Demons (Darkness #4) (9 page)

“Crochet
?” I asked Charles as Dominicous stood and handed back the reading device. “What about knitting?”

“I can’t be
carrying around a huge ball of yarn in a bag. People would think I had a purse!”

“Charles…you
knit.
Why not just take that extra step and have a purse, too? What’s the difference?”

Charles cocked his head to stare
at me. “Are you being serious? A
purse,
Sasha? A male can’t be seen with a freaking purse, get real.” Charles shook his head as we walked down the stairs.

“S
oft is as soft does,” Jonas growled with a creased brow. “Want some lotion for your hands?”

“Al
l right Forrest Gump, real original,” Charles shot back. “And you never gave back
Scarface
.”

I sidestepped the fact that those were
my
DVDs, so I continued to try and figure out Charles. “So you gave up knitting for crotchet in order to be more masculine? Is there something wrong with your head?”

“I
crotchet little pieces at a time while waiting for you since you’re always on the go lately. So I do the little squares, and then I can fit them in my pocket. I hate being bored, Sasha, you know that. I’m going to make them into a quilt. It’ll look good.”

“My grandma used to knit,” Dominicous said pleasantly. “Mean, vicious old lady. She taught me some great combat moves. She was my favorite relative. I don’t think that’s how you make a quilt, though.”

“I feel like I’ve just stumbled into the nuthouse,” I mumbled.

“Sasha, I wondered,” Dominicous continued, “Would you mind dining with me this evening? I’d love to spend some time with you.”

A burst of butterflies fluttered through my ribcage. I had so much pressing on me right now, with this counsel coming up, and these demons, and Toa trying to swap fluids, and Stefan’s dominance issues—but for all that, I wanted nothing more than to get to know my new adopted father. To finally, after all this time, have a real family. That wanted me. That wanted to adopt me!

“I’d love to,” I said quietly, my face getting hot.

“Lovely. What is your favorite meal? I’ll have it prepared.”

“Burger
and fries. She can wolf that down faster than me.” Charles peered down the hallway, his eyes starting to lose their happy-go-lucky sparkle. He could be a complete clown in the mansion, but as soon as we stepped outside, his Watch Captain mask clicked into place.

“Anything is fine,” I answered, sparing an elbow for Charles. It bounced off his hard lateral muscle. No effect.

“So Jonas,” Dominicous said as they turned a corner, fast-tracking toward the front of the house. “What is it you hope to find—”

Dominicous cut off suddenly, his eyes snagged on someone up the hall on the right. A short someone.
With a shock of blue hair. She stood in the center of the hallway, staring into a sitting room with a gaping mouth.

“Ann?” I walked up beside her and followed her gaze.

A woman sat back on the couch, completely naked, with her knees dropped to the sides. Another woman, wearing black latex, crouched between spread thighs, going to town on the other woman’s lady bits. A man, wearing a freaking catsuit, of all things, kneeled next to the woman on the couch, feeding her his large manhood.

“Ah yes, I see you’ve found the leisure room,” I said in a
tour guide tone. “I have no idea why, but people seem to gravitate toward this room for weird crap.”

Ann turned to me slowly with incredulous eyes. “I knew these people were sexual, but…the
door’s
open. And they just go have random orgies? Just, willy nilly, let’s have a little sex with a bunch of people in the great wide open?”

“Great wide open?” Charles
leaned over us and squinted into the din. “They’re in a secluded room. Obviously
you’d
need a nunnery, but here we don’t mind having a good time. Although, I think they’ve gone a little crazy with the costumes. Latex can chafe if you rub against it fast enough.”

Jonas
stabbed the ceiling with his eyes from a few paces away. If it wasn’t for Dominicous, he would’ve grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and hauled me out of the house already. His eyes had that wild, impatient look that said he was about to snap.

I didn’t blame him. This night just kept getting weirder.

As if hearing my thoughts, Ann turned away and said, “Well, this is too strange for me.” Before she moved on, though, she couldn’t help glancing back into the room. The man was moving around to the latex butt.

She
shook her head, ripping her eyes away. “I don’t even want to know. He’s got a plan, and I don’t even want to know.”

“He’ll probably rip it open with his teeth. She really likes anal
stim—”

Ann cut Charles off with a savage punch to his stomach. He wheezed out a breath, trying his
damndest not to hunch over.

“I said I didn’t want to know,” Ann reiterated slowly.

His face burned a light red.

“Sir, we need to get going,” Jonas said to Dominicous in a polite snarl.

Dominicous smiled at Jonas agreeably. “Fascinating. I would assume, then, that you would speak to your mage, who is currently in charge of the procession.” It was hard to mistake the sharp edge beneath the words.

Jonas slowly turned his wild-eyed
stare my way. His teeth ground together and the scars on his neck looked white against his temper-filled, heated skin. He flashed me a
well, come the fuck on
kind of smile that resembled a fanged grimace. My butt tingle sounded for the second time that night. While I did need to learn to lead, I did not need to practice on Mr. Bat-Shit-Crazy right out of the gate.

Nodding diplomatically, I said, “Yes, we need to see to that site. Jonas, lead the way.”

“Oh, well, thank you so much
, Mage
.” His eyes widened further and his smile looked like a contorted snarl. He whipped around and started stalking down the hall, his hands clenching and releasing as he went.

Dominicous watched him in speculation the whole time.

“What?” I asked quietly as Charles fell way back. If Jonas took his temper out on anyone, it would be him. He was no dummy. Anymore.

“I marvel that Stefan is able to keep that male reigned in
,” Dominicous noted in a deep voice. “He has a severe problem with authority, and his anger redlines fairly easily.”

