A Fiend in Need

by Maureen Child

  A Fiend in Need

  Maureen Child

  A SIGNET ECLIPSE BOOK

  Chapter One

  My name is Cassidy Burke and I’m a Demon Duster.

  Is there a twelve-step program for that?

  Anyway, about a month ago I turned thirty-two, I found out demons really exist, my daughter’s long-lost father moved back to town, I had sex for the first time in way too long, my daughter got kidnapped by an evil demon and I found out I was a superhero or something.

  A full month.

  Oh, and did I mention the guy I actually had sex with turned out to be a demon, too? Yeah. Still getting used to that myself.

  As a Demon Duster, I’m supposed to rid the world of demons by punching my hand through their chests and ripping out their hearts. I hear you. Ew. But I’m getting used to it. At least, I thought I was. Up until the moment my darling daughter, Thea, turned to me and said, “Uh, Mom?”

  Every mother in the world recognizes that those two words, said in that exact tone, are never followed by the statement, I’ve got good news.

  I grabbed a brown sugar–and-cinnamon Pop Tart, took a big bite and muttered, “What?”

  “I was, um, looking around on the Internet to see if they had any more information about Demon Dusting.”

  Thea was sitting at the kitchen table in a golden slice of sunlight that was spearing through the wide window behind her. Her long black hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and her eyes looked worried. Not a good thing.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked. “What’d you find?”

  “This.” She leaned back in the chair, pointed to the screen of her laptop computer and waited for me to look.

  Sugar, our elephant-sized, black-and-white dog of indeterminate breed, was hiding under the table, hoping for crumbs. Me, I was just hoping that whatever Thea had found wasn’t going to make me nuts.

  I looked at the screen, blinked and looked again. Stunned, I dropped my Pop Tart, and Sugar made a lunge for it. “What?”

  “Guess that explains all the extra demons lately, huh?”

  I didn’t even glance at Thea. I was too busy staring at the Web site she had found: www.dollarstokilltheduster.com. Just perfect. I scanned the information quickly, hoping it was all a big joke. No such luck. It was real. Somebody out there was posting a reward for killing me.

  “They put it online?”

  “Well, at least it’s a nice picture of you,” Thea said.

  Actually, it wasn’t bad. My hair looked great in that picture, and, thank God, I was wearing makeup. But that wasn’t the point. “Great. I look good on my Wanted poster. Who’s doing this?”

  “I don’t know,” Thea answered, though I really hadn’t been expecting an answer at all. “But maybe killing the judge last month pissed off the demons.”

  I glanced at Thea, remembering how that bastard Judge Jenks had kidnapped her, with plans to sell her as a sex slave, and wished I could only go back in time and dust the old demon all over again.

  “How much are they offering for me?”

  “Right now?” Thea punched a button, the screen scrolled down and numbers flashed in blinking red lights: $10,000, DEAD OR ALIVE BUT PREFERABLY DEAD.

  “That’s it?” Now I was offended. I’m the scourge of the demon community and all they could come up with was ten thousand lousy bucks? Where were their standards? I was worth at least fifty!

  “Cheer up, Mom,” Thea pointed out as she disconnected and closed the computer lid. “Maybe it’ll go up.”

  “Sure, sure.” I glanced at her as she got up, and moved my bare foot when Sugar licked crumbs off of it. “Where’re you going?”

  “School,” she said. “Unless you want to give me the day off?”

  “Nice try, but I don’t think so.” She didn’t even look disappointed. No big surprise there. Thea’s a math genius. I have no idea where she got it, but the girl’s amazing—plus, she actually likes school. Weird, but there you go.

  Outside, a car horn honked, and I winced. Thea’s father had moved back to La Sombra the month before, and when he discovered that he had a nearly sixteen-year-old daughter he’d never known about, he’d been a little testy. Since then he’s been making up for lost time. He takes Thea to school every morning and shows up with food at least twice a week, to wangle an invite to dinner.

  I have to hand it to him: He really knows me well. Show up with food and the chances of your getting in my door are really good.

