Grimrose Path (8 page)

“Big, wholesome, and bright and shiny as a parade of Valentine’s hearts. I promise you that. Want a peek at my emotions to know if I’m telling the truth?” I offered. I could drop the shield that protected me against psychic incursions. I rarely did, but for my guys, I made exceptions. And when it came to situations like this, I didn’t think twice.

“No. The offer is enough. That you believe is enough.” He pretended to smooth his shirt. Zeke growled. “And you too,” Griffin added. “I think that would go without saying though.”

“Like you listen to me.” Zeke slid out of the booth. “Did you believe me when I said the house on the corner was a meth lab? No.”

“I did too believe you. I just thought you should let them blow themselves up, not do the job for them.” Griffin exited the other side. “It would’ve happened sooner or later. They didn’t have kids . . . or puppies. There was no hurry.”

“It smelled. It made my eyes water.” Zeke waited for Griffin to pay the bill. He was of the opinion that he provided a public service like a policeman and like a policeman, he deserved food and drink for free. That he didn’t have a badge to prove it was the only flaw in his plan.

Griffin passed over some bills, waved off the change, and walked out with us. “I guess I should be grateful you waited until they were out before you blew up their house.”

Zeke didn’t appear the least bit sheepish. “Coincidence is a . . .” He let the words trail off, at a loss.

I tried to help. “Wonderful thing? Convenient thing? Fated thing?”

He shifted his shoulders. “Eh, it’s a thing.” And that was good enough for him. By this time we’d hit the casino floor and were headed for an exit. Griffin was about to swat him hard on the back of his head. I saw his hand rising, when a centurion moved in front of us, blocking us from the nearest exit.

The costumed throwback to Colosseum days said with a dazzling smile, “Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s. Render unto God that which is God’s—your middle finger will do nicely. And render unto me any and all sexual favors. A good deal of Rome did and who can blame them.” He spread his shield and sword to show off what the fake armor covered. “Not their souls, of course. Most of them belonged to Hades or Pluto or whoever you had running the Roman underworld then, slim pickings in those days, but everything else . . . a never-ending feast of orgies and death. And
damn
it was good! Can I get a hallelujah?” He frowned at us. “No? Not even one?” Then he shrugged and that smile was back again. “But now there’s Vegas, which is almost as good as Rome, plus there’s air-conditioning and deodorant, because, seriously, it did get a bit rank at times back then.”

“Eli, how did your pet tattle so fast? No telepathy among you lizards.” I folded my arms. I had nothing to fear from him here. This was far more public than the bar had been.

“My cell. I gave you my card, but you never call anymore.” He sang lightly, “You don’t bring me flowers, you don’t sing me love songs. . . .” Once he stopped the singing, his face darkened. “Do not bother Amdusias.” That would have to be Armand. “He is a duke, like me. If he were to kill you before I have my chance, I would be very disappointed.”

“You are a duke, aren’t you?” My smile was as bright as his had been earlier. “A mere duke with a measly sixty legions of demons to your name. Aw, I feel for you, sugar. Always the bridesmaid, never the bride. Always a duke, never emperor. Never Lucifer himself.” I’d studied so much demonology in my day, I would’ve owned Aleister Crowley’s ass in Satanic Trivial Pursuit and had time left over to kick it in Unholy Pictionary too.

Eli stepped closer, dropping the sword beside his well-muscled leg. I noticed it was a real sword, unlike the fakes provided to Caesars’s usual centurions, and even sharper than the ones once used by gladiators. Most certainly not OSHA approved. “A duke in Hell, but a king everywhere else, sweetheart. And do not ever forget it.” He leaned in and nuzzled my hair. “Amdusias is a duke as well, one who used to have thirty legions of his own. We both have fewer now, thanks to one of yours. And he does my scut work for the privilege of being in my mere presence. Eager to learn. And good lackeys are hard to find.” He inhaled, then exhaled, the air rustling past my neck with an unnatural heat. “Oranges and honey. It’s not only on you, but part of you. I could lay you down in an orange grove, Trixa, and cover you with that honey.”

“Then you could eat me, and not in a way women usually care for.” I gave him a push hard enough to move him back a few inches.

He grinned, unrepentant. “We all have our particular preferences, but we could have sex first and
then
I could eat you. I aim to please.”

