“Of course.” He gestured to the sofa, and then he sat down in the old man’s chair, crossing his legs. “Let us talk.”
“You seem like a pretty with-it ghost.”
“I guess you could call me that.” He grinned but then I saw a little brooding smolder in his eyes. “I know I’m dead. It’s a very stark thing to be aware of.”
“Uhh…right.” I guess it would be. “And so you know…I can’t let you stay here. I mean, I’m sure you don’t want to stay here. I need to help you move on.”
“Hm.” His fingers laced.
“Right?”
“No comment.”
Great. He was going to be a typical long-term resident ghost after all. Didn’t want to move on. Didn’t want to talk about anything. It was like trying to convince my parents they needed a therapist. Ghosts were usually just people who really, really needed therapy, so much so that they were stuck in their unhealthy relationship with living in one particular house forever.
I had many hats, doing this job. Ripping up carpet, picking out paint colors, obliterating imp swarms, and ghost counseling.
I sipped my wine. “When did you die, anyway?”
“1973,” he said.
1973? He looked so darkly romantic that I felt like he should have died in 1873, in Paris, from drinking too much absinthe or something. “Oh, so you really know about the carpeting. And…the drugs?”
“It wasn’t that,” he said, narrowing his eyes at me a little, while turning back on the killer smile.
“So, you and Mr. Capello were…friends?”
“This is your ghost interrogation, is it?” he asked, leaning forward a little, his golden eyes dancing a little with a combination of danger and amusement. “I’ll tell you my story of woe, and then move on to the afterlife, and you will sell my dear friend’s house as a vacation home for a family of five. He’s a lobbyist for the Potions Bureau. She’s a secretary at a mundane company, just for fun. The kids are spoiled as hell but well-trained in surface manners…”
“Nooo,” I said. I drank half my wine. “I don’t have the energy to get into it with you tonight, okay? But you can’t stay. And you know that.”
No woman could have looked at him without feeling something, and it was annoying me, because I knew it was just incubus magic. He was just so gorgeous and so…charged. Looking at him was making my body quiver with unspoken need, making me think about the fact that incubi were all seriously hung. I’d never experienced that before. He leaned forward just a little, panther-like.
“I’m here for a reason,” he said. “And I hope you figure out what it is.”
“You can’t tell me?”
“No. My lips are sewn shut.”
With that, he disappeared again, and a little shiver went down my spine.
Chapter Nine
Helena
And just like that, I was up late, scouring the library. The shelves had large gaps, but it was still full of dogeared paperbacks and Encyclopedias I needed to clear out. Graham said he didn’t have any other family, and I could see why he didn’t want most of his grandfather’s stuff. Most of it was just more mystery novels. But there were a few common spell books left, the mass produced type. They surely had a little spell on them to deflect the notice of ordinary humans so they escaped the estate sale. I found the spell that shows how to sew shut the lips of a corpse to keep dead men from telling tales. There were even detailed engravings to illustrate! I probably shouldn’t have been so excited, but there was still a creepy little kid inside the competent adult.
What I didn’t find was any inkling as to why the incubus was dead or in any sort of trouble.
Hmm…
What do you want to bet…that stuff Graham buried…
I wished I could travel back in time, get those books, and then ring his clueless neck. What could I say for him to tell me where he put the stuff? I wasn’t finding any grimoires. Just thinking about it made nausea churn through my stomach. That stuff he got rid of might have been worth more than this entire house. My internal accountant was already dying, but my internal witch would be tortured for all eternity.
Eventually I decided to try a different tactic as I noticed some photo albums shoved in the corner of a low shelf. Weird that Graham left family photos behind. Maybe I needed to start by finding out more about Fiore Capello and what sort of life he led. He was a dark warlock, so I wouldn’t know his acquaintances by sight, but I could spot the robes, suits and badges of different offices.
