A Demon's Desire (10 page)

Tristan said they won’t hurt me
, she
thought again.

She pulled a carton from the shelf and placed
it in her basket.

Tristan’s effort to be normal the night
before touched her. He would never look anything but like a demon
to her, but he was more human, taking her out to relax, answering
her questions.

Kissing the daylights out of her. Emma
touched her lips, face warm. No man had ever kissed her like that.
No kiss had ever suffused her with warmth, welcome, and promise
beyond that of the hot fire of desire. He made her feel like the
only woman on earth.

Which meant he had kissed a lot of women.

She shook herself mentally and continued,
unable to dismiss the wonderful sensation of his lips against hers.
She rounded a corner and nearly ran into another freak. She pushed
this one with her cart. He moved but continued to stare at her, and
she decided her trip was done.

Emma checked out under the supervision of
several more hawk-eyed freaks and moved smartly to her car, where
one leaned against it and another hovered.

Calm, Emma, calm. Tristan said they won’t
hurt me.
She hurriedly placed everything in the trunk and
turned, jumping and pressing herself against the trunk.

Mr. Winter stood in front of her in a light
gray suit, smiling a smile as chilling as a stiff breeze. His eyes
were silver-gray and empty, his presence like that of a meat
locker: dead, still, cold.

Tristan said--

Mr. Winter touched her arm, and Emma
jerked.

Tristan said nothing about what to do if they
did more than watch. She eased away, determined to run over any
that remained in her path. Mr. Winter took her arm in a tight,
painful grip.

“Why don’t you try one?” he offered,
producing a tin of mints and flipping the lid with one hand.

Emma stared at him. Freaks lingered in a
loose circle around them, watching, shifting, waiting, as restless
as shadows. Mr. Winter held her in place, and Emma suspected she
would not be released until she accepted. She timidly took one and
placed it in her mouth, surprised it tasted like a real mint and
didn’t burst into flames.

“Thank you,” Mr. Winter said and released
her.

She moved away from him, startled to see the
loose ring around them break up. The freaks turned their backs and
walked away. Mr. Winter smiled again.

Shaken, she threw herself into her seat,
locked the doors, and bolted from the parking lot to Amber’s
apartment building. She hesitated in the parking lot of the
apartment building, willing her hands to stop shaking before seeing
her family. They needed her strong, especially Amber, who was too
fragile for such trials.

Isolde waited at the foot of the stairs. Emma
relaxed and crossed to the blind dog.

“Hi, angel,” she murmured and sat on the
stair beside it. “Met a few people you need to chew on.”

Isolde licked her and panted, ears
flickering. Emma hugged the animal, comforted by its warmth and
presence. Isolde trailed her back to the car. Emma filled her arms
with what she could carry and staggered up three floors and into
Amber’s apartment. She made it to the table before dropping
everything.

“Hey, doodle,” Mama greeted her as she
emerged from Sissy’s room.

Emma gave her a withering look at the hated
moniker and snagged an apple as it headed for the edge of the
table. Isolde snapped up the first that fell, surprising Emma and
Mama alike.

“Good nose,” Mama stated.

“Emmy!” The shout was tiny, high-pitched,
feminine, and distinctly Sissy’s. Emma froze, suspecting she was
hearing things as well as seeing freaks everywhere she went.
“Emmy!”

“Is that …” She looked at Mama. Mama smiled.
Emma gazed at Sissy’s partially closed door, recalling the last
time she had stepped within.

She moved forward, heart beating fast, and
pushed it open, eyes settling on Tristan before falling to Sissy.
The little girl was awake and bright-eyed, her cherubic face gaunt
but glowing.

Emma took a step and braced herself, awaiting
the coldness of the curse. Nothing came, and she hastened to the
bed, amazed when Sissy flung open her tiny arms and leaned forward
with a grin. Emma sat and was engulfed by slender arms and the
scent of innocence. She squeezed Sissy’s warm little body hard,
tension slipping from her. Black curls tickled her nose and
eyelids.

The bottle around her emotions cracked. She
blinked away tears, relieved.

“Tristan and I played a game,” Sissy told
her.

He did it.
Torn between gratitude and
fear, Emma pulled away and cleared her throat.