“You aim anywhere and everywhere and leave a trail of blood wherever you go,” I replied. Zeke was growling at my shoulder, but he knew better than to interfere. I knew demons and I knew how their brains worked . . . murderous mazes reflected in manic mirrors. They were twisted, but not insane. I’d faced worse than demons, far worse . . . and run away, but that’s another story. “And why are you so sure this is one of my kind?”

“It’s not Heaven; it’s not Hell. There is no rhyme or reason to the levels of demons killed. No gain for an upper to take out a UPS-level demon. So that leaves only the
païen
. You and yours are always so full of surprises. It’s why I like you, and I do so so like you.” He saluted, his sword and fist banging his chest. “Hail, Trixa. To the end of our days. And they will end . . . for one of us.” Cocky smile still in place, he melted back into the crowd until he was gone.

“Armand is his second in command, then,” Griffin said, moving up beside me.

“Armand is a snack who’s currently picking up Eligos’s dry cleaning and having his car detailed,” I corrected. “Useful for a while, but still a snack when all’s said and done. Like Eli said, there’s no point in a higher demon eating a lower one, but sucking the energy from one close to your level, that’s worthwhile. And either Armand doesn’t get it or he’s hoping to turn the tables.”

“He’s stupid, then,” Zeke offered as he rocked back and forth on his heels, already bored.

“Not stupid, Kit, but not quite as bright as his boss.” He might be a duke in Hell, but he was no Eligos. The clock was ticking on him. My only regret was I wouldn’t be there to see it hit midnight. Looking from left to right at my boys, I changed the subject. “Who wants lunch? My treat.” Because when you didn’t pay, it really was a treat. “But snap snap.” I pulled out my phone and punched in a number. Why is it that the clairvoyant never call
you
first? I have a psychic to talk to.” And, depending on what he told me, the clock was ticking on him too. Only much faster.

Tick.

Tock.

The buffet owner did have it coming. First he tried to turn Zeke away at the door. Zeke was right: “All you can eat” means all you can eat—not all you can eat if you have a reasonably expandable stomach. If you mean all you can eat, excluding metabolism freaks who can eat their own weight in steak and crab legs before even beginning to eye the dessert bar, then you should note that on the sign.

Lesson one: Roaches in food? That’s simply embarrassing. Fingertips? . . . That only gets credit if you chop off your own finger for a free meal. For that I have to hoist the flag of respect and salute. That is true commitment and hard to find in a human—such infants in their conning ways. In the old days, before I was stripped of my trickster powers, I would’ve put a goat in the salad bar, where it would have complacently grazed away. But in the here and now, I had to deal with what I had to work with . . . my brain and a few hundred in cash. It was amazing. You could go to the pet store, buy an on-the-smaller-size boa constrictor, smuggle it into a buffet in your shoulder bag, turn it loose in the pasta bar, eat up while screaming patrons ran in all directions, leave, return the snake—because, say, it didn’t match your stripper wardrobe, get your money back, and the only downside was Griffin complaining there was a scale in his gelato.

He was awfully fastidious for an ex-demon, but as I’d told him and completely believed, he was human now. Or a peri if one wanted to be specific. Peris in mythology were half demon, half angel. In reality, they were expatriate angels who found Earth more to their liking than Heaven and obtained permission to “go native.”

I’d met a few peris of the ex-angel persuasion, but Griffin was the first demon one—the only demon one in existence. But I know he preferred thinking of himself as human rather than peri because of all the “ex” that went with the label, which was fine by me. All humans,
any
human, should be as good as my boy Griff. We parted ways at the buffet parking lot. I headed back to the pet shop and then home.

The psychic I was meeting back at Trixsta wasn’t half as fastidious or one-tenth as good as my boy. I’d told that poor little girl Anna to stay away from psychics and I’d told her that with good reason. There were three kinds of psychics in this world. First, there was the fake. . . . Everyone has to make a living and if you’re that naïve, I could let a human do a trickster’s work and not lose any sleep over it.

Second, there was the real thing. Usually human and connected to a plane of existence only they could see. To them, the world was one huge clock... every piece doing its part, every cog turning, and everything as it should be, no matter how horrible. They would never tell you ahead of time, but they’d smile sorrowfully as that bus finally ran your granny down and pat you on the back with a “There, there. What’s meant to be is meant to be. But cheer up. She’s one with the universe now.”

