Deal with the Devil

by Kevin Lee Swaim

  I threw my head back and laughed. “You’re kidding, right? That’s a big secret? What difference does that make? You and your Order. What have you done? Secrecy and lies. That’s all you’re good for.”

  “Sam—”

  “This doesn’t change anything. You’re worse than no help at all. You actively keep me from doing what needs to be done.”

  “Where are you going?”

  I grabbed Desmond from the floor and threw him over my shoulder. “Honestly? I don’t know. But I have to do something.”

  “Get over yourself,” Sister Agnes said.

  “Agnes,” Sister Beulah said.

  “Callie matters,” Sister Agnes insisted. “Everything that’s happened to you is a tragedy, but in the end, you’re unimportant—”

  “Agnes!”

  Agnes turned her glare on Sister Beulah. “The girl has the potential to unleash a demon. You understand what that means. I don’t mean to belittle the boy, but he must realize that he doesn’t matter and he never did. He must—”

  “That’s okay,” I said to the two women. They stopped their bickering, their cheeks red, and looked anywhere but at me. “Even an idiot like me gets it. Only Callie matters.”

  I spun and walked off before they could utter another word.

  * * *

  I gunned the Chevy out of the parking lot. Desmond groaned and struggled up into a sitting position as we roared off. “What did those old women do to me?”

  I took a right turn, chirping the tires as we headed back toward downtown. “They have something guarding that place.”

  “I ain’t never felt anything like that.”

  “You’re lucky those old birds didn’t kill you.”

  Desmond snorted. “Yeah, like that was gonna happen.”

  “You were laid out on the ground,” I reminded him. “Those old women aren’t playing around. They could have killed you while you were helpless.”

  Desmond sighed heavily. “I take your point.”

  The streets were remarkably empty. Either the neighborhood was too rough, or it was too late at night, but for whatever the reason, we had the roads almost to ourselves. I braked hard and came screeching to a halt at a stoplight. “I don’t know what to do, Desmond. I don’t know where to go. I’ve got no clue about—”

  “You’ll find her,” Desmond said. “And after that, I’m gonna kill Garski.”

  “You can’t,” I said halfheartedly.

  “He took my family from me. You get your friend back and then I’ll do what needs to be done.”

  “But—”

  Desmond turned to me and said wearily, “I ain’t asking for your permission.”

  “I can’t be a part of that.”

  “You never killed a human before?”

  My mind wandered back to Carlton Meriwether’s smug face as he’d claimed his freedom from demonic possession and how I’d blown his brains out even as he’d protested. “It wasn’t the same thing.”

  “But you did.”

  “He was a witch, and he was possessed by the demon, Haagenti.”

  “Not exactly a human…”

  “I killed him after we exorcised the demon.”

  “Ah,” Desmond said, stretching it out. “We ain’t that far apart, Sam.”

  “I’m not a killer.”

  “Maybe you weren’t before, but you are now. It ain’t nothing to be ashamed of.”

  “I’ve crossed a line,” I said. “I don’t even know when it happened…”

  “I suspect it was after you learned how the world really works. Remember how I told Jordan about dying? It’s terrible, man. When I was a kid, I thought it would be kinda like going to sleep, but it ain’t nothing like that.”

  He was quiet for a few minutes. “The way we are ain’t all just from the gift.”

  “I guess.”

  “You been through things that done changed you, just like you had died.”

  “Callie insists that I’m a good man. Sometimes I wonder if she believes it, or if she believes that if she says it enough, I’ll believe it.”

  “I barely know you, Sam, but you seem like a good man to me.”

  “A good man wouldn’t agree to let you murder Garski. A good man wouldn’t hope that you do it.”

  “Part of me wants to say you don’t need to worry about it. I got this. The other part…”

  “What?”

  Desmond turned to me and his mouth twisted into a smile. “The other part is thinking hot damn, now you’re talking.”

