Demons Undone: The Sons of Gulielmus Series (78 page)

“Was there a struggle? Do you remember fighting back?”

“Claude, like I said, I didn’t see anything, didn’t hear anything until I woke up in that warehouse. Things went dark before I passed out, so I think whoever it was must have thrown a bag or hood over my head before they … well, whatever they did. I’m pretty sure magic was involved, and I’m pretty sure it was witch, but it wasn’t like anything I’ve ever sensed before. It seemed …” She held one hand over her yawning mouth, and with the other, gestured for him to wait. Once done, she wiped her watering eyes. “Wait. What was the question?”

“You said the magic was unusual.”

She snapped her fingers, nodding as her eyelids drooped. “Right. Seemed …” Her words trailed off and eyelids drooped.

Marion gave her a little shake.

“What?”

Claude covered his mouth in time to hide his grin. John could make a small fortune traveling around town at night and putting kids to sleep if he ever figured out how to filter his power. Claude had to resort to magic to do the same thing, but for John, it was a built-in gift.

No one really knew what John was capable of, and sometimes Claude thought that his little brother was afraid to find out.

“The magic, Ellery,” he said. “You said it seemed, what?”

“Oh. It’s hard to explain, but there was artificialness about it. It felt like it didn’t really belong to the person using it. I know that sounds weird, but I’m new to this just like Gail, so it’s highly probable that I’m talking out of my ass.”

Huh. A witch borrowing power from someone, or some
thing
, seemed more and more likely.

“Were you alone the entire time you were at the warehouse?”

“No.” She yawned again, patting her hand against her open mouth, and tears beaded at the corners of her eyes. “I had the hood on until Agatha showed up, but I think there were two different voices. They tried to speak quietly, but I could tell one was definitely male. The other I’m not sure about. It was whispery.”

“Could it have been Agatha? Disappearing the way she did points to guilt.”

Ellery shook her head violently. “No. No way. When she popped in, she said something about always being able to find me if I call out for help. It sounded weird, but hey, I
did
call out for help as soon as the other people left. Agatha showed up five minutes later. Besides, she couldn’t have been involved before that. When she’s in a room, I feel it down to my toenails.”

“Same way with me,” Gail said.

Marion leaned her forearms onto the table and looked past Sweetie at Ellery. “I can sense when she’s near, but nothing like that. I don’t think she hits Sweetie’s radar that hard, either.”

Sweetie shook her head. “Nope.”

“Why’d she leave?” Gail asked. “Why wouldn’t Agatha have seen Ellery home, knowing what she’d endured?”

“Because she’s not allowed to interfere,” Claude said. “She probably panicked when she got spotted.”

Clarissa, back turned at the stove, grunted.

“Spit it out, Momma,” Marion said.

“It’s Agatha’s business.”

“Are you suggesting you know her business?”

Clarissa decreased the flame under her chili pot, and turned to face the table. “I know as much as you do about her.”

One of Clarissa’s typically cryptic non-answers. Claude wasn’t buying it this time. They didn’t have time for it. Ross was still out there somewhere. Papa was leaching power at a remarkable rate, and Gail was growing frostier with each passing minute. He was through with all the games. “Stop. What you’re really saying is that you know certain truths, and the rest you can only speculate on. Why don’t you go ahead and share that speculation with us?”

“Don’t get surly with me, Claude Marcel Fortier, or the next time I see your momma, she’s going to hear about it.”

Was she for real? Did she really just use the threat of telling a two-hundred-and-fifteen-year-old man’s dead
momma
on him?

He swallowed. The sad thing was, the threat scared him a little. He took a deep breath, let it out, and shoved his hands into his pockets. “For the second time in five minutes, I truly apologize. My patience is not inexhaustible, Clarissa. I’m used to working alone, so all of this rigmarole comes across as tedious and unnecessary for me. Please, for the sake of everything that keeps me human, if you know something, tell it.”

It took a moment, but she relaxed her glower. Switching her dish towel to her other hand, she said, “I won’t do that, and I have my reasons. Not my story to tell. If you want to ask Agatha, you have my blessing. But just because you ask, doesn’t mean you’ll get the answer you want to hear.”

