Demon Soul (27 page)

"Oh! Oh, the poor thing," cooed Rose. She knelt beside the mama and let the cat sniff her hand. It gave her a weak lick and put her head down again.

"It needs food. And water. We should move them, too." Rose turned to the men with a hopeful smile. "Don't you think?"

“Ah, maybe not,” Gabriel said. Rose wilted in disappointment.

"I've already made an appointment with a local vet." 

"They're probably hopping with fleas." Gabriel kept well back from the cat and her kits. "I hate flea bites."

"One year, we had four dogs and Gideon didn't keep up on the flea stuff. Gabriel's dog had them worst and he was covered in the things. Had to have allergy shots because of it," Kellan confided to Rose.

"Kel," warned Gabriel.

"Which is why they can't come into the house until they've been de-fleaed," he continued.

Rose touched the kittens, played with their paws. "Look. Look! They have six toes! Can you
imagine?
These are magic cats!"

"Come on, Rose. Kellan has the cats handled, and you promised me you'd rest."

Reluctantly, Rose let Gabriel draw her away from the cats and back through the yard to the house.

Kellan walked on her other side, putting a hand out as she swayed with tiredness. "I've got the perfect room for you," he said. He grinned at Gabriel. "Our room. It's perfect for her. Don't ask—you'll see."

They walked into the kitchen and Gabriel automatically took the back stairway to the second floor. Their room sat right at the top of the stairs.

Kellan ushered Rose into the room and gestured to the ceiling. "Look familiar?"

Rose stared. "It's a spiral. Oh! Beautiful." The words were written in English, the lettering a gothic style, the colors in soothing shades of blue and gray. "What does it say?"

"Lie on the bed and see if you can figure it out," he said.

Rose lay down and looked up. "So beautiful," she murmured, and yawned. "This is such a peaceful house." She relaxed into the mattress as sleep swept over her.

* * *

Gabriel closed the door to the bedroom and turned to Kellan. "Do you realize what that is?"

"Yeah. A sleep spell, or something. I told you I had the best night of sleep ever last night. Aunt Maria must have painted it. It still works. Neat, huh?"

He looked at his cousin thoughtfully. "This was the room you and I shared, until you left."

"Yeah." Kellan met Gabriel's eyes. "She painted it for you. For us, really, because I'd shown up on the scene before you were born, but she'd always planned for us to share."

"Do all the bedrooms have spirals on them?"

"Not just the bedrooms. They're
every
where."

Gabriel frowned. "I don't remember any spirals growing up."

"Neither do I, but that doesn't mean they weren't just there," said Kellan. "What we need is a witch. And before you say anything, I've already called Justin and Maggie. They should be here soon. But I will say, I don't think it's a coincidence that Rose has a spiral on her belly."

"So what do we do until the witch gets here?" Gabriel stuck his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels.

“There's lots of work to be done outdoors. I've got garden gloves and trash bags ready on the back porch. Or, there's wood to chop. Should burn well after all the drying time it's had. If you're not above doing manual labor."

"After you, buddy. After you."

* * *

"You're gonna have to put your anger on hold, Magdalena. Tell me everything you know about Kendall Sorbis, and tell me right now." Justin downshifted as traffic slowed. He scowled at the witch in the seat next to him. She'd worn a jumpsuit of army green with a zipper down the middle, the rip-stop fabric outlining every part of her body. Justin did his best not to look.

"I don't have to tell you anything." Maggie's voice was like ice.

"Let me put it this way. The Weres said Kendall has opened a portal to the Chaos Plane. Maybe more than one portal, and is enticing demons this way. Do you really want to work for someone like that?"

He waited while she thought, trying not to breathe in her spicy scent. He sent his window down for a blast of hot air.

"I don't work for him. We used to be lovers, but that was years ago. I got thoroughly burned." Her words were quiet and edged with pain. "I picked up the phone in his office because I was there as a favor to his wife. Looking for any sign of his whereabouts. He's run off," she added. "He left his bride of two years high and dry."

Justin narrowed his eyes. "Why did you tell me he was on his anniversary trip?"

“Because that’s what I was told to tell anyone who inquired.”

"Any ideas about why he ran off?" Justin glanced at her. She'd bitten her bottom lip and her eyes were squeezed shut.

"He was wanted for questioning about a murder, but when the cops came to his door a couple of days ago, he'd already split. His young wife found a note protesting his innocence. He's apparently searching for the real murderer."

"What do you think?"

"He's capable of it." The words were cool and without malice. "He's got a curiosity gene a mile wide. He likes to…experiment. Death—causing it, or seeing it—never bothered him."

"Some lover.”

"Like you said. We all make mistakes. Such as the multitude of mistakes you've made recently."

"I still don't understand why you're pissed off." He bit the words off without looking at her.

