A Girl's Guide to Demon Hunting (7 page)

Chapter 12

"It's not nice to bet on how many broken ribs I'll have."
                   
             
                                               -Allie

    The first step, according to Max, was to get everyone killed. As usual, a plan involving imminent death struck Ace and Shooter as brilliant. I don’t think they were any more on the Max-is-not-an-ass bandwagon as I was but they were always up for something truly stupid. I kept having to remind myself a Guardian was missing, which was why I was even listening to Max’s ideas and not trying to see if his hair was flammable.
    “I won’t let you do this.” I said, stopping this particular crazy train in its tracks.
    “What do you mean?” Max asked, “It only makes sense that we start with the Demon Lords, they would be the ones most likely to take her.”
    “Maybe where you come from but not in Vegas. Trust me; they like their life here way too much to throw it away over any single Guardian. And what is your plan, knock on their door and ask them nicely to come along?”
    “She’s right.” Jenny said backing me up. “Besides, if they wanted a Guardian they could just take Allie and they haven’t done that yet.”
    Great, she
would
have to use logic. I’d been hoping to avoid any mention of how I’d stayed alive so long. Although if I was to be honest, I think it would be a tad harder to take me than it was to get the blonde waif in the photograph.
    Father Henry managed to stop any further questions from Max by speaking up.
   “They’re right; plus if a Demon Lord did take her, the last thing you want to do is tip them off to your suspicion. It significantly raises the odds they would harm her.”
    Max seemed satisfied with his answer, at least more so than mine. I on the other hand gave Father H a suspicious look. When had he become a kidnapping expert?
    “Fine, then we find their nests and start searching there.” Max said.
    “No.” I said.
    Really, search a nest? Obviously he’d never actually been in one. It’s a lot like jumping in shark infested waters with a bloody chest wound. And maybe a T-shirt that says ‘Sharks Suck.’
   