“Yeah, Jonas is a real treat,” I said dourly. Ann snickered behind me.

Dominicous turned his steel-infused eyes my way. “A mage should not have to keep on the knife-point with a member of the Watch. I’m sure someone else would step up and take his place beside you …”

I waved his concern away. “Jonas has faults in plenty, but there is no one else, besides you and Stefan, that I would want at my back. That guy would—
” I shook my head. “He would jab the devil in the eye to keep me safe. He’s proved it.”

I heard a throat clear behind me.

“And obviously Charles, too. At my back.”

The corner of Dominicous’
lips quirked as he ingested what I said.

As we stepped outside,
I slowed for Ann to walk beside me toward Jonas’ Hummer. “How’d you get so far in without someone stopping you?”

“Walked in. No one bothered me.”

“They all know you’re Sasha’s friend. Prudes of a feather floc
k together.” Charles walked around the far side of the vehicle, steering clear of Jonas, who was waiting at the driver’s side door, watching them all intently.

“What’s that about?” I asked
Ann as I hesitated in my walk to the front passenger side door. Regardless of the fact that Dominicous was older than everyone, and the most superior and adult-like, and should probably go in the front like parents were supposed to, as the leader of this crew, that place was reserved for me. I felt awkward.

“When we were at the lodge—the place where you trained in the woods with all the cabins...”

My face lit up in recognition.

“He hit on me. Well, that’s not true. What he actually did was ask me if I wanted to have sex. Just like that. Point bl
ank.” She put on a dopey expression to mimic Charles. “‘Oh hey, animal-human lady— if you’re not doing anything, want to have sex? I’m horny—I could do with a lay. Doggy style is fine—I’m not picky.’” Ann threw a glare into the car.

“So what’d you do?” I laughed.

“I punched him in the nuts, obviously!” Ann scoffed, trying to hide the smile. “He’s hot, though—if he put a little time and effort into it, I might’ve.”

She lowered her voice to a whisper,
glancing at the driver’s side where Jonas waited with his forehead against the steering wheel. “Jonas hasn’t freaked out that I’m going. Is that because of Dominicous?”

I
matched her tone—it was best not to aggravate the guy any more than he already was. “He’s so mad right now that he has to have some quiet time or he’ll explode. If it was just me, he’d rant and rave and argue. If Dominicous or Stefan is around and he’s like this, he simmers in acute aggression. Word of advice: Don’t badger him until he calms down.”

“I’m not suicidal,” she said, scurrying into the car. She’d sit b
etween the two guys in the back.

I headed to my spot and climbed in
, with Dominicous getting in as well. Once we were all settled, Jonas took his head off the steering wheel, flashed me a look promising pain, and jerked the ignition, starting the car.

“Sasha,” Dominicous spoke up
over the roar of the motor. You would almost believe he was a gardener of beautiful flowers rather than a lethal predator. “Did you plan to ask Stefan to dine with us, tonight?”

“Uh…”
I hadn’t had much time to think about it.

“I would encourage
you to bring him, if you like,” Dominicous continued. “I rarely get to see the pair of you outside of a work capacity. Dropping titles for a family dinner would be a luxury.”

A shiver went up my back, both because he said family, and because
Stefan had been dropping titles off and on, anyway. Jonas’ lips quirked, probably thinking the same thing. Right before he shoved his phone in my face.

“Jonas, I’ll ask him later,” I mumbled.
The man was starting to be as overbearing as Charles.

“He has a million things to prepare and see to. He might have to rearrange his schedule.” The phone inched toward my nose.

“What are you, his secretary? I’ll ask him later.”

“Just text him,” Ann helped from the back. “
That way it won’t be embarrassing asking honey-do-dah for a date with your new dad in front of other people.”

“
Yes, thanks for saving me all that embarrassment, Ann,” I replied in a dry tone.

“No worries.”

I pushed Jonas’ meaty hand away from my face as we pulled up to Jefferson Park, bringing out my own phone and whipping off a text real quick. I figured I’d leave it open—I’d ask if he wanted to go, but tell him it was totally fine if he didn’t. Because he definitely wouldn’t—he’d be worried he’d finally start a fight…

The night pressed against the windows, the wan
ing moon not giving us much to see by. And by ‘us,’ I really meant me, because even Ann had better night vision than humans.

I climbed out of the car into the stillness of midnight. The lush night harbored a chill that had me pulling my hoody tightly around
my body. Large oak trees reached overhead, their leaves littering the ground, a blanket of browns and blacks, the brilliant colors of fall muted in the darkness. Dominicous stepped out beside me, standing close, his body poised, his pleasantness shed like a second skin. His eyes scanned the area, his arms glowing lightly.

Ann gracefully stepped around the car, followed by the stern and serious face of Charles. Last came Jonas, his hulking shoulders and thick arms lightly flexed, prepared for the anti-
Christ as a normal course of his duties.

Something felt off about this place. Some weird energy was poking at me. It was like the equivalent of someone swishing the ve
ry ends of my hair. Disturbing.

“Something’s not right,” I said slowly, turning toward a black patch between two monstrous oaks. “I feel…”

Charles stepped up beside m
e, a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t go chasing demons, Sasha. If something pulls at you, you shout that shiznit out.”

“There
ain’t no demons.” Jonas stalked by, his glare flaying Ann as he passed her. “Follow me.”

He led the way through the still
copse of giant trunks, the ground bumpy with fallen acorns. The thick hush of the night hovered, sound strangely deadened. Another few steps had us nearing the edge of the plant life, the tableau opening up into a flat grassy soccer field with two skeletal frames of soccer goals hunkering in the distance. Beyond that, a playground spread out, shadowed and deserted.