Demon's Daughter: A Cursed Book (3 page)

Dro nodded, white hair bouncing against her shoulders. “Nothing over fifteen dollars and we make sure the restaurant is empty.”

I nodded back at her, tossing the tablet into the back of the car. “Okay. Let’s start pretending.”

***

Dro had picked out a mom-and-pop diner as soon as she’d left the library. The poor girl had been starving. I pulled the door open and walked ahead of her, bells tinkling over my head.

To normal people, it looked like a cheap, fifties diner with red and white tile on the floor, faded red booths and chipped tables. Light shone through the wide, greasy paned windows, illuminating the poorly printed signs boasting the “
Best Breakfast in all of Texas!
” A cool grey counter top with plastic bar stools was set up across from the booths. Behind it was a silver walled kitchen I couldn’t see into very well. There were two doors, the one we had walked into, and another at the other end of the diner.

I didn’t like this place at all.

It looked harmless enough, but all I was seeing was a place with only two visible exits and too many windows. I couldn’t see what the people in the kitchen were doing. They could call the cops or the Blood Thorns and I wouldn’t have a clue.

And if Dro sensed something wrong about them…

“Con?” she said from beside me.

I turned my head slightly so she would know I heard her. “Yeah?”

“Are you going to be okay?”

“Of course,” I told her, shifting the bag on my back.

The kitchen door opened with a bang so loud I reached for the hatchet on my hip. I pressed myself closer to Dro, ready to throw her behind me.

Not that the woman who came out of the kitchen looked like a threat. She looked more like Dolly Parton, all curly blonde hair, big eyes, and peppy attitude.

“Mornin’ ladies!” she said in a chirpy Texan drawl. She smiled so wide the cherry red lipstick she wore turned into two curved slashes on her face.

I won’t say I hated her, but I damn sure didn’t like her.

My sister moved in front of me this time. She was a lot better around people than I was. She was friendly and didn’t constantly look like she was about to break something.

“Good morning,” Dro said politely. “We’d like to get some breakfast, please.”

“Sure thing, sugar! Take seat anywhere you like.” Dolly’s eyes shifted over Dro’s shoulder to me, some of her smile fading. “Your friend okay? She looks a little upset.”

I crossed my arms and held back from laughing rudely. Dro smiled for me. “She’s fine. She’s just not a morning person.”

This time I did laugh, shortly and icily. Dolly looked at me with hesitance, but Dro took over again.

“We’ll take one of the booths.”

“Sure thing, darlin’. Menus are on the tables. I’ll get you back in a second.”

Dolly turned on her heel and clacked her way back into the kitchen. I watched her, trying to see who else was beyond the swinging door. I wanted to know who Dolly was talking to and what she was saying about me. If there was someone back there I needed to be worried about. If–

Dro tugged at my elbow. “Con? Where do you want to sit?”

I looked around the diner again. There was no decent place. No corner I could sit in and watch all the exits. I looked at the booth on my left. It was the closest I was going to get to a corner.

“Here’s good,” I said, shrugging off my backpack and tossing it onto the seat. I sat down and moved into the corner by the window. Dro sat across from me. I unzipped my jacket so I could go for my hatchet or a knife easily if I had to.

Dro slid a gaudy, plastic menu with enormous type in front of me before picking up her own and looking at it eagerly. I glanced at the menu, but barely registered what I was reading. I kept flicking my eyes up toward the kitchen whenever I saw the hint of movement. A barrel-chested man in a white apron came into view. His face looked a little chubby, but he was big. Ghosts of tattoos covered the part of his arms I could see. He might have been holding a knife. I couldn’t tell for sure, but he didn’t seem to be looking at me.

The kitchen door banged open again and Dolly came back with a pot of coffee. I stayed tense and watched her out of the corner of my eye.
Normal, normal, pretend to be normal…

“This should perk you right up, darlin’,” said Dolly as she poured some steaming black coffee into the mug near my wrist. I pulled my hand back and let her do it.

“Are you girls ready to order?” Dolly asked, purposefully looking at Dro and avoiding me.

“Yes, can I please get the chocolate chip pancakes and the mixed berry salad with a glass of orange juice?” Dro asked.

