Night Call (Book 2): Demon Dei

by L. J. Hayward

Unable to think straight, Erin dialled the hospital where William was. While it rang, she stood and wandered, unable to sit still while her thoughts tumbled one over the other. Finally, someone answered and, finding what might be an office, Erin identified herself, grateful it was a nurse she knew rather well.

  “Hey, Erin, we were wondering where you’d got to,” Nadine said in that soft voice all hospital workers seemed to adopt late at night.

  “Something unavoidable at work came up. How’s he doing?”

  “Really good. His latest blood culture came back negative.”

  Erin let out a long, painful sigh. Inexplicable tears stung her eyes. She fumbled her way into the chair at the desk.

  “Honey,” Nadine murmured, that sixth sense of nurses kicking in, “it’ll be okay. He’s strong, you know that. Another day or two and he’ll be ready to go home.”

  “Thank you, Nadine,” Erin said, forcing back the tears.

  “Get some sleep, and that’s an order from a medical professional.”

  “I’ll try,” Erin said and they made their goodbyes.

  Sitting back in the office chair, something eased inside Erin’s chest. Seems like they’d beaten the Devil—or God—once more. How many more times they could do it remained to be seen.

  The office was illuminated by soft moonlight coming in through the open curtains over the windows. It was small, crowded by the desk and bookshelves against all available wall space. Erin turned on a lamp and wandered around, looking at the spines of the books. Chemistry and biology text books, clinical pathology references, medical texts and journals, several shelves of dog-eared detective novels; some horror, though judging by the amount dust on them, she guessed Matt hadn’t read them in some time—probably not since his own life had turned into something of a horror story. His history on display.

  At last, she found the books that most reflected his life at the moment. Eight books about vampires, some of which looked very old, a couple on werewolves, a ‘field guide’ to supernatural creatures and a dozen, spiral bound notebooks. Pulling one out, Erin opened it to a page of neat handwriting.

  Under a date was a short, concise entry.

  Susan spoke today. She said she wanted to kill me and drink my blood. I asked her why she wanted to do that and she refused to speak again. A Pos given. She slept for twenty hours.

  Am I doing the right thing?

  He didn’t answer his own question and on the next line was another entry, detailing the effects of differing blood groups.

  Susan was Mercy’s true name. At least, the name of the human she had once been. The date showed the entry to be a couple of years old. Flicking through the journal, Erin noted that Matt began referring to her as Mercy not long later. It was clear that as the vampire emerged from the ruins of the human, she was not Susan Greyson anymore.

  Erin put the journal back on the shelf without reading any more. It felt wrong to pry into that part of their lives, especially when she wanted nothing to do with them.

  She returned to the couch, determined to stay awake throughout the remainder of the night. Someone needed to be on watch for mad vampires or demons.

  The next thing she knew was someone swearing.

  Sunlight peeked through the curtains opposite the couch. Erin sat up, blinked the sleep out of her eyes and winced at the twinge of pain in her lower back. Couch sleeping was for the young. The room came into slow focus and she remembered where she was.

  More muttered swearing came from somewhere behind her. She stood, realised she had to pee and dashed upstairs to the bathroom she’d found the night before. Relieved, she came back down and found Matt stalking past the bottom of the stairs. He only wore a pair of loose track pants.

  “Morning,” he groused.

  “You’re chipper.” She followed him into the kitchen, watching for signs of irrational rage—beyond the obvious, that was.

  “Blue screen of death. Cornflakes?”

  “Sorry?”

  He pulled a box of cereal from a cupboard. “Do you want cornflakes for breakfast?”

  “No. And blue screen of death?”

  “On the computer. I’ve been meaning to upgrade the hard drive but you know how it is.” Matt poured himself a generous bowl of flakes and added grapes.

  “Busy with vampires and werewolves, yeah I know how it is.” Erin checked out the coffee situation. Which turned out to be that there wasn’t any. “No coffee?” She could hardly keep the fear out of her voice.

