A Demon's Desire (4 page)

She entered the store. It was as small as she
remembered, though bright and non-threatening in the light of day.
There were no corners with impenetrable shadows, no gleaming eyes,
no devil.

Same clerks. Emma almost rolled her eyes but
looked to the back of the shop. He
did
have Coke.

“Will you tell Tristan if he leaves his
coffin that I’m going to call a tow truck for my car?”

They both gave her looks more hostile than
previously.

She ignored a hiss of
bitch
and
stepped into the sunlight. The street was as she left it:
possessed. There were plenty of vampire and fairy wannabes, more
than she had ever seen concentrated anywhere except during
Halloween, mingling with the tourists cheerfully strolling in and
out of shops with names like Witch’s Brew, Demon Delicacies, and
World’s Smallest Portal to Hell.

Distracted by the weirdos, she didn’t realize
her car was gone until she reminded herself why she’d come outside.
She muttered a curse, her gaze lingering in front of the store
where she’d parked.

No keys, no car. It was fully insured, though
that wouldn’t get her home today. Unease stirred within her.
Tristan didn’t seem like a very eager host, and his location of
living quarters left much to be desired. Most of the caped and
winged people on the street deserved to reside in a mental
institution at the very least.

Her phone rang. She pulled it free of her
pocket.

“Hey, sis. How are you?” The woman’s voice on
the other end was strained, tired. Guilt engulfed Emma. She’d had a
good night’s rest and had managed to avoid the pain and sorrow at
the edge of her thoughts. Her sister had no such opportunities.

“How are you? Have you gotten any rest?” she
asked.

“Some,” was the evasive answer. “You sound
good; you needed some sleep.”

“Thanks, Amber,” Emma said.

“Hey, look, someone called today claiming to
be a friend of yours. I’ve never heard you talk about him, so I
wasn’t sure. He said your car was being towed and that you asked
him to help my baby.”

“Yes,” she said slowly, wondering how Tristan
had figured out her sister’s phone number and address. “Tristan,
right?”

“Yeah. Pretty accent. Is he French or
something?”

“No idea.”

“So is he okay?”

“He’s there to try and help,” she hedged.
“He’s different, so don’t be surprised.”

“None of your friends surprise me, not that
I’ve met more than a couple. What’s the story?”

“I’m kind of seeing him,” she said, unable to
voice the truth.

“Boyfriend?” The surprise in Amber’s voice
was apparent. “I’ve been so worried about Sissy I haven’t paid any
attention. You think he can help Sissy?”

“I think if anyone can, he can,” Emma said
honestly. Pain filtered through her at the desperation in her
sister’s voice.

“Is he a doctor?”

“Not quite.”

“I trust you, Em.” Amber’s voice was quiet.
Her words tore at Emma’s heart. She took a deep breath and felt her
eyes water. She’d invited the devil into her sister’s home, to meet
with her four-year-old, dying niece.

What if I made a mistake?

“We’ve never met anyone you dated. Is it
serious?” Amber continued.

“Most of the guys I date turn out to be
idiots. I’m doing a favor by not introducing you to them,” Emma
said, her mind going to Adam, the last man she’d dated. “No, it’s
not serious.”

“You trusted him with your car, and he’s
coming to meet us!” The hopeful note in her sister’s voice was too
sweet, too long absent for Emma to correct her.

“Yeah, well, this one might be useful,” she
said lamely.

“This is really cool. I’ll have Mama drop by
to meet him,” Amber said.

“That’s fine,” she managed, growing even more
unsettled by the thought of introducing everyone she loved to a
stranger who wasn’t quite normal. “Maybe I’ll drive over, too, and,
uh, introduce him or something.”

“You’ve made my day.”

“Thanks, Amber. Take care of baby and tell
Mama I said hello.”

“I will. You’ve done enough, Em. You need to
get back to your life,” Amber lectured.

“Sis, you and baby are my life.”

“Yes, but if this guy is serious, don’t lose
him on account of us.”

“Oh, no problem there,” Emma assured her.
“I’ve never let a guy come between my family and me before.”

“You ought to. Someone needs to take care of
you.”

“I know, sis.”