Anyway, old pictures were fun to browse. Since Fiore was over a century old when he died, the photos began with stiff old portraits of people who were probably his parents and other family members, then little kids with white playsuits and teddy bears and button-up shoes, then a graduation photo from Stormwind Academy in New York, an institution I was familiar with because it was the backup high school for my brother Harris and I had cousins who went there. It was a very respectable school, but also known as sort of a flashy, party school.
So…he came from a pretty good family, I thought. But he became a Sinistral warlock, so at some point he was banished from Etherium…and became a dark warlock.
I wondered what he had done to be barred. Judging by the incubus haunting his house, I assumed it was consorting with demons, but I was dying to know why this extremely hot creature was actually lingering in his house past death.
As I turned the pages, I saw Fiore turning into a pretty attractive dude himself, with a strong resemblance to his grandson. He went on to attend Merlin College, the same place my brother went.
Huh.
Fiore’s photographs suggested a suave, Mad Men-esque lifestyle in the 1950s. He married a petite blonde witch who always looked a little sad. They had two kids, trips to Manhattan and some beach resort, Christmases with lots of presents, and adult parties with lots of suits, cocktail dresses and gold-edged barware. Nothing special there.
Then, suddenly I got hit with a photo of a tombstone for Judy Capello, and from that moment onward, the sad blonde had vanished from the photos. For a witch to die young was unusual. Sure, witches could die of heart attacks or aggressive cancers or car accidents. But since we had both healing magic and access to modern medicine, it was pretty strange. It usually suggested she was killed by something.
But the plot really thickened when a smoky-eyed bombshell entered the picture, and the two other kids started appearing less. The cocktail parties were gone and now Fiore only seemed to hang out with the sexy woman and three other guys.
One of the guys was definitely my incubus ghost, and he looked a lot like Fiore’s wife.
So Fiore married a pureblood succubus demon and made friends with his incubus brother-in-law? Yeah, that’ll get you kicked out of Etherium for sure…
Soon, a gorgeous baby boy was born, and I guessed this was Graham’s father. The resemblance was even more uncanny.
Which meant Graham was one-quarter warlock, one-quarter incubus, and…well, that explains a lot about why I agreed to go on that date.
I was relieved to have a sensible magical explanation as to why I had been so horny ever since I got involved with this house.
But Graham has no idea.
Good lord. That’s criminal.
The photographs, naturally, followed the laws of the magical world that said, you can never photograph the magical world. There were no pictures from the parallels, the spots that stood between worlds, or of any magic being cast or demon forms or familiars. You never spotted an altar or grimoire in the background. No one looking at these photos would ever suspect they were looking at warlocks and demons.
But there was definitely a scandal: a dead wife, an old family replaced by a new family. Graham must know about that. It was all right here in the photos. But they must have grown estranged. No family. I kept thinking about that. Kinda sad to be all alone in the world. It would explain why he left the photos here.
I kept going through them but it was pretty boring from there on out. Mainly, I wondered who t
he two other men were that Fiore was always spending time with. It was sooo annoying when people didn’t label their photos.
I shut the book and sighed.
Back to work in the morning, so I blew up an inflatable mattress, made the bed, cast a little protection spell, and crashed onto the pillow. I was plastered from the work and the Sullivan brothers would be back around lunch. I used to have trouble sleeping when I was younger, but ever since I’d started doing a lot of manual labor, I slept like a log.
Usually.
I kept thinking about Jake trying to get Jasper to go on a date with me. Does he actually like me? And why would I care? I’m not dating either of them, or any werewolf, they’re just so…you know. Imagine me having a huge set of Irish werewolf in-laws. I would rather teach preschool and the noise level is probably similar.
I was just too charged up.
And I wasn’t about to start taking care of my needs, because this house was haunted, and a ghost like that was sure to watch.
I wondered if it was safe to go to the truck and take care of it there, but that sounded too pathetic for words. I just needed to stop thinking with my loins. There was no time for this nonsense.