  He patted his admittedly taut abdominals. “I’m off caffeine. This body is now a temple.” Then he dumped half a tonne of sugar on his cornflakes. “And oddly, I haven’t been busy with vampires or weres or much of anything lately. I was referring more to the fact that when there is nothing to do, you can’t seem to do anything.”

  “I think the term is ennui and there’s Coke in the fridge.”

  “For emergencies only. You’re free to have some if you want. Ennui it might be but you can’t avoid the fact there is a distinct lack of supernatural bad guys around the place lately. Obvious exceptions excepted, of course.” He crunched a mouthful of cereal.

  “Of course.” Getting desperate, she asked plaintively, “Tea?”

  “In that cupboard.”

  Relaxing a bit, Erin made herself a cup of tea. “Your lazy boredom to the side, why aren’t there any vampires for you to kill? When I saw you that last time you seemed to think there was more than enough to keep you going.”

  He had, in fact, hinted that he might need help. She’d rejected him before it could grow from a hint into something more solid.

  “And there was, for a while at least. Then they all left. Well, most of them. A few hardy souls have stuck around, but they’re laying so low the worms are charging them rent.”

  Erin sat down opposite him. “Could it have anything to do with that demon?” It still felt a bit unreal to be talking about something used to scare her as a child.

  Matt poked at the dregs of his breakfast, hair falling across his brow in an untidy, just got out of bed, tumble. “I don’t think so. The vampires cleared out a couple of months back. If it had been here that long I’m sure I would have...” He shrugged and gave her a quick, rueful smile. “Felt it or something before now.”

  Erin swallowed a sip of scalding tea. “Or been affected by it.”

  He sighed and got up to put his bowl in the sink, with other such leavings. “I’m sorry about that. It caught me unawares.” Back to her, he gripped the kitchen bench and his shoulders tensed. “Merce went dark quicker than I’ve ever seen before. And she nearly took me down with her. It’s never, ever, been like that before. I can always resist and I can always control her.”

  “Always?” Erin couldn’t help herself. She asked before thinking twice, remembering the way he’d come after her, intent on making her dinner for Mercy.

  He flinched.

  Erin fought down the impulse to apologise and left the kitchen. She took her tea onto the back patio and stared at the water while she drank. How much could she blame him for what had happened? He hadn’t asked to have Mercy thrust onto him, to become so intimately linked with such an unfathomable creature. It wasn’t as if he chose to suffer the mindless rages that had shaped so much of his history. He hadn’t been the one to draw her into his life.

  Maybe she should ease up on him.

  Movement in the corner of her eye caught her attention. A man stood on the patio of the house next door. About her age, hair thinning a bit on top and a little saggy in the middle, he held a mug but ignored it in favour of gaping at her.

  She could guess how it looked. A strange woman in rumpled clothes with dishevelled hair standing on his neighbour’s patio in the early morning.

  A treacherous part of her made her smile at him.

  Eyes widening, he dashed back inside his house.

  “I see you’ve met Charles,” Matt said, coming up beside her.

  “I’m going to hazard a guess and say he doesn’t like you.”


  “Thinks I’m odd, for some reason. I just wanted to apologise again, and thank you for driving last night. I really appreciate it.”

  “What else could I have done?”

  He shrugged. “Left us there.”

  She probably deserved that one. “You don’t pull punches, do you.”

  A hint of his devastating smile flashed across his face. “Neither do you. Besides, life’s too short to be polite. Tell it like it is and get over it.”

  “That’s your motto?”

  “More like a mantra. Mercy treat you okay last night?”

  Erin nodded, then thought to give him some of his own mantra. “No. She was sulky and uncommunicative.”

  “I would apologise for her, but then I would spend my entire day doing that if I started. In vampire terms, I think she’s a teenager.”

  Enough said. “In that case, bury her in the ground up to her neck and come back in a couple of years.”

  He laughed. “I’ll catch a shower and then take you back to your car.” Heading inside, he added, “There’s a shower upstairs if you want one. I can get you a towel.”

