Blood of the Demon (33 page)

I frowned. “But what is it? Is it a human doing this?”

“It is indeed possible,” he replied, expression inscrutable.

“How?”

He lifted an eyebrow at me. “How is it that you are able to open a portal between our two worlds?”

That gave me pause. I’d been born with the ability and supposedly inherited it from my grandmother. “So it’s an arcane skill that this person is born with?”

“In a manner of speaking,” he said, sounding almost bored. “There are many humans with the ability to shape and manipulate potency. Some can open portals. Some can draw power from essence. A rare few are little more than parasites. You are all descended from the same source.”

This was something I’d never heard before. I knew that there were other people with the ability to shape arcane power, even if they weren’t able to open a portal, but I’d never heard this idea that every arcane practitioner shared some sort of great-great-grandpappy.
So what was that original source?
I wanted to ask him more about that, but I could already see that he was getting annoyed with the questions, and I wasn’t sure how much more he would put
up with. With regret, I wrenched my thoughts back to my original track.

“How is this person getting stronger?”

“Exposure to sufficient potency. Or perhaps consumption of another essence-eater.” He lifted a shoulder in an elegant shrug. “There are any number of ways.”

I shoved my fingers through my hair. “Okay, so how can I stop them?”

His eyes narrowed. “I dislike the thought of you pursuing one with this ability.”

“Well, it’s my job,” I retorted. “And people are dying.”

His mouth tightened. “Ah, yes, your duty to protect and serve.” I could hear the sneer in his voice, his disdain not for what I did but for whom I chose to protect and serve. Then he inclined his head. “Yet I understand that this is a matter of honor for you.”

“Yes. I swore an oath.” Which was true, though I’d never really thought about it on this level. I’d been sworn in as an officer after graduating from the academy, and like everyone else I’d raised my right hand and done the I-state-your-name business and never thought twice about it, except that it was one of those things you had to do to be a cop. But for demonkind, an oath was serious, and honor was paramount.

But any hopes that he would be more inclined to help me due to it being a matter of honor were dashed when he turned away and strode toward the diagram. He was making a point. He had no need to be in the diagram to return to his own realm. Well, I guess now I knew whether he was pissed or pleased. But then again, it wasn’t
his
matter of honor, it was mine.

“Rhyzkahl,” I said, following him. “Please. How can I stop this killer?”

He spun to face me, lip curled in a snarl.
“You
can do nothing to stop this creature, save destroy it, and soon, before it grows too strong to be destroyed by any means that you possess.”

I opened my mouth to ask
how
to track it down and destroy it, but he jerked his hand up to silence me. “I will answer no more questions for you until you agree to
my
terms,” he growled. Then, with a shimmer of potency, he was gone.

IT WAS A GOOD THING THAT I’D SLEPT SO WELL BEFORE the summoning, because I sure as shit wasn’t able to sleep after Rhyzkahl departed.

I stared at the ceiling in my bedroom, alternating between angst and anger at myself. Woo, boy, I sure showed Ryan, didn’t I? I showed him that I could call the demonic lord. I showed him that I could sleep with whomever—or whatever—I wanted. Too bad I was left feeling like shit now.

Rhyzkahl was an excellent lover, there was no denying that. He knew all the right moves, could read my desires, gave me what I wanted when I wanted it—whether I knew it or not. He did all of the right “afterglow” things too, like holding me, stroking my hair, and murmuring sweet nothings.

But he didn’t mean any of them. He was a demon, and anything he did for me was only part of some bigger plan.

Then, to really cap the night off, I’d managed to piss him off by not yet agreeing to be his summoner.

And why the
fuck
did I feel like I’d cheated on Ryan? That was the most insane part of it all. Ryan and I were most certainly not in anything remotely resembling a relationship. We’d never slept together, had never even come close to kissing. Was I feeling guilty only because Ryan had come out so vehemently against me having a relationship with Rhyzkahl? Though, again, that wasn’t exactly a relationship either.

I sighed. Okay, so I really couldn’t summon Rhyzkahl again unless I was willing to give him the commitment he wanted, but I had the storage diagram now. I could call any demon I wanted, whenever I wanted. I didn’t need the help of the demonic lord.

