Interview With a Gargoyle (11 page)

Calypso glared, just as he’d suspected she would. Melodie only checked her watch and sighed. “I’ve got to go to work. Cal is going back to talk to her coven members tonight, so can one of you guys drive me?”

“I will.” Palmer practically leapt over the kitchen table. Fresh from his own short tirade, Blake had little fire left in him to fight for the privilege of escorting Melodie across town. He hung back as they made their way past Calypso and out of the kitchen. “I’ll follow after. I’m going to do a little demon hunting first.”

Palmer ignored the jibe, but Melodie glanced back over her shoulder. “Be careful.”

“Yes,” the witch added with a sharp curve to her tone. “We wouldn’t want anything to happen to
you
.”

“I apologize for my little freak-out back there,” Mel said when she and Palmer pulled up in front of Gleason’s. She had no idea how she was going to concentrate on work with every nerve in her body jangling and her brain on overdrive.

“Don’t worry about it. It has to be a shock…but just because you have, or seemed to have, absorbed the Cabochon, doesn’t mean you’re a demon. There’s obviously some sort of loophole in the curse. Maybe with no other demon available, the Gogmar had to give the gem to whoever was on hand.”

“The fact remains, demon or not, the gem doesn’t change hands unless whoever is holding it dies. I could have this thing in me for the next…fifty years or more.” She didn’t want to think about it, couldn’t stand the thought of Blake DeWitt waiting for her to die so he could have another chance at ending his curse.

Palmer shut off the engine and hopped out of the Jeep. He loped around the front end and opened Mel’s door for her. “I’m sure Calypso will come up with something. I don’t know much about witches, but rumor has it the Council is made up of some pretty powerful individuals. Hey, look, if someone could create a curse this powerful, there has to be someone who can break it, right?”

Mel’s boots hit the sidewalk, and again, a displaced sense of well-being washed over her. Sure, it would be all right. In fact, everything would be great.

She tossed Palmer a bright smile and sauntered toward the bakery. With practiced ease, she unlocked the door, punched in her security code on the alarm system and headed toward the kitchen. There would be four dozen carrot-apple cupcakes that needed autumn-leaf motif icing for the Women’s Club luncheon waiting for her. She’d have plenty to do, and even with Calypso gone, she’d have someone to talk to tonight while she worked.

That, at least, was something to be thankful for.

While she mixed a batch of sweet cream-cheese icing and sorted through Arnie’s collection of cookie cutters looking for the exact shape of autumn leaf she had in mind, Palmer played watchdog. After a quick recon of the alley, he stationed himself in front of the back door, arms crossed over his broad chest, blue eyes watchful and intense.

Mel would have found it amusing, and definitely sweet, except her thoughts swirled around DeWitt and the pain she’d seen in his eyes when he’d spoken of his family. Even though Percival Blake’s son and grandson would have lived more than two hundred years ago, it was clear that Blake felt a connection to his forefathers. Their lives had been diminished by a curse of vengeance, and beyond blood, he obviously felt a kinship with these men.

Tears stung her eyes and the back of her throat as she rolled out the fondant for the cupcake leaves. She turned away from Palmer and used the back of her hand to dab away the first salty drop of moisture that rolled down her cheek. If the curse passed from father to son at the moment of death, what would happen to a young child if his father died too soon? Blake hadn’t mentioned having children of his own, but the implications were staggering.

A full-body sob racked her as she cut the first leaf from a thin layer of orange fondant.

“Melodie? You all right?”

She squeezed her eyes shut for a second. “Fine. I’m fine.” She swiped another tear and turned. Her bodyguard gave her a curious grin that seemed to morph into a hot, sexy, come-hither wink. Was he serious? Mel almost laughed at her own absurd thought. Surely Palmer wasn’t coming on to her.

She shook off the tingle of curiosity that swept through her and fought to ignore the wicked hint of mischief that caused her to eye him from under her lowered lashes after cutting another leaf. Her ability to distinguish a good idea from a bad one fled after another sidelong glance at his broad shoulders.

She dropped the cookie cutter and stalked across the kitchen, drawn like a magnet to Palmer’s incredibly delicious lower lip. She cupped his jaw in her floury palms and lunged in for a feral kiss, a drink of him that ended in a bite.