I was finally starting to get tired…
I was aware that I was in a dream, but it was a very vivid dream. I was standing in a beautiful garden built onto a terraced hillside with wildflowers and vines crawling around ironwork and fountains worthy of a European palace.
My hair was long and loose and I was wearing a floor-length dress that was completely sheer, showing off lingerie underneath that was nicer than anything I currently owned. In the dream world, I was less fazed by this than I would be under normal circumstances. I was holding some bird seed and feeding some song birds. The part of the garden where I was standing was surrounded by gates, and just outside the iron gate, the incubus was watching me. He was wearing a suit that somehow fit around his wings and tail, but he had the suit jacket slung over his shoulder so I could see how the shirt material fit around his broad chest and muscular arms.
Tasty.
“Now I see that your true form is that of a goddess,” he said.
“Hardly.” I wet my lips a little, unable to take my eyes off of him for a moment, but then I went back to feeding the birds.
“You have taken ownership of my house and shut me out,” he said. “Usually my dreams are a little more…debauched.”
The gate was locked, I noticed, with chains and a padlock. He couldn’t get in to the heart of the garden.
That was the protection spell I had cast before sleeping.
“So this is how it will be,” he said. “You will banish me from my home.”
“I can’t stay here for long,” I said. “And neither can you. Homes need flesh and blood owners. Gardens need tending. Otherwise you’re just haunting a shell.”
“I was hoping someone would come along after Fiore died,” he said. “The right person.” The words rolled, soft and low, off his lips.
“I’m just doing my job,” I said. “If I hadn’t bought the house, someone else would. I don’t know what I can do for a ghost.”
“I can tell you one thing.”
“What?”
“Open this gate.”
I walked right into that one. “Yeah, right. I’m not letting an incubus into my dreams. Bad enough that you put me in this outfit.”
“You can’t blame that on me. The subconscious does some interesting things. What were you thinking before you went to bed?” His amber eyes compelled me even from a distance, and to his credit, they mostly stuck to my face and not the curves revealed under the sheer dream dress. “I could satisfy you with no consequences,” he said. “It’s just a dream.”
“Just a dream, my ass! The same way you’re just a man! No…I don’t deal with demons.”
“Your loss,” he said. “It’s my highest purpose in life to bring you pleasure.”
Chapter Ten
Helena
I woke up drenched in sweat and even more starved for some physical attention than before. Holy shit. I had to get this house done as quickly as possible. Maybe I could just leave the incubus here and market the house to single women. The real estate listing wrote itself: You’ll love the original details in this Victorian charmer! Four bedrooms and one hot ghost ready to keep you busy in them.
The house didn’t have a shower and I didn’t want to take the time to scrub down the old clawfoot tub and take a bath, so I did my best to bathe off my sexually charged dream sweat with a wet rag, change into jeans and an old t-shirt, and then it was back to work. I tested the clawfoot tub for lead paint, and of course it was positive, so that was too dangerous to salvage. Heartbreaking. Maybe the guys would carry it downstairs.
I was disturbed at how readily my mind was starting to assign them more jobs, and vowed instead to wait on the tub until I could get my own crew in here. The bathroom remodel could wait until then.
So, I just started moving out as much junk as I could while making a list of smaller projects I could handle with the supplies in my truck, and another list of things I would get on my own home improvement store run. The plaster in the master bedroom was still in fantastic shape, just a few ceiling cracks needed patching, and the light green paint was lead-free. Nice. Not everyone would like the green bedroom, but I thought it was pretty, with sort of a permanent spring feeling. And there was a window seat with a built in bookcase next to it. I was thinking of staging it with a rocking chair or maybe even a wicker chair by the window and a houseplant or two for sort of a Victorian sunroom feel. This house really has a lot of upsides. This whole room hardly needs anything except refinishing the hardwood.
