SEDUCTIVE SUPERNATURALS: 12 Tales of Shapeshifters, Vampires & Sexy Spirits (139 page)

Recipe for disaster.

“What do you say?” He asked and reached out to tweak a lock of my hair. “We could go to Tully’s. Get a pizza.”

Sure. Tully’s on the pier. Just where we spent most of that summer. What? Were we going back in time? Was he trying to rekindle things? Or start a brand new fire?

And why was I hesitating? The truth was, it had been a long time since I’d had a fire anywhere near me. And the way I remembered it, Logan had a real knack for fires.

Plus, we were both grownups—well, he was anyway—and neither one of us was involved and—

“God!” I shrieked it, pushed his hand away and slithered to one side, scooting past him closely enough that I could actually feel his Mr. Happy all hard and eager in his jeans. “How do you do that? We’re fighting one minute and the next minute, we’re...not.”

His hand fell to his side and he shrugged and gave me a grin that made my knees feel all slippery. “Worth a shot. You look really good, Cassie. And I’ve missed you.”

“Be honest. Until you moved back to town, you hadn’t given me a single thought in sixteen years.”

He shrugged again and I watched, fascinated as his chest muscles clenched and released. Man. He was seriously getting to me.

“I thought about you, Cassie.” His gaze moved over me slowly and I almost believed him. “Then, when things got so bad with Misty, I started thinking about you even more. Remembering how much fun we had together. How
good
we were together.”

“I was a kid,” I managed to squeak.

“Didn’t feel like a kid to me,” he said, and now his voice was so soft, it was like a caress. “And, now I find out you’re the mother of my child.”

“And this makes you horny?”

“I’m a guy.” He grinned. “I was born horny.”

“Well, don’t I feel special.”

He sighed. “I’m still pissed about you hiding Thea from me—“

“I wasn’t hiding her,” I argued. “She’s been right here. Living out in the open and going to school and everything.”

“You know what I mean,” he said. “Anyway, I want you to know I’m still pissed about that, but damn, Cassie, it’s so good to see you again.”

Something inside me did a quick little hop and skip. Hey, so shoot me! I can’t help it if it felt good to have Logan giving me that hot and sexy look again.

“There never was anyone like you, you know?”

My mouth went dry and my brain short circuited. But I defy any living breathing female to be able to think when that close to Logan Miller. Back when I was a kid, he’d been able to turn me into a molten puddle of goo, just watching him stride in from the ocean, water sluicing off his tanned, completely cut body.

But I wasn’t sixteen anymore. I couldn’t just give into my hormones, no matter how much I wanted to at the moment. There was Thea to think about and how Logan showing up was going to change everything.

“Logan...”

“C’mon Cassie,” he said and lifted one black eyebrow again. “A pizza at Tully’s. For old time’s sake.”

Tempting.

And if I’m gonna be honest, it was way more than tempting. It was uber-tempting. But the plain, ugly truth was, the last time I’d been tempted by Logan, I was a kid. I could use brainless and romantic as excuses for having sex under the pier with a guy I
knew
was going to be leaving town to finish college.

Now, I’m an adult. Technically. And a mom, of a nearly dating age daughter and hey, I need to set some standards. Be a good role model.

“You’re thinking too much,” he said. “Which means you’re going to say no.”

I frowned at him. “Just because you knew me back then doesn’t mean you know me now.”

“I’d like to.”

“And I’d like a million bucks,” I quipped and hoped to hell my voice wasn’t quavering. “Looks like both of us are doomed to disappointment.”

He walked toward me and just to be sure I didn’t go back on my brand new ‘role model’ resolution, I backed up until I hit the door behind me.

He ran his hands up my arms and I swear I could actually
feel
little flames dancing along my skin. Like I said, good with fire. He looked into my eyes and for a second or two, I saw the boy he’d once been in the man he’d become—and boy howdy, the combo was really appealing.

He smoothed his thumb across my bottom lip and it was all I could do not to nibble on it. Oh God, I was so in deep shit.

“I’m not going anywhere, Cassie,” he said and tapped the end of my nose with his index finger. “We’ve got lots to talk about and I’m looking forward to getting to know my daughter—and you—better.”

He left right after that and I sort of slid bonelessly into a kitchen chair. Sugar gave me a disapproving look.

“Hey,” I argued, “easy for you to say. You’ve been fixed.”