  I walked outside with Thea and lifted a hand in a halfhearted wave to Logan. We had a kind of weird relationship. There was a lot of sizzle and heat, but so far I’d managed to resist. Because at the moment I was getting plenty of sizzle and heat from a different guy: Devlin, the demon I mentioned earlier.

  Needless to say, Logan and Devlin hated each other’s guts, which, while entertaining, was sometimes a pain in the ass.

  “Hey, Cassie!” Logan leaned out of the driver’s-side window and grinned at me. He’s the only person in my life who calls me Cassie. Irritating and yet somehow endearing. God, I’m a sap.

  “Morning, Logan.”

  “Wanted to tell you the deal went through.”

  “What deal?”

  He rolled his eyes. “You never actually listen to me when I talk, do you?”

  “Not really.”

  Thea climbed in the passenger side, but Logan didn’t put the car in gear. Instead, he leaned further out the window and said, “I bought the house.”

  “What house?”

  He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. I glanced in that direction and spotted the SOLD sign on the house across the street. No way.

  “You bought the Johnsons’ house?”

  “Just yesterday, neighbor.”

  Oh, crap.

  Logan was grinning, and even Thea looked pleased. I sighed. How could I resist something that made my girl so damn happy? She was glad to have a father. Glad to have two parents to torture. And to be honest, Logan was really getting into the whole father thing.

  So, it was only me thinking that this was a bad idea. Only me realizing that having Logan across the street was going to make me crazy in no time at all.

  “I’ll bring dinner tonight,” Logan was saying. “Tell you guys all about it.”

  Whatever.

  When they were gone, I turned and headed back into the house. I hadn’t even shut the door yet when a gorgeous man was standing on my porch.

  And I mean seriously, orgasm-inducing-just-by-looking-at-him gorgeous. He had to be at least six-foot-five, with shoulder-length, dark blond hair and eyes so pale a blue they looked almost silver. His chest was broad, only barely covered by a wispy white shirt that opened his Pecs to glorious view—those muscles of his looked like they’d been carved out of bronze. His jaw was square, his lips full and parted in a worried smile, and his legs were about a mile and a half long.

  But I already knew that a pretty face could be hiding horns and a tail. So I grabbed the bottle of demon spray I kept beside the front door and gave him a squirt right between those beautiful eyes.

  No smoke.

  No screams.

  So, he wasn’t a demon. This mixture, given to me by my “trainer,” Jasmine, a tiny woman who looked a couple of hundred years old, reacted like acid on demons. Made them cranky and distracted them enough that I could dust ’em before they could dust me.

  He swiped one big hand across his face to wipe off the greenish brown liquid, then looked at me and said, “Sanctuary.”

  “What?”

  “Just say yes,” the great-looking guy ordered, and flipped a quick look over his shoulder.

  “Are you selling something?” I asked. “Because if you are, you should know I’m really not in the mood. Can’t afford to buy anyth
ing, and I don’t have enough time to be ‘saved.’ So better luck at the next house—”

  “I’m not selling anything.” He looked over his shoulder again and this time I looked, too. Nothing out there but that damned SOLD sign on the house across the street.

  Sugar came up behind me, bumped the back of my knees with her head and almost toppled me out the door. The dog was whining, Mr. Gorgeous was practically dancing in place and I was fresh out of patience. “Bye.”

  “Sanctuary,” he repeated, like I should know what the hell he was talking about.

  Ah, God. Another escapee from the local Nutso Hotel. La Sombra’s got one of the biggest mental-health facilities in the state. Every once in a while, though, somebody wandered away from their Jell-O cups. Wouldn’t you know he’d find his way to my door?

  “Okay then, sanctuary to you, too,” I said. No point in upsetting the crazy people.

  “Just say yes,” he implored, and he looked just a touch more frantic this time.

  “Why would I say yes?” I asked.

  “Good enough!” He pushed past me into the house, and Sugar howled when he tripped on her.

  “Hey!” I didn’t even have time to grab him and toss his ass back outside before a demon appeared on the porch.

