Bedeviled

by Maureen Child

  “Hmm.”

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Nora said with a frown. “Not like I wasn’t thinking the same thing the whole plane ride home. Is Quinn really going to come to me? Or was he just looking for a good thing while it lasted?”

  “Nora—”

  “He seems great, but I’ve been wrong about men before.”

  Case in point, Maggie thought silently, Nora’s rotten-to-the-core ex-husband, who after seven years of marriage had left Nora for their babysitter, a nineteen-year-old bubblehead with an IQ to match her breast size.

  “I know, I know,” Nora said quickly, waving both hands as if dismissing this whole conversation. “I shouldn’t fall so fast and so hard. But, Mags . . . when I met Quinn it was like this instant connection. I’ve never felt anything like that before. It was like we were supposed to meet. Like someone somewhere had set it all up for us. Like it was meant to be.”

  Crap. More destiny stuff. Though Nora’s sounded much better than hers.

  “So why are you worried that he’s not going to show up?” Maggie’s voice was a hush in the quiet, and for a moment Nora felt as though they’d slipped back in time and they were kids again, whispering in the dark so their Gran wouldn’t hear them and know they were still awake.

  “I’m trying not to be,” she admitted.

  “Tell me about him.”

  Nora smiled, and even in the pale light Maggie could see the shine in her sister’s eyes. Nora always had led with her heart, and it looked like this time she was already more than half in love with her mystery man.

  “His name’s Quinn Terhune. He says he deals in futures.” She shrugged and picked at a loose chenille thread on Maggie’s pale green bedspread. “Stock market stuff, I guess. But oh, God, when he touches me I’m on fire.”

  “I know that feeling,” Maggie said.

  Nora’s lips quirked. “Tell me it’s not the tree-sleeping pixie.”

  She laughed. God, it was good to have Nora back. With everything else in her life so off-kilter, hearing her sister give her a hard time was enough to straighten things out a little.

  “Definitely not Bezel. Culhane. Which is just as bad, if not worse. He’s opinionated and bossy and annoying and wouldn’t even peel me off the ceiling the first time I floated.”

  “But . . .” Nora scrambled over Maggie and took a seat on the other side of the bed.

  “But,” Maggie admitted on a sigh, “there’s something there. I don’t know what, but the man’s hands are like electric or something. He touches me and I’m burning up.”

  “Wow.” Nora scooted around until her back was against the headboard, too. “Sounds like what it’s like with Quinn. Weird, huh? I swear, though, from the moment I met Quinn it was like . . . magic.”

  “Magic?” A tiny thread of worry spun out through Maggie’s system as she thought about her sister’s choice of words. What if there were more going on here than even she knew about? Culhane and Bezel both had warned her that there were demons and, heck, who knew what else out there gunning for her. What if one of them had found her sister and was planning on using Nora to get to Maggie?

  Along with that thread of worry came a white-hot slide of anger, too. Eileen and Nora hadn’t signed up for the Fae business. And damned if Maggie was going to allow her family to get dragged into this mess.

  “Nora,” Maggie said thoughtfully, “what are the odds that the two of us—with our lousy history with men—would each meet a guy like that? In the same week?”

  Slowly Nora tuned her head to look at her sister. “You don’t think—”

  “I don’t want to. But I think we ought to find out what exactly’s going on. If your guy Quinn is a demon or something, we have to know.”

  Nora stiffened, her features tightening. “He’s not.”

  “Hope you’re right.”

  “But what if he is?” Nora straightened up. “Then I had sex with a demon, for God’s sake, and invited him home, where he can get my daughter!”

  “Nobody’s going to get Eileen.” Maggie patted her hand. “When Culhane shows up again, I’ll ask him what’s going on.”

  “And if Quinn gets here before Culhane comes back?”

  “Well, then,” Maggie said as she untied her wrist from the bedpost, “we’ll just have to handle it ourselves.”

  Nora looked up at her. “That probably would have sounded more commanding if you weren’t floating.”

  Chapter Six

  Culhane shifted a hard look down a side street in Castle Bay. He’d come through the portal to check up on Maggie Donovan, but instead he was here, tracking a demon.

  The blasted things were all over this little town, and the humans didn’t have any idea. How was it, he wondered, that mortals could be so oblivious to their surroundings? How had they survived all this time without being able to sense danger?

  A glamour could alter a demon’s—or a Fae’s, for that matter—appearance. But the essence of who and what they were remained. Humans seemed to deliberately ignore any sign or hint of something out of the ordinary. If they felt watched, they put it down to paranoia. If something cold touched them, they told themselves they were imagining it.

  They had no sense of self-preservation.

  Culhane pushed away from the brick wall and moved through the crowd of pedestrians unseen. As much as these mortals baffled him, the fact that they were so unaware worked to his advantage most of the time. He moved among them, unseen unless he wished it different. Foolish humans were completely oblivious to the many and varied threats that moved among them.