Stiff as a mummy under her onslaught, he tipped back against the kitchen door and uttered a muffled, “Mfflat erf yudoo…ing?”

He tasted like sin, which happened to be Mel’s favorite flavor. She ignored his halfhearted protest and hitched one jean-clad thigh up on his hip. “I’m hungry. I haven’t eaten since yesterday, and I want a taste of you.”

“Uh…”

She had him writhing between her and the fire door. His hands seemed to be everywhere at once, which was fine with her until they ended up on her shoulders, pushing her gently but firmly away.

“I think maybe you’re a little stressed,” he said. His eyes were huge, and beneath her spread palms, his heart beat like a war drum.

“Come on. Don’t you want me? You drew a portrait of me, for heaven’s sake. You obviously put a lot of thought into my eyes, my hair, my lips…” She dove again, and he ducked, leaving her staring at the door.

“This doesn’t seem like you.”

“How would you know how I seem? You don’t even remember me from the other day. For all you know, after you killed the Gogmar, I might have been so grateful that I threw you down on the floor and had my way with you right here in the kitchen.”

He raised a brow and continued to back up until he reached the workstation island in the middle of the room. “You told me Blake came in and dropkicked me.”

“Maybe I lied.” She fingered the buttons on her shirt and let her hungry gaze travel down to an interesting spot just below his belt buckle. “Maybe we did things too wild to talk about.”

“Somehow, I doubt that.”

Mel pouted.
She
had no doubt that DeWitt would have accepted her advances and helped her slake her sudden desires. Maybe she’d go find him.

She dismissed Palmer with a wave and turned to open the back door. “Don’t say I never gave you a chance, hot pants.”

The night air hit her like a splash of cold water, followed immediately by the hot, putrid breath of a creature that made the Gogmar look cuddly.

Claws the length and shape of scimitars protruded from long, spindly fingers. Flesh the color of moldy bacon hung in folds from a body that had a few too many limbs and not quite enough muscle. A dozen clustered eyes, lidless and black as midnight, blinked at Mel, and a mouth that looked like a gateway to hell gaped at her.

She didn’t scream.

She wanted to, but fear had closed her throat up tight and threatened to suffocate her.

Behind her, Palmer’s voice reached her as if through a long, water-filled tunnel. “Maybe we should sit down and talk about thi—”

The demon struck, and everything went black.

Chapter Twelve

Just as Blake suspected, the body of the Ak’mir demon was gone from the basement of the abandoned townhouse on Bailey when he returned to continue his investigation.

The distinctive stench remained, however, which led him to believe the creature had managed to regenerate itself. It wasn’t skulking around the shadows among the construction garbage, so it stood to reason this wasn’t its preferred habitat. It had definitely been stalking prey the other night. Chances were, it would return to hunt again.

The ride back to Gleason’s was uneventful. Though the cool evening was full of shadows and Amberville’s quiet streets were empty at half past eleven, Blake saw nothing suspicious. If demons were mobilizing, they were being remarkably discreet.

Van Houten’s Wrangler sat in front of Gleason’s bakery, gleaming under the pink-tinted glow of the nearest street lamp. Nice car. Waxed to perfection and detailed. Spanky clean, just like its owner. Blake grumbled while he secured his helmet to the back of his bike, which he parked just close enough to the Jeep so Van Houten would have to back up in order to pull away from the curb.

This rivalry was pointless, really. The demon hunter just irked him because he represented everything Blake had never been. Growing up, he’d been a shy kid, bookish and introspective. Wrenched from his home in Glasgow at age eleven when his father’s company transferred him to the States, he’d floundered socially through the rest of his teen years. Good grades hadn’t been enough to make up for the fact he couldn’t catch a ball to save his life, couldn’t run a lap faster than the girls in gym class and couldn’t hit anything with a bat but his own shadow.

Funny how ten years in darkness had changed that. He’d gone from skinny math geek who couldn’t get a date, to dark, mysterious stranger who didn’t dare ask a woman over for fear he’d fall asleep and crush her to death when dawn turned him into a hideous stone beast.

Palmer represented everything Blake had never been and never could be. He had every reason in the world to hate the demon hunter and no reason at all.

The bloodcurdling scream that sliced through the night gave him one more reason to despise Mr. All-Star. Clearly Palmer hadn’t done his job. He hadn’t protected Melodie from the demons, and now it sounded like she was being murdered.

