A Demon Does It Better (9 page)

Miss Garrish edged the scroll open and read the contents. There was no denying that the elaborate seals which decorated the bottom gave the cat a lot of immunity within the medical context. Her thin lips narrowed even more. “If there is one speck of trouble from that creature, she will be barred from the hospital. And now I suggest you return to your work, Dr. Carter.”

Lili patted herself all over after she left the office.

“What’s wrong?” Deisphe asked as the witch passed her.

“I’m just making sure I’m not missing any body parts.” She relayed the head nurse’s edict.

“Yeah, she tends to do that.” The Wereleopard yawned. “Hey, want to go out for a drink with a bunch of us after our shift?”

“Sounds good. Let me know where. Also, you can work with me downstairs tomorrow.” Lili sketched a wave and headed for the stairs.

She had already consulted her computer to see which patient she’d be seeing first. Dr. Mortimer had left a written schedule on her desk, which she wasted no time inputting into her tablet. She noted that all the patients but Jared were referred to by name.

“Old fogy,” she muttered, sending a ball of witchflame ahead of her to better illuminate the dimly lit stone stairs. Before she passed through the large iron door, she stopped to check herself in a small mirror and applied fresh lip gloss. “Vain witch.” She rolled her eyes at herself and her need to look her best.

“Doctor.” The word rolled off Turtifo’s black-veined tongue with rich sarcasm. “Who do you want to see first?” His dark eyes mirrored the disdain in his voice.

“Bring Pepta to my office,” she said, recalling the list on her tablet. “And, Turtifo, I better not see any bruises on her,” she warned him.

He growled under his breath as he lumbered off.

Lili released a soft snarl in his direction as she headed for the small room she’d claimed as her own.

After setting out cups of chamomile tea and a small plate of special cookies, she waited for her patient.

She heard the ogre’s rumbling voice before he walked in with a small slender female before him, one of his meaty hands wrapped around the nape of her delicate neck, although his grip on her was lighter than he had used on Jared—probably because of the strong pheromones Pepta was exuding. The nymph’s lips were curved in a smile that was pure seduction.

“Hello, Pepta. Come sit.” Her gaze flicked over Turtifo. “Return in an hour.” She was pleased to see he didn’t argue with her this time.

Pepta was a vision, with her porcelain skin that glowed under the lights like a pearl, silver hair hanging loose to her waist, eyes that were a mesmerizing copper, and lips that invited a man to partake of them. What should have been an ankle-length gown of rough cotton had been ripped in strategic places to reveal her rounded breasts and a hint of silver pubic hair and creamy thighs. The nymph walked with the sultry grace of her kind and dropped onto the cushy chair Lili indicated. She deliberately spread her legs as if inviting anyone to have a snack.

“Is Morty afraid of still seeing me?” Pepta asked, with a smile that would have made a succubus proud. She arched her lithe body in a sensuous curve.

“As you know, Dr. Mortimer has asked me to work with some of his patients. I was especially looking forward to our talking together,” Lili replied, nudging the tea in her patient’s direction. She was pleased to see the nymph had been allowed to wash herself and was wearing clean clothing, even if it was obviously well-worn. She could see the brand on her shoulder, announcing to all she was a mental patient. Lili’s fingers itched to hex it off, even as she knew there was no way she could do that. Plus, for all she knew, her effort could only cause pain to the nymph. She made a note to see about arranging suitable wearing apparel for the patients, perhaps even a form of scrubs, in different colors than the staff wore upstairs. She couldn’t believe that Dr. Mortimer hadn’t taken better care of his charges’ needs.

“Sorry, darling, I like cock—although you dress more male than female.” She gave Lili’s blue scrubs and white lab coat a disparaging sniff. She plucked at one of the tears that revealed the side of her breast. Shrugging when Lili ignored her efforts, she picked up the cup and sipped the hot tea. “You wouldn’t have a mug of dark ale up your sleeve, would you?”