  She agreed and followed him in. He got a towel from a stack in his en suite, promised it was fresh, and loaded her up with liquid soap. Then he went into Mercy’s room and emerged a moment later with shampoo and conditioner.

  “She won’t mind?” Erin asked, not wanting a grumpy vampire hunting her down for something so trivial.

  “Nah.”

  She went upstairs, showered, shampooed, conditioned and made it back down before Matt emerged. When he did, he was wearing a Wolfmother shirt, jeans and a support around his knee. A quick hunt later found his sneakers and they were good to go.

  It felt strange to be in his car with him, intimate. He was only a foot away and there was no escape. All of her worries flooded back in, overriding the decision to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  He drove with casual confidence, one hand on the steering wheel, the other resting on his thigh. The black car swept in and out of traffic on the motorway, sitting on the speed limit most of the time.

  “How have you been?”

  His question caught her off guard. She knew what he meant.

  “Okay.” It was easier to answer than to dodge.

  Matt glanced at her. “I don’t think so.”

  Erin pressed her lips together. This was part of why she hadn’t wanted him around.

  “Erin, you went through hell with Veilchen. Have you talked to anyone about it?”

  “Who could I talk to? No one would believe me.”

  She thought he would immediately promote himself to the role her councillor.

  “If you told Ivan everything, you two could have helped each other out.”

  “Not you?” It came out caustic.

  “I’m willing. I just didn’t think you would have accepted that.”

  Teeth grinding, she said, “After last night, I’m not likely to change my mind.”

  “Fair enough. But I have to ask. Are you always this stubborn or is it just me?” He sounded genuinely curious.

  She let out a short, twisted laugh. “What do you expect from me, Matt? Do you honestly think that just because you know a bit about vampires and werewolves that you’re the answer to every problem there is?”

  “No, of course not. And that’s not all I’m talking about. I don’t know what’s wrong with your husband, but I can see what you’re going through. I’ve seen it before. I can—”

  “You can leave him out of this, for starters. He has nothing to do with any of your shit.” She hated the way her voice cracked.

  “All right,” Matt said softly. “I don’t want to upset you.”

  It was a couple of kilometres down the road before she felt she could talk again without bursting into tears. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped.”

  “It’s okay. I shouldn’t have pushed.”

  Another distance along and Matt said, “So, am I going to have to move now that you know where I live?”

  “Afraid I’ll give away your final secret?”

  “More afraid of stalking, to be honest.”

  She snorted, he grinned and the tension eased.

  “Mind if we make a quick stop before going to your car? It’s on the way, sort of,” Matt asked as he took the motorway exit onto Kingsford Smith Drive.

  “Go for it.” Feeling a touch more comfortable, she decided it was now or never to broach the subject sitting between them like an elephant. “You’re certain it was a demon?”

  “I got the same sense off it as I get off imps and Mercy said it smelled like an imp. Imps are a form of demon, ergo, that thing last night was a demon.”

  “Imps?”

  “Yeah. Itty bitty demons. Cute if they’re not chowing down on prize winning Burmese cats.”

  Her expression must have told him she wasn’t in the mood, so he elaborated.

  “Lately, we seem to be suffering an infestation of imps. I don’t know where they came from. All I know is that most of my work the past couple of months has been catching the little bastards. Had no idea what they were at first, but one of Jacob’s contacts recognised them.”

  “Jacob?”

  “You’ll meet him. We’re going to his place now.”

  An associate of Matt’s. Fantastic. How did she end up here? She was only just coming to reluctant grips with Matt; now here she was, in his car, on her way to meet someone who knew someone who knew about demons.

  Why did everything associated with Hawkins feel like an avalanche?

  “So,” she said, resigned to doing her best just to stay on top, “a demon. As in a fallen angel, Satan, opposing God, possessing poor little rich girls, demon. How do you manage to find all this trouble, Hawkins?”

  “Talent?”

  “How did you piss off a demon?”