  * * *

  I followed Desmond’s directions and headed southeast toward Lottie’s warehouse. It was well past midnight by the time we arrived. Desmond had used my phone to call ahead and inform them we were coming. The night air was sweltering, and the streets were dark for blocks in all directions.

  There were the faint rumblings of traffic off in the distance, but the night air was eerily quiet. I glanced over to Desmond. “Is it always like this?”

  Desmond’s expensive suit was grimy from the night’s activities, and he brushed at it, trying to make himself look presentable. “Lottie likes it dark. Keeps people away.”

  “I’ll bet.” I craned my neck, trying to look in all directions at once. “Dark and miserable. It sets a mood.”

  “This heat,” Desmond said. “I ain’t felt anything like it since thirty-four. Come to think of it, I don’t think it was this hot.”

  He was right. It was like trying to breathe in an oven, and every breath made the spot on my back burn. The long-sleeved shirt Jordan had given me wasn’t helping, either. “You sure about this?”

  Desmond stopped, his shoes scrunching against the loose rock. “She’s … it’s hard to explain.”

  “I’d feel a lot better if you tried. You know, before we go in there and I get slaughtered.”

  “She had no interest in my first club. No ambition. She put up with it, but by the time I opened the new one, she didn’t want no part of it. She just … faded away. She was more about the old days, you know? The way we were after she first gave me the gift.”

  “You mean when you used to go around killing people? That’s not making me feel safe.”

  “She ain’t interested in the real world no more. You met her. She didn’t lift a finger to hurt you.”

  “Henry was with me,” I said. “No offense, but you aren’t Henry.”

  “Don’t worry. When I tell Lottie about Tessa killing Elijah, Greta, and Asa, she’ll want to help us.”

  I nodded but went to the back of the truck, opening the tailgate and removing the leather harness from the tool chest’s third drawer. I pulled my shirtsleeve up and strapped the harness to my arm. When the long sleeve was pulled down, the harness was unnoticeable.

  Aw, who am I kidding? Callie is right. If it comes to this, I’m too close.

  “I told you, we’ll be safe,” Desmond said.

  I stared longingly at the Ingram in the tool chest. “Relax, I’m not bringing heavy artillery.”

  Even though I want to.

  * * *

  Cornelius opened the door and waved us in. “Desmond. It’s been…”

  “Yeah,” Desmond said. “It has been that.”

  “And the hunter,” Cornelius said without enthusiasm. “You are alone?”

  “I told you that on the phone, Corny.”

  Cornelius’s mouth quirked up in the ghost of a smile. “You haven’t called me that in a long time.”

  “How long has it been, Corny? Two years?”

  “Eight,” Cornelius said. “You came to see the queen eight years ago.”

  Desmond shifted from side to side. “I’m sorry about that. I suppose I got—”

  “Don’t trouble yourself,” Cornelius said. He motioned for us to enter the warehouse. “Things aren’t the same, are they? Nothing stays the same, I suppose.”

  “We’re still here,” Desmond said. “That’s something.”


  “Come,” Cornelius said. “The queen awaits.”

  We followed Cornelius through the empty hallway to the queen’s throne room. When we entered, Lottie was stretched out on the couch, staring at a blank television screen.

  She had changed outfits and now wore skintight black slacks and a purple silk shirt. Her lips were caked with ruby-red lipstick.

  She sat up and smiled lazily as we entered. Her gleaming white teeth shone in the overhead light, and her tongue flicked across her teeth. “Desmond.”

  “Lottie. It’s … you look good.”

  “You said you wasn’t gonna come back here no more.” Her voice was thick, like she had something in her mouth. “You said you was done with me.”

  Desmond frowned. “That wasn’t what I said. I—”

  Lottie’s smile grew wider. “I always knew you was gonna come back. I knew it.”

  Cornelius cleared his throat. “My Queen. Desmond has something to tell you.”

  Lottie pointed at Desmond. “Corny told me some of it, but I want to hear it from you.”

  “Wait,” I said. “I hate to interrupt, but do you know where my friend is?”

  “The sheriff?” Lottie asked. “I ain’t seen him.”

