Demon's Hunger (3 page)

For weeks, she'd been feeling off. As though unseen eyes watched her from the shadows. It was crazy. She knew that. There wasn't actually anyone there. She'd even had a friend, Paul Martinez—an officer who'd worked with her on the ostrich farm case—stomp through the trees with her, searching for signs of hidden watchers. They'd found nada. Zip. Zilch. But they'd done it in the daylight. Maybe that was the difference.

Not for the first time, Vivien wondered what had possessed her to buy this relic of a house on Sideroad Sixteen, where her nearest neighbor was a tree farmer five miles up the road and where the road itself was an unpaved stretch of dirt with row upon row of tree-farm trees on one side and an endless field of six-foot-high uncut grass on the other.

She'd wanted privacy, and she'd definitely got it.

Pulling the front door closed behind her, she turned the dead bolt, locking out the night. She took off her sweater, hung it on a peg, and chose a red lollipop from the bowl on the entry-hall table. Popping it in her mouth, she savored the tangy sweetness and continued down to the basement. The overhead lights were bright, her work table clean and tidy, with six very old red velvet bags and their contents arranged in clear containers, lined neatly side by side.

Though she knew perfectly well the contents of each and every pouch, she washed her hands and pulled on a pair of surgical gloves, ready to examine things she had looked at innumerable times. It wasn't a mere urge; it was a
compulsion
. Great. She wasn't just imagining people watching her; she was starting to show signs of OCD. She sighed. What was next? Washing her hands fifty times a day? Checking the stove in triplicate before she believed she'd turned it off?

She reached for the first bag, the one from her father, one of the three things she had to remind her that she'd ever had a father. He had left her with a threadbare red velvet bag, a single photo of a tall handsome man with mahogany-brown hair and hazel eyes just like hers, and a cold and bitter mother who had never gotten over the fact that he'd walked out on her and their two-year-old daughter, never to be seen or heard from again. At least, Vivien assumed that bitterness was the motivator for her mother's behavior.

The sins of the fathers… Araminta had never forgiven the daughter.

Not that her mother didn't love her. She did. In her own really special, controlling, eternally disappointed kind of way. And it wasn't that Vivien didn't love her mother. She did, in a thank-heaven-she-visits-only-three-times-a-year kind of way.

They got along fine over the phone. E-mail was even better.

Vivien ran her index finger along the worn velvet. With its contents of salt, red pepper, colored stones, and bones, the bag resembled a voodoo gris-gris. But the bones themselves were far older than the cloth. A puzzle. There were other things she'd found in the bag: hair, desiccated skin fragments. Definitely a charm bag of some sort. And her father had left it for her. The
why
of that nagged at her more and more of late.

Leaning forward, she studied the bones, let herself slide into the cool familiarity of anthropologist mode. Phalanges: finger bones. Very old. Human. Three of them, all from the same finger. There was a deep slash across the middle phalanx, as though a blade had hacked at it.

Each of the bags she had acquired through the years had similar contents. Different colored stones. Different bones: fragments of a twelfth rib; a second cervical vertebra broken into three pieces; a fragmented fifth lumbar vertebra; three cuneiforms from the right foot, two of which bore slashes from what appeared to be the same instrument that had marked the finger bone. All the bits and parts had come from the same person. A male.

Who? Why? How had his skeletal remains ended up scattered over the globe in little red velvet sacks?

And why did she keep stumbling across them?

She'd found one in a head shop on Queen Street years ago when she'd first moved to Toronto. It had been in the display window, a small red velvet bag sewn with red thread. She recalled how she'd stopped dead in her tracks, amazed, determined to buy the thing, because it was an exact match for the one her dad had left for her. Then she'd unearthed one in a shop in New Orleans—she'd been in town for a four-day conference. One in Paris—again, a conference. The shop owner had insisted that the bag came from an aristocrat, a confidante of Marie Antoinette, a woman who'd clutched the bag as she was guillotined. The story was gruesome. Maybe the shopkeeper had thought it would up the price.

Another from London from a tiny little store that had smelled like old books and rot. That bag had carried the dubious distinction of having been owned by a victim of Jack the Ripper. Supposedly.

The most recent bag had come to her just last week, in the mail, delivered in a plain brown paper package with no distinctive labels and no return address. Its arrival had creeped her out. She couldn't think of anyone who knew she collected these bags, certainly no one who would send one to her anonymously.

Icy fingers skittered over her skin, and she shuddered, set down the bones, and rose to turn a slow circle.
Not alone. Not alone
. The certainty was so strong, but no one was there. The room spun, and Vivien steadied herself against the side of the table. Her eyes stung, and she felt an overwhelming fatigue, soul-deep, a frozen ache.