  Yeah, this one I knew was a demon. His red eyes were pretty much the big tip-off. And then there was the drool. Ew. He was furious and made a grab for Gorgeous George. The big guy jumped back, Sugar’s howl went up a notch and I gave ol’ demon boy a good long squirt. While he was shrieking in pain and the smoke was lifting off the top of his head, I reached into his chest and grabbed his heart.

  Just before he died, though, the demon yelled, “Sanctuary won’t save you!”

  Then he was just dust on my freshly swept porch.

  I turned around to look at the guy behind me. He grinned at me and said, “Thanks. I owe you one.”

  “That about sums it up. Who the hell are you?”

  “The name’s Brady,” he said, leaning down to stroke his hand over Sugar’s head. She’d stopped howling and was staring up at him like he was a big bowl of buttered popcorn (her favorite).

  “Nice to meet you, Brady. Now get out.”

  “Oh,” he said, grinning again, and his smile was so bright I nearly squinted. “Can’t do that. You granted me Sanctuary.”

  “When did I do that?”

  “When you said yes.”

  Damn it.

  “Fine. Why do you need Sanctuary?”

  “I’m a Faery,” he said, lifting his chin like he was posing for a statue.

  I blinked at him. Not what I was expecting—and frankly, from a purely female point of view, a damn waste. Not really the point, though.

  “It’s great that you’re so up-front about it, but you might want to try being a little more politically correct.”

  He frowned and was just as pretty as when he smiled. “Not that kind of Faery,” he said, and grabbed me.

  He kissed me so hard, so long and so deep, that by the time he let me go my knees were shaking and my brain had shut down. I stared up at him, and a small corner of my mind worried that my expression looked a lot like Sugar’s.

  Brady gave me another brilliant smile and said, “You are the Duster. You are Sanctuary. You’re the only one who can keep me alive.”

  But no pressure.

  Chapter Two

  The buzz of that kiss was starting to wear off, damn it, and now I was left with one major question rattling through my brain.

  Since when was I bodyguard to the weird?

  Seriously, I didn’t remember signing up for this. Demons, okay, fine. I was beginning to deal with the whole “destiny” issue and was more than willing to rip out hearts. (How disgusting does that sound?) But come on. Couldn’t the other weirdos in the universe find somebody else to lead their parade?

  What was I supposed to do with a Faery, for God’s sake? Besides, weren’t Faeries tiny, cute little buglike things? You know, Tinkerbellish? (Not a word, I know.)

  Brady the Faery was standing there looking around my living room as if he were planning to settle in and get comfy. Me, I was trying to figure out what to do next.

  “You got anything to eat?” he asked. “I’m starving.”

  Was he serious? In my house, there was always junk food. “In the kitchen.”

  “Right.” He headed off, Sugar hot on his heels like he was her new hero or something.

  The rear view of the Faery was just as impressive as the frontal. He had a very nice butt, I’m forced to admit, and his long legs looked great in those dark blue pants and knee-high black leather boots. Not many men could pull off that outfit without looking like they were chorus dancers in Peter Pan or something.

  And it’s back to Tinkerbell.

  You know, I had my first sexual dream after my mother took me to see the play Peter Pan at the Pantages in LA when I was eight. I was madly in love with Peter and was truly bummed when I found out later that Peter was being played by a girl gymnast, for Pete’s sake. Had a weird moment or two after that, wondering if maybe I was gay. Hey, give me a break. I was eight.

  Now, though, I knew exactly what I liked, and to be honest, I was giving my hormones a stern talking-to while a freaking Faery strode with long steps toward my refrigerator.

  This is not entirely my fault. I’d been pretty much sex-starved for years—and then last month my life all of a sudden picked up speed. Serious speed. Devlin the demon was an amazing lover, although, gotta admit, the whole demon thing was still creeping me out. Especially since I found out from my trainer/mentor/pain-in-the-ass Jasmine that demons and humans could actually make babies, and I’ve been worried that Devlin might have supersperm or something. The thought of giving birth to some red-faced, horned demonette would keep you up at night, too.