“Try the tea instead.” Lili watched her pick up a cookie and bite into it. She knew her recipe had additional calming properties. She didn’t believe in using even magickal drugs if herbs could do the same thing. She kept her computer tablet in her lap where she could make notes as the two spoke. Lili listened to Pepta’s erotic fantasies, some of which she hoped were just that, and others that had to be true.

The nymph had seduced a leader’s son and then killed him in a fit of rage. Her punishment had been to be locked away in an underground cave for two hundred years. However, no one had arrived to free her until she was discovered, eighty years ago, when she was finally released from her prison. Her sanity wasn’t even hanging by a thread. All she cared about was fulfilling her hungers for food and sex. Lili read, in Dr. Mortimer’s notes, that he hoped to help the nymph balance her life in a healthy way, but it had been a slow-going affair. She wondered if that wasn’t due to the doctor not wanting to look deeper into Pepta’s problems.

Freud
would
have
a
field
day
with
this
one.

“Why can’t the demon be with us?” Pepta asked, choosing another cookie.

“Private sessions,” Lili reminded her as she picked up her teacup. “Plus, wouldn’t you prefer some girl talk?”

“With someone who wants to dissect my brain?” The nymph sipped her tea. “When will you bring out the tentacles?”

The witch lifted her hands and wiggled her fingers. “Not my style.”

Pepta chose another cookie.

Lili could see that the bespelled treats were making her patient a lot calmer. She was pleased that something she’d learned from another doctor who treated the mentally ill was so effective.

“You want to fuck the demon, don’t you?” Pepta said suddenly. A sly smile crossed her lips. “You want him to take you hard and dirty.”

Lili had spoken briefly to Pepta a few days ago, so she knew it would be a struggle to keep the nymph on track. In looking over her records, it was easy to see the female hurt a great deal inside and lashed out at others in hopes of keeping her own pain under control.

The witch just had to find a way to persuade Pepta to release the agony and face what she’d done before the healing could truly begin.

“And what do you want, Pepta? Do you want to remain a prisoner in a stone cell while the world spins around you, leaving you behind? Don’t you want to return to your family? Feel whole again?”

Aha
. She watched the nymph’s vivid purple eyes darken and a hint of a crystal tear appear in one corner, but just as quickly it was gone, and she showed her true self.

“You’re too soft to work down here, Dr. Carter. You should leave before something happens to you.”

Lili’s headache grew to massive proportions by the time she had Pepta returned to her cell. She dropped a headache powder in her tea and sorted through her files.

“I’ll see Patient 1172 next,” she told Turtifo.

The ogre opened his mouth then closed it when he caught the warning look in her eyes.

“And no shackles!” she called after him.

Fifteen minutes later, Jared was pushed into the room, his wrists and ankles manacled in iron chains that obviously pained him. She admired his restraint in not wanting to cause some serious hurt toward the ogre. But she could understand why, after seeing his previous wounds.

“I said no shackles,” she snapped, feeling her headache returning.

“Dr. Mortimer’s orders, and he’s the boss down here. You’re just the hired help.” He fastened the fetters to the table and left without a backward glance.

It took all of Lili’s willpower not to order the door to slam after the orderly. Instead, she shot her fingers at the manacles. She swore under her breath when the iron bands didn’t fall loose. Lili had to settle for adding thick layers of soft wool lining to the inside of the restraints. She didn’t miss Jared’s soft sigh of relief. She conjured up coffee and a thick juicy burger and fries.

“Gotta say, I like your service, Doc.” He munched away happily. “Or is this the carrot-and-stick method? You have me all sated with good food, then you bring in the electrodes or fire whips?”

“Fire whips were outlawed in 1822 when many strove to improve the lot of the afflicted.”

Jared snorted. “Saying so isn’t the same as being on the receiving end. You’ve been here, what, a week? Maybe a little longer? You only see what you want to see, Doc. Not what really goes on around here. How old are you? How long have you been practicing healing?”