  “Not Henry. Callie. The woman that was with us.”

  Lottie shrugged. “I ain’t seen her, neither. You lost her?”

  “I didn’t lose her. Joseph Garski took her.”

  Lottie raised an eyebrow. “The hunter? Ain’t you folks working together?”

  “No,” I said in a barely contained growl. “We are most definitely not working together.”

  “Let me explain it to her,” Desmond said.

  I lowered my voice. “Okay, but the clock is ticking.”

  While Desmond gave Lottie and Cornelius the rundown on Garski’s attack on the club, I kept my eyes on Cornelius. The man listened intently, but occasionally his eyes would shift to the door behind us and then back to Desmond.

  Where is Minerva?

  Perhaps I had seen too much, but I was no longer the fresh-faced young man that had stood by helplessly as vampires ruined my life. I had fought back against their kind, and even carried a part of their darkness within me. I wasn’t about to blindly accept anything.

  Not anymore. Something doesn’t feel right.

  I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it was more than the missing vampire.

  I just don’t know what it is. Yet.

  Desmond described our attempted escape through the tunnels, and when he got to the part where Garski had slaughtered Greta and Asa and taken Callie, Lottie chewed at her lip and asked, “He killed Greta? Just like that?”

  “Just like that,” Desmond said.

  Lottie sat up on the couch, ramrod straight, and her hands worked themselves into fists. “Greta was…”

  “I know.”

  As they spoke, Cornelius pursed his lips. He caught me watching and his face emptied of emotion, then his gaze returned to Lottie and Desmond.

  “What ’bout Elijah?” Lottie asked.

  Desmond opened his mouth, caught my eye, and nodded when I shook my head. “He got Elijah, too. He killed them all, Lottie. My entire clutch.”

  “Them hunters,” Lottie hissed. “Why don’t they leave us alone? What have we ever done to them?”

  “Maybe it’s the people you murdered,” I said.

  All the vampires in the room turned to me. Desmond looked guilty, and Lottie’s face was still emotionless, but Cornelius was staring at me with an odd sense of satisfaction.

  “Sam,” Desmond began.

  I was less than ten feet from the couch, and when Lottie stood, she didn’t just approach me, she flowed across the floor with a liquid grace that made me take a step backward.

  When we had visited Lottie earlier in the day, she had been disinterested, almost churlish. But as she neared me, her eyes bored into mine with a startling intensity. “You got that right, hunter. We killed. We bled. We fed.”

  “How many?” I asked. “How many lives did you ruin?”

  Lottie blinked. “Countless, hunter. Like, I can’t begin to count them all. It’s what we are, and I ain’t making no apologies for it. You don’t beat a dog for sniffing ’round, and you don’t kick a cat ’cause it scratches the furniture. They just doin’ what they were born to do. Why should I feel bad? You know how I got made, hunter? You know what my life was like ’fore I got the gift?”

  I shook my head.

  “I was nothing,” Lottie said. “Maybe less than nothing. Momma died. Daddy was sold like livestock. No kin to look out for me. I worked from mornin’ to night scrubbing floors, washing clothes, and cooking meals. Then the vampire came. I lived in a log cabin down by the creek. The master that owned me didn’t want me sleeping in the big house. I wasn’t no person. I was something to be owned and sold when I couldn’t work no more. The vampire changed all that. He grabbed me, and he laughed while he…”

  “You don’t have to say anything more,” Desmond said.

  Lottie ignored him. “When I rose, I wasn’t tired no more. My feet didn’t hurt. My arms, neither. I was free, but … I wasn’t. The hunger was like nothing I could have imagined. The vampire took me with him when he headed north. He taught me ’bout my new life. I learned I had to feed. I learned everything I needed to keep going.”

  “What was his name?” I asked.

  Lottie’s mouth opened and closed. “Huh?”

  “The vampire that turned you. What was his name?”

  Lottie stared at me. “His name?”

  “He gave you the gift,” I said. “You were on a plantation? He helped you escape?”