“So, what, do we call her, or …” Gail eased over to the stove, gripping her shirt hem in her fists and keeping her gaze on Clarissa.

She wouldn’t even look at him. If she thought she was going to ice him out like that, she had another think coming.

Thunk!

Ellery didn’t wake when her head hit the kitchen table. She slept with lips parted and cheek atop the day’s newspaper.

Gail hurried over, Sweetie fretted next to her, looking this way and that as if trying to figure out how to move her, but Marion gave Sweetie a nudge and shook her head. “Just leave her,” she mouthed.

“If we knew her true name, we could summon her, but I suspect that’d piss her off,” Clarissa said.

Yeah, it certainly pissed Papa off on the few occasions Claude had done it.

“Perhaps you could have Ariel call her and invite her over. Would she be suspicious at that?” Gail ducked out from the arm Claude attempted to drape over her shoulders, but he could tell it was with a great deal of effort.

Her cheeks had flushed scarlet and breathing sped. If he pushed his power out a bit, he could make her grovel and beg for him, but that was just lust. Lust, he could get anywhere and with anyone.

“Probably,” Clarissa said. “I don’t think we’ve ever had to invite her over. She just shows up at all the right times.”

“What if we wanted to go to her instead of waiting on her to come to us? How could we find her?”

Clarissa pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and worried it for a moment. “Mark would know. Give me half an hour and I’ll have everything worked out. Be ready to jump when he gets here.” She grabbed the cordless phone from the wall as she passed into the living room.

Gail tried to edge around Claude, but he slipped an arm around her waist and drew him against his chest. “Going somewhere?”

“Yes. To peel the newsprint off my sister’s face and get her into a bed. I didn’t realize she was so tired, but I don’t blame her. It was a taxing ordeal.” She pushed ineffectually against his chest, but she really wasn’t trying all that hard. With every little push, her fingertips curled against his shirt, kneading, pulling him back.

“She’ll be fine. We should talk.”

“About what?”

So many things.
Everything
. He hardly knew where to start.

“We could go upstairs,” he hedged. He tightened his hold on her waist in part to remind her that he wasn’t going to let go of her easily, and also to hide the evidence of his bourgeoning erection. She’d done it to him, so it made sense to him that she be the one to shield it. Well, and do other things to it, too.

“Anything you need to say to me, you can say right …” She sucked in some air, sighed, and laid her cheek against his chest, still kneading his shirt. “Here.”

“All right. How about we start with you telling me where you learned to climb a pole like that?”

She took a quick step backward and her dreamy expression retreated. That shook her free of the lust, though that hadn’t been his goal. Now he wasn’t certain he wanted to hear the answer.

He narrowed his eyes at her. “You sure you were just a cook at that strip club?”

He expected immediate indignation in response, and got it.

She turned on her heel, stomped out of the room, and her footsteps were heavy thuds up the staircase.

Heat wrapped his ribs, squeezed his heart, and his fists balled on their own. That base, primal part of him that tended to seek revenge first and ask questions later sought its due. It wanted to find that club, burn it down to the ground, and salt the earth it was built on. It wanted to find every man who’d dare lay their gazes upon her and squeeze unyielding hands around their necks until their eyes bulged.

Popping sounds filled his ears, and he swiveled his head slowly to the right to find John had returned. His brother snapped his fingers in Claude’s ear and his forehead furrowed.

“Claude?”

“What?”

“You all right? I think you left us for a moment.”

He wasn’t even all the way back yet. He closed his eyes, and pushed back the rage mounting in him. He uncurled his fingers one at a time, and concentrated on his breathing. In, out.

In, out.

He’d never been to that place before. Sure, there’d been a few times when he’d come close to that sort of unforgivable anger, but he’d always been strong enough of mind to circumvent it. If he were just a human man, he’d probably be too laid-back for his own good. But he understood too well that there was very little that was human about him. His mother had seen to that. For better or for worse, he had to endure it.

No,
survive
it.