Pressing her fist against her forehead, she took a slow breath. Maybe she needed food. Her mother's visits always decimated her appetite, and she'd barely eaten over the past couple days. She tidied her work area and turned toward the stairs. The small hairs on the back of her neck prickled and rose.

Someone
was
watching her.

She spun. Her gaze shot to the small basement window high on the wall.

Nothing. Just a thin glimpse of star-dusted sky.

She blew out a hard breath as she stalked up the stairs, wanting to wish it all away, wanting to crawl into her bed and pull the quilt up until it made a warm little cave, wanting to sleep until she could wake up and feel like herself again, without premonitions and suspicions and paranoia that she was being watched.

Pausing in the kitchen doorway, she pondered her meal choices, finally opting for soup. Absently, she opened the tin, dumped the contents in a mug, and set the auto-reheat function on the microwave for one serving, her foot tapping out a rhythm as she waited for the microwave to beep. Then she took her steaming mug to the back door, where she stood, leaning her shoulder against the cold glass, blowing on the hot soup and looking out at the back deck.

Winter sunlight streamed over the wood, kissing it with warm highlights.
Sunlight
.

No moon or stars in sight.

OK God.

The mug slipped from her nerveless fingers, falling, falling, until it hit the wood floor with a sharp crack, spraying soup in an arc, droplets speckling her jeans and slippers.

Vivien slapped both palms against the glass and stood, shivering, staring at the cloudless blue sky.
Sunlight. Sunlight.

She looked at her watch. 8:30.
In the morning
. She'd lost twelve hours.

Again.

Darqun Vane sat at the scratched and dented counter, his index finger tapping a slow rhythm on the yellowed Formica. He smelled burnt toast and mildew. Two of the fluorescent bulbs overhead were dead, lending a shadowy cast to the gloomy booths, the empty tables, the thick layer of dust on the faded photographs that lined the walls. At the far end of the counter, a frail old man slouched over his breakfast. The waitress leaned one shoulder tiredly against the wall, wiping mugs with a dingy gray towel. A guy with lank, greasy hair and a beige overcoat staggered past Darqun on his way to the bathroom.

That was the sum total of the diner's patrons.

Not exactly a hopping place.

Darqun took a slow breath. This silent little diner, with its musty smell and dirty windows, was not his kind of place. He needed sound and light and human warmth, the smells of perfume and smoke and sweat, the throb of life that pulsed in a crowd. There was no music here, no hum of a television set; the waitress had told him it was broken when he'd asked. Briefly, he pondered calling on his magic for a little sorcerer-style repair, then decided the notice it would draw wasn't worth the effort.

With studied care, he took the last sip of his coffee and fiddled with the empty creamers lined up like little brown garbage bins. Eventually, he signaled for a refill. The quiet made his skin crawl. He'd spent an eternity alone, so alone, without a single living thing to ease the silence. He never
chose
solitude now. This morning, it was an unpleasant necessity.

Because last night, with his arms wrapped around the pretty lawyer he'd coaxed to his bed, he had slept and dreamed of a caduceus, and he'd dreamed of a restaurant called Abe's Eats. So here he was, waiting.

Opening his senses, Darqun probed for magic. Nothing. Not a whisper of demon or
hybrid
. Still, something felt off, the dragon current flickering and twitching like a poorly wired lightbulb.

A blast of cool air swirled through the restaurant as another patron pushed open the door. Studying the new arrival, Darqun tapped his index finger once, twice, then paused. Toronto was having an unseasonably warm winter, but the guy was wearing just a T-shirt and jeans, no coat, which struck Darqun as odd. The newcomer was shaking, his skin puckered into gooseflesh.

"Cold morning," Darqun said.

The guy's bleary gaze roved the floor, the walls, and then locked on Darqun. He sidled closer. "Uh, yeah, it is cold. Yeah. Listen"—he swallowed—"I'm not cruising you or anything, but do you mind if I sit here? Talk a bit. I—" He paused, shook his head. "It's been a long day. I just need to talk to someone. I can't stomach being alone right now, ya know?"

Darqun nodded. Yeah, he knew. "Stool's free. You're welcome to it."

The guy sat, slumping forward with his elbows on the counter, the heels of his palms pressed to his forehead. Darqun tensed as the smell hit him. Demon stink. A touch of brimstone. The newcomer had no magic of his own, but he'd recently come in contact with something that did.
A hybrid? A demon
?