So why did the thought of never calling him again leave me with an ache in my gut?

I was definitely the most screwed-up human in all existence.

My thoughts continued to churn and whirl in similar lines. I didn’t remember falling asleep, but when my cell phone rang, I jerked out of something that was awfully similar to sleep.

I blinked away the scuzz in my eyes and managed to make out that it was the Beaulac dispatch number. I fumbled for the answer button. “Gillian here,” I croaked. I glanced over at the clock. Five a.m. Gah. If I
had
slept, it wasn’t for more than an hour or so.

“Detective Gillian, this is Corporal Powers in the radio room. Mandeville PD called. They found your business card at the condo of Elena Sharp.”

I sat up. “Why were they at her condo? What happened?”

“She’s dead. Apparent suicide. Want me to text you the contact info?”

“Yeah. Thanks,” I said, trying to shake off the numb shock. Too convenient. Too much coincidence. It was all connected somehow.
Suicide, my ass
, I thought grimly.

ABOUT AN HOUR later I pulled into the parking lot of Elena Sharp’s complex. The detective I’d spoken to, Robert Fourcade, had been fairly accommodating. And, after I’d given him a quick rundown of the case surrounding Elena’s husband’s death, he had agreed to allow me into the scene.

I pulled my badge out and showed it to the officer manning the door. “I’m Detective Gillian, from Beaulac PD. Detective Fourcade’s expecting me.”

The officer nodded as if he’d known I’d be showing up. “Right, you can go on in.”

I stepped in, feeling a strange déjà vu, with crime scene superimposed over it. A couple of the officers inside gave me “who the hell is this” looks, but a burly detective with dark-red hair stepped my way.

“You must be Detective Gillian,” he said, extending his hand. “I’m Rob Fourcade.”

I shook his hand. “Call me Kara. Thanks for allowing me to come check out the scene.”

He shrugged. “I got no problem with it, but there’s nothing to indicate anything other than a suicide.”

Yeah, well, I could see and feel things Detective Fourcade couldn’t. I gave him an answering shrug and smiled. “But you understand why I wanted to check it out, especially since her husband was murdered.”

“Paperwork. Loose ends. I know the drill.” I could tell that he felt that I was wasting my time driving all the way
down here. He jerked his head toward a back bedroom. “She’s in there.”

“I appreciate it.” I headed down the hallway. I hadn’t seen this part of the condo on my earlier visit. The walls were bare; the only decorative touch was an elegant vase with dried flowers sitting on a table against the wall.

The bedroom was more of the same. Solid, sturdy, and beautiful furniture that looked like it would last through an apocalypse. And lying across the expensive bedspread was Elena Sharp, quite clearly dead. I took in the sight of the pill bottles on the nightstand, then stepped closer to take a more thorough look at Elena.

I shuddered to a stop as I neared the bed and
felt
the body. I sucked in my breath, head spinning. The gaping lack of essence was so profound that I literally had to grab the bedpost to steady myself. This was far worse than Brian Roth and Davis Sharp. Worse even than the Galloways. I could feel the rending, the violence where this essence had been savagely ripped away while she was still alive. My fingers dug into the bedpost, and I fought to not puke.

“You all right?”

I hadn’t realized that Fourcade had followed me into the bedroom. I straightened, taking deep breaths to try to regain something resembling composure. “Yeah, I’m … just getting over some food poisoning.”

He frowned and nodded, but I could see the faint derision in his eyes. He thought that I was squicking at the sight of a corpse. If he only knew how many corpses I’d seen in the past six months …

“I don’t want to rush you, but the coroner’s office is here. As soon as you’re done, they’re going to bag her up.”

“Sure,” I said as I peered into the dead woman’s face.
There was nothing to indicate that she’d died in the kind of arcane violence that I could feel. No look of horror etched into her features, no arcane sigils traced upon her body in blood, nothing else that would be there if this had been a scene in a movie.

“No forced entry,” Fourcade continued, sounding a bit bored. “No signs of struggle. I guess this helps tie up your other case.”

I looked at him blankly. “How?”

