Blythe went down, almost to my belly, then looked up with those big blue eyes through crazy long lashes. He hummed a little, and I almost started crying, I was so overwhelmed by how good it felt and how much I hurt. The simultaneous opposite sensation thing was fucking wild. I just lay back and let it carry me away, and Blythe sucked me, weirdly gentle and sweet.
And thorough. Like, boy was enjoying himself in the extreme, treating my dick like it was royalty. All tongue and spit and fondling my balls.
It took roughly sixty seconds to get me there, if even that, and I like hell I was going to make it wait like I usually did. I gave some kind of warning—at least I think I did—and let it all go. It was the strangest orgasm, more of a sigh of relief than an explosion of joy, but it made my heart race and my body shake and—damn, look at that boy suck. He just swallowed it and kept going, nice and slow, careful.
When I was done shaking and groaning, I flopped, totally boneless. Blythe sat up, dragged the back of his hand over his pink, swollen lips, and flopped next to me. "Nice dick." He threw an arm over my middle.
With a grunt of effort, I moved my arm and pulled him in, so he could rest his head on my shoulder. That was about all the energy I had left, but I asked, "You want a hand job or something?"
He patted the flat of my belly and kissed my shoulder. "I'm good. ‘Til tomorrow. Then you can start paying off what you owe me."
"Ass, grass, or gas?" I mumbled.
He snorted. "Sorry about that. I'm a dick."
I tried to mumble something else about his dick, but I guess I fell asleep.
Præsidium
Reginald Latour's skull made a cracking noise when I slammed him against the wall. Calmly, I asked, "Who's behind this bullshit?"
He squirmed, but my grip was adamantine. "Get the fuck off! How the fuck are you so strong?"
"It's demonic," I lied. "Who's. Trying. To call. Demons?"
"How should I know?" He kicked at me.
I grabbed him by the throat and lifted, forcing him onto his toes to keep from strangling. "One, you have a pentagram tattooed on your left hand, indicating involvement with the local witches. Two, you stink of demon magic, and while the smell is similar to that of the sewers, that edge of burning sulfur is not. Three, I know for a fact the Veil is thinner in that warehouse, it's less than a week from Hallowe'en, and you're scurrying around trying to look inconspicuous and failing."
"Gah!" He choked. I let him down a little, so he could stand on the balls of his feet and not end up with a crushed larynx. For the moment. He went on, "Who the fuck are you?"
"I'm Thackeray," I said. "You're Latour. That's a ritual space for the local coven, and I can't get into it."
"Why not?"
"It's demonic," I repeated through my teeth. This time, it wasn't a lie.
"The warehouse?"
"The reason."
"You're demonic?"
I lifted him again.
He kicked. "Okay, okay! Jesus, you want names?"
"I have three days to shut this down before you idiots unleash hell. Yes, I want names."
"Danny and Marjorie Fenwick are in charge," he said.
"Was that so hard?" I settled his feet on the ground again. Then I reached into his pocket with my free hand, grabbed his phone, and threw it to the ground. I lifted my booted foot and finished the job with a satisfying crunch.
"Aw, I just got that."
I let him go. "Don't speak to anyone; just go. If I find out you warned them—and I will find out—I'll smash more than your phone."
"How the fuck will you find me?" It was all swagger, no substance. Latour rubbed at his throat and eyed me petulantly.
I sighed and held out both arms to the side. Go on. Make yourself visible.
Seir's power washed over me, a sensation like molten lava replacing my skin. I hadn't seen him in years, myself, not since the haunting began. But I remembered him well enough: a tall, beautiful warrior on a winged horse, glowing with flame.
Latour stumbled back into the wall and attempted to scurry away. "Wh-what the... what?"
What a ridiculous little thing he is, Seir "said". His voice was an echo in my head, half-words, half impressions.
I snorted and dropped my hands to my sides. Get. And Seir did "get". His power stopped crackling in the air around me.