  Scents and sounds surrounded him, so different from home. Here the colors were harsh, the noise a cacophony. His footsteps, though, were sure as he moved swiftly down a crowded sidewalk, darting through the crowd, his purpose uppermost in his mind.

  He’d been watching over Maggie and had seen the demon confront her in the grocery store. Though she hadn’t risen to the creature’s challenge, she’d found a way to escape it, so Culhane hadn’t intervened. He might even have allowed the demon to live if the same creature hadn’t been following her that morning. Clearly the demon still had plans to finish Maggie off and claim the Faery dust for itself.

  That, Culhane would not allow.

  Following the demon’s trail was easy enough. Though it wore its human costume, the demon’s underlying scent could not be hidden so easily. It went farther from the heart of the small town and moved closer to the harbor. Here the tang of the sea flavored the air. Here the buildings were older, dirtier, the streets narrower. The docks lay idle now but for a few pleasure craft, but the jetty that led to the old lighthouse was crowded with people wandering there and back as waves crashed and spray flew into the air.

  Culhane closed the distance between him and his prey, and it was then that the demon finally became aware that it was being followed. One quick look over its shoulder and the creature began to sprint. Running, shoving its way through the crowd, the beast in human costume made a desperate bid for escape. It shoved one man into the street, and a car horn blasted even as the driver slammed on his brakes to avoid hitting it.

  Culhane wasn’t more than a step or two behind the creature, so when the demon threw a child down to the sidewalk, Culhane jumped over the small, crying boy with ease. Damned if he’d play games with the thing. He had other business to take care of—such as turning a human female into a Fae warrior.

  The demon darted down a side street, ran between the parked cars and into a squat brown building with faded paint and broken windows. Flower boxes holding the skeletons of blooms long dead lined the front steps, and the door hung open as if in welcome.

  Culhane took the demon up on its invitation. Stepping into the building, he wrinkled his nose at the smells. The mortal world smelled badly enough, but this place was a true test of a warrior’s resolve. The stench of something rotten curled in the stale air, and Culhane knew he’d found a demon nest.

  Drawing his knife from the scabbard at his waist, he mo
ved farther into the shadows, eyes sharp, checking every hole and darkened corner. “You hide from me? Are you really such a coward?”

  “Coward?” The voice came from nowhere and everywhere. “You think you were following me? I led you here. You’re in my house now, Fae. The rules are mine.”

  Culhane laughed and heard rustling. The demon was constantly moving—looking for a better angle of attack? Or a better hiding place? “And your rules are to hide and jump out at me from the darkness? What a brave demon you are. This must be why they chose you to go after the human woman.”

  “What do you know about her?” The voice was sly, the question careful.

  The demon was still moving, shifting position in the house so that Culhane couldn’t keep a lock on it. But Culhane’s ears were attuned to every creak, every whisper, every slide of a foot against the floor. He knew precisely where the demon was now, but had no intention of giving that away.

  “She’s my charge,” Culhane shouted, to make sure that any others hiding in this pest-hole heard him. Too much rested on Maggie Donovan. He would take no chances with her safety. He never had. “Under my protection.”

  “Why does a Fae warrior care what happens to a mortal?”

  “Since when does a Fae warrior explain himself to a demon?” Culhane countered. The soft brush of cloth on wood told him where the demon was. Culhane tracked it without moving an inch.

  “She killed one of us.”

  “To protect herself. The demon was feasting on a human and then attacked her.”

  “Word is, her mate’s putting out a reward for the human bitch. You think I’m the only one who will be after her?”

  “My protection,” Culhane reminded it. His gaze moved carefully over the room, noting the torn furniture, the ripped carpet and the broken tables. Demons were all different, he knew. Some preferred opulent living here among the mortals. Some preferred anonymity. This one apparently leaned more toward a rathole.

  “I saw you stalking her,” Culhane said. “At the food store. You confronted her.”

  “Only a warning,” the demon cooed, its voice coming now from behind Culhane. “Only having some fun. Not like I could have killed her in the grocery store.”

  “You were still stalking her today, but you won’t kill her. She is beyond you.” Or would be soon. When Maggie Donovan fulfilled her destiny, she would be a force to be reckoned with throughout the worlds.

  “Because of the Fae power? Please.” Disgust and humor both rang in the demon’s voice. “She doesn’t know how to use it yet. She’ll be dead inside a month.”

  “Not by you or yours,” Culhane promised quietly. Then he spun around, stretched one hand into the shadows and grabbed the demon trying to slither closer. Fingers closing tight around the creature’s throat, Culhane yanked it into the half-light. The demon’s human mask had slipped, leaving behind only oily, dark green skin, red eyes and the hint of horns. “You should have stayed away from her.”

  “I didn’t hurt her,” the creature whined, pleading for mercy now that it had been caught.