Darqun signaled the waitress, who brought the coffee pot and a menu, then wandered off, looking none too happy.

Thrusting his hand at Darqun, the guy introduced himself. "Uh, John Weston. I'm… uh… I'm an intern." His palm was damp, hot, and the taste of dark magic that leached into Darqun's skin was acrid and raw.

"Darqun Vane."
Doctor
John Weston. Interesting, given his dream of the caduceus. "Doctor, huh?"

"Don't… um… call me Dr. Weston. Just call me John." He poured sugar into his coffee—one packet, two, three, four—smoothing the wrinkled paper of each one and lying them in a neat and tidy stack. Then he stirred and stirred, the metal spoon rasping faintly against ceramic. Finally, he picked up the cup, swallowed, and turned to Darqun, his expression bemused. "I don't take sugar," he said, frowning.

Darqun called the waitress, asked for a fresh cup.

Conversation turned to the weather, traffic, sports. Darqun guided it to easy things, nonthreatening. Patience, patience. He could simply steal John's thoughts, use one of his unique sorcerer enhancements to take the answers he wanted. But the trauma of that to a mortal mind might leave the doctor a babbling husk, and that would breach the
Pact
, the eternal agreement that governed the actions of all those with magical bent, an agreement so old it predated human measure of time.

Breakfast arrived—eggs, toast, sausage, bacon. John stared at the meat for a very long time and then carefully removed the sausage and set it aside with a shudder. He lifted his fork, poked at the eggs, sighed.

"Lousy night," he said. "Goddamned lousy night."

"Is that right?" Darqun rested his forearm across the counter, let his weight slouch to one side, relaxed, friendly.. Every instinct screamed that he was here at Abe's Eats to learn this man's story. Dr. John Weston. The caduceus from his dream. The reason Darqun had forced himself to come to this miserable little diner before he needed to meet up with Ciarran and Dain.

"Goddamned lousy night." John banged his forehead slowly against his upraised fist. Then he looked at Darqun, his expression stark. "You know those stories. In the paper. The ones about the… killings?"

Darqun's attention sharpened. Yeah, he knew. He and the rest of the Compact of Sorcerers—a brotherhood of magical beings who maintained the balance between the supernatural and the natural—had been paying close attention.

Because the killer wasn't a crazed human.

They'd gotten close enough to the first two corpses to detect dark magic, demon magic. Problem was, it didn't read like anything they had encountered before. Not
hybrid;
the magic was far too powerful. Not demon, at least not any they recognized. Then, what?

"It'll be in the papers today. Probably on the news right now." A quick glance at the silent television, and John continued. "They found another one. Another guy. Same MO. Drained dry, desiccated, tortured, and his guts… His intestines looked like they'd been gnawed on while he was still alive." He huffed out a breath. "They brought him in to St. Mike's. Something wrong with that body. Really wrong.
Evil
. No man could have done that. No human."

John took a long swallow of his coffee, the fresh cup the waitress had brought. "Whoever—
whatever
—killed him took a prize. A trophy. The guy's left patella " he cleared his throat—"his, uh, left kneecap was cut out." He raised haunted eyes, his face chalk-pale. "It was my goddamned lousy luck to be working the ER last night. Made me wonder why the hell I thought I could be a doctor. Right now, I'm wondering if I have the stomach for it."

Darqun studied John for a moment, then lifted his coffee cup as a toast. "Think of the glass as half full, John," he said bluntly, but not without sympathy. "
Your
luck was better than his."

The sound of the doorbell pierced the bubble of Vivien's distress. She turned slowly, disoriented, woozy, and more than a little afraid. In a blink, she'd misplaced twelve hours.

She remembered warming the mug of soup while staring out the kitchen window at the winking stars. They were so bright and beautiful here north of the city, undiluted by ambient light.

Now, she stood by the sliding glass doors. Between one breath and the next, the stars had disappeared. Daylight poured through the glass, slanting across the living room floor, the green leather couch, the glass and iron coffee table. In a fleeting instant, night had turned to day, and she had no explanation for that, other than the distinctly unpleasant possibility that she was losing her mind.

Pressing the flat of her hand against her chest, she struggled for calm. How long had she been standing here with the soup puddling at her feet?

Again, the doorbell chimed. She was… expecting someone. The vague thought gnawed at her, but the details escaped her. She cast an anxious look at the mess of soup and shards of ceramic mug.

Okay. Front door, then cleanup.

Then meltdown.

Having a game plan was important.