“I have to stay in bed, though,” Sissy
continued with some disappointment. “Mama went to get the
doctor.”

“Oh, good,” Emma said, aware of Tristan’s
gaze on her.

“I don’t think I need one,” Sissy said.
“Tristan says the snowman won’t come back.”

“Snowman?”

“From my dreams, only he was real and sitting
in Tristan’s chair. I said I didn’t want to go and-- ”

Emma looked at Tristan, Sissy’s cheerful
prattling unheeded. His head rested against the back of the rocking
chair, his eyes slits through which gleamed his dark demon
eyes.

“ … can we?” Sissy asked and shook her
arm.

“I’m sorry, Sissy, what?” Emma returned her
attention to the little girl.

“Go to the movies? When I’m well.”

“Yes, of course. Why don’t you lie down until
the doctor comes, Sissy?” Emma said and nudged the little girl
toward her covers.

Sissy gave an exaggerated sigh and crawled to
her pillow. Emma watched her and stood, unable to shake her guilt.
Sissy’s sickness, the men following her, the demon in her niece’s
bedroom.
Everything
was her fault. She felt ill knowing
she’d caused so much harm to her family.

She looked at Tristan. His eyes were open,
and he assessed her once more. She stepped toward him. He watched,
relaxed, as she leaned down and looked him squarely in the eye, her
face inches from his.

“Thank you, Tristan,” she whispered and added
silently,
this better be real.

His faint smile indicated her message was
received. She kissed him. He yielded to the tender kiss, his
velvety lips sending a shot of warmth through her.

“No mushy!” Sissy all but yelled.

“Okay, okay, Sissy,” Emma said, laughter
bubbling. She straightened. Tristan touched her arm in his own sort
of reassurance. Emma turned away without looking at him. She went
straight to the bathroom, managing to close the door before
bursting into tears.

* * *

Emma hid the rest of the day in the bedroom
they shared. Tristan was annoyed by it. He’d expected some sort of
progress with her after she saw Sissy. Instead, she spent the
afternoon crying, refusing to let anyone comfort her. He didn’t
want Emma to cry, ever. He yearned to take away what pain was hers
and see her dazzling smile. He had never felt so affected by a
client before.

“Adam Merchant?” Amber repeated. He pulled
his gaze from the front bedroom door again and focused on Amber,
who he’d been talking to for half an hour. Two days of sleep
rendered the woman’s color returned, and the sight of her healthy
daughter made her glow with warmth and happiness.

“Tristan!” Mama chided as she brought him a
cup of tea. “You should ask Emma.”

“Mama, Emma’s too stubborn,” Amber responded.
“And if Tristan’s here, Emma trusts him.”

Mama padded back to the kitchen, passing
Isolde a cookie as she did so. Isolde had never had so much
attention or people food in her life.

“I remember her mentioning him in a less than
complimentary way, as usual,” Amber went on. “She saw him for a
while, maybe even a year. I think she really liked him, but I think
…” Amber glanced toward the kitchen and lowered her voice. “I think
she found out he was engaged to someone else.”

Adam’s letter blaming Emma for their failed
relationship returned to him. Irritated with the dead man, Tristan
sipped his tea.

“Why is she afraid of the dark then?” he
asked.

“You don’t think badly of her for that, do
you?” Amber asked. “She’s a good girl and never would’ve stolen
someone’s fiancé on purpose.”

“I know she is,” he assured her. “Sometimes
circumstances are less than clear when we walk into them.”

“She was really angry at him for a long time.
I know she had bad dreams for about a year afterwards; she stayed
with me for a bit. It’s hard to sleep with every light in the house
blazing.”

“She never really said why aside from
nightmares?”

“No. Why so interested?” Amber asked
curiously.

“I’m more interested in why she’s afraid of
the dark,” Tristan responded. “Your mama mentioned that she started
turning on lights about the time she broke up with Adam.”

“I guess that’s about right,” she agreed.
“Maybe it’s connected. My sis is too private for her own good. Do
you mean to help her like you did Sissy?”

“Help her be unafraid of the dark?” Tristan
chuckled.

