up the phone when it rang. I glanced at Allie, who shrugged. I wasn’t in the mood for calls, and I didn’t recognize the name on the caller ID— Lackland—but I answered anyway. Then soon found myself wishing I hadn’t.