The Demon King and I (20 page)

Then I had to go and be so rude.

“Sometimes, Gilly, you can be a real bitch.”

CHAPTER 23

My headache had turned into a full-blown migraine
by the time I made it to the kitchen. Kyle, who was dressed in jeans and his trademark black T-shirt, stood at the counter talking with Claire. The only time I’d seen him wear something different was when he’d donned a brown suit for my father’s funeral. I only remembered because none of us had ever seen him in a tie.

He wore a Yankees ball cap over his buzz cut. The caps changed—in fact, I’d never seen him wear the same one twice. He had to have hundreds of them.

“Where is everyone?” I grabbed some of the herbs Mira kept on hand for headaches and put them in a loose bag to make a tea.

“There’s been another shift. Many of the portals we closed are open again,” Claire informed me. “Mom and the rest are doing their best to protect against the dark magic. The council is involved, which means at least everyone is paying attention.”

The pain in my head became a tight band around my brain. Open portals meant eventually there would be jumpers. That’s probably why Arath had had to leave so fast. “Any more word about Bailey?”

“I’m getting ready to fly down to Houston to see what I can find.” Kyle sat on one of the barstools, leaning over a cup of coffee. His eyes were red and it looked as though he hadn’t had much sleep. We’d soon be able to start our own insomniacs club.

“Kyle, do you think the murders might be connected with Bailey?”

He shrugged. “You know I don’t really understand what’s going on with all this otherworldly stuff, but I don’t think it’s coincidence. Someone wants something from you. I mean you specifically, Gillian. The murders were people that were associated with you. Maybe not best friends, but they were involved with you in some way. I can’t find any other connection.”

I pulled my hot cup from the microwave and took a sip even though I knew it would scald my tongue. “I’ve been thinking the same thing, but I don’t know why. As far as I know, Markie and Reuben never even met. And I think someone was after Georgia—Wait, if you’re here, where is she?”

“I had Jake send over two of his men to watch her. They’ll make sure she gets to work in the morning.”

“Good.” I pulled myself up onto the kitchen counter forgetting I still wore my rather slippery silver dress. I almost slid off the edge before I caught my balance.

Claire smiled. “Hey, klutz, maybe you should take two minutes to change clothes.” While I’d been talking to Arath, she’d put on her jeans and a “Save the Blue Whales” T-shirt.

“I will, I just need to get rid of this headache.” I chewed on my lip. “Let’s take a minute and work this out. It’d be easier if someone would remove the butcher knife from between my eyes.” I circled my neck to ease the tension. “Kyle’s right. There’s some kind of connection. Markie was in real estate. She was helping me look for a gallery space in New York, and she’d found something in the SoHo area.

“Reuben was my number one guy for all things technical. He set up all the networks here, and—oh, crap. Claire, go get Jake.”

I must have had a strange look on my face because she didn’t even ask why.

“What is it?” Kyle pushed the barstool away. “Did you figure out a connection?”

“No, not really, but I need to ask Jake something. All the trouble with the portals began after Reuben’s death.”

Jake ran into the kitchen and almost ran into Kyle as he slid to a stop. “Did you find your brother?”

I set my cup down on the counter. “No. How often do you check for viruses in the system?”

Jake frowned. “I think it’s something like every fifteen minutes. Why?”

“When the jumpers started going crazy, did you notice any blips in the system?”

He shook his head. “Not as far as I know, but I can run a report to see. What are you thinking?”

“Kyle mentioned that whoever was involved seems to have wanted something from me specifically. Markie and Reuben did have a meeting together to talk about what we needed for the tech aspects of the loft space for the gallery.”

“Okay, there’s nothing irregular about that.” Claire had grabbed a pen and paper and was taking notes as I went along. “You guys do that for every gallery. And Reuben is—sorry,
was
—involved in almost all of our projects in some way or another—” She realized the same thing I did. “Gilly, do you think Reuben was a spy?”