Latour straightened up somewhat, but still edged toward the end of the alley. "So... you're possessed?"
"In a way." Inaccurate. I was not possessed.
"Explains why you're so damn articulate."
I froze. "What did you just say?"
"Articulate. You know, for a n—"
Latour didn't get to finish the word. My left hook impacted with his jaw hard enough to send him spinning. He knocked his head off the brick wall and fell to the ground in a stinking pile.
I stepped over him. "Fuck you very much, sir."
***
The Fenwick house was even more heavily warded than the warehouse, and a small shadow crouched just beneath the kitchen window in a hedge. Silently, I approached, Seir a tingle in the back of my mind in case I needed him. As the shadow-person came into clearer view in the moonlight, I decided he wasn't much of a threat. He didn't stink like demons, just a metallic edge of magical ability, all but lost in the Fenwick wards. Smallish, compared to me, with a brown face and a meticulously maintained coiffure, dreads on top and shaved on the sides.
Unobtrusive observer, a neighborhood witch, most likely. Either way, I had this.
He didn't notice as I approached, so I got my arm around his middle and one gloved hand over his mouth before he could shout. After tugging him away from the house and into the trees, I said into his ear, "Don't scream. I'm not going to hurt you. We might be on the same team."
He tried to nod, so I let him go. He spun, one hand over his mouth, the other adjusting his tortoise-shell glasses.
"Who are you?" But even as I spoke, I caught the pentagram tattoo on the inside of his wrist.
"I can explain." He held out both hands in front of him in surrender. "Probably. Maybe. Depending."
"Start with who you are and why you're spying on your own people." I backed off and put one hand in the pocket of my pea coat, making myself as nonthreatening as possible. I needed him to talk.
"I'm not. I mean, they're not. Unless you--" Finally, he looked down, as if to check my wrist for a tattoo.
I pulled down my glove so he could see there wasn't one. Not there, anyhow, and definitely nothing associating me with a coven.
"Are you security?" Dreadhawk Boy asked.
"Do I look like security?" I asked.
He frowned and furrowed his brow. "I... have no idea what answer you want."
"The true one."
"No, then, you don't," he said. "But I don't have a lot of experience with security, so—"
I facepalmed. "Man, seriously."
"Sorry. Sorry, I just—I talk a lot when I'm nervous."
"Yeah, I noticed. Look, what's your name?" I asked.
"Matt. Matthew Antonin."
"Is this your coven, Matthew Antonin?"
"Yes, but—no." He cocked his head like a puppy. "Wait, what's your name?"
"Thackeray," I said.
Seir piped up in my mind with, This one will be easy to crack.
I sighed. Shut up. I don't need your help with this.
A pretty face and you're done in, aren't you?
I hadn't realized the guy was pretty until Seir said that, but fuck, he was. In a skinny, punk librarian kind of way. I growled in annoyance.
Antonin took a step back, nervous all over again. "Uh. Is the growly noise supposed to be your last name, or...?"
"Thackeray is my last name," I said.
"So you don't use your first na—?"
I cut him off. "There are magical wards all over this place. You being that close for that long should've set something off."
He dug into his patched up jean jacket and pulled out a silver leaf charm. "This
hides me."
I examined it in the moonlight without stepping nearer. It glittered, not with light, but with power. It smelled like burning sage. "Impressive magic," I said.
"This ain't my first rodeo." Antonin tucked the charm away again. "I moved here a year ago. My old coven was all nature magic—healing, protection, that kind of thing."
"Where?"
"Huntington. I went to school there."
I just nodded for him to go on.
He shifted his weight, but looked slightly more comfortable now I wasn't growling at him. "People saw the mark and invited me. I joined. Then I found out what they were planning for Samhain." His face darkened.
He seems legitimate. Seir sounded surprised.
I grunted assent, but said nothing, eyeing Antonin for telltale signs of lies or dark magic.
He rolled his eyes. "Would I have been hiding in the bushes if I was with them?"
"Maybe."