    With a deep sigh Max turned his full attention on me, his voice mocking as he said,  
   “Listen little girl; I get it if you’re afraid but I’m not going to let you or your childish fear get in the way of finding Julie.”
    I’ve never seen Ace or Shooter move so fast. Before I could do more than take a step, they had leapt from their chairs and pinned me back against the wall. As I sputtered, too angry to actually form a coherent insult, Father Henry placed himself directly between Max and me, forming a human shield. Seeing the worry on Father Henry’s face as he looked at me, I held tight to my power and anger, not wanting to hurt Ace or Shooter with either.
    Father Henry lowered his hands when I didn’t explode in a rage and his worry seemed to fade a little. Looking at me he said, “I think everyone needs to just relax. We’re all a little stressed, especially Max. Allie, I’m sure Max didn’t mean that the way it came out.” I looked past Father Henry to Max, who didn’t show an ounce of remorse. D-bag.
    “Ah...Allie you should maybe think about breathing. Your face is turning red.” Shooter whispered to me. Tearing my eyes away from Max, who I’d been imagining ripping limb from limb, I looked up into Shooter’s deep green eyes.
    “There ya go; now just breath in and out, in and out. Now say with me, murder is bad. I won’t murder the giant asshole because my friends have plans on spending their hard-earned stolen money on beer and loose women and not on gas money to go bury the asshole’s body.”
    I felt some of my anger bleed away and my control come back at his goofy rambling. Loose women and booze; yeah right. Taking another calming breath, I gave Shooter a grateful smile and told him and Ace, “You can let go, I’m okay.”
    They both did as I asked but neither sat down. Standing by my side, they were ready should I lose it again. Jenny, knowing the greatest threat would be Pancake, had leaned down and grabbed hold of her collar. When she let go and sat up, Pancake of course took it as an invitation to jump up in her lap. 
    “You’ve got her phone number?” Jenny asked Max as if she was asking him to pass the salt.
    How she could stay so calm I had no idea. Upon closer examination, I saw her hand tremble as she moved it to pet Pancake. It was that more than anything that helped me settle down. I didn’t like her scared, not when it was something I could prevent. I cleared my head and pushed down my anger, bringing my attention back to the conversation.
     Max pulled a sheet of paper from a black backpack at his feet and handed it to her.
     “I can trace her signal from this,” she said, “maybe get you close enough to find it. There’s the chance she had the phone on her.”
    “We can start asking around, hit up the hospitals.” Shooter suggested.
    “I’ll go to the shelters, maybe someone saw something.” Father Henry said.
    “Do you have anything else on her?” Jenny asked.
    “This is everything I could copy from her records.” Max said pulling a thick file folder from the bag.
While Jenny asked Max a few more questions about Julie, I pulled Father Henry from the room and out to the front porch where no one could overhear us.
    “What the hell?” I nearly shouted.
    “Language.” He scolded. As usual I just rolled my eyes and continued.
    “You’ve finally cracked if you think I’m going to work with him. He’s a Guardian; you know, the ones I’ve been avoiding for years? The very powerful, very non-forgiving group that would love to just throw me in jail if they found out about my little indiscretions?”
    “Allie, this has nothing to do with you. Max is here to find Julie. I know you don’t want him here nor do you want to work with him but if you don’t it’s going to look suspicious. Which is exactly what we want to avoid.”
    Seeing he wasn’t making any headway he tried again, “The faster you find her, the faster he leaves and everything can get back to normal.”
    I mulled this over for a moment. It was a solid argument but I still wasn’t convinced.
    “Do you trust him?” I asked.
    “As much as I can. I’ve only met him once and it was a long time ago when he was just a boy.”
    “Was he always an ass?” I asked.
    Now it was Father Henry’s turn to roll his eyes. We walked back into the house where Ace, Shooter and Jenny waited for us. “He’s in the bathroom.” Jenny said as I looked past them towards the kitchen.
    “So what’s the deal?” Ace asked me.
    The image of Julie bruised and bleeding at the mercy of a Demon slammed into my mind. She faded away and was replaced in quick succession by Ace, Shooter and finally Jenny. As much as I didn’t want to be involved or worse, my three best friends, I couldn’t say no. Father Henry was right; the five of us were Julie’s best chance. 
    “We’re in.” I said.
    “Good.” Shooter said and with a small smile he walked out the front door. I had to make Ace promise not to get into trouble before I let him leave. After ensuring me he would only use deadly force if necessary he left. Actually he said if necessary or if it was really cool but I think he was kidding about the last part. You never can tell for sure with them. A few seconds later the sound of squealing tires could be heard as they peeled out of Father Henry’s driveway.  
    Imbeciles. But my imbeciles.
    “You’re going home?” I asked Jenny as she collected the thick file from the kitchen table.
    “Yeah, I’ll be fine; alarm will be on the whole time.”
    “I’ll follow her back home and make sure she’s safe.” Father H said
    “Thanks.” I said giving him a grateful smile.
    “What about you? What are you going to do?” Jenny asked while Father H went into his bedroom to get his coat.
    “I haven’t gotten that far but I’ll figure something out.”
    “Just be careful; we still don’t know what happened. She could be perfectly safe and we’re about to stir up a hornet’s nest.”
    “I will.” I said and gave her a quick hug. Hearing footsteps behind me, I turned and caught sight of Max coming down the hall. 
    “Take Pancake.” I told Father Henry.
    No way was I going to let him go out alone, not when the Demons knew how much I cared for him. He opened his mouth to protest but then closed it when Max brushed past us and walked to the window. Getting my meaning, he picked up Pancake and carried her from the house. I closed the door behind them and locked it and just like that, I found myself standing not ten feet away from a Guardian. 
    Max watched as Father Henry drove away.
What the hell was I supposed to do now?
Except for my parents I haven’t been around a Guardian in almost ten years. I didn’t know how to act or even what to say. Plus, it’s not like I had any experience with kidnappings. Once the sound of Father Henry’s little car faded away Max turned to me.
    “You were quick to shoot down my ideas; you have something better?” Max asked.
   Leaning back against the door, I racked my brain for something that would help us find her. I had to say something; for some reason I felt the need to show him I could handle this, that I could help.
    “I didn’t want to say anything in front of the others, since they’d want to come along, but I’ve got an idea.”

Chapter 13

Tip 549:  Many things can be blamed on Demons...reality TV is not one of them.

