Was there really any preparing Casey for what was to come? Fuck. “Look, Darnell. I’ll be with her and so will Wanda—wherever she goes, whatever she does. I’ve been around a long time—and Wanda’s no slacker when it comes to taking care of business. Nothing can happen to her if we don’t let her out of our sight. And if ‘you know who’ shows up and wants to fuck with Casey because of me—I’ll handle it.”
“Oooooo-weee, boy. ‘You know who’ shows up, there might not be time to handle it. That one’s got a jealous bone.”
“Damn it, Darnell! I was this close to ending this fucking nightmare. This close,” Clay spat. Fucking hell. He’d been so near an end to this miserable existence he’d been forced to live with for more years than he could count he wanted to bash his fist through a wall.
Now, in his rush to rid himself of something that had stalked him for far too long, he’d only made things worse, and not just for him, but for someone innocent. Coupled with the disaster he was already in, he now had to try to find the kind of focus he’d need to protect Casey until her demon ears weren’t so green, while looking out for his own ass. The monumental mistake he’d made could only be deemed careless, stupid, and bumbling.
Running a hand through his hair, Clay asked, “The still- human half of her, you think it can cancel out the half that’s malicious demon?”
Darnell’s finger wagged at him. “You damn well better hope so. I’d like to think yeah, because she’s a good person from what you found out about her, but she’s gonna have some times when she’ll battle it. ’S up to you to try and keep that shit on the down low and help her channel it for good. Takes time to work it all out. Sometimes you so overrun with the power, you figure people owe you—’specially if you was like me—always bein’ taken advantage of. You get all jacked up with it. If you ain’t careful—ya lose sight of what’s right.”
Goddamn it. “Do you think I’ve doomed her to eternal life? Is there a way you can find out?”
“I told you, man, I’ll poke around and see what I can see. I’ll call ya if I hear somethin’.”
Then that was that. Clay held out the top of his fist to Darnell, signaling his impending departure.
“Hey, wait. You still feel ‘you know who’ all the time like you used to?” Darnell looked around with clear caution. As though ‘you know who’ would pop up at mere mention—which, unfortunately, wasn’t exactly an exaggeration.
Clay’s grunt was of eternal exasperation. “Like a goddamn ax lodged between my shoulder blades.” For centuries.
“Look, you pay close attention to Darnell. You be careful. Bad enough you got problems. That poor kid don’t need ’em, too. If I get a heads-up ’bout anything, I’ll let you know. You do the same. I’ll keep my ears to the ground case I can maybe hear anything that can help you or her.”
Clay slapped him on his linebacker-wide shoulders. “Thanks, Darnell. I have to go—the sun will be up soon, and I’ll be no good to Casey if I’m in vampire sleep.”
“Uh, yeah, ’bout that.You give any thought to how you’re gonna look out for her durin’ the daytime, vampire?”
“Wanda’s not full vampire. She’s part werewolf, too. I figure she can take the day shift.”
Darnell winked one twinkling dark eye. “Man, yous all a crazy bunch. I thought us demons was bat-shit, but ain’t nuthin’ like bein’ a vampire. You take good care a her. I can tell you think she’s pretty, but you better leave that shit alone.” Darnell knocked fists with him before he made his way down the long stairwell to his truck where Wanda and Casey waited.
His cell phone chirped a tune he recognized and, at this stage of what was going on, dreaded hearing. Flipping it open, he said with impatience, “I told you I’d call you later, and I will when I’m settled in.”
The response was nothing short of what he’d expected—difficult and argumentative.
“I’ll call you later,” he repeated, shutting the phone and instantly regretting his cranky response.
Clay grimaced when he hoisted himself into the pickup, avoiding Casey’s pretty, round, fearful eyes. Yeah, there was nuthin’ like being a vampire.
Nuthin’.
“WELL, well, well. I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Don’t be sorry, sweetheart. I’m not.”
“Um, I don’t believe we’ve met.”
“Oh, we’ve more than met,” a male voice slithered into Casey’s ear from behind her. “We’ve been—carnal,” he whispered, harsh and throaty and way too familiar for her liking.