He waved a hand toward the pill bottles, and now I saw that there was a sheet of paper beneath them. “Note. Confession. It’s why I called you,” he said, as if explaining it to a three-year-old.

My jaw tightened, but I managed to keep my retort in check. I stepped over to the nightstand and read the note.

I cheated on my husband, then killed him. I couldn’t take the shame of a divorce. Now I can’t live without him, can’t live with the guilt
.

It was a decent little suicide note, but it totally rang false. “This isn’t signed. It’s just a printout.”

“Half of all suicides don’t even leave notes,” he replied, mouth drawing down in annoyance. “You’re gonna get hung up because she didn’t dig out a pen and do it all nice and legal?”

“If you expect me to use this as a reason to close my other investigation, then, yes, I’m gonna get hung up,” I snapped back, too on edge to censor myself. “Where’s her computer?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it, face darkening. “How should I fucking know? Probably in one of the other bedrooms.”

I walked past him to the hallway. I knew from my previous visit that there wasn’t a computer in the sitting
room. The door to the other bedroom was ajar and I pushed in, quickly scanning. “No computer in here,” I called back over my shoulder. I heard a muffled noise that sounded like a growl, then the sound of opening and closing doors. I yanked gloves on and started opening drawers.

“Here,” I heard after about half a minute. I returned to the hallway to see Fourcade holding up a laptop case, smug smile on his face. “One computer. Satisfied?”

I shrugged. “Halfway. Now, where’s the printer?”

His red mustache was beginning to look pale in contrast to his florid face. “Maybe she wrote the fucking note and printed it out somewhere else.”

How stubborn was the guy going to be? I knew that I shouldn’t get into an argument with the detective about how to handle his own case, but I couldn’t believe that he had zero interest at all that the case could be more than a suicide. A rational part of me tried to argue that toxicology testing would show whether or not it had been a suicide, since I seriously doubted that she had actually ingested the pills, but I wasn’t interested in listening to the rational part at this moment. The past few days had been grueling and stressful, and I wasn’t about to let this jackass do a slapdash job of investigating this scene.

“Look,” I said, stepping toward him. “If she couldn’t take the time to find a pen to sign her name, why the fuck would she take her laptop to someplace else that had a printer to print out a suicide note? All I’m asking you to do is to treat this like a homicide investigation until you know for a fact that it’s
not
. I’m asking you to do your job.”

The last sentence was one that I really should have internalized.

“Get off my fucking scene, Detective,” he said through clenched teeth.

“Get surveillance video from the guard gate. See who came in,” I pressed. Fuck it. I’d already completely pissed him off. “Check the prescriptions. Fucking investigate it!”

“Don’t tell me how to do my fucking job. Get out!”

I took a step back to avoid the slight spray of spittle, abruptly realizing that everyone else in the condo had stopped working and was staring at us in the hallway. I scowled and squared my shoulders. “Fine.” My gaze swept the others. “Don’t any of you worry about this woman’s murderer going free because this man was too damn lazy to put in a little legwork.”

I left amid the openmouthed stares of Mandeville’s finest.

MY ANGER AT MYSELF GREW AS THE DISTANCE FROM Mandeville increased. I’d been a jerk. An undisciplined, tactless jerk. There were a thousand ways I could have handled that whole situation differently, and any one of them would have been better and far more likely to result in Elena’s death being investigated properly. It was possible—even probable—that Fourcade was a good detective. But faced with the antagonistic ravings of a detective from a neighboring jurisdiction, it was no shock that he’d become defensive. Then my reaction had been to embarrass him in front of his coworkers. I’d put him in a no-win situation and given him no way to save face. If he went and got those surveillance tapes now or checked the prescriptions—all the things that he would have most likely done on his own without prompting—he would look like an idiot who had to be told what to do.

I wanted to bang my head on the steering wheel, but since I was driving I decided that would probably be a bad idea. Instead, I settled for taking several deep breaths and
focusing on the monotony of the drive to ease my stress. The drive from Mandeville to Beaulac was almost completely on back highways, and after about twenty minutes of pine trees and cow pastures I began to zone out, regaining a bit of the feeling of peace that I hadn’t even realized I’d needed until it was gone.