“Yes, I suppose.” Amber’s considering,
evasive response sparked his interest. She knew more than she was
saying. At his intent look, she looked away. “She had her mail
forwarded when she lived with me. Someone used to write her nasty
letters. I was nosy and opened a couple. Her dreams were bad, too.
She looked like a zombie for a couple of months and used to jump at
her own shadow. I remember because Sissy was sick with pneumonia
and we were in and out of the hospital constantly for a while.
Whenever I came home, Emma would have every light on, the radio up
full blast, and an overflowing coffee pot to keep herself from
going to sleep. She said something similar to what Sissy said a
week ago, that there was someone waiting for her when she fell
asleep. Sissy said it was a snowman.”

Tristan listened, intrigued.

“I have no idea what that means or why she’d
be afraid of it. I mean, a snowman?” Amber continued, glancing
again toward the kitchen. “Anyway, I think something bad happened
before Emma left Adam. She came here from where she was going to
college in northern Maryland. She never said what, but sometimes
she gets this haunted look on her face, and I’m pretty sure she’s
thinking about it. I kinda thought it was some sort of post
traumatic stress disorder, like when soldiers come back from war
and dream of being attacked by the enemy.”

Mama emerged from the kitchen with a tray of
snacks. Amber grew quiet, gave him a quick, anxious look, and
smiled at Mama. Tristan leaned back, patting Isolde as the animal
followed the scent of food. He would research Adam, using the city
that had been on the letter in his pocket.

Someone waited for Emma in her sleep. He
dwelled on this. Sissy experienced similar, a dark spirit trying to
draw her away. What got rid of Emma’s dark spirit? He didn’t sense
the darkness anywhere but in Sissy’s room. Something in there acted
as a homing device for the spell.

“Does Emma have anything stored in Sissy’s
room?” he asked, puzzled as to how else someone had tagged the
little girl.

“Her apartment’s too small for all her junk.
I moved some of her boxes into Sissy’s closet to clear out the
guest bedroom. Not sure what’s in them.”

The evil in Sissy’s room was similar to that
which had tagged Emma. He’d felt it the minute she returned.
Something had happened when she went to the grocery store. She was
approached by something, and it managed to mark her. Wondering if
the signature would be the same as that in Sissy’s room, he went to
the closed door of the bedroom they shared and opened it. Emma lay
on her back, with one arm slung across her eyes. He was quiet for a
moment, allowing his grip on the shadows to loosen enough for him
to read what had tagged her.

It was the same evil that had afflicted
Sissy. He entered, more concerned than before.

“How’s your headache?” he asked and closed
the door behind him.

“Fine. Tristan, does this mean you’re done?”
she asked. She swung her legs off the bed, regarding him with
large, guarded eyes.

“Done?” he echoed.

“With your part of the deal.”

“Not quite. I need to cleanse the apartment
and discover the source.”

“I don’t want you to do that. I say you’re
done, aside from cleaning.”

“Cleansing,” he corrected. “I’ll do what you
asked me to do. We made a deal.”

“Which was …”

“You wanted to know how to counter it, what
it is, where it came from, why,” he reminded her.

“You do remember,” she said with a frown.

“Yes.”

“Do you have any answers?” she asked.

“I’ve countered it. It’s black magic. Sissy
was not its target but happened to be there to fall under its
influence.
Why
and
where
I’m still unearthing,” he
explained. “If you care to share anything about this …”

She crossed her arms in response.

“I guess not. I’m leaving tomorrow morning
for a day,” he said.

“Why?”

“I need to go home for a day to do some
research and check on my shop,” he said. “Sissy will be fine, and
whatever is tracking you doesn’t want you dead. I won’t be gone
long.”

“You’ll leave Isolde?” she asked. He
nodded.

What if something happens?
Her
question went unvoiced, and he didn’t respond, agitated she didn’t
feel comfortable enough to ask him.

“Just don’t take any candy from strangers,”
he said with some frustration and turned to go. Emma shot up and
took his arm, pulling him back to face her.

“Why not?” she demanded.

His warning was late, as he suspected. “You
don’t know what you’re messing with, Emma,” he told her. “You need
to start talking to me. I’m working in the dark here, and you’ve
got the info that’ll help me find the source of evil.”