  “Talent?” he tried again, then relented. “I have no idea. Maybe it doesn’t like me killing off the imps. I’m hoping Jacob’s heard something, or can find something out.”

  He pulled up at the east end of Edward Street.

  “I won’t be long if you want to wait here.”

  She just got out and waited for him to catch up. He grinned at her and lead the way into a shop called Vogon Books. A balding, middle-aged man was at the counter. He was bent over a book but his head shot up and his gaze arrowed in on Erin with frightful intensity.

  “Down boy,” Matt said, mockingly stern. “You know what a woman looks like.”

  “Yeah, but I had to wonder if you did. You don’t ever come in here with one.” He looked her over. “Oh, hey, I know you. The intrepid PI. I’m Jacob.” He held out a hand.

  He was nothing like she imagined an associate of Hawkins’ being. “Hello, Jacob. How do you know me?”

  Matt slouched over the counter and picked up Jacob’s book.

  “Saw you on the news in May, when Matt’s house was shot up.” Jacob tapped his head. “I never forget a pretty face.”

  “When did this get in?” Matt demanded, shoving the book at Jacob. “You know I wanted to read it ASAP.”

  Jacob snatched the book back. “It came in yesterday. I was going to call you today.”

  “I bet you were. Where’s my copy?” Matt ducked around the counter, shoving Jacob out of the way as he searched the stacks of books piled on the floor.

  “Um, Matt,” Erin said. “Will you have time to read?”

  “That’s not the issue.” “I’m sure it is,” Jacob said, sneaking a book off the last pile and handing it to Erin behind his back.

  Erin read the blurb. A hell-for-leather PI and trusty sidekick solving crimes. Nothing she shouldn’t have expected after seeing his study, but still. “Oh, please.”

  Matt stopped his furious search and glared at Erin. “Hey. They’re good books.”

  “I’m sure they are.” She tossed him the book.

  Matt grumbled and shoved the book in his back pocket. “Put it on my account. And get out the ledger. G
ot a new nasty for you.”

  Jacob went still, but his eyes flashed toward Erin meaningfully.

  “It was a demon apparently,” she said.

  “She’s in the know, Jacob,” Matt said. “Deal with it.”

  The little man pulled out a black ledger and opened it. The pages were full of neat, small hand writing.

  “Don’t tell me the Night Crawler here got you messed up in his troubles again?” Jacob asked her as he began writing.

  “Jacob,” Matt said, quiet but warningly.

  Jacob glanced at him and something a little scared went through his eyes. “Hey, just curious.”

  “Don’t be.” Then Matt cocked an eyebrow. “Night Crawler? How long you been waiting to use that one?”

  The moment was gone before Erin was certain it had even been there.

  Jacob smirked and said, “Not long. Only thought of it yesterday. So, demon, huh? Imp? Familiar?”

  Erin looked from one to the other, unsure of what to make of their relationship. They seemed friendly enough but there was history, something that made Jacob wary. The way Jacob had looked at Matt for an instant was how she’d looked at him a time or three. Had Matt’s berserker side touched everyone he knew?

  Matt made a dismissive sound. “Nothing that small. Jeez. This was a full on winged beast that tossed Mercy around like so much limp spaghetti.”

  “Winged beast?” Jacob asked sceptically.

  “It had wings.”

  “It did,” Erin said. The men were over the moment, so she may as well get over it too. “It looked angelic.”

  “Yeah,” Matt said, grinning. “Female angelic.”

  Jacob’s eyes lit up. “An angel? A fallen angel?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I have you, Jacob. Or more specifically, your contacts. Can Creighton tell us about this demon like he did the imps? Is it affected by salt? Does music put it to sleep?”

  Jacob shrugged. “Not sure. Creighton said he only recognised the imp because he saw a picture of one killed in Mexico in the 1800s. He’s not a demonologist, you know.”

  “Well, do you know a demonologist?”

  “Nope.”

  “Can you find one?”

  Jacob made a praying gesture and bowed, all of it sarcastic. “I’ll see what I can do, my master.”