Goose bumps trickled along the back of her neck. “No, I’m pretty sure we haven’t.” Well, okay, she wasn’t positive she hadn’t. But the word carnal made her about as close to sure as she could be. She hadn’t been “carnal” in a coon’s age.
A hand, large and warm, grabbed a fistful of her butt from behind. His lips, so close to her ear they left the residual heat of his breath curling around the outer rim of it, moved in tickling increments. “Now do you remember me?”
“I’m probably being exceptionally rude when I say, um, no. I also hope I don’t go too far over the line when I say this as well. If you don’t remove your hand from my ass, I can’t promise there won’t be some hot coffee involved and the potential scalding of your most personal assets.”
His chuckle was warm and silky in response. Like she was playing a game with him she didn’t remember choosing a playing piece for. “That’s not what you said the last time I was behind you like this. Remember the—what was it called? Oh, wait. Now I remember—‘Bendy Bob.’ As I recall, you begged for more.”
Hookay. Bendy Bob . . . She might have had some pretty kooky shit happen to her in the last few days, some of it she couldn’t much remember, and she was definitely, guiltily, up for almost anything carnal since this had gone down, but the last time a guy was behind her with even the slightest hint of carnality was when that B-list actor had tripped over her at a party the twins had attended in Hollywood. By mistake—because he couldn’t see without his contacts and it had nothing to do with a Bob who was bendy. “No. No, I’m pretty positive I don’t remember that. Which means you have the wrong girl. Which also means if you don’t back off, a scene, ugly and very, very public, could happen right here in the middle of a crowded Starbucks full of people who just want their morning dose of caffeine minus a rather loud, possibly fiery throw-down.”
And fiery wasn’t exactly an overstatement on her part. The fingers that clutched her purse tingled with sharp pinpoints of electric currents. Oh, God. Please, please, please. Not. Here. Every single person behind the counter knew who she was. Knew her so well, they didn’t even have to ask what her order was. She’d placed the same one for the twins each morning for four and a half years. The day didn’t begin unless Lola and Lita had coffee waiting for them on their nightstands.
The unknown hand on her ass tightened its grip. His tone became suggestive, as though they’d ruffled some sheets with wild abandon, and she’d somehow missed it all. Every slick-with-sweat, hot, from-behind moment. That would make her almost a little sad, seeing as sheets and a man—one in particular—were all she could think of, if she wasn’t so sure it was the one thing she could remember not doing.
“I think I like this whole new guise you’ve acquired. It’s sort of no-nonsense and bookish with only a hint of the vixen you really are. It’s hot, hot, hot,” he purred.
Self-consciously, her hands ran over her simple but warm, brown down-filled jacket. Out of habit, her fingers went to the bridge of her nose where she pushed up her black, square- framed glasses—glasses she didn’t seem to need as often since she’d been turned into a demon. She’d been many things in her lifetime—been called many things—vixen wasn’t one of them. Neither was hot. Though her temper certainly was moving apace toward hot. Yet for the moment, she couldn’t bring herself to indulge in trying to understand just what he meant when he said she’d “acquired a guise.”
Who
’d want to acquire a guise like hers? Boring, predictable, and so far left of a vixen, it was laughable. No matter, there were other things to focus on. Like her burgeoning lust to fry this man’s love sacs. Not quite as sudden this time, but definitely bearing down with the potential for a gale- force flip-out. Darnell had said she’d need to control her more primal urges. So far, in the almost two days since she’d found out she was a demon, she’d successfully mastered the art of not claiming Clay as her very own vamp love toy, and she hadn’t touched him once. There should be some kind of restraint award for that alone. So she tried to heed Darnell’s words with teeth clenched and her spine rigid. “I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about, but if I turn around, and you’re still here when I do—I can only hope you shaved this morning.”
“Shaved?”
“Shaved—and I don’t mean just your five-o’clock shadow.”
He pulled her in closer. “I’m intrigued. Why would I need to have shaved?”