I nodded. “I don’t want to think that any more than you do. He’d been with us for years, and my God he was brilliant. Like you said, though, he was involved with all of us. He knew our every move. What projects were coming up, when we had problems with the portals. He and Bailey—”

“Worked together all the time,” finished Jake. “You are on to something. So it’s information. But why kill your friend Markie? And if they had such a great insider, why kill Reuben?”

“I think Markie saw something. When she came in early for our meeting she met with Reuben first. Maybe she saw someone leave. I don’t know, I’m just brainstorming here.

“As for Reuben, I don’t know either. Maybe he had finished whatever it was they needed. Ya know what? Whoever it was, I bet a bag of diamonds Georgia saw them, too. Markie met with Reuben in my office because the conference room was busy.”

“I better send over some more men to your assistant’s house.” Jake had already pulled out his cell. “I think we should bring her back here. If Reuben was compromised, we may have bugs in the system. We’ll run a full diagnostic, and we’ll also comb his place for more information. The police didn’t find any incriminating evidence, but then they didn’t know about all of this.”

“You’ve got your hands full, I’ll take care of the house.” Kyle pulled his car keys out of his pocket. “I’ve got a friend in Houston I can call to cover our bases down there. He’ll check with the NASA friends, and he’s good with the CSI crap. If there’s anything in that hotel room, he’ll find it.”

I took a deep breath. “We’re going to find him.”

Claire squeezed my hands in hers. “Damn right. Now go change your clothes, we have work to do.”

 
 
By the time I’d changed, Jake had a report ready for
me in the control room. “We’ve got a real mess on our hands. There’s a virus set to go off like a time bomb in our tracking system. We don’t know how long we have to figure out the problem, and once it goes off my techies think it will conceal all of the jumpers. We won’t know who or what is coming over or from where.”

“What about the backup system?”

He shook his head. “There is no backup system now. It’s been wiped clean by some kind of internal coding.”

Okay.
“Well, then we’re going to have to do things the old-fashioned way.” Guardians had been protecting Earth for thousands of years, since long before computers were ever invented. We had an extra sense that all of us could tap into. It took a great deal of energy, but we could use it to track if necessary. “Alert Mom and my sisters. And do whatever it takes to get that system back online. Reuben was as smart as they come, but there are great people on the team at Caruthers Corp.—someone should be able to destroy this virus.”

Bailey could do it, which was probably one of the many reasons why he was missing. Whoever had him had to know they had a gold mine with that brain. That would work to our advantage because there was a really good chance they would try to use my brother to get to us, which meant he would stay alive. “I need a few minutes to think. Let me know if anything happens.” Mira’s miracle medicine hadn’t worked as fast as I would have liked. I made myself calm down. Stress only made things worse and I needed all my brain cells to find my brother.

Jake went into his glassed-in office just off of the control room. I headed back to my bedroom. It was peaceful there. I knew I should be doing something to help close the portals again, but I felt that I was on to something. Just at the edge of my brain was a thought that would not come to fruition.

“Be logical.” I sat at the desk facing my window. The sun peeked over the tree-covered hills. I focused on the view and let my mind wander. The demons had to be working for someone. Arath said they usually dealt with Fae, so I needed to talk to Mira about that. She would have a better idea of who would do something like this.

I wasn’t sure why, but I trusted Arath enough to believe him when he said his people weren’t involved. I couldn’t keep my thoughts from straying to our dancing earlier in the evening. Our bodies had fit perfectly together, and when he touched me . . .

Oh, my God, Gill. Get it together. You’re lusting after a half demon, half mage, and your brother’s been kidnapped. Not to mention the world may be ending.

I leaned my chin on my hands and rubbed my temples. Thanks to Mira’s herbs the pain in my brain was a dull ache now.

Staring down at the paper, I tried to connect the dots. Markie had obviously stumbled on to something. There was no other explanation. Reuben wasn’t the kind of guy she’d date, so it was tied to business. I just couldn’t figure out how.

And Reuben. It broke my heart that he’d betrayed our family. We’d trusted him with our most precious secrets, and he and Bailey had been friends for years—since long before he ever came to work for us. None of this made any sense.