“Well, have a good day,” Amber said.

“You, too. Please take care of yourself.”
Emma hung up and stared at the phone then glanced at the Great Dane
sitting patiently beside her. “Your master has a lot of nerve,
angel. He better not be some wacko.”

The dog stood as she started forward, and
Emma pocketed her phone. She passed through the shop, ignoring the
poisonous stares from the clerks. She trotted up the stairs and to
the apartment. His scent lingered where it hadn’t before. Her
cereal bowl was no longer in the kitchen sink. Her eyes settled on
the fridge, where a note that hadn’t been there when she stepped
out was held in place by a black magnet.

Emma -

I called your sis to tell her where you are
and had your car towed to her house. I rented you a car. It’s out
back. Bring Isolde. The keys are on the dresser and my cell number
below.

T

Emma shivered. Not only could the man read
minds, but he must’ve been invisible or gone in and out a back way
in the five minutes she spent downstairs. What
was
he?

“Your name is Isolde?” she asked the dog,
forcing her mind on something other than a sense of panic and
foreboding building within her. The dog thumped its tail.

“I hope you like car rides.”

Thump, thump, thump.

“God help me,” she murmured and turned away
from the note from the fridge.

* * *

Tristan understood Emma’s exhaustion and
sense of urgency the moment he entered the small apartment. He
stood in the doorway of a brightly painted child’s room. The bed
across from him held a sleeping girl as pale as her white pillow
and covered in a cartoon character sheet. Her hair was a mass of
soft, dark curls, her chubby face heart-shaped. The room smelled of
her, an innocent, pure scent, tainted with the heavier scent of
sickness. Toys were organized in an open trunk and fat picture
books stacked on one bookshelf. Stuffed animals had been banned to
a beanbag in the corner, and a large dollhouse took up the area
between the bed and one wall. An empty wooden rocking chair sat
close to the bed.

He took in everything with a critical glance
and knew without stepping into the room what afflicted her.
Darkness, like that in Emma’s box, hovered around the girl and
throughout the room in patches. It called to him as a brother, its
presence familiar and soothing. He stepped away, hands sweaty. He’d
never faced anything this strong, wasn’t sure he could suppress the
evil within him and the evil of the room at the same time.

Emma’s sister, a pale woman with dark blond
hair, stood over the bed. Despair clung to her. She had already
given up on finding a cure for her daughter.

“Emma swore she’d find a way to help,” Amber
said in a distant voice. She straightened. “Thank you for
coming.”

Tristan was not unaffected by the scene
before him or her words. How would he feel if he sensed the danger
without understanding anything about it?

“Amber,” he said, drawing off his shadows to
reach the woman’s exhausted mind. She turned, dark green eyes
focusing. “Come with me.”

Tristan led her past the bright living room
and into the kitchen. Amber slumped on a stool at the counter
overlooking a double sink and watched him with glazed eyes. Tristan
prepared a cup of tea to put her mind at rest long enough for her
to get some sleep.

“Tell me what happened,” he instructed.

“A couple of months ago, Sissy started … to
get sick. Fevers and such. Kids are always sick when in daycare, so
I took her to the doctor. He gave her penicillin, and she seemed
okay for a couple days. Then it came back, worse, and she slept for
a few days, recovered, and seemed okay again. I took her to a
specialist, to a few specialists, but they didn’t find anything
wrong.” Amber’s voice was monotonous, her hand propping up her
head. “She said she had nightmares, and one night she was crying. I
went in to see her. She was okay, and I stayed until she was
asleep. She didn’t wake up for a week. I took her to the hospital,
and they hooked her up to machines but found nothing. When she
woke, she seemed okay again, then … more fevers, more nightmares,
more days when she slept without waking.”

“How long has she been out this time?”

“Over a week. The doctor …” Her voice broke.
Tristan turned away to give her privacy and retrieved the water
from the microwave. “The doctor says she can stay in the hospital
or here at home, but that the chances … the chances of …” Amber
blinked back tears and stared, unseeing. Tristan dipped a loose
leaf strainer into the hot water. He said nothing for several
moments, withdrew it, and handed her the tea. She offered a ghost
of a smile.