“Because if you don’t get the fuck off me, I’ll torch the everlovin’ shit out of every hair on your body! Now, hands off my ass before I—kill—you!” Whirling around, Casey glared up into the face of a strikingly good- looking man who wore a look of amused surprise.
And clearly, from the gasps that flew on astonished wings from several patrons’ mouths—her voice had risen, and that control thing she’d bottled up like a fine wine had popped its cork.
Wanda’s carefully highlighted head sprung up amid the throng of people. “Casey!” She pointed two fingers at her eyes. “Look at me and calm down. Say it with me now. I’m calm and centered. C’mon.”
Oh, fuck calm and centered. She’d much rather be fired up and crooked. “Go back to the apartment, Wanda. I’ll handle this.” And she would—after she ripped this mutant’s balls off.
The man’s eyes, a gorgeous, unlikely blue, narrowed. “I think you’re the one who needs to be handled,” he growled, the crinkle of his black leather trench coat piercing her ears when he moved ever closer. Dressed in black from top to bottom, he had a Goth feel to his attire. Three lines were shaved into his right eyebrow. Adding to his dark persona was a tattoo of a snake wending its way along his lean neck.
Casey, feeling as though she were in someone else’s skin, using someone else’s lips, yet completely aware of what was about to occur, felt the stirrings of a good freak. “I’m not sure you’ll be singing the same tune when I tear your balls off and eat them Rockefeller style.”
“Casey!” Wanda was between them in the blink of an eye—pressing a hand to her sister’s shoulder, forcing her way into Casey’s line of vision. “Look at me, Casey, and focus before you go too far. Try and think about yesterday when all the maid did was ask you where you put the mail. Did she really deserve to have you set fire to her spare pair of shoes because she disturbed you while you were watching American Idol? It was mean-spirited and totally out of character for you.”
Yeah. Poor Magda. But by hell, it was the only two hours she had free while the twins were holed up in the exercise room with their yoga teacher. Still, it had been sucky mean on her part, and yes, incredibly out of character for her. The moment she’d flicked her fingers was the moment she’d regretted this crazy impulse she had no control over until it was too late. “I bought her a new pair before she ever knew they were missing.”
Appeasing and doting was how she’d describe Wanda’s smile. “And that’s good, honey. Contrition is good, but your temper was what brought that on. We absolutely have to learn to control your bouts of rage. I vote we don’t make a scene we can’t fix by just going to Payless. A scene that could cost thousands of dollars you don’t have. A scene right here in Starbucks—where everyone knows you and your boss.”
Casey leaned in close to Wanda as though she were going to share a secret. “Fuck everyone, Wanda. It isn’t everyone who had their hand on my ass. It was just him.” She reached around Wanda and jabbed a finger into the presumptuous prick’s chest. His sharp, slanted cheekbones sprouted two red spots on his otherwise cool, angular face.
“Casey.” Wanda let off that warning she’d become so gifted at. Not the older-sister one, but the half werewolf, half vampire one. The one that said no matter how demon- ish Casey was, Wanda was still the badder ass.
And still, that didn’t stop her. “Wanda. Move.” Because if Wanda didn’t move, she’d move her—then she’d spike this asshole through the eyeball with her nail file.
“Casey. No.”
“Girls? I see our daily dose of mayhem and madness is well under way,” Clayton drawled, tilting his sunglasses downward for a brief glance at the two women.
All of her attention, all of her focus, instantly centered on Clay. His words, no matter how sarcastic, were like divine music to her ears. His tall frame, dressed in jeans and a tight-fitting black thermal shirt that accentuated every muscle she’d fought so hard not to touch, blocked out everyone else in the small space. Placing a hand on Casey’s shoulder, he pushed his way into the threesome, kneading her flesh as he did.
“Wanna lend a girl a hand?” Wanda pleaded up at him.
“That’s why I’m here. You”—he pointed at Casey—“settle down. And you”—he leaned down toward the shorter man, clamping his other hand on his shoulder—“get the fuck out of here or I’ll be forced to suck you dry—very unpleasant experience I’m told.”