Feeling as though she were walking underwater, she crossed the living room to the hall and shuffled to the door. Her trembling fingers closed on the brass doorknob. The certainty that she was expecting someone grew stronger, bringing a nagging distress because she couldn't
remember
.

Deep breaths. Yes, that was better. One more. Her chest expanded until she felt the pull of it, felt the intense urge to exhale. She let the air slide from her in a rush.

Resting her open palm on the wall, she began leaning forward to peer through the peephole. Before she got the chance to open the door, it swung open, seemingly of its own accord. With a gasp, she jerked back, lost her breath, and after a thready moment, recovered.

She
knew
she'd locked that door, shot the bolt. She was certain of it. Wasn't she?

There was a man on her front porch, dressed in faded jeans, a loose poet's shirt, and a long black duster. His angular features were hard, handsome, perhaps a little savage. He hadn't shaved in a day, maybe two, and the shadow did really great things for him, gave him a sort of outlaw veneer. Brown-black hair, cut in a short, shaggy crop. Straight brows, straight nose, strong jaw. He was absolutely, amazingly gorgeous.

"Holy flying fish." It just jumped out. Odd, because she had a tendency to watch her words.

He pushed off the porch rail where he'd been waiting and straightened to his full height. Vivien had the disconcerting realization that she had to look up quite a few inches to meet his gaze, a rare experience for a girl who stood five foot nine in her stockinged feet.

He studied her, intent. Silvered eyes. Mercury gray, ice gray, framed in dark, thick lashes. The contrast defied description.

"Dr. Vivien Cairn?" he asked.

She'd never thought her name particularly sexy, but when he said it, touched by a question, low and a little husky, she thought it sounded damn fine.

"Yes, I'm Dr. Cairn." Forgetting that she'd had her conservative bob cut in a short, spiky style, she lifted her hand to shove a hank of hair back behind her ear. Finding only gelled wisps, she dropped her hand and looked away.

Her gaze slid beyond him to the gleaming black SUV parked at the far end of the driveway. Two other men lounged against it, one tall and blond and stunning, the other tall and dark and stunning. What was this, a three-for-one deal?

Following her gaze, her visitor said, "My associates. Ciarran D'Arbois" the blond lifted a black-gloved hand in acknowledgment "and Darqun Vane "the dark-haired guy grinned and gave a friendly nod. "And I am Dain Hawkins."

She thought she ought to recognize the name, that she'd heard it before. He waited a beat, and when she said nothing, he continued. "We spoke on the phone last night. We set up an appointment for this morning…"

Panic clawed at her. She didn't
remember
. She could recall opening the soup can, dumping the contents in the mug, and then blowing on the hot soup while looking out the sliding door at the sun-drenched deck… this
morning
. An entire night, wiped from her thoughts.

One memory lapse she could explain away as stress. Maybe even two. But this was the third.

Cold dread gouged her.

Wrapping her arms around herself, she struggled for calm, and then the hairs at her nape prickled and rose. Her gaze shifted to the tree line.
No one there. There was no one there
. She had to stop doing this.

"What time did we… umm… talk?" she asked, returning her attention to Dain Hawkins.

"Ten." There was subtle downturn to his lips, a crease between his brows, and his attention slid away, his gaze moving slowly along the perimeter of her property. Restrained tension wove through him; she saw it in the shift of his posture, the set of his shoulders.

Vivien frowned, noticing that the two guys by the SUV had straightened and were looking around, suddenly alert. She'd worked with enough cops to recognize the intensity of their perusal. Only these guys weren't cops. Somehow, she was certain of that. Private security? Government? Neither possibility felt right. Which left what? Criminals?

Right now, she felt the same cloying unease that crept up on her every time she'd thought she was being watched. Only now, she had three big guys in front of her house, and they were looking around like they felt it, too.

That small vindication of her paranoia was comforting. Again, she scanned the trees and then turned her gaze back to the SUV.

Ciarran and Darqun exchanged a look. Without a word, they strode off in opposite directions, one toward the uncut grass and the other toward the tree farm. The way they moved, purposeful, targeted, made her think they had a definite plan in mind.

Dain watched them go, then turned his attention back to her. "I had some difficulty finding you," he said.

Vivien stared at Darqun's back as he strode away, wondering exactly where he and Ciarran were heading. After a second, she shifted her gaze back to Dain.

"Yeah, I'm a little off the beaten path here."

He gave her a strange look. "No, I meant I had a bit of trouble tracking you down. I had expected to find you at UTM. When they told me you were on sabbatical, I had expected you to be holed up in the library of another university, hard at work on some thesis or other."