Someone knocked on the door and it made me jump. I laughed at my nervousness.

“Yes?”

“It’s me—Jake.”

“Come in.” I turned to face the door.

“This was left with the gate guard two minutes ago. He said it came by a courier, and we’re checking out the driver and the company.” He handed me latex gloves and I noticed he had on a pair, too. “Just in case we can pick up some prints besides the guard’s.”

Once I’d donned the gloves, he handed me a letter opener. “We scanned it to make sure there are no toxins involved.”

His words made me hold the thing by the corners as he handed it to me. Leave it to Jake to think of everything. He put down a piece of plastic on my desk and I slid the opener across the cream-colored envelope. The heavy paper made me think of an invitation to a party, of which we received hundreds each month. Of course, invitations seldom came by special courier at six in the morning.

There was a single sheet of paper inside with one sentence typed in bold letters.

 
Kill the demon king, or your brother dies.

CHAPTER 24

Demons, prepared for battle, crowded the great
hall. The rooms were packed with beasts of every imaginable size and form. Some floated, others walked on two or four legs. Two huge troll-looking things had to duck down to fit inside the two-story foyer.

No one paid attention to me. I slipped through the great hall and found Arath’s second in command, Clede.

“I must see the king.” I gave him my most authoritative stare.

“He does not wish to be disturbed.” Clede waved one of his paws toward the crowd. “We prepare for battle.”

“I can see that. It—it won’t take long, but it’s imperative I see him right now. The state of the universe depends on it.” Oh, the lies. “He’ll be angry with you if you don’t do as I ask. I promise you this is of the utmost importance.”

The grumpy demon gave me a weird look, almost if he were appraising me in some way. It sent a chill down my spine. “I have news from the council. He must hear what I have to say before he goes into battle.”

It became more difficult by the second to keep a straight face.

He didn’t say anything for at least a minute, just continued to give me that weird stare. Then he turned and motioned for me to follow him.

We went through several long hallways, and finally he pounded on a door.

“Yes?”

“The Guardian wishes to speak with you, my lord,” Clede hissed through his fangs.

The door opened.

The demon king’s armor, which consisted of an intricate carved silver breastplate and leather pants, made him look even more magnificent. Weapons were stashed in a leather belt around his waist and a sword hung at his shoulder. The sight of him took my breath away.

He watched as I entered the room. The look in his eyes held something I couldn’t decipher.

Is he sorry I’m here? God, why does he have to be so handsome? I can’t do this.

“I—well. You’re obviously going into battle.” I blabbered the words, nervous. “It’s inconsiderate of me to even be here. Did you find out anything about Bailey?” The words tumbled out of my mouth at an alarming rate. I’d never been so nervous.

“Is that why you are here, for information about your brother?” He turned his back to me. With his neck unprotected I had the perfect opportunity to slice his head from his body. There was one big problem. I couldn’t seem to get my hand or my sword to cooperate. The weapon sat in the harness at my back, and my hand stayed by my side. I cared too much for him. As much as he frustrated me, he was a good man.

So was my brother.

Kill him.
My mind ordered. “Why are you going into battle?”
That wasn’t what I meant to say.

“It is not your concern.”

“Why do you do that?”

He turned. “What is that?”

“You argue every point. I could have asked any demon in the great hall who they were gathered to fight, and they would have told me.”

“Then perhaps you should do so. As you can see, I am busy.”

The man was nothing short of infuriating. “You didn’t answer my question. Do you have any news about Bailey?”

His right fist tightened and I could see that it took effort to make it relax. “I have more important matters to deal with than a Guardian’s missing brother.” Arath continued to stare at me. I finally recognized the look. Disappointment. For some reason that bothered me more than anger ever could.

“What did I do?” I had to know.

“It’s what you came here to do.” His voice was so soft it barely registered and I wondered if he had really said the words, or if I’d only imagined it. “Tell me, Guardian. Why are you here?”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “I came to speak with you about something. It can wait.”