  “And you won’t.” Culhane drew his knife back, thrust it forward and delivered the killing blow so fast, the demon never saw him move. As he dropped the creature to the dirty floor he bent over it, blew a stream of Faery dust over the demon’s body and watched as it exploded into dust.

  Finished, Culhane lifted his gaze again for one last sweep around the interior of the building. He sensed the presence of others, though they were making no move to confront him. Just as well, he thought. He’d spent more than enough time in this place. But before he left he issued one last warning.

  “I know there are more of you here. I could take the time to search you out and dispose of you as I have this one.” He slid his blade back into its scabbard with a whisper of sound.

  The house was silent, but Culhane knew they were still there. At least two more demons were hiding in the nest they’d built out of the humans’ leavings. So he spoke again, to make himself clear.

  “The woman has the protection of the Fae warriors. Leave her alone . . . or die. Your choice.”

  Then he turned, left the house and disappeared into the sunlight.

  “Oh, my pixie ass! What part of the word concentrate do you not understand? Stop worrying about floating and flying and worry more about the enemies who’ll be coming after you.”

  Maggie fixed a hard stare on the ugly little man who, over the last two days, had become the bane of her existence. “I am concentrating—on not floating so high I’m whipping around through the treetops! How’m I supposed to concentrate on more than one thing at a time?”

  “I thought women were supposed to be multitaskers.”

  Maggie’s feet hit the ground and she laughed. “Where’d you hear that?”

  “What?” He glowered at her, his silvery eyebrows drawing together over those weirdly pale blue eyes. “You think this world is the only one where women think they’re better than the rest of us?”

  “Man, I’d really love to meet your wife.” Any female, pixie or human, who would intentionally put up with this little jerk should be, in Maggie’s opinion, put up for sainthood.

  “That ain’t gonna happen,” he muttered, and kicked Sheba’s ball. Reluctantly the golden shuffled off after it. “She’s not real happy with me at the moment.”

  Delighted to take a break from her “training,” Maggie grabbed the change of subject and held on with both hands. “What’d you do? Drop pixie dust in the hallway?”

  “Funny. If you want to know, she didn’t want me coming here, helping Culhane.”

  Okay, that was surprising. Maggie reached up, lifted her hair off her neck and almost sighed as the cold wind buffeted her bare skin. “Why not?”

  “Nosy, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah.”

  He sighed, and his scraggly chin whiskers ruffled in the breeze. “For one thing, Fontana’s not real fond of humans. You guys are so big you make her nervous. But mostly she’s afraid Mab’ll find out and have me flayed.”

  Not what she was expecting to hear, for some reason. Her stomach jittered a little at the ugly picture his words had evoked. “Nice queen you got there.”

  “Yeah, she’s Ms. Popularity in Otherworld.”

  “If everybody hates her, how come nobody’s overthrown her?”

  His eyes narrowed on her. “Thought that’s what you were going to do.”

  Her? A revolutionary? “Not my plan. Culhane’s.”

  Just the mention of the Fae warrior’s name had tiny pools of heat forming in her center. She really didn’t want to admit that, even to herself, but it seemed that the longer he stayed away from her, the more she thought about him. Damn it. She even dreamed about him, long, tantalizing, sexual dreams where those magical hands of his stroked her body into a feverish pitch and she woke hot, needy and cranky.

  Meanwhile, Culhane was probably off in Fae having a grand old time, not giving her a thought, while she was sweating and being insulted by his pixie.

  “It’s a good plan.”

  Her gaze shifted to Bezel, who was watching her with a steady, penetrating stare.

  “You think I’m hopeless.”

  “Yeah, but I think all humans are hopeless. You’re no worse than the rest of them.”

  “Wow, thanks.” She stretched out on the grass and barely managed to stifle a groan as Sheba dropped her enormous body across Maggie’s chest. At least now she didn’t have to worry about floating.

  The sky overhead was smoke gray, with clouds the color of fresh bruises piling up over the ocean, getting ready to rush to shore. The bare-branched trees were rattling in a cold wind that heralded a coming storm, and every muscle in her body ached like a bad tooth. She had demons and Faery queens who wanted her dead, and a pixie making her life a living hell.

  How had she come to this?

  Seriously? Maggie was beginning to think it might be easier if she just let some demon eat her and have it over with.

  “Fee
ling sorry for yourself?”

  Maggie turned to look at the pixie as another frown crossed Bezel’s features. She idly noted how comfortable he seemed to be with that particular expression.

  “Maybe.”

  “Well, cut it out. You’ve got Fae blood in you, and the power, so it could work.” He lifted one long, bony finger and pointed it at her. “But you’ve got to try harder. You don’t exactly have a lot of time.”

  “I know, I know,” Maggie said on a sigh. “Demons are after me.”

  “It’s not just them you have to worry about. If Mab finds out about you . . . ”