Unearthed (38 page)

When his dad opened the door, Brian let out a sigh he didn’t even know he’d been holding. It was just Arch, standing there looking he’d had a pretty rough night. Brian’s dad didn’t even get a word out before Arch spoke.

“Hendricks.”

Kitty walked back into the house, feeling marvelously loosened up. She might have broken the cowboy, but the only thing she’d felt break was all that tension she’d been just storing up in her essence. There was nothing like a magnificent orgasm to tear that all loose, make her feel like she’d had her triumph and could just relax. It was an illusion, of course, because she had so much still to do, but it felt right and good for now, and that’d do while she went to work making it real.

“Madam,” Rousseau said by way of greeting as Kitty came and flopped down on a long couch. It wasn’t exactly a fainting couch and it lacked some of the class and sophistication of the plantation’s furnishings. It was comfortable enough, though, and Kitty let herself just melt into it. Her legs were loose, the feelings of knots in her essence under her shell gone. The cowboy hadn’t been the best at giving face that she’d ever had, but he’d been well timed in his submission, and that wasn’t nothing.

“Rousseau,” she said, eyes lazily flicking to him. The Rog’tausch was balancing on one leg on the far side of the room. This was the closest it had been to assembly in thousands of years, and that was a triumph of its own kind. Four pieces down, two to go. “Any word from Bardsley or Lawrence?”

“They only left an hour ago, madam,” Rousseau said.

“Oh, wow, time flies when you’re having fun,” Kitty said. She frowned. “What is up with Lawrence?”

“He seems … rather a pain compared to the personality he exhibited when he arrived, didn’t he?”

“I know, right?” Kitty said, throwing her legs up and leaning all the way back, placing her head against the arm of the couch. “Either someone’s gotten to him or he’s changed plans about being loyal to me. Either way, I’m gonna need to deal with him sooner or later.”

“That could be dangerous,” Rousseau said. “He does know that you’ve dealt with Trinculo and his bodyguards, and it would be wise to assume that he’ll be aware that you killed them all yourself.”

“Yeah, the surprise gambit probably won’t work again,” Kitty agreed. “People are always so shocked when a duchess comes roaring at them with a holy knife. We’ll need to start figuring out how best to draw out Lawrence—and I’ll also need to be prepared in case he goes a different direction with his plans.”

“How so, madam?” Rousseau asked.

“Lawrence is a creature of the system,” Kitty said, waving a hand at him and then toward the door she’d just entered. “He could very well try and turn the system against me … somehow.”

Rousseau seemed to nod. “The prisoner.”

“Yeah,” Kitty said and stared at the white ceiling, smooth above her. “Get rid of it, will you?”

“‘Get rid of it’?” Rousseau asked. “As in …?”

“Dispense,” Kitty said. “I broke the cowboy and had my fun, so I’m good for a while. No need to keep the evidence.” She turned her head to look at him. “You know what to do. For effect. Get rid of it.”

Rousseau smiled, and here Kitty could see the cruel streak a mile wide that had so endeared him to her. “As you wish, madam.”

Arch was sitting in the front of his father in-law’s pickup truck, Bill in the driver’s seat, Brian squeezed between the two of them with a not-so-happy look on his face. Brian always had that aroma hanging around him, like smoke covered up by Febreze. Distinctive and not all that pleasant to Arch’s nose.

Still, this was better than the last ride he’d taken, with Lex Deivrel in her luxury car.

“I’m glad you got out so quick, Arch,” Bill said.

“Yeah,” Brian said, sarcasm just oozing off the boy, “what did you do to get landed in jail again?”

“Discharging a firearm—” Arch started.

“He’s just being an ass, Arch,” Bill said. “Ignore him.”

Arch paused, mulling the best way to approach what was on his mind. “I am a bit curious why he’s coming with us.”

“I like how politely you said that,” Brian said. “It ignored me being here totally, but still … nice tone.”

“He, ah, stowed away in the back of the truck to the Venus Plantation,” Bill said. “And afterward, back to the house. He knows everything.”

“Not everything,” Brian said. “I’m not omniscient. But I do know what you’ve been up to lately, what with your supposed demon hunting and whatnot.”