“Old enough to know better, and I was
born
a healer,” she told him, tamping down hurtful memories of long ago.

She
shouldn’t have abandoned her mother to suffer a horrific death alone.

Jared froze as his loaded cheeseburger hovered near his lips. He slowly set the food down and stared at her across the table.

“What’s wrong?”

“Shouldn’t I be the one asking that?” She threw up shields. She didn’t think he could rummage around inside her mind. She hadn’t seen signs of it before, but she wasn’t taking any chances. Not with her lack of knowledge about shadow demons.

“You look devastated.” Shadows crawled from the corners of the room toward Jared’s chair. They started to wrap around his ankles, stealthily making their way up his legs.

“Tell them to back off.” Her voice was sharp, filled with command, as she glared at the darkness. Her head shot up when he didn’t respond. “
Now
.” Lili held up her forefinger, the tip glowing red. She didn’t indicate she was in any pain from the flame that engulfed her skin.

Jared’s smile was filled with malice. “Make me.”

It wasn’t the shadows that caused his world to suddenly go black.

***

Jared’s eyes popped open at the same time that a blinding pain tortured the inside of his head.

“What the fuck?” He found himself sprawled on the floor while Lili looked on as if there weren’t anything unusual about sending a patient into la-la land with the snap of the fingers. “What did you do to me?” he rasped as he finally managed to crawl back into his chair. He swore his shackles had easily gained a thousand pounds since the ogre slapped them on him. He reached for the coffee cup and found his hands trembling from the violent shocks still racing through his body. A glance at the clock on the wall said he’d been unconscious for at least a half hour, yet his drink and food were still hot.

Terrific. She zaps me but thinks enough to keep my lunch warm.
Not that he thought he could handle solid foods just now.

“Any reason for what you just did?” He winced as the coffee burned his tongue. Damn, he must have bit his tongue when she zapped him.

“I told you to force your shadows to back off,” she told him with a shrug of her shoulders. “You didn’t comply, so I did it for you.”

Jared’s arms felt as heavy as his shackles as he lifted his hands to rub his aching head. No wonder it all hurt. The room was as bright as the noonday sun. She’d not only managed to knock him out but destroyed his shadows too. He felt suddenly bereft.

“You witches pack quite a wallop.” He rubbed his hand over the back of his neck.

“Be grateful I didn’t use full power. You would have been lucky if you could even drool by now. Speech wouldn’t have returned for at least forty-eight hours.” She smiled cheerfully.

“And I thought Dumb and Dumber were bad enough.” He started to scowl at her but discovered even that hurt. “Does Dr. Mortimer know about that trick of yours?”

“Does he know you have a way to leave the hospital when you want to?” Lili countered.

“Point taken.” He took an experimental bite of food and discovered his head was no longer trying to squeeze his brain out through his eye sockets. “First you protect my skin from the irons, provide me with decent food, and then you hex my lights out. Are you sure you’re not really an inmate down here?” He felt warm inside as her soft laughter washed over him.

“I wanted to prove I back up what I say.”

“I haven’t met all that many witches, but you definitely take first page in my memory book.” He polished off his burger and worked on the fries. He didn’t notice Lili’s sharp look of interest.

“Did other witches work down here?”

He missed her all-too-casual tone. “Not on a regular basis, unless more medical care was needed than Dumb and Dumber could provide. They were usually the ones to provide minor medical treatment, even if their bedside manners frankly sucked. Dr. Mortimer handled the bad injuries.” His voice tightened. “A Were nurse was down once. Shingleg mangled her pretty badly. You’re going to want to keep the two ogres in with you when you talk to him.” He started to push away his plate with half the fries still on it but changed his mind. Who knew when he’d get a good meal again? He didn’t have enough power to sneak out for the next few nights. He wondered if his shadows could track the lovely doctor down like that night in her house. He wouldn’t mind running into her in Inderman again. He’d like to see her in a place of light and laughter instead of down here in darkness and sorrow.