“Clay!” Wanda looked around, her wide eyes full of caution and worry. “Watch what you say,” she muttered almost under her breath.
Clay’s broad hand only gripped the now- wary man’s shoulder harder. “No need. We understand each other, don’t we, friend?” he asked the now-cowering, not so arrogant after all, man.
The unidentified man was quick to nod his agreement, the look of confidence he’d worn shriveling into a weak smile of apology. “Completely.” But his eyes sought Casey’s. “So I guess I’ll see you around, kjæreste,” was his last suggestive remark before he slunk out of the coffee shop, leaving Wanda and Casey with bewildered gazes lancing his back.
The anger that had so consumed her fizzled, but the million questions she had running through her brain didn’t.
Yet Wanda was the one to voice them. “What did he just call you? What language was that?”
“Scandinavian—Swedish, I think. Maybe Norse.” Clay answered the question from between stiff lips, then turned his rapt attention toward the front of the store.
Casey directed her gaze at Wanda, irritation littering her response. “You ask that like I might actually have an answer, Wanda. I have no answer for why he thought I was anyone other than mousy Casey Schwartz—or why he seemed to think he had a right to plant his hand on my . . . butt like we’ve always known each other. And I definitely don’t know why he seemed to think we had prior, uh, knowledge of each other. If I’m honest, there are very few who do know me in that way, and they definitely don’t frequent coffee shops talking about it because it probably wasn’t nearly as memorable as the encounter I supposedly had with that man. An encounter I either can’t remember, or forgot in a fit of passion, because, you know, I’m supernatural now and can’t be held responsible for what happens during my blackouts.”
Clay put his hand on her lower back, propelling her forward in the line while whispering in her ear. “I did warn you there’d be those who’d recognize you as a demon, didn’t I? Yep, yep, I did. And that was exactly why I told you not to leave the apartment without one of us. But nooooo, instead, you take a chance like maybe setting a coffeehouse on fire—or worse.You’re a real walk-a-tightrope kind of girl, huh? FYI, he was a demon.”
In Starbucks? “No shit?”
Clay looked down at her from behind his dark glasses. “Nope. No shit.”
“So that was about the thing Darnell told us about? You know, the bit about me attracting other demons?”
“Yes, and you have to be very careful who you incite, Casey. Threats of bodily harm might only provoke a wrath you can’t yet handle, and I might not be a
round to take care of it. If I’d known you were going to be this hard to keep track of, I’d have handcuffed you to my side. Under any other circumstance, I guarantee that’d be fun. But I get the impression you’re not into that.”
Said who? Her mental gasp whistled through the corridors of her brain. She was not the kind of girl who—who—used paraphernalia.
But how do you know until you try?
Casey pressed her fist to her lips in an anxious move.
“So in other words, when I say can it, you damned well better can it, young lady!” Wanda admonished, swatting her on the shoulder. “I tell ya, kiddo, you’re almost as bad as Nina is when she rages. It’s like you can’t hear or see anything but how angry you are.You have some serious tunnel vision. If we’re ever going to get control of this, you’re going to have to start trying harder and help me help you.”
Babysit her was more like it. Casey was beginning to understand why Lola and Lita were so resentful of her constant presence. Their father had hired her to escort them wherever they went because they got into constant trouble, and it was always public. She was damage control. How ironic that Clay and Wanda now held the same tedious position she did. “I didn’t want to wake you, Wanda. You were sound asleep and you looked so comfortable. You’ve been sleeping on an uncomfortable couch, missing Heath, and babysitting me day and night for almost four days now. I figured you deserved a break—and who knew I could get into any trouble with a quick trip to Starbucks? I mean, honestly, who would ever suspect that me, Casey Louise Schwartz, would have some strange man accost me and my ba- donk-a-donk in broad daylight like he had every right to?”
Clayton stuck his head around her shoulder. “What’s a ba-donk-a- donk?”
“My ass.”
“He touched your ass?”
“Like he’d done it a million times before.”
Accidentally Demonic Page 11