  Not worried enough to deprive myself of a little hoo-hah happy time, though.

  But I digress.

  I tend to do that a lot.

  While I was on a mental rant, I went back to wondering why the hell I was suddenly the person otherworlders came to for help. Didn’t I have enough going on? I had a teenage daughter! Trust me when I say that’s more than enough trouble for anybody. Not to mention Logan Miller dropping back into my life, and all the demons, and, hey, let’s not forget I’m the star of my very own Web Wanted poster. More than enough going on in my life already, thanks very much.

  Yet there was a big damn Faery rummaging through my cupboards and acting like I was supposed to be glad to see him or something.

  So with all of these thoughts racing around in my brain, I headed into the kitchen, poured myself another cup of coffee (mainly because with enough caffeine, anything is survivable) and said, “You wanna explain this Sanctuary thing to me, and just why I shouldn’t toss you out the back door?”

  The gorgeous, bare-chested Faery grinned at me from behind the open refrigerator door. Pretty impressive grin, too. “You’re the Duster. You’re the one who can save me.”

  “Got that much. Save you from what?”

  “Who.”

  “Huh?”

  “Save me from who not what.”

  “Oh, pardon the hell outta me. Okay,” I said, and reached for another Pop Tart. Hmm. Running low. Mental note: Replace staples. “Who am I supposed to be saving you from?”

  He shrugged. “Vanessa.”

  I took a bite and rolled my eyes. “Oooh. Sounds scary.”

  Brady pulled out a Tupperware container, pried off the lid and took a sniff. He approved and bit into a slice of cold pizza before I could stop him. I mean, come on. I’ll maybe…possibly…perhaps think about saving his life, but that didn’t mean I was willing to give up the pizza I’d been saving for my own damn lunch.

  “This is good,” he mumbled around a huge bite of cold pepperoni and cheese. (Hey, the pizza was from Tully’s—best in the state, so at least he had good taste.)

  “Duh.” I took another bite of my Pop Tart and tried not to resent the fact that a stra
nger was eating my leftovers. “Who’s Vanessa?”

  He shivered at the woman’s name and swallowed hard. “Vanessa is the Queen of the Demons.”

  Queen? My Pop Tart hit the floor. I staggered, sloshed coffee over the rim of my mug and burned my hand. In reflex I dropped the cup; it splashed coffee across the linoleum, slapped against Sugar’s big behind, and the dog shot straight up and spun around in midair, looking wildly for her attacker. She landed on her hind feet, planted her front feet on Brady’s back and looked like she was in a conga line while she tried to escape the river of coffee.

  Brady took Sugar’s nearly hundred pounds slamming into his back in stride—his chewing didn’t even slow. “There, there,” he muttered around yet another bite of my pizza.

  I shook my hand, blew on the red spot where the coffee’d burned me, then groped on the counter for the roll of paper towels. Damn it. No coffee, no Pop Tart and a damn queen to worry about. Dropping to the floor, I wiped up the mess while demanding, “A queen? Demons have queens?”

  “I escaped from her this morning and came right to you.”

  “Wow, thanks.” Just last month I’d dusted Judge Jenks, the head demon around these parts. I’d thought getting rid of him would make life a little easier—not so much. Now I’ve got my own Web site, and there’s a new queen in town. How do these things keep happening to me?

  Sugar woofed, dropped to the floor and trotted through the river of coffee. I thought for a moment there that she was going to give me a big kiss to comfort me. But no. She was after the Pop Tart.

  While the dog ate my breakfast, Brady finished off my lunch, tossed the empty container onto the kitchen table and dipped back inside the fridge. He came back up holding a KFC box and helped himself.

  “Do you have a tapeworm or something?” I pushed myself to my feet, tossed the paper towels into the trash and glared at him.

  “It’s been a long time since I ate.”

  Color me curious. “How long?”

  He tipped his head back, took a bite of a chicken leg and thought about that for a moment. “Must be fifty years or so?”