Arch just stared straight ahead, then slowly turned his eyes to look at his brother-in-law. Brian was a diminutive fellow, bony thin, a little pale. He’d always struck Arch as the sort of outsider that caused half his own fitting in problems by protesting loudly that he was glad he didn’t fit in anywhere. What was that old Shakespeare quote? The lady doth protest too much? That was Brian with other people. Too smart for his own good, too stupid to realize he was his own worst enemy. “‘Supposed’?” Arch asked.

Brian just rolled his eyes. “You know how I feel about sermons, Arch, and this whole demon joke feels like it’s perfect fuel for fire and brimstone being hurled from a pulpit.”

Arch looked at him like he was crazy. “And you don’t concede that any part of it could be real?”

Brian just stared at him. “Yeah … no.”

Arch felt his head shake involuntarily. “Well, all right then.” He looked past Brian to Bill as they took a curve. It was only a couple miles to the house now. “Why’s he still riding along if he doesn’t believe this is happening?”

“I’m sitting right here,” Brian said a little crossly. “You, of all people, ought to understand how unfair it is to ignore someone—”

“I’m not ignoring you because of your race,” Arch said, feeling his own face twist in irritation. Brian possessed a very specific skill set when it came to annoying the heck out of people. “I’m ignoring you because you’re a knucklehead and I have almost no basis for being able to communicate with you.” That shut him up. “Did you discuss Hendricks while I was gone?”

Bill held tight to the wheel. “Duncan says he’s done. Says the duchess will kill him, that there’s no hope.”

“She fled the plantation, though, yes?” Arch asked.

“Yep,” Bill said, steering them around the last turn. “She’s gone.” He glanced toward Arch. “There’s something else you ought to know before we get there. A couple others are there … Alison took a hard hit—”

“I know that,” Arch said. “You said she was fine when I asked—”

“She’ll be all right,” Bill said. “Concussion, that’s all. She’s got a doctor looking after her at the moment—”

Arch shook his head. “Which hospital?”

“No hospital,” Bill said and put on the brakes to turn into the drive. “She’s here. She’s just being looked after by … someone.”

Arch felt his hand come to his forehead instinctively, felt an urge to just rub the skin there, try to work the tension out. “Someone who’s a doctor.” He sighed. “Is it Lauren Darlington?”

“Got it in one,” Brian said. “Not exactly a huge field of doctors to choose from in Calhoun County, though.”

“Especially not ones that have had their daughters saved from demons by us,” Arch said. “It would have to be her.”

“You got a problem with the doctor?” Brian asked.

“Nope,” Arch said. “But she seems to have one with me.”

They fell into silence as Bill pulled the pickup into his normal place on the driveway. Arch ignored the new car, tried to act like it wasn’t there, like he wasn’t about to walk into a potentially hostile situation. He got out of the truck first, held the door open for Brian until he saw the younger man wasn’t going to get out on his side. Then he slammed the door, loud, like he was trying to set off a signal flare to warn of his imminent arrival.

The door opened before he was halfway to the porch, and Duncan came out, still wearing the same suit he’d had on the night before, though it was ripped and damaged, cloth hanging in a few places. The demon looked slightly … relieved? He nodded as Arch ascended the porch steps, the boards calling out their disapproval of the weight they were bearing from the OOC and the three humans, a moan of protest in the early morning light. “Good to see you, Arch.”

“You too, Duncan,” Arch said. “Things got a little off track last night, didn’t they?”

“You could say that,” Duncan said. He cast a look back at the door. “We’ve got company.”

“I heard about the doctor,” Arch said. “Hopefully this won’t be too tense.”

“You hear about the reporter?” Duncan asked.

“Reporter?” Arch asked.

“More like blogger,” Brian said. “Dude doesn’t exactly have a high Alexa score, I’m guessing, and it’s not like he’s with the
New York Times
.”

“What’s he doing?” Arch asked.

“You’ll see,” Duncan said darkly. “He’s been following me around all night, trying to get me to answer questions.” Duncan ran a hand through his hair. “If I thought I could get away with it, I’d have baton-whipped him into unconsciousness hours ago.”

“We thank you for your restraint,” Arch said and started for the door. “I need to see Alison.”