“Of course, sweetheart,” Dolly replied, jotting it down on her notepad. She looked at me with her big brown eyes. “And what can I get you?”

“Ham and cheese omelet with a side of bacon and potatoes,” I said, tossing the menu down the table and taking the mug of coffee. I glanced inside the cup. It smelled normal, not poisoned. I took a careful sip. It was scorching hot and a little bland, but it didn’t taste like acid.

“That’s a lot of food for one girl,” Dolly said, trying to be nice to me again.

I gave her a dark look. “I have a good metabolism.”

I didn’t add that I burned calories by fighting monsters and running for my life. My diet secret was for me to know and Dolly to envy. She looked at Dro again, clearly liking her more. Everybody did, and that was fine with me.

“I’ll be right back with your order,” Dolly said before scurrying off to the kitchen.

Dro looked across the table at me impatiently. “I thought we were trying to be normal,” she said.

“That is my normal,” I said, taking another sip of coffee.

“Normal people are a bit more polite.”

I just blinked at my little sister. She sighed and shook her head. Dro loved me and I loved her, but when it came to social skills, we were in a never-ending war.

“Did you find anything out?” she asked me after a moment.

“Nope,” I said, thinking back on my research in the car. “Just a bunch of sites saying that the Reds are demons. You?”

Dro shook her head, leaning back in the seat. “Not really. Most of what I came across suggested demons, too.” She looked at me. “Do you think that’s what they are?”

I shrugged. “Wish I knew, Dro. I’m not sure there’s anyone we could ask, either.”

“There must be someone here. A demonologist or paranormal investigator we can ask.”

“Assuming they know what the hell they were talking out. We can’t waste time looking through all the fakes and hoping we find the real deal.”

Bells tinkled harmlessly behind me. I turned sharply in my seat. Two parents with a young boy and younger girl walked in. The kids were tired and restless. The parents were trying to contain them. Dolly came back out of the banging kitchen door to greet them. I was ready to rip the fucking thing off its hinges. Dolly led them past us to another booth. The little girl caught sight of Dro and stared with wonder. Dro smiled and waved at her. The girl giggled.

The kid was harmless, just reacting the way everyone reacted around Dro, but it was unwanted attention. Having a beautiful, pale sister with snow-white hair and ice blue eyes made it difficult to stay under the radar.

When the family was seated three booths down, Dro looked at me again. “What if we went to a priest?” I took my eyes away from the family and looked at my sister. “They’d know for sure if we were being chased by demons, and they would know how to prevent them from coming after us, or at least tell us what they could want.”

“We prevent them by killing them, little sister. And I’m not sure we’d like knowing what they want.”

Dro narrowed her eyes. “It doesn’t matter if we don’t want to know. We have to find out. I’m not going to die not knowing what I am or why I’m being hunted.”

I matched her sharp gaze, nerves forgotten. “Don’t say stuff like that. You’re not going to die. I’m going to keep you safe, just like I always have.”

She sighed. “This is so much bigger than us, Con. I can feel it. I’m not asking you to believe everything you hear, but we aren’t going to get anywhere if we skip obvious options.”

The kitchen door banged open again, Dolly coming towards us with huge plates of food. Dro’s eyes lit up, but I looked past them to the cook, the way he was chopping down with his knife. I’d seen similar motions when I was with the Blood Thorns. A blade slicing into flesh and removing it from the bone, blood gushing out like a fountain, a tortured man screaming for mercy–

I tensed again, nearly jumping when Dolly placed the plate of food in front of me. I glanced up at her, not hearing what she was saying because I was still shaking free of my memories. Dro said something nice to get her away from our table. A small smile played across my sister’s lips as she looked at the mountain of chocolate chip pancakes and berries in front of her. She picked up her fork and knife, cutting into her food.

I looked down at mine. The omelet was cooked pretty well, brown singed egg folded over and over with greasy ham and cheese seeping out of it. The potatoes were crispy and dark. The bacon was perfectly cooked and smelled like heaven. I grabbed my utensils and started eating.

Maybe it wasn’t the best diner in Texas. I hadn’t been to enough restaurants to compare. But to me, this was five star cuisine. It tasted homemade, reminding me of the Sunday breakfasts Mom used to make when she wasn’t working. I looked up at my little sister. She was in bliss, the small smile that I loved on her face as she devoured chocolate chip pancakes.