"Who are you, Thackeray? You're not a witch." Antonin nodded at my hand. "So how do you know the coven, and why are you here now?"
"Same reason you are, apparently," I said.
"Yeah? Then tell me what they're planning."
"To call a demon."
"And what? You want it for yourself?" He stood straighter. Still about four inches shorter than me, but he was trying. "Good luck keeping a hold on it, without magic."
"And you think they can with magic?"
"I know they can't," Antonin said. "Especially not on a night when the Veil's so damn thin any demon they conjure could bring all its friends."
Smart. Smart enough that this guy might be the missing piece I needed to get on the inside. I said, "Look, this isn't a great place for this conversation."
"So let's go somewhere that is."
"Let's."
***
It's a power-struggle every time you meet someone new. Think about it: you go out to dinner, sit down, look at someone new across the table—business associate, first date, whatever—and you're engaged in a skirmish. You're trying to figure out who has the upper hand in the conversation, the budding relationship. You're trying to decide if you can feel confident enough to pretend you don't find the stretches of silence between topics disconcerting.
Seir was feeling chatty tonight. He was always stirred up when we neared the end of a chase. Antonin had gone off to the bathroom, and I was staring down at a piece of apple pie in the one all-night diner in town. I thought, You just love to hear yourself yammer. I swear it's masturbation via rhetoric. Starting to feel like I'm in a Quentin Tarantino film. We're even in a diner.
Seir said, I'm not wrong, though.
I stirred my coffee lazily, clink, clink, clink. After a moment, I answered as if he hadn't heard the thoughts it took me to get there. If no one wins the struggle, if both declare defeat, the silences are intolerable to everyone.
The point is that you've got to be the one in control, or someone else is controlling you, or you're spinning out of control, which never leads to anything good (for more than a few minutes at a time). Wouldn't you say?
He knew goddamn well that I wouldn't. What if the person gets control of you and does horrible things? It was a layered statement. It could be about him and me, and how he couldn't possess, just haunt. Or it could be about me and Antonin, here. The potential for some form of control implicit in physical attraction.
Seir said, So be the one to win. It's not that difficult; it's a question of your belief in yourself being stronger than his in himself.
I snorted. The most delusional wins?
It's not delusion; it's self-manifesting superiority. Try it. People will eat it out of your hand.
"So you keep saying," I mumbled aloud.
Antonin slid back into the booth across from me. "What?"
"Nothing." I made an attempt to appear extra grouchy, since that was usually all it took to discourage questions.
He cocked an eyebrow but said nothing. In the real light of the diner, it was hard not to notice how flattering the freckles sprinkled liberally over his bronze nose, cheeks, and forehead were.
I wasn't usually a freckles guy, but damn. "I need you to help me stop them."
He stabbed a spoon into the bowl of melting ice cream before him. Peanut butter chocolate. Too rich for my blood, but not too sweet for his, apparently. "Don't you think you could tell me a little about yourself first?"
"Why?"
"Because you're just some stranger who swung into town and happened to know about a bunch of evil shit about to go down. Also, you attacked me in the shrubs."
Fair point, but I wasn't giving in. "I didn't attack you. I took you to a more secure location to question you. I could've attacked you. We wouldn't be having this conversation."
"And you'd be no closer to figuring out how to fuck up their demonic plans."
I pinched the bridge of my nose. "What do you want to know?"
"Who are you? Really. Not your name; I mean who you are, what you do."
I pushed my barely touched pie away. I don't even like pie. It just seemed like the thing to order, in a place like this.
I'm bad at human things, sometimes. I pretend that's not because of Seir. Maybe it's even true. I had a weird childhood, to say the least.
I said, "I'm Thackeray, and I hunt demons. Any time there's a frayed piece of the Veil, I know about it. I go there and I fix the situation."
"Okay, so who do you work for? Who can convince a handsome, capable, brick shithouse of a man like you to demon hunt?"
I ignored everything but the "capable" part, which was true. "Myself."