He plowed through into the house, leaving the porch behind and heading straight for the curtained-off living room. The soft cotton of the sheet felt strange against his hand in spite of it having been their door for months. Arch felt like an intruder in this house now, in his bedroom, too. Alison lay upon the bed, watching him through half-open eyes, and there next to her sat Lauren Darlington, knees bent and arms across them like she wanted to hug them close to her with his arrival, some measure of protection from whatever argument the two of them might spin out. Their last confrontation had been in and outside of an abandoned mine, where she’d seen a demon get vaped, presumably for the first time.

“Alison,” he said quietly. He didn’t look at the room’s other occupant, but in the name of politeness, he greeted her as well, more formally. “Doctor.”

“Arch,” Lauren said, more than a little tense. He wondered if she was gearing up for an argument as well.

Arch dropped to a knee next to the bed on the side opposite the doctor’s, and Alison rolled toward him. Her eyes were still only half-open, and she looked pained as she moved. The room was dim, the lantern turned to a low setting and sitting next to the mattress on the other side. “How are you feeling?” he asked his wife.

“A little blurry,” Alison said. “Things were kinda … unclear for a while. Better now, though.”

“Your wife has a concussion,” Dr. Darlington said, adopting the voice and tone that seemed universal to every medical practitioner on the planet delivering news. “She’s going to be okay, but I’m still keeping watch on her to be certain.”

“Does she need any tests?” Arch asked, running fingers lightly along the side of Alison’s face and up into her blond hair. She flinched a little even at his light touch. “Should we take her to the hospital?”

“I don’t think there’s any bleeding or bruising of the brain,” Dr. Darlington said. “It’s impossible to tell for certain without tests, but provided her recovery continues down its present path, I’m not worried about it. She’s shown marked improvement just in the last few hours, which is a good sign.” The doctor stood and stretched, and Arch got the feeling she’d been sitting like this for a while. “If you’re gonna be here for a few minutes, I’m gonna take a break.” She walked out, and Arch caught a look from her that he didn’t know how to interpret.

“They got Hendricks,” Alison said, rustling the sheets as she moved to him. She moved slowly, though, like he’d expect someone who was hurting to move. She had that lethargy of movement that told him she wasn’t feeling well, but he’d have been hard pressed to know it was her head that she’d injured just by the way she spoke or moved. “Duncan says he’s—”

“I know,” Arch said and felt his hand go to hers. Her fingers were cold, like she’d had them in an icebox for a while. They were like that a lot, but not nearly as cold as her feet got. “I heard.”

“We don’t know where to look for him,” Alison said, and when she looked in his eyes he could see that hint of slowness there, too. His wife had a quick wit, unassuming, but always lurking under the surface. Now she looked like she was half-asleep. “Duncan says he’s as good as dead.”

“I don’t believe that,” Arch said. “Not yet.”

“He charged in like an idiot, Arch,” Alison said. “Left me and Duncan behind. He had a real hard-on for that lady since the beginning.”

“Yep,” Arch said. “She did get under his skin for some reason he never properly explained.”

“I think it’s his wife,” Alison said. “Something to do with her. He’s always been gung-ho, but never quite this thoughtless. He just left us behind and ran right to her like he thought she’d just roll over and die for him. He’d have to know that a greater—that royalty—couldn’t be so much of a pushover that he could take her on his own.”

“Maybe he wasn’t thinking all that deep,” Arch said.

“Which goes to my point about it having something to do with his wife,” Alison said. “It’s his blind spot. Gets him all worked up, like a bull seeing red.”

“There are other reasons a man could get worked up like that.”

She smiled at him, wistful, something that felt inappropriate for the situation and made Arch a little uncomfortable. “Worked up isn’t the same as dumb as a box of rocks. He had a reason he was after her like a dog that caught a whiff of tail. We might not ever find out what it is, but … he had a reason.”

“Okay.” Arch found he didn’t want to argue, so he just went along. Silence fell, and the sound of anyone outside their little curtained-off bedroom fell by the wayside, the noise of her breathing a little deeper than usual the only thing he could hear. Her fingers were cold against the grasp of his palm.

A sound came from outside, something strange, like a small dog making a yelp. Boards squeaked out on the porch, and then the door opened and shut, slamming closed in the main room with an echo like a shot in the night. The sun’s first light was leaking through the dirty, smudged windowpanes into the room, a purple sky visible through the dirt. The curtain ripped back suddenly, and Duncan was there, his usually blank face twisted into an expression that wasn’t like anything Arch had seen from him before.