Demon's Hunger (6 page)

Dain rested one hand on the roof of the SUV and ducked his head to get a better glimpse at the inside. From the backseat, Vivien looked out at him, her eyes wide and glassy.

He figured she was holding it together by the thinnest thread, and damn but he admired her for that. A smile tugged at him as he thought of her standing in her basement, ready to battle a demon with a stool. Brave lady.

Misguided, but brave.

Instinct screamed at him to climb in with her, wrap her in his arms, hold her tight. Protect her from the frigging demons and
hybrids
, because she clearly had no idea that she couldn't protect herself.

Tunnel his fingers through her sexy, spiky hair and turn her face to his kiss.

He had no business feeling this way, no business kissing her—or even thinking about it—but everything about Vivien Cairn made him want to. The craving was a hot, primal need, coiling low in his gut. The attraction. The urge to keep her safe.

It was that damsel-in-distress thing again.

If he told himself that, maybe he'd believe it. Or not.

Because despite her shock, she wasn't acting the part of helpless maiden.

Vivien Cairn was tough. Whatever she thought of the things she'd just seen, her spirit was undaunted. He admired her for that.

So maybe that was the appeal.

He straightened, stepped back. Her eyes narrowed, and her sleek body tensed as she rallied, lunging for freedom with an angry cry.

He slammed the door, closing her in. "Stay put, Vivien. Stay safe. I'll be back."

The sound of her fists on the glass was a brief indicator of her displeasure. But she wasn't one to waste time on useless frustration. Instead, she turned her attention to trying all the doors and windows.

Dain shook his head. She wouldn't have any luck getting them open. He'd sealed them with magic to ensure she stayed inside—stayed safe—until he figured out the best course of action, because he couldn't be certain there were no other demons or
hybrids
in the vicinity, not with the damned demon bone in his pocket greasing everything with a dark smear.

Pacing away, he conjured his acacia staff and held it in an easy grip. He shot a quick look over his shoulder at the SUV The smoked-out windows blocked his view of her, but Dain knew she was in there. Freaking? Maybe. Fuming? Definitely.

He figured that if glares were bullets, Vivien Cairn would be shooting hollow-points.

There was a repeated clicking as Vivien methodically tried each door handle. Twice. She was a problem-solver, his Vivien.

The thought made him freeze.

She was not
his
Vivien.

His chest tightened. The heat and smoke from her burning house wafted over him, but he couldn't use that as an excuse for the choked feeling behind his sternum.

What the hell was this?

His heart, his emotions, were buried in the ground with his wife and baby daughter. For centuries, he had allowed himself no visceral connection, allowed for no other tragic mistakes. The only thing he let himself feel—deeply, richly, a powerful stimulant in his veins—was hatred of the goddamned demons.

He even held himself apart from his brothers in the Compact of Sorcerers. A wise tactic, it turned out; the Ancient had betrayed them, betrayed
him
.

The pain of that was still fresh enough to bleed.

But the worst of it was, the Ancient had been secretly laying the groundwork of his plot for decades, lured by the darkness over a span of a century, losing a bit more of himself each day until he was no longer the leader, the friend, Dain had known.

And Dain had failed to see it.

Just as he had failed centuries past to see the danger to Moria and Ciel.

Which meant he couldn't trust anyone. Not even himself.

Dain shook his head. He had lost his wife, his child, to the demons, and over the years, friends and comrades. Finally, he had lost his mentor, in effect, his father.

It was better not to care. Not to
trust
Not to feel.

A thud from inside the SUV grabbed his attention, and he glanced back. There was something about Vivien Cairn—some emotional draw he couldn't explain—that made him want to lower his barriers enough to hold her close, touch her, taste her.

Brand her as his.

He felt like he
knew
her, all the hidden depths of her. A primal connection.

How frigging messed up was that?

He'd known her for less than an hour. When exactly had she had enough time to become important to him?

A harsh bang rent the air as the fire blew out a window of the house. With a roar, red-orange flames soared through the shattered panes, brilliant tongues of light and heat. The power of it came at him like a blow.

He spun and scanned the perimeter, looking for Ciarran and Darqun. Time to get the hell out of here.

Vivien's house was in the middle of nowhere, but someone would have called 911 by now. Probably the tree farmer up the road. Pretty soon, a fire crew would arrive, and Dain had no intention of hanging around until they did.

"Dain!" Ciarran called, loping toward him, his expression grim as he assessed the inferno engulfing Vivien's home.

Dain shoved his hand in his pocket, felt the acid burn of the charred demon bone seep through his skin. He knew that if the dark aura of the bone wasn't clouding his perceptions, he would be able to sense the part of Ciarran that was demon. Once, Ciarran had used warding spells and an alloy glove to hide his left hand, to deny the part of himself that was infested by a demon parasite.

Now he accepted it, embraced it. Dark, demonic magic blended with Ciarran's light-fed power, making him a formidable and unpredictable force within the Compact of Sorcerers.

Dain still wasn't certain how he felt about trusting that.

But weeks past, when the Ancient had betrayed their cause, Ciarran—a sorcerer who was part demon—had chosen to hold true. That choice had to count for something.

It was always about choices.

And for Dain, it was about trust. He had a little problem with that commodity, kind of like looking for sunshine in the arctic in the dead of winter.

Skidding to a stop, Ciarran studied the burning house, then turned to look quizzically at Dain.

"Exterminate something?" he asked, his voice mild.

"Yeah. A full-blooded demon and its keeper," Dain replied, wondering what the hell the demon had been doing in Vivien's basement. "You?"

Ciarran flexed his leather-gloved left hand. "Smoked three
hybrids
in the cornfield."