Until a few months ago, my life had been fairly uncomplicated—before Rhyzkahl and Ryan, and before losing my aunt. I drummed my fingers absently on the worn steering wheel. There was a part of me that was glad my life was not uncomplicated anymore. The loss of my aunt gnawed at me, even though I had hope that it wasn’t permanent, but I had to face the fact that I didn’t
want
a staid and sensible life. I would never have become a cop if I did. I liked the action and the excitement, even though most of the time on the job was spent in long stretches of inaction. My field-training officer had told me that police work was ninety-five percent boredom and five percent sheer terror, but that five percent made it all worth it.

The sign for St. Long Parish flicked past as I approached the bridge over the Kreeger River. I’d wasted much of the day with the trip to Mandeville, but at least I could mentally cross Elena off as a suspect, even if I couldn’t quite do so officially.

The loud bang on the right side of the car derailed my thoughts and sent my pulse racing. My hands tightened on the steering wheel convulsively as the car fought to swerve in the direction of the blown tire. Adrenaline dumped into my system as I felt the tires slide on the metal decking of the bridge. I steered into the skid, even though the retaining wall of the bridge loomed threateningly, and I managed to get the damn car straightened out
and under control just shy of scraping the low concrete barrier.

I allowed myself a ragged breath of relief, then caught a movement in the rearview mirror, barely registering the large pickup truck coming up on me far too fast—

The truck slammed into the left rear corner of my car, spinning it, sending me jerking heavily against my seat belt, and knocking the breath out of me. I saw the retaining wall approach again, far closer and faster. I fought the steering wheel, and for a timeless instant I thought I’d regained control. Then the truck slammed into me again, and my stupid Taurus slid up the side with an agonizing shriek of metal on concrete, hovering on the lip for a heartbeat before tipping over the barrier.

The impact when the car hit the water jammed me against the seat belt again. I dimly felt something in my chest or shoulder give way, but the massive wave of adrenaline slamming through me didn’t give me a chance to feel pain. Water sloshed threateningly against the windows as the car began to sink, and within three heartbeats the car had slipped under the surface.

I was shrieking inside, but within the car it was insanely quiet, save for the low creak of metal and plastic and the quickly rising sound of water rushing through the vents.
Stay calm! Stay calm!
I silently screamed at myself, teeth gritted together, breath hissing as I fought to undo the seat belt. My heart pounded as the water rose past my knees.
Stay calm, damn it!
That was the key to survival. Stay calm, wait for the water to fill the car and equalize the pressure, then get a door open.

I couldn’t tell if the car was still descending or if I’d already hit bottom. I didn’t know how deep the river was or what section of the river I’d landed in. For all I knew there
was only a foot of water above the car. Or thirty. The seat belt finally came free and I gave a sobbing gasp of relief, then had to clutch wildly at the seats as the car began a lurching roll, coming to a disorienting stop belly up and nose down.

I stabbed at the down button for the window, but either the electronics had already gone or there was too much pressure from the water. The water continued to rush in, swirling angrily higher. I fought the urge to claw at the door, then took a deep breath as the water rose over my head.
Now
I could open the door. I grabbed the handle and shoved against the door with my shoulder, shuddering in relief as it pushed open.

But only a few inches. My relief shifted to horror as I tried again to shove the door open.
Something’s blocking it. The car’s wedged up against something
. I groped through the small gap, fingers brushing a rough wood surface.
It’s a tree. Shitshitshit, the car’s wedged up against a fucking submerged tree!
Hurricane Katrina had dumped thousands of trees into the waterways, and most still remained. I swallowed the fear that screamed at me to keep clawing at the door and clambered past the seat to get into the back. A pocket of air lingered there still, air that I gulped desperately, but it was shrinking quickly. My piece-of-shit car wasn’t airtight by any stretch. I was shocked it wasn’t already completely filled with water, considering how much it leaked when it rained.

I sucked in another breath and pushed myself down to try the passenger-side door, but even through the murky water I could see the dark shapes of the tree branches that kept both doors from opening more than a few inches.