Muttering every expletive he could think of, Blake ran for the alley.

The smell of blood reached him first, and he pulled up short, stunned by the carnage. Gogmar goo couldn’t compare to this.

The bricks around Gleason’s back door ran with blood. Splatters six feet high reached the small spotlight mounted over the door. Claw marks scored the green paint of the nearest Dumpster, and a bloody trail of footprints led inside the building.

Blake swallowed bile and steeled himself. It couldn’t have ended this way. Not so soon. Melodie didn’t deserve to die like this.

Muffled sounds made their way into the alley, and Blake slid the blade he carried under his jacket out of its sheath. He refused to entertain the notion that if a demon had come to tear the Cabochon from Melodie McConnell’s body,
he
might have a chance to retrieve it.

The thought never crossed his mind.

Much.

He hated himself for thinking it. Hated himself for hoping her end had been swift, though by the looks of things, far from painless.

He’d make Palmer pay for this, if the attacking demon hadn’t already done so.

The door creaked when he nudged it open, and he froze. Nothing came after him, though, and he took another tentative step, pushing the door open far enough to slip inside.

“Good God.”

“Hey…oh, shit, it’s you. Do you mind getting this thing off me?”

Palmer lay on the kitchen floor in a pool of blood that now appeared more orange than red. Sprawled over him was a beast of ungainly proportions. From this angle, it resembled half a roast pig with spidery arms and legs—at least half a dozen appendages bent at odd angles. Thick claws were embedded in the terra cotta tiles of the kitchen floor, trapping the demon hunter in a cage of demon flesh.

Dead flesh, fortunately.

Relief washed over Blake and made him momentarily light-headed. “Where’s Melodie?”

“She’s gone. She took off after the other one…ugh. A little help here, please.”

“But I just heard her scream.”

Palmer looked away. “Umm, no. That was me.”

Holding in a laugh, Blake navigated the pool of blood and, with a solid kick, dislodged the Betryminar demon’s nearest claw from the floor. Palmer slid through the muck and rolled out from under the enormous body, which splashed down into the remaining reservoir of its own viscera.

“Oh man.” Palmer shivered and turned to the nearest sink. He hung there a moment while his complexion marched through several shades of green. “I need some air.”

“Well, the alley’s no better. Don’t go out there. Did you say
the other one
? Melodie took off after a Betryminar demon?”

“No. The other one was a Fryyk, I think. I didn’t get a good look. This one came barreling in here and started chasing us around.”

Ignoring the unpleasant odor of dead demon, Blake knelt beside the body. It looked as if the Betryminar had been ripped to shreds by something even bigger and badder. A Fryyk could certainly have done the trick, but it wouldn’t likely have run away and left a human alive.

“Melodie chased the Fryyk away?”

Palmer wet a hand towel and covered his eyes with the damp cloth. He nodded, swallowing hard. “Yup. She was pissed.”

“Because the Fryyk killed the Betryminar?”

Palmer eyed him from under the dripping corner of the hand towel. “No. Because I…she…I wouldn’t let her seduce me.”

Blake ruminated on that for a split second before he laughed. Hard and long.

Palmer glared. “Would I kid at a time like this?”

“Melodie tried to seduce you?”

“Yeah. I don’t know what came over her. I’m thinking maybe it’s some kind of demon side effect. One minute she was sobbing over her cupcakes, and the next minute she was climbing up my leg.”

“And you turned her down?”

“Well, of course.”

“What came over
you
?” Blake shook his head. He had one up on Palmer now. The All-American boy was a stone-cold wuss.

Or a gentleman.

“Crap. She got mad at you and took off after a demon? I suppose you don’t have any idea which way she went?”

“Sure. I think she turned left at the entrails and followed the blood splatters all the way to Oz. Come on, DeWitt. I was lying under a dying Betryminar trying not to hurl. Those things weigh a ton, and they stink like Ak’mirs.”

Blake cast a jaundiced eye at the corpse. “No. They really don’t stink anything like Ak’mirs. Consider yourself lucky on that count. Um…where’s your weapon?”

“My weapon…oh. Melodie grabbed my crossbow before she left. I don’t think she knows how to use it. We better track her down before she hurts someone.”