    The whole ride to the Strip, I had ‘liar, liar, pants on fire’ running through my head and I kept checking to see if my pants were smoking. Okay, so I didn’t have any clue as to what to do. All I did know was that I couldn’t expose a Guardian to the Demon Lords or them to him. No way would I be able to maintain my cover with both at the same time. There’s multitasking and then there’s juggling chainsaws. So I lied and now somehow I had to come up with something before Max caught on.
    Las Vegas, while big, isn’t
that
big; someone had to have known a Guardian was in town. Sadly Max was at least partially right; a Demon Lord probably knew about a new Guardian in town but in the off chance that they didn’t, I wasn’t about to alert them to the one currently sitting next to me. This meant I needed someone who was connected to the Lords but had no loyalty to them. Difficult when the Lords forced all resident Demons to swear fealty. I needed a Demon even the Lords wouldn’t trust.
    “Turn here and park.” I said to Max as we came to the outskirts of the Strip. Taking a sharp right turn, Max parked and turned the car off.
    “What’s this?” he asked, looking out the windshield to the low white building in front of us.
    “Three Coins Casino. It’s a complete dive, which is perfect for what we need.” I told him as I got out of the car.
    “So how does that help us?”
   “The Demon that runs it is the biggest gossip in the city.  A missing Guardian is big gossip in the Demon world.”
    What I didn’t tell him was Sylvia, the Demon in question, had a role in the overthrow of the previous monarchs in Vegas. I wasn’t sure why Peaches still let her live, although considering she was basically lower than me in Peaches’ eyes, I figured living was a worse punishment than death. Which was just what I needed; no way would any of the Demon Lords come around here. Sylvia held no loyalty to anyone, Demon or human.
    “What’s the plan?” Max asked as we walked towards the Casino.
    “You are going to wait in the alleyway while I go inside and raise a little hell, so to speak.”
   “Wait…what?” Sputtering, he stopped in his tracks.
    I turned around and walked back to his side. Slowly, as if talking to a small child, I told him again. “I am going in
there
.” Pointing to the Casino. “You,” I said, pointing to him and then the alleyway, “Go wait
there
. When I come running out,” I said, pumping my arms to mimic someone running, “Be ready.” I then pointed at the fists that were balled up at his sides.
    Judging by the clenched fists and the slight grinding of his teeth, I’m guessing Max didn’t appreciate my attempt at hand signals. Flashing him an over-bright smile, I turned away and ran towards the casino. I half expected him to follow and was relieved when he wasn’t behind me as I pushed through the doors. Good; maybe he’d actually do as he was told.
    The thick smell of stale smoke wafted towards me as I walked further into the casino. Yuck; this place was actually worse than I remembered and it wasn’t exactly a nice memory in the first place. The large open room was packed with slot machines and along the back wall stood a mostly empty bar where a small Gluttony Demon was cutting lemons. Row after row of the old dime slot machines filled the center of the room, set up in a sort of maze which made it harder to get to the front door. Probably some trick by whoever set up the machines; bait for the addicts. Addicts were exactly what this place was for and it showed.
    There were none of the pretty waitresses dropping drinks at your elbow, no laughter or shouts of victory coming from the patrons. No, they just sat there glued to their stools, inserting a coin and pulling the handle over and over again in an endless cycle. Sadly the humans controlled by Greed Demons and the regular gamblers were hard to separate. Pushing my disgust away, I slowly began to walk the maze looking for Sylvia.
    I was halfway through the aisles when I caught sight of an old man; stooped shoulders, grey hair, it didn’t look like he’d seen the outside of this place in days. I smiled as his shadow reached for the handle of the machine an instant before he did. Sylvia was using her shadow form and she was getting lazy; when they’re on their game you can’t catch the time lapse. I listened to the sound of the wheels turning and resetting as the old man continued to lose.
    I had to get Sylvia to break away without killing the human, which was exactly what would happen if I forcibly pulled her off of him. I took a deep breath, pulled hard on my power and watched as the shadow slithered away from the man and formed into a human-like shape. The fine hairs on my neck stood on end as the shadow turned towards me and I felt the cool burn of Simone’s power along my skin.
    “Sylvia.” I warned through clenched teeth.
    I’m not exactly the terror of the Demon world but I’m not entirely without a reputation either. Hell, I’m still alive, right? When the burn on my skin faded along with her power I sighed in relief. Sylvia wasn’t a Demon I really considered a threat but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t bring the pain if needed. Still I’d rather not, Sylvia was a valuable snitch.
    “We need to talk.” I told her once I was sure she was in control.
    The power rushing though me was almost overwhelming as I turned away and walked back the way I came. I couldn’t stand the thought of her dark shadow hovering right behind me but just managed to stop myself from turning around. She’d take it as a sign of fear and no way was I going to admit that, no matter how true.
    I ignored the Gluttony Demon at the bar; it now had the leathery looking skin of a Demon, about one breath from changing into its natural state. I needed to get out of here before it morphed; even addicts would notice a giant winged Demon in their midst.
    I was nearly jogging by the time I pushed the front door open but once outside I slowed to a more leisurely pace. Circling around the corner of the building, I had a moment of panic when I didn’t see Max. If he took off I was going to kill him; alone in a dark alley with Sylvia after she’d been feeding was not a place I wanted to be. Even a douchebag Guardian was a welcome partner at this point.