I kicked back up to my pocket of air. My rising panic screamed at me to shoot the back windshield out, but a
last remaining sliver of calm asserted itself. The car was upside down, my head was barely above water, and if I shot my gun—a Glock, which probably
would
shoot once—I’d most likely kill myself from the shock wave in the water, especially since I was carrying hollow points. But I still had other options. I yanked my gun out of my holster and took a deep breath, ducking under and bracing myself with my feet against the seats. I grabbed the gun around the butt and the barrel with both hands, then drove the end of the barrel into the rear windshield as hard as I could.

I felt the windshield give way on the third try, relief flooding me as the tempered shards of glass billowed away. I pushed up to the sliver of remaining air pocket, then took a last heaving breath and ducked under the water.

I tried to keep my eyes open, but it was pointless. I couldn’t even see my hands through all of the silt in the water. I felt my way to the window and tried to worm my way out, but all I could feel was mud. My lungs began to burn from holding my breath, and I scrabbled frantically at the mud, trying to dig a way through. Horror flared through me again. This was the riverbed. There was no getting out that way.

My lungs screamed for breath, and I pushed up again to find the air pocket. Only about an inch of air remained, and I pressed my face against the carpet and sucked in one more breath.
The front windshield. Stay calm. You can get out that way
. I reached for my gun again, fingers fumbling on the empty holster as dread filled me.
Fucking shit!
I’d dropped it? Or maybe it hadn’t been fully in the holster?

The pocket of air was gone now. Red haze began to
creep in on the edges of my vision.
I’m going to die
, I realized with a sick jolt. I’d faced certain death once before, but this time I didn’t feel any calm acceptance. This time I felt terror and anger and everything else. I wanted to scream in rage, but I wasn’t ready to give up that lungful of air just yet. The red burned across my vision, and then, without realizing it, I shifted into othersight.

I hung motionless in the water, shocked to my bones at the stunning wash of potency that swirled around me and the car. For a blinding instant I thought that the entire incident with the car going into the river had been an arcane attack, then I realized what I was seeing.

It was the
river
. The power of the raw element—a potency that I had never used before, never even been able to see before. I was accustomed to using the potency that formed the fabric of the planes, a power that felt sweet and hot and elegant. But this … this potency was raw and profound, and I could see how someone could be swept away in it.

I steeled myself and
pulled
at that potency.

It resisted me at first. It knew that I had no experience in drawing that sort of power—didn’t deserve to hold it, to shape it. But I didn’t want to shape it. I wasn’t looking for anything elegant or pretty, not now when I had only seconds left. I pulled harder, and then it felt as if a dam burst. It came crashing in on me and I opened myself to it, feeling it rage into my control,
beyond
my control. I gathered it clumsily, as much as I could bear. The river shrieked through me, churning and foaming as I pulled.

And then I
pushed
. As hard as I could. Pushed the power away from me in a wave. I felt and heard metal and wood and plastic twisting and tearing. I could feel myself
screaming, using that last breath, forcing it all out as the power surged around me, swirling into a vortex.

And then I could push no more. I had no more air, no more power. I floated in the water, completely spent and out of air, the ruins of the car swirling around me.

And then the
river
pushed. I felt it crush into me, forcing me up and up. I suddenly burst above the surface, as if the river had birthed me. I took a dragging gasp of air, catching a small wave and inhaling water as well. I coughed, struggling to tread water with limbs that had no strength. I could see the bridge and the bank, but I couldn’t get my body to respond.
Too far. I don’t have anything left to make it to the bank
. The current grabbed at me, pulling me toward the center. My arms felt like lead weights, dragging me back under.
Shit, so close
.

The water closed over my head again, but before I could sink any farther, I felt a hard yank at my hair. My head broke the surface and I let out a choked gasp of pain.

“I gotcha!” I heard a voice shout. “God damn it, I gotcha!” The grip on my hair quickly shifted to my arm and collar, and I was dragged over the hard metal edge of a boat, scraping my ribs and belly. I landed in a tumbled and ungainly heap against a tangle of fishing poles and empty beer cans, as I struggled for a full breath. “You all right?” the voice asked. “Was there anyone else in the car?”