For a minute, we had the normality Dro wanted. We didn’t have to say anything. We could just sit there with each other and let everything else fade away.

But then the kids started arguing and I was snapped out of my trance. I kept eating, but my eyes focused over Dro’s head as the mother of the family was saying something to her kids with a sharp tongue. I couldn’t hear what they were arguing about, but the little girl was trying to get out of the booth. What was she trying to run from? Was she just being stubborn, or was there something wrong that she was seeing and I was missing?

My eyes ran over the diner again, my body stiffening and my pulse starting to quicken. I’d lost sight of the cook. Was he in the back of the kitchen? Had he looked at me and recognized me? Was he calling the cops? I’d made Dolly nervous. She must have said something to him by now.

I focused on my food, forcing it into my mouth and chewing more than tasting. The far door of the diner kept opening and closing, filling up with the morning seniors and hungry regulars. I kept my head down, but we were going to have to leave soon. Dro noticed this too, taking a break from her pancakes to eat some of the berry salad.

The doorbells tinkled behind me again. I twisted in my seat, hands loose and ready to go for a weapon. Two large men walked in. One was wearing a plaid shirt with rolled up sleeves and dirty denim jeans while the other one wore a black Creedence Clearwater Revival shirt and light blue jeans. I saw them both look at Dro, staring at her with wonder and amazement. Creedence whispered something I couldn’t hear to Plaid, and I felt the tension build in my muscles yet again.

What were they saying? Did they think they could try something? Would they listen if I told them to stop looking at Dro and fuck off? How fast would I have to move to stop them? Could I reach a knife in time if they left me no choice?

They took their eyes away from Dro and beamed when Dolly’s chipper voice called them over. I watched them sit at the long booth across from us. Only Creedence looked back at Dro.

“Do you want to leave?”

I looked across the booth at my sister. She’d eaten about half her food, but stopped when she saw how uncomfortable I was. I looked down from her concerned blue eyes and poked some of the potatoes with my fork.

“No, it’s okay,” I said. “Just wish it were the two of us.”

Dro was looking at me with a frown on her face, but I pretended I was all right. That I didn’t hate places where I couldn’t see everything. That I didn’t like the cook. That I didn’t have a minor anxiety attack when the doors slammed open and someone I didn’t know walked inside a place I was unfamiliar with.

Pretend you’re normal, Constance. Give Dro her wish.

Maybe I could have kept faking for another five minutes, if Creedence and Plaid didn’t have such loud voices and a habit for gossip.

“Did you hear about the bodies they found in El Paso? Can’t imagine what kind of animal could tear up a body like that. Sammy was saying the body was shredded like red confetti.”

Dolly was laughing loudly with some of the seniors. The regulars were talking over them. The kids started screaming at each other. The parents raised their voices to calm down. The cook slammed things around in the kitchen.

“What about that execution a couple days ago? Guy had his intestines torn out and wrapped around a damn bouquet of red roses.”

My heart started racing. The Blood Thorns were two days away from us. The monsters were even closer. They were on our trail. The monsters could sense Dro, and the Blood Thorns would know how to track me. We were going to be found unless I did something. Unless I moved us out of the town and headed somewhere safe.

But nowhere
was
safe. I might know how to run from the Blood Thorns, but the monsters? I didn’t know what they were. I didn’t know how to keep Dro safe from them. I didn’t even know what she was and why they wanted her so badly.

I hadn’t even known I was shaking until Dro reached across the table and placed her hand on mine. I looked up and inhaled, the havoc of the world starting to dissolve around me. Dro tried to smile, but the concern in her ice blue eyes was easy to see. She squeezed my hand.

“I don’t know about you, but I can’t eat another bite. What do you say we get this all to go? I’m sure it’ll last for a couple days, and I know how fanatical you are about leftovers.”

I let out a laugh, though it sounded forced. Dro smiled, gave my hand one more squeeze, then signaled Dolly for the check and to-go boxes. I reached into my pocket and pulled some crumpled bills from our reserve cash. As I tossed the money on the table, I glanced at my sister and thought about what she’d said about trying to talk to a priest.