"Rose disappeared from my house. I’m frantic with worry about her, but you don’t respond to my phone calls. I call the office and you don’t even have an assistant to tell me what’s going on. Damn it all to hell, Justin. You left me in charge of Rose’s safety, and then you don’t tell me what happened to her. That, plus everything else that happened in the past twenty four hours that you just now told me about, gives me every reason to be angry. You ass." The look she flashed at him made Justin grateful she didn't turn him into one.

"I called you eventually," he pointed out, and winced when she let out a short scream of frustration. He heard her quick breathing, her struggle for control. When she finally spoke, her voice was tight.

"Justin, I know I'm not a Caine. I understand we have a hate/hate relationship. But I'm getting close to Rose and consider her a friend. I've been a part of this case almost since the beginning, and you're shutting me out. How would you feel if the shoe were on the other foot?" she demanded.

"Okay. I see your point. But it's not like we had time to give you a jingle. 'Hey Maggie, yeah, come on over, we're having a bar fight.' Be reasonable," he added.

"When you got home last night, you could have called. When you were at the hospital, you could have called. I would have called you," she said, and turned to face the side window. "In fact, I did call you. And boy was that a mistake.”

"Look." Justin shifted gears, exiting the freeway at Victory Boulevard going west, and continued. "I'm sorry, okay? It's not that I thought you couldn't handle what was happening. It's just that everything happened so fast."

"Yeah, pull my other leg," she scoffed.

Justin grimly kept his thoughts off her legs and her other luscious body parts. "I was trying to keep you safe," he bit out.

"And that made you happy," she shot back. "Obviously, since you're just bubbling over with joy."

"What does my being happy have to do with anything?" he said, bewildered.

She tossed her hands up in the air, barely missing his face, and looked away. "Apparently nothing, since you were so
un
happy about having to see me again."

"Oh, I get it. You're angry that I kissed you." Justin grinned. "Now it makes sense."

"What? That's not why I'm angry," she grumbled, and crossed her arms.

"Oh, that's right. You're not angry that I kissed you. You're angry that you kissed me back. Don't pout. It's not attractive," he advised and turned the car into the drive. The gates stood open, so he eased the Jag down the long drive.

"I'm not pouting. I'm thinking up ways to torture you slowly before I kill you."

Justin laughed. "Good luck with that." He pulled the car to a stop in front of the house. "We're here." He got out of the car and leaned against the hood, just looking at the place and remembering.

He heard Maggie get out and slam the door behind her. Justin turned to look at her and caught his breath again at her profile. She was too damned sexy for his peace of mind.

She wavered a little, put a hand out to steady herself against the car. Her eyes were glassy. Concerned, Justin moved to stand in front of her, breaking her view of the house. "Maggie? You okay?"

Maggie blinked, and a tear rolled down her cheek. "Justin."

"Hey." He wiped the tear away. "It's okay. The house hits some people like that." He leaned against the car next to her, studying the house that had been his home, giving her time to pull herself together.

"I used to come here on the anniversary of her death. After, I mean. After Dad left and we closed up the house." He sighed. "It always caught at me. The house looked like it was waiting. And I wasn't what it was waiting for."

She turned to face him, their bodies mere inches apart. "That must have hurt."

"Yeah." He shot her a crooked grin. ""Yeah, it did. But the inside—you've got to see the inside." He grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the front door. "It's the best."

The door stood open. As they stepped inside, a hint of incense seemed to welcome them.

Maggie looked around, her eyes wide. "Spells are everywhere. Did you ever notice? Everywhere I look, I see a spell of one sort or another. It's absolutely, breathtakingly beautiful."

"This way. This was my favorite room." Justin tugged her over to the hearth room, a huge room anchored by a fireplace at one end and three large windows to the front of the house.

The fireplace was big, in keeping with the rest of the room, clad in river rock with a black slate hearth and a thick, wide mantel of black oak polished to a shine.

Over it was painted a tree, rich in detail, thick with leaves.  It looked alive, and for a moment Justin could swear he heard the rustle of the leaves in the summer breeze.

Maggie stepped closer to Justin. "This is amazing, absolutely amazing. Did those leaves just move?" She left his side to step up on the hearth and look at the painting.

Justin shook his shoulders and took a breath. "Maggie." She turned to look at him, and their eyes locked. Energy rose between them, hung in the air.

"Hi guys. Maggie, we need a witch. Come upstairs—there are a couple spirals I want you to look at."

Justin didn't know if he should hit Kellan or hug him. He turned from Maggie in relief.

"Kellan. The whole house has spells painted in it. Maybe we shouldn't be here. I'm not getting an overly friendly vibe from it."

"I know. It's waiting. Since Gabriel's back for a while at least, and I'll be in and out for a few months, we decided it was time to open the place up. But it's not like we're going to paint over anything. We need your opinion, your expertise. And your decoding abilities," he added. "Come on."

Maggie sent Justin a hot look before following Kellan upstairs. "The spells I've seen so far have been simple ones. Spells of love, faith in family, and protection, mostly."