The Unlikeable Demon Hunter (Nava Katz #1)(27)

I made a pffft noise. “World domination. You’re welcome.”

He failed to look impressed. “No shit. But how? What’s his final move and is there a specific trigger for it? Another disaster like Kingdom Come but on a bigger scale? Something else entirely? What’s the timeline?” Rohan blew out his cheeks in frustration. “That’s what we have yet to