  “That’s right—”

  “And he never told you his name?”

  “Chima,” Lottie said in a voice barely above a whisper.

  “You never told me that before,” Desmond said.

  “I don’t think ’bout it much,” Lottie said. “Why you so interested, hunter?”

  “I was thinking about how terrible it must have been,” I said. “Born into slavery and then murdered, only to rise again. It’s all so terrible. This vampire that turned you led you to Chicago?”

  “That’s right. By the time we got here, I knew how to hide and how to feed. I knew about givin’ the gift.”

  “And you gave Desmond the gift? What did Chima think about that?”

  Lottie’s eyes narrowed. “You want to know ’bout Chima?”

  “I’ve never heard a vampire speak about receiving the gift. What the older vampire expected of you when you rose. What happened to Chima?”

  “He left before I got the gift,” Desmond said.

  “Why did you do it?” I asked Lottie. “Why give Desmond the gift?”

  “Chima left,” Lottie said. “But, before he did, he told me I should start my own clutch.”

  Desmond frowned. “He did?”

  Lottie’s intensity faltered. “He told me to find some folks, people nobody would miss, and give them the gift. I watched you for weeks before I knew you was the one for me.”

  “Chima just left, and was never heard from again?” I asked.

  Lottie turned back to me and glared. “Wasn’t no need. He done what he set out to do.”

  “What did he set out to do?”

  “Chima wanted a vampire queen and king to run this city,” Lottie said.

  “Why?” Desmond asked.

  Lottie shrugged. “I was the queen. I didn’t care why.”

  “He never told you?” I asked.

  “Didn’t matter to me. I got what I wanted.”

  “Except for the hunger. You didn’t want that, did you?”

  “I learned to live with it,” Lottie said grudgingly. “The hunger ain’t as bad as being a slave.”

  “Isn’t it?” I asked. “Isn’t it just another form of slavery?”

  Lottie scowled. “You ain’t got no idea what being a slave is like. How old ar
e you, hunter? It’s all just old stories and history to you. I lived it. After what I been through … well, I like things just fine the way they are now.”

  * * *

  Cornelius had listened with casual indifference as Lottie spoke, but his eyes kept shifting from her to the door. He caught my gaze, and there was a hint of a smirk on his face.

  The lizard part of my brain, a part I hadn’t even been aware of until the night that Silas had murdered my wife, started working overtime. “Desmond,” I said. “We’re in trouble.”

  Desmond frowned. “What?”

  “They’ve been stalling,” I said. “The queen is not going to help us.”

  When Lottie’s mouth opened, her fangs were out. “You ain’t as dumb as you look, hunter.”

  “What are you talking about?” Desmond demanded. “What’s—”

  Lottie grabbed Desmond’s wrist and squeezed hard enough to make Desmond gasp. “Just relax. We gonna get this sorted out and then ain’t nothing ever taking you away from me again.”

  Cornelius pointed at me. “I’m sorry about this, hunter. I am. I don’t like having to do this, but it’s for the best.”

  I licked my lips. With the vampire’s speed, there was no way I could reach my Kimber in time. “Is it the Ancients? Are they behind this?”

  Cornelius smiled sadly. “There are so many things that you don’t know, Sam Harlan. I’ll answer your questions. It seems only fair.”

  “Quit jabbering with him,” Lottie said. “She’s here.”

  “She?” I asked.

  Any hope that I had for Callie’s return sank as Minerva Higby entered the room. She was dressed in tight black leather pants and a sparkly silver shirt, and she was grinning from ear to ear. But, before my brain could process what was happening, another vampire followed Minerva into the room.

  “Spurlock,” I muttered. “Of course.”

  Tessa Spurlock glanced around the room, her eyes resting momentarily on Desmond before landing on me. “Thanks for calling, my Queen. They were alone, right?”

  “Just them,” Lottie said.

  “They didn’t call anybody else?”

  “Who do you think we called?” I asked.

  Spurlock snorted. “At this point, it doesn’t really matter.”