Most of the walls I would paint a very light gray, I thought, with the window frames and trim in white. That was trendy and neutral, but the pink dining room and green bedroom would have that little bit of quirkiness. Oh, yes. I could see it. This would be such a relaxing house once, you know, all the demons were gone.
When Jake and Jasper returned, I was back to work trying to pry up the kitchen floor.
“Princess Hel on her hands and knees,” Jake said. “You’re like Cinderella in reverse.”
I sprung up and dusted off my knees. “And I’ll be glad when you’re gone so I can get back to talking to mice.”
He chuckled. “Well, we’ve got more than enough material to redo those floors for you, and then you can dance and sing with the mice all the live-long day.”
I wished he wasn’t so useful to have around. Or that his teasing grins didn’t involve such charming dimples and sharp canine teeth. Fangs were one of my secret weaknesses.
“Any more imps?” he asked.
“Oh…no,” I said. “You don’t get more than one infestation.”
“How about the poltergeist.”
“The poltergeist?”
“The one that slammed the door while we were talking? Anyway, even I can tell there is something going on here.” He rapped the wall.
Right. That was probably the incubus. “Oh, no. No drama this morning. Just a lot of sweat.” I shouldn’t have said that. It was making me think about the dream again. There was definitely some appeal in seeing what incubus sex was like, just once, in a dream setting…but even that would sap the life out of me. Infiltrating dreams were a classic way for an incubus to gain power.
“So your leg is still feeling fine?”
“Yes. All good.”
“Have you just been working on this floor all morning?” Jasper asked, because clearly I had made little progress.
“No! I walked the house and made a list, and I tested for lead paint in a few spots where I was hoping I wouldn’t find any. To mixed results. The tub will have to go.”
“Damn,” Jasper said.
We all knew the pain of a beautiful, poisonous clawfoot tub.
“You want us to move that out for you?” Jasper asked. “Into the yard, at least, so it’s not in your way?”
“Uhh…no. I got it.”
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“You got it? You know levitation spells, Princess?” Jake looked at Jasper and they went back out the door.
“Just so you know, my ancestors weren’t princesses, they were baronesses!” I said.
They returned with a dolly.
“Baroness,” Jake said, bowing to me before they went up the stairs.
I decided not to fight it, even though they were being nicer to me than I deserved, and I knew this was a bad idea. The first rule of magic is that all magic comes with a price, a trade of some kind. Having the Sullivan brothers just hang out and do a bunch of hard work for me? Well, that was magic too. And there had to be a price later.
They grunted and barked “Stop!” and “Wait wait wait” at each other as they dragged the heavy thing down the staircase, and then they dragged in their fresh materials to fix the floor above me, so I had to leave the kitchen alone for a while.
I liked to start with the easiest room and move on from there. Since I had already taken stock of the whole project, I went to the bedroom and got to work on the floors, moving out the old twin bed frame and one ratty armchair, then fixing up and filling in a few spots where nails were pulling up or gaps appeared between boards. I really enjoyed this stuff. It was like meditation, hours slipping by before I knew it. And while my rich family would have been horrified to see their daughter fussing with dirty old floors, one thing I could say about Jake and Jasper is that they got it. I could hear snippets of their conversation and they were loving every minute of the restoration.
Then I came to a crack in the floorboards that had been underneath the bed. The board seemed a little loose. I tried to pull it up. Painful heat shot through my nerves from fingers all the way up to my shoulders. I whipped my hands back too late.
But this was a good feeling to have in an old house. Once you shook it off.
“Ah-haaa…secret hiding place,” I whispered. I took out my wand and delicately tapped the edge of the board, sensing a protection spell. “Éclairer…” I should probably quit with the boarding school magical French, but it was habit by now. Really old school witches used Latin, and super modern—or low-class—witches used whatever language they actually spoke. But the daughters of wizarding royalty always used French. The pattern of the spell glowed, and I could see that it was a tricky knot.
Demons in the Bedroom (Paranormal House Flippers Book 1) Page 5