“Thank you,” he said with a nod. “Clarissa went to track down Mark and Agatha. Did you hear from Charles?”

“Yes. He hasn’t caught up to Ross, but he’s actually working with Gulielmus and Jason.”

Claude couldn’t help but to chuckle. “You serious? They must all be desperate.” Hell, Papa had tried—lazily, but tried all the same—to decapitate Charles last year.

“
Do me a favor?”

John murmured “Mm-hmm” under his breath and turned his back to the room. He fiddled with the coffee cup he’d left previously on the counter.

“
I’ve got some darkness swirling around in me right now I’m having difficulty reining in.
”

“
Because of Gail?
”

“
It’s the same sort of effect Eve had on Adam, I imagine. I think the subconscious part of me feels this chase has gone on too long, for too many lifetimes. It’s desperate, and I feel pulled to act without forethought. Part of me wants to isolate her and keep her out of the world, but the reasonable part of me knows I have to love her in spite of my fears of what the world can do to her. I don’t want her to fear me.
”

“
What do you want me to do?
”

“
I’m asking that if I slip to that place where I’m more monster than man, that you do everything in your power to keep me away from her. Don’t tell her why because doing so will defeat the purpose. I don’t care what you have to do to manage it. Hurt me if you must. I likely won’t remember it, anyway
.”

“
Shit.
”

“
I’m not saying it’ll be easy. I’m saying I’ll forgive you for whatever you have to do.
”

“
I’ll do my best.
”

Claude clapped John on the back, and eased around him. He glanced at the wall clock and did some quick mental math. Clarissa had said she needed half an hour. He had twenty minutes to apologize for what probably came across as a jealous, judgmental slight. It wouldn’t be enough, but he had to make do.

• • •

Gail was in the guest bathroom batting twigs and sawdust out of her hair from her earlier breaking-and-entering efforts when Claude slipped in without knocking.

She rolled her eyes at him in the mirror, and he closed the door behind him.

“Go away.”

“No. I’m here to apologize.”

“Why apologize if you don’t really mean it?”

“What makes you think I wouldn’t mean it?”

“Because that’s the way it always works.” She dropped the brush onto the countertop and turned to face him. “Men say what they think women want to hear to placate them. It’s more of a
I’m sorry that you were offended
than a truly contrite
I’m sorry for being an asshole
apology.”

He closed his eyes, breathed out a long sigh, lifted his hat, and pushed his hair back.

Had she pegged him that easily?

When he opened them again, she could see the red—but this time, it wasn’t his irises. The whites were shot with flared red blood vessels, indicative of a lack of sleep or intense stress. Maybe he needed a cigarette.

“I thought the worst, but not of you. People do what they have to in order to make money. I’m certainly in no place to dictate morality. I simply responded to the idea that strangers may have looked on you in such an intimate way. I’m jealous, and I apologize for it.”

Oh.

She sighed and grabbed the hat from him before he could push it back down. If he’d bothered to use a little gel he wouldn’t have to worry about his hair being in his eyes. She understood why he didn’t cut it shorter, though. Curly hair tended to grow into a halo before it grew down. She’d been through that growing-out stage enough in her life, having regularly alternated between pixie cuts and back-length hair.

“Look. I meant when I said I was just a cook, but sometimes I’d work out with the dancers because it was fun and they needed help with choreography. There were a couple of nights when I had rent overdue that I’d put on a mask and take the stage, but I never even took off my top. I’m bashful that way.”

“I’m glad you’re bashful.”

“At least in public.”

“Oh, I see.” His lips pulled up at one corner and he leaned into her, pressing his hands on either side of her at the counter.

“Was … Laurette bashful?”

His body went rigid against hers. Perhaps the topic was meant to be off-limits, but they couldn’t keep tiptoeing around it. The very mention of the other woman’s name enraged Gail, which was absolutely idiotic because Laurette had been her—just different. She needed to desensitize herself, and maybe they could start working out some of their other problems next.

“Well, she was retiring. She didn’t much like people paying attention to her.”

“Except you?”

He chuckled. “I’d like to think so. She was alone in the world except for me and my mother.”

“How sad.”