     I’d gone about ten feet into the alleyway when I heard the sound of approaching footsteps. Spinning around I found Max standing in the entrance, his arms crossed over his chest, a bored look on his face. What the hell? Didn’t he know the danger he was in? It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him to stop being stupid when I saw a shadow move behind him. Aw hell, Sylvia had lagged behind.
    Right, so Max: not as dumb as I first thought. Before I could even warn him, he spun around and pushed his hands into the Simone’s shadow form. I’m still not sure how it worked but he managed to grab the shadow and toss her into the alley. She slid across the asphalt, coming to a stop about ten feet from me and morphed into her human form. Tall and heavyset, her deep tan skin stood out against her shocking white hair. Tonight she was dressed in a particularly ugly red velvet suit.
    Max was on her instantly and with one hand grabbed her by the throat and lifted her in the air until her feet dangled off the ground. If I didn’t stop him from choking the life out of her I was going to have a really big problem on my hands. Rushing to his side, I placed my hand on his shoulder.
    “Uh, Max, this isn’t usually how I do this.” I said, trying not to yell.
    “Then you’re doing it wrong!”
    Psycho much?
   “Okay, you’re right; I’m probably doing this all wrong but how about you ease up a little so you don’t kill her before we can ask her anything?”
    It took a moment, but he finally relaxed enough to lower Sylvia so her feet could touch the ground. I let her take a few much-needed breaths while I tried to calm my rapidly growing anger and focus on the reason I was here.
    “Hey Sylvia, any news on a new Guardian in town?” I asked brightly. Just a couple of pals shooting the breeze.
    When she didn’t say anything, Max gave her a rough shake and a low growl came from her throat.
    “Max! Lay off. She can’t talk if you crush her windpipe.”
    Max gave me an angry glare before turning back to Sylvia. Without warning he let her go and she went crashing to the ground. Great, this was going well. Ignoring the psycho Asshat, I kneeled down so I was eye to eye with Sylvia.
    “New Guardian.” I prompted, “Do you know anything?”
    “No.” she croaked.
    Frustrated I tried again, “It’d be sad to find out you’re lying to me. We’ve had a good history. Remember that time I totally didn’t kill you? You know, like every day? And you’ve given me info. I’d hate to have to resort to anything as undignified as violence. Besides I can’t promise you my friend here will be as nice as me.”
    She continued to look over my shoulder at Max and I felt the slightest burn of her power in the air around me.
    “Sylvia.”  I said.  Just her name.
    The warning of her impending doom in my voice brought her attention back to me and caused her power to fade. She climbed to her feet and after brushing dirt off her hideous red velvet suit she give me a tight-lipped smile and said, “Get rid of the muscle and we’ll talk.”
    I gave Max a look that clearly told him to take a hike, which he answered with a small shake of his head. I couldn’t help but let out a growl of frustration as I grabbed him by the sleeve of his jacket and pulled him a few steps away from Sylvia.
    Max didn’t even bother to lower his voice. “You’ve obviously lost your mind if you think I’m letting you alone with that
thing
.”
    Furious, I threw his words back at him. “That
thing
may have information about your precious Guardian. Now unless you want Sylvia to disappear and her information along with her, I think your skills might be best utilized by waiting in the car.”
    Max just stood there glaring down at me, his arms crossed over his chest. I was already getting a better picture of him. I’m guessing he could count on one hand the number of times he’s been told he’s wrong. Welcome to actual life, Guardian boy. Still, this was not the place to teach him about grownup rules.
    “Fine, stand over there where you can still see me.” I said, pointing to the entrance of the alleyway.
    I waited unmoving until he went where I told him. If this was what it was going to be like working with him, we were never going to find Julie.
    Turning my back on Max, I felt the slightest burn of a power in the air, a power I didn’t recognize. I slowly turned in a circle, searching the darkness for any new threats. I looked to Max to see if he’d felt it too. He looked relaxed leaning against the side of the Casino, his eyes closed. Rolling my eyes at his complete lack of attention, I pulled on my power and went to Sylvia.
    She’d been quiet this whole time. Great; I’m sure she was filing away this little incident in her memory, ready to use it against me the first chance she got.
    “That’s as good as it’s going to get. Now spill.” I told Sylvia as I came to a stop a few feet away from her.
   “I don’t know anything about a missing Guardian but I have heard things; interesting things.” She said with an overly creepy smile. “In the dark the whispers say he’s looking for you; that he has a bone to pick with you. Snap, snap like a twig you go.”
    I felt the blood drain from my face as she spoke. Did I mention Sylvia was a little nutty, even for a Demon? Seeing my fear she let out a sharp laugh and disappeared into thin air. I stared into the space where she’d just been for a long minute as my power began to react to my fear, fighting to break free and protect me.
    Needing to get control and fast, I spun around and found Max standing just inches away, watching me. How long had he been standing there? I was totally going to get him a bell to wear. The image of Max, a shiny gold bell hanging around his neck like a cow, brought a little warmth and I felt my fear begin to bleed away. I was unsure of how much he’d heard and not wanting to clue him in on how scared I’d been, I plastered another overly bright smile on my face.
    “She doesn’t know anything.”
    “Clearly.” Max said, sounding irritated. Turning on his heel he swiftly walked to the car. It didn’t take a genius to know he was pissed.
  
    Max looked ready to explode when I climbed in the passenger seat. I didn’t have a clue as to why he was so pissed; I was the one who was threatened. It had been a long day and I wasn’t up to jumping into the deep end of his emotions. I leaned my head back, closed my eyes and did my best to ignore him.