“Thanks,” she murmured. “I’m sorry. Emma’s
the strong one.”

“You’re strong, Amber,” he assured her,
touched. Even if he wasn’t sure he could control the darkness
within him, he’d do whatever he could to alleviate the sisters’
pain. “Did Sissy tell you about her nightmares?”

“She said there was a man by her bed, a dark
man with snow clouds. She was afraid of him, but I didn’t
understand why exactly. She said he just stood there and watched
her. He wanted her to go somewhere, but she didn’t want to go.”

A knot of understanding sank into his
stomach.

“Emma came back two weeks ago from a business
trip. I thought … I was too tired to think much, but she heard
Sissy talk about her dreams, and she acted really weird. Wouldn’t
go into her bedroom even when Sissy asked for her. I yelled at her.
We were both stressed, but she actually cried. I’ve never seen Emma
cry, and she’s-- we’ve-- been through a lot. She’s been working so
hard to find someone to help.” Amber paused then added drowsily,
“Emma and Sissy are so much alike. They have the same hair and are
afraid of the dark.”

Tristan leaned his hips against the counter
across from her, watching. The tea was taking effect, and tension
eased from the slender woman’s frame.

“Go rest.”

“Mama will be here in a bit,” she said in a
thin voice as she rose. “Make yourself at home. Em never brings
people to meet us, especially not boyfriends. You must be
special.”

“We’ll talk more when you wake up.” His eyes
followed her shape until the door to her room closed. He returned
to Sissy’s room and took in the patches of shadows. Emma was hiding
something from her sister and him. There was more to her than he
expected, but had the darkness within him not warned him of
such?

He stepped into the room, at once inundated
with hot and cold as shadows and darkness were propelled to him
like paperclips to a magnet. He paused a few feet from the bed and
let the darkness acclimate to him. He hesitated, then let the
darkness within him enough freedom to greet the evil in the room to
keep it from targeting him next. He shuddered in uneasy pleasure as
the two essences merged.

Welcome, Tristan.
The voice was so
soft, he barely heard it. His body recognized this darkness, though
he didn’t know how. He moved forward slowly once again, feeling the
shadows swirl around him like a soft night breeze. He sat on the
bed and touched the girl’s clammy forehead with a steady hand. Her
breathing was shallow and uneven, her body laboring.

It was evil that afflicted her. The shadows
that clung to the teddy bear in the box Emma carried had also crept
into the little girl’s body. Removing them wouldn’t be hard for
him. Ridding the room and apartment would take more time, unless he
could identify what object in the apartment had been tagged by
evil. The shadows were guided to their target by something touched
by a curse, and he needed to find whatever that was. This was no
accident. Emma had known enough to know she needed to seek out
someone like him. He couldn’t help feeling she had a few things to
explain.

“Hello?” a cheerful voice called out.

Tristan shook off the shadows and strode to
the door. An older woman with fluffed brown hair highlighted with
silver and Emma’s stunning green eyes behind large glasses entered
the apartment. Her smile brightened as she saw him, and he waited
for her to recoil in the usual horror people displayed when they
first met him. She hesitated and then crossed the room with her
hand extended.

“You must be Tristan,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, surprised she’d
approached him.

“Call me Mama. The girls introduce me to
everyone as Mama,” she said and studied him. There was intelligence
behind the shining eyes, and Tristan suspected she was assessing
him even as she smiled. She would’ve seen and felt his darkness
like everyone else did. Instead of running away screaming, Mama’s
eyes went to Sissy’s room. “Is Amber …”

“Resting,” he supplied.

“Good. Don’t think she’s slept in a couple of
weeks. Emma will be here today, right?” The older woman searched
through the bag she carried as she walked to the kitchen.

“She’ll be in about four.” Tristan followed
her.

Mama withdrew several bags of cookies and
looked at him closely before choosing one bag. “You look like an
oatmeal chocolate chip cookie type,” she decided.

“How is that?” he asked and accepted the bag,
puzzled.

“Complex,” she said and flashed a smile. Her
interest turned to the pouches he’d placed on the counter. “Did you
bring tea?”

“I did. Do you like herbal teas?”