More than Fiends: Chapter Five

So far, my birthday sucked.

Well, semi-sucked. I still had a shot at the cleaning contract to Magic Nights, unless Devlin Cole called in the next couple of minutes to tell me it was all an ugly joke. My gaze slid to the phone, half expecting it to ring. When it didn’t, I grabbed a couple more Kisses, because they were handy and why the hell not?

With Logan gone and Thea at Zoe’s, no doubt complaining about the hideousness of her life, I had a good hour or more to myself. Plenty of time to figure out just what the hell I was doing to so piss off the Karma Gods. Or, I could just grab a beer and forget about everything else.

“Sounds like a plan to me.” I stood up, went to the fridge and gave the handle a good yank because the stupid door always stuck. Not today. Well, not entirely.

The door stayed shut, but the handle came off in my hand. “What the hell?”

I looked at Sugar, but she was as confused as me. Just what I needed. More appliance death. I tossed the stupid door handle onto the table and peeled the stupid door open with my bare hands, giving it a lot of
oomph
. Too much as it turns out, since the damn door popped off and crashed to the floor, spilling out half empty bottles of ketchup, mustard, salad dressing and a jar with what looked like fuzzy salsa.

Whoa.

The light in the fridge shone out at me and I reached in to grab a beer. Twisting off the top, I took a long drink, stared down at the door and asked nobody, “Okay, is it just me or did things take a seriously weird ass turn here?”

Sugar whimpered and crawled further under the table, just in case the stove tried to get her next. I was about a minute away from joining her.

“You are the Demon Duster with inherent strength that will continue to increase.”

“YIKES!” I spun around on one heel of my boring little green pumps, felt it snap off and staggered a little while I caught my balance by grabbing the back of a kitchen chair with one hand and steadying the beer I really needed with the other. The Looney Tune was back. Naturally. “Are you
trying
to kill me?”

Jasmine gave me a small smile and widened her nearly black eyes until they seemed to take up most of her face.

I could already see the headlines in the La Sombra Daily News.
Crazy Old Bat Sneaks into Kitchen, Kills Karmically Damned Woman.

“What the hell are you doing back here?” I asked when I was pretty sure my heart was back in my chest where it belonged.

“I never left.”

“What?” She’d been lying in wait for me? And nobody noticed? Not Thea, not Logan? Not
Sugar?

I took another long drink of my beer, hoping to cool myself off a little, but it didn’t do much good.

“Some watchdog you are,” I muttered and glared at the dog, who actually had the nerve to give me a
Who, me?
look.

“I cannot leave until I have convinced you of your duty.”

“Duty again. Right.” Okay, no more Ms. Nice Guy. This old lady was about to get a one way ride to the Happy House. As soon as I figured out a way to put the refrigerator door back where it belonged. And just why the hell had my life chosen today to take a turn for the crappy?

“I’ve been waiting for you to return,” she said and set her ugly vinyl purse down onto the kitchen table. She opened it and pulled out yet another bottle of that spray stuff she’d had on her earlier. “The day of your destiny has arrived and I’m here to help you accept it.”

“Look lady, I don’t want to be rude...” Actually, that wasn’t completely right. At this point, I didn’t really care if I was rude or not. You know, I’m usually a pretty patient person—well, I try. But as I mentioned earlier, my birthday was really sucking and at the moment, what I really wanted to do was throw myself a pity party. “I’ve got a refrigerator to fix, a beer to drink, an ex-boyfriend to kill, a daughter to soothe and hey, what’s left of my birthday to survive. I don’t want you here and if you don’t leave I’m going to—“

What? Call a cop? Yeah, because that wouldn’t be too embarrassing.
Help, a hundred and fifty year old woman broke into my house and is holding me at spray bottle point.
Great idea. Besides, call a cop and it would be just my luck for Logan to show up.

Fine. I didn’t have a threat handy. But I
could
forcibly walk her bony ass out the back door and into my car where I would strap her in—she should be used to
that
feeling—and take her back to Mixed Nuts Central. I walked around the end of the table, made a grab for her and the old woman jumped five feet in the air.

Straight up.

I kid you not.

Impressed into momentary speechlessness, I could only look at her as she landed in a crouch, then stood up again, smoothing one gnarled hand down the front of her dress. If I hadn’t seen it, I wouldn’t have believed it.