"Right, but someone has to pay you."
"I wish they did."
He watched me for a moment, like he was trying to decide if I was serious. When I didn't flinch, he said, "Yeah, all right, man. But why do you do it, then? You can't be hurting for options. You could be a bodyguard or—I don't know. A fitness model. Jesus Lord Almighty."
Again, I ignored the compliments, uncertain what to do with them. "Don't ask if you don't really want to know."
Something like annoyance flared behind his eyes. "Start talking, or I walk."
"Fine. When I was three years old, my mother tried to kill me."
His eyebrows went up again, but he just sat, silent, ice cream forgotten.
I've never been shy about my story. I don't see the point, as there are usually more benefits to sharing it than not. "The priest who exorcised her told me that it wasn't her; that some demon that had lived under our house for centuries chose her to be its vessel. That it required a sacrifice, and so it puppeted her into grabbing the first living creature she saw, which happened to be me.
"Even as a kid, I thought the explanation had holes. Where did demons come from? Why had this one waited for our family? What was the point this supposed necessary sacrifice, and where had Father Barton learned all that?"
"Man, no shit." Antonin shook his head.
The story always convinced people to help, maybe because it was true. Or maybe Seir helped me sway them, though I hope not. Personally, I liked the way it kept people at a distance, once they knew.
"What was it like? Seeing her like that?" Antonin asked. Pure human sympathy made him even prettier, sadly.
I shrugged. "I remember it in flashes, mostly. Her eyes rolling back in her head, words in backward Latin flying, spit and blood. The bruises on my arm from her dragging me into the basement. I don't remember what it felt like. Just pictures from someone else's life."
"So... you remember, but the memories are stripped of meaning?" That wasn't so much sympathy as curiosity.
"I'm grateful for that much. Really, I'm grateful for all of it. Someone has to do what I do." And they'd have to be awful fucked up to do it. So, here I was. "That's who I am."
Antonin asked, "Why would you tell me that? I'm a stranger."
"My goal is to get your help. If you know why I need it and why I do what I do, you're more likely to believe in my sincerity."
&nbs
p; "True that." Antonin sat back in the booth and adjusted his glasses, just watching me. Then, after a few moments, asked, "How did you know what was going on here? Like, did being exposed to a demon that young do something to you, or...?"
I shook my head. "I have help. From the other side."
"A ghost?"
"Something like that."
He frowned.
"Look, Antonin—"
"Matt."
"Look, Matt, you can't stop them alone, and neither can I. If we join forces, there might be a way."
Matt frowned. "What do you want me to do?"
"Get rid of the wards in the warehouse," I said.
The crease in his forehead deepened. "You want to fuck with the ritual space?"
"And check out the Veil," I admitted.
Matt narrowed his eyes. "How? How could you tell without magic? The ghosts?"
I nodded.
"So you're a medium?"
"Will you help or won't you?"
For another long moment, he was silent. Then he said, "Maybe I'm just being a sucker for your hotness, but I want to trust you. Problem is, you're holding a lot back, and that makes me nervous.
"But we can check things out and see how this goes. I was just trying to figure out when they're going where to prepare things."
"You mean a stakeout." I sighed. I fucking hate stakeouts. Stakeouts with someone flirting with me, with whom I desperately wanted to flirt? Probably gonna be even worse.
He shrugged. "We could just charge right in. What could possibly go wrong?"
"No." That was all I had to say to that.
He grabbed the pen out of the check wallet on the table and wrote an address down on a napkin. "Tomorrow at dusk. They won't risk it before sundown."
I accepted the napkin with a grunt. It was gonna be a long night, tomorrow.
***
"So, where are you from?" Matt asked.
"I'd rather we didn't do this," I said.
He settled his Timberlands onto the dashboard like he owned the place. "You want to sit here in a dark car in silence."
"It's worked so far."
"It's been the longest hour of my life," Matt said.
Witchy Boys: The Complete Collection Page 4