Big comfort.

Big asses . . . but technically I couldn’t punish them, but that didn’t mean I didn’t want to.

Third was also the real deal, but they didn’t give a damn about philosophy or fate, Granny or the bus. They only wanted cold hard cash, and I understood that. You paid for something and they gave it to you. Trouble was, the second kind of psychics were right—as much as you might want to hate them for it. Things couldn’t be changed. What will be . . . Well, everyone knows the rest of that saying. But these third kind of psychics
would
tell you. The second type wouldn’t mention Granny and the bus. You’d find out in the fullness of time and they’d give you your money back with a smile of pity. They dealt in the light and the way, and that way, the best they’d discovered so far, happened to be blissful ignorance. Number three had no such compunction. Not only would he or she tell you about Granny but they’d even tell you the number of the bus that was going to run her muumuuloving, orthopedic-shoe-wearing self down. Then they’d put your money away and shove you out the door to make room for the next client. The bastards wouldn’t even bother to give you a Kleenex on your way out. And they definitely didn’t leave you any money to soak up those tears either.

That’s why I used only the third kind. They were sons of bitches, but they told you the truth, all of it. But I made absolutely sure that I wanted to know the truth before asking. Once it was out there, there was no taking it back, no matter how much you wanted to. That meant I didn’t use psychics often. They weren’t worth the pain or the money, and I usually could guess the future as clearly as they could see it. And the times that I couldn’t, when people died . . . family died, it would be too bad for the psychic I was with when I lost control because I couldn’t accept what they told me.

Fate. If you can’t accept it, don’t tempt it.

“You’re late,” came the complaint as soon as I walked into the bar.

“Galileo,” I sighed, dumping my bag and taking him in as he finished off his—I counted the plates—seventh plate of potato skins and cheese sticks. “You’re looking . . . your handsome usual self.”

Four hundred and fifty pounds if he was an ounce, he beamed over four double chins and patted greasy fingers on his Hawaiian shirt that sported hula girls and rather obscene monkeys peering up the grass skirts. “You know what they say at the Vatican, the sun doesn’t revolve around the earth. It revolves around me.”

I sat down opposite him, wondering idly for a moment if I could actually feel the pull of a gravity well, then got down to the matter at hand, because, quite frankly, the less of Galileo I had to put up with, the better. He might come off cheerful as Santa on vacation, feeding the slots and catching a show, but he was a shark through and through for his forty-some years. Too bad for him that made him about six inches long with a teeny tiny dorsal fin and sitting across from Jaws. “I need to ask you a question. I’d ask how much, but I believe you’ve already eaten your fee and then some.” I flicked a finger against one of the plates to make a ringing note hover in the air. “So I’m thinking we’ll make this an even trade.”

He laughed and smoothed a plump hand over what few black strands he had left for a seven-inch comb-over. “Sassy Trixa. Always joking, but you send me a client now and then, although this is your first time asking for yourself. Interesting. Interesting. So, I’m thinking, how’s ’bout an even four grand? And maybe I get to see you in a hula skirt to match my shirt?”

I sent only the clients I thought tough enough to hear what they wanted to know to him. Not like little lost Anna. Her type I would never send to be gobbled up by Galileo Riogas. I smiled at him. “What a funny one you are. I like a man who makes me laugh.” Four thousand dollars my gym-aching ass. Let’s see how much of a shark he could be when he met the real thing. “And I do love to laugh.” I put my elbows on the table, rested my chin in cupped hands, and asked him to do something I never had before—not in the days when I’d been undercover. “Why don’t you see how I laugh, Galileo? In my eyes. Look. See how I laugh.” My smile widened. “See
why
I laugh.”

And he did look . . . because he had no idea what he was looking into.

Dark brown eyes widened to show the jaundiced yellow around them. His sausage fingers gripped the table hard. His voice struggled from a tight throat, and I think if he could’ve kept the words to himself he would have. But he wasn’t strong enough. “I see . . . forests. Mountains. Deserts. Seas. I see animals with your eyes. I see . . . What is that?” He tried to close his eyes, but it didn’t work out for him. “It floats. It floats like water come to life, with a thousand fireflies swimming in it, every color there is. It’s heading for the sky, an iridescent phoenix.” That was very poetic of him. Who knew he had that rattling around in his heartless lump of a body?