“Does the Olympic committee know about you?”

She blew out an exasperated breath. “I’m here to explain your duties. To give you the recipe for the demon elixir. To guide you as you rid the world of—“

“—demons, right.”

“You don’t believe.”

I did an eye roll. “Duh.”

She sighed again like I should be riding the short bus to school. Waving one hand at the refrigerator door lying on the floor, she pointed out, “You see your strength is increasing.”

“Bad hinge.”

“Why do you refuse to listen?”

“To what? Stories about demons and secret potions? Are you crazy?” I shouted, then stopped, listened to myself for a second and said, “never mind. Of course you’re crazy. I’ll just call the hotel screw-loose and see if they’ve got your room ready.”

She muttered something that sounded like
I’m too old for this shit.
But old ladies with blue/gray hair didn’t cuss, did they? Still, no point in pushing her over the edge. Because frankly, if she was this bad
on
the edge, I didn’t want to have to deal with her once she went over.

“You seem like a nice crazy person.” That’s me. Ever tactful. “But I don’t believe what you’re saying. Who the hell would? And even if I did...still wouldn’t be interested. I’m too busy for a destiny. I’ve got a life and let me tell you, it’s already pretty crowded.” Not that I actually had a life, but certainly not the point at the moment. “I’ve got enough responsibilities, thanks. I don’t have time to save the world. Besides, I don’t even know
how
to fight.”

There. Calm. Reasonable. Even the crazy old lady was bound to understand now.

I headed for the phone to call the mental ward, but before I got there, Jasmine charged me. She had neat, sprayed down, blue/gray hair, enough saggy skin to make two old ladies, no boobs to speak of and orthopedic shoes. But she snarled and raced at me like there was a Metamucil sale and the last bottle was right behind me.

I of course, being a legendary (hah!) demon duster, destined to save humanity, shrieked like a big girl. Cut me a break, okay? It’s not like I was attacked regularly by crazed senior citizens—or anyone, for that matter. Then, something happened. I can’t explain it. But all of a sudden, I
knew
what to do.

Which is strange all in itself—as anybody who knows me can tell you, I don’t make fast decisions. I’ve been known to stand in the cleaning products aisle at the grocery store for a half hour trying to choose between Comet and Ajax. And don’t
ever
offer me a choice between white or chocolate fudge covered Oreos.

But in that one split second, I was no longer Cassidy Burke, house cleaner extraordinaire...I was Catwoman/Batman/Spiderman and a bunch of other cool superheroes all rolled into one.

Instinctively, I spun around, kicked my right leg out and caught the gray marauder dead in the stomach. Her air whooshed out of her lungs as she flew back and slammed into the kitchen table. This was all too much for Sugar. The dog jolted out of her terrified stupor, leaped to her feet, turned the table over on her wild scramble toward the back door and what was left of the Hershey’s Kisses plopped onto Jasmine’s head and shoulders like brass colored raindrops.

Holy crap.

I just beat up an old lady. Catwoman never did stuff like that. Hell, even Buffy never beat up old ladies. Well, she staked one or two, but that was her job.

Good thing I was raised Catholic so I could call up my guilt at a moment’s notice. There’s nobody does guilt better than a Catholic. We
excel
at guilt. My friend Rachel Cohen—Zoe’s mom—and I go over this whole Catholic/Jewish guilt thing all the time, but I always win. See, Rachel was born and raised Catholic, then converted to Judaism when she married Simon, so even
she
doesn’t believe that anybody could beat Catholics when it came to the Guilt Games. Like I told her. Doesn’t matter if the Jews have been persecuted for centuries.

None of them had to deal with nuns as teachers. And the Jews don’t have Hell.
We
have Hell. How can you feel guilty if there are no eternal flames waiting for you? Fear of a bad reincarnation? Forget it. Come back as a cockroach? Who cares? Cockroaches live forever.

Nope. Catholics win the guilt crown every time. Nobody can compete with us. We grew up learning the sign of the cross as The Father, The Son, and the It’s All My Fault, otherwise known as the Mea Culpa.

But I digress.

I’m standing there wondering how in the hell I’d just done that—I haven’t exercised since the day I taught Thea how to ride her bike. I held onto the seat and steadied her for about twenty steps, then I was wiped and she took off, leaving me in the dust. So how, I had to wonder, did I come up with that completely cool, kick ass move?