"I got four at the tree farm." Darqun jogged up, pulling leaves from his hair. He grinned. "And one tree."

"What the hell is going on? What were they doing here?" Ciarran asked, his voice low, his body eerily still.

Narrowing his eyes, Dain glared at the burning house, slid his gaze to the tree farm. "Whatever it is, it isn't good."

Dain felt the shift of the
continuum
as Ciarran called up his strange blend of demon-tinged magic to cordon off the blaze. The smoke and flames twisted and writhed and coalesced in a single column that held close to the house.

"Did they follow us here to Dr. Cairn's house, or did we all just happen to show up for the same party?" Darqun asked.

The question brought a harsh stab of guilt. Dain had no liking for the answer he conjured. "Best I can figure, they must have followed us. We led them right to Viv"—he cleared his throat—"Dr. Cairn's doorstep."

"Probably," Ciarran agreed, his tone laced with disgust. "I can think of no other explanation for their presence here. But why the hell didn't we sense them?"

"The garlic-on-a-date effect," Darqun muttered, and Dain almost laughed at Ciarran's expression. "You know… when you go out on a date, don't eat garlic unless your date does, too. You won't smell it if you both eat it."

Ciarran swung his gaze to Dain, looking both pained and baffled. "There's a point he's making, right? Tell me there's a point."

"Yeah. There's a point." Dain hauled the charred demon bone from his pocket long enough for Ciarran to catch a glimpse, then shoved it back out of sight. "The equivalent of demon garlic. As long as me and the bone hang tight, I can't sense anything in the haze of darkness. And if you're sitting next to me, neither can you."

He had no idea how Ciarran could sense anything in the first place, given that his light magic was woven with dark, but he wasn't about to ask. Some things crossed even the line of friendship.

"
You We carrying the bone around with you
." It wasn't a question.

"I'm sure as hell not going to leave any of them—not the charred bone or these fun little bags of bones—lying around unguarded. Besides, I wanted Dr. Cairn's take on them." Dain crossed his arms, implacable. The movement made his mangled forearm throb, and he glanced at it, surprised by the extent of the injury.

Ciarran narrowed his eyes but offered no argument.

Stepping between them, Darqun frowned, his gaze sliding first to Dain's shredded forearm, then to his gouged chest. "You good, my man? That looks brutal."

"Flesh wound." Dain grabbed a hunk of savaged muscle, shoved it back in place, and summoned just enough of his magic to hold the mess together. "I'm good."

Light shimmered from his fingertips, and he willed the wound to heal. Sorcerers were capable of this partial recovery, of knitting skin and muscle and bone. But full recovery still took a day or two, depending on the severity of the damage, and the pain remained until the wound fully healed.

"By the way"—Darqun glanced about—"where
is
Dr. Cairn?"

"Locked in the SUV." At their looks of incredulity, Dain spread his arms, palms up, a gesture of innocence. He'd been right to lock her in. It had been his best option.

There it was again, everything coming down to options. Choices.

"It's warded and bulletproof. It seemed the safest place." And he was damn well going to keep her safe.

"Which raises the issue…" Darqun looked back and forth between the other two. "What do we do with her now? She can't stay here"—he glanced at the flaming house, the billowing smoke contained within the invisible perimeter that Ciarran had conjured rising in a writhing, twisting column—"not that there's much of
here
left."

"I need her." Two sets of eyes nailed Dain with blatant disbelief.

He gave a harsh grunt of laughter. "For the bones. We didn't even have time to begin the investigation process, let alone finish it. I don't know anything new about the bone I believe is from the Solitary, and more importantly, nothing about the gris-gris bags. Not a damn thing."

A siren wailed in the distance. They were out of time. Unless they wanted to do some major explaining to the arson investigation squad, a change of venue was in order.

"We could leave her here for the EMTs. Let them check her out. Hook up with her later," Darqun suggested. "That'd probably be best."

Dain felt his whole body tense, his muscles prime themselves for battle.
No
. The word snarled through him, and he felt the denial soul-deep. There could still be
hybrids
hanging about, or demons. She wasn't safe here.

"She comes with us." For the second time, the other two sorcerers slammed him with quizzical stares, and Dain realized he'd barked the words more than spoken them. "I didn't get the answers we came for. I still need her expertise," he finished, milder.

Plausible, though it wasn't the whole truth.

He couldn't pin down the whole truth. What was it with him and this possessive urge to hold close to Vivien, to touch her, stroke his hand along her skin, to—

Shoving his fingers through his hair, he spun and paced off a distance. He was frigging losing it.

"Uh, yeah." Darqun cleared his throat. "Her
expertise
. You said that already."

Dain turned back, barely held himself from lunging. Almost growled at him.

"Head to my place," Ciarran suggested, stepping between the two men.

Dain figured his comrades sensed his tension. Probably wondered about it. Only, he couldn't give an explanation, because he had no clue what was winding him up so tight.

"Dr. Cairn can stay with Clea and me until we figure this out," Ciarran offered.

A logical suggestion, and a surprising one, given Ciarran's reclusive nature. But the thought of being parted from Vivien made Dain's gut clench. Thick, choking fury pounded through him. He recognized that it was unreasonable but couldn't seem to drag it under control.

"No." Slow breaths didn't calm him. "No. She stays with me."

"But—"

"She fucking doesn't leave my side. Got it?" he snarled, ramped up all over again.

He glared at them, his pulse pounding in his ears, the crack and roar of the fire swirling through the air, through his blood.

"Build a wall," Ciarran said quietly, raising his hands, palms forward. "Build a wall, Dain, in your mind. Hold it back, whatever the hell
it
is. And get rid of that demon bone before it makes you nuts."