The Hearts We Sold(14)

“Three-person team,” he replied. “We’ve got another friend coming… if they don’t get stuck in traffic all day.”

Something about that statement made her choke out a laugh.

Get out of here, she thought. Whatever was happening, it was other. It was dangerous. She needed to leave, to go back to the normal world. She turned on her heel, pushing herself forward.

And then she slammed into the demon.

All the breath rushed out of her and she found herself spun around, knocked off balance by the force of the demon’s entrance.

It looked just as startled; it gazed at Dee with its unnaturally blue eyes, a line between its brows.

“About time you got here,” said Cal. “Where’s Cora?”

The demon’s attention snapped to the two boys. “I was ensuring that no one finds us,” it said, with a bite of annoyance. “As for Cora, I had assumed she would have arrived by now.”

Cal slid a cell phone back into his pocket. “Looks like she’s stuck on the way here. That’s the thing about starting a fire—traffic shuts down.” He frowned, but he looked more annoyed than disapproving. “I told you we should’ve just called in a bomb threat.”

“Because that would never cause traffic issues,” drawled James, but neither Cal nor the demon paid him any attention.

“There was no one in that building,” said the demon. “But we should act now.” Its mouth pulled tight. “I shall collect Cora.”

Cal grinned. “If you’re going to do that rip-a-hole-in-reality thing again, can I watch?”

The demon blinked once. “No.” And then it glided out of the room.

This was it. This was her chance. Dee couldn’t talk to the demon in front of these boys. She took a step forward, and then another, until her feet carried her out of the room and into the hall.

The demon eyed her. It looked exactly the same—dressed in the clean lines of a suit, an umbrella beneath one arm, and its dark hair tucked neatly into place.

“Back for more community service?” it asked.

That surprised her. She didn’t think the demon would remember her, to be honest.

“Are you—I mean, are you here to do business?” she asked.

The demon slid its hands into its pockets. “No,” it said, face impassive.

She wrapped an arm around her own stomach, trying to make the gesture look natural. “I want to make a deal.”

It raised an eyebrow. “Maybe you didn’t hear me. Maybe you didn’t see the thing that is taking root in that room. I don’t have time for this.” It started to walk away, and her heartbeat skyrocketed.

“I could help,” she said. Her voice was quiet from nerves.

The demon froze. Not like humans froze, but how Dee once saw a stray cat freeze just before disemboweling a bird.

“You need three people,” she said. “That’s what those boys said. You need a three-person team, but you only have two.”

The demon glided toward her. “You didn’t want to make a deal before.”

Her throat was twisting shut, and she barely managed to croak, “I need money.”

The demon’s brows rose higher.

She swallowed. “I need money. A lot of it. I can’t—I need it. If I help you, if I do whatever you need three people to do—do you still need a… part?”

It was a hopeless sentence, filled with false starts and stops. But the demon understood. “Yes.”

She knew this was coming, so she shouldn’t have been afraid. She refused to be afraid, even as she began to shake. “What would I have to give you?”

“I don’t deal in toes or fingers,” it said.

The words felt like a physical punch; she was knocked off balance, and she swayed. A foot, she thought. It wanted a foot—or a leg. Could she do it? Could she trade part of herself away if it meant her future was secured?

“What, then?” she said.

The demon turned to face her fully, angling so that the line of its shoulders was parallel to hers. The pressure of its gaze squeezed at her insides. But she stood her ground, even as it answered her question.

“Your heart.”





EIGHT


M agic did exist.

Dee felt it in that basement. It hung around those two strange boys, around that smudge on the ceiling, clinging to the otherness that was the demon.

Real magic, Dee thought, and wished she could tell her eight-year-old self. But it wasn’t princesses and fairies, knights and vows. It was that darker flavor of magic, spools of stolen gold and promised firstborn children. It was the huntsman cutting out Snow White’s—

“Heart,” she said.

It took a moment to register. And then her heart was racing, thumping so hard it felt like the demon was already trying to take it from her. She pressed a fist to her breastbone.

This hadn’t been on any of the websites—they said it was always a limb, not a vital organ. Or in this case, the most vital of vital organs.

“But I—” she started to say, and then stopped. “I’ll die.”

It sighed and held up a pale hand. “You’ll live. A twenty-four-month lease is my usual price. I take your heart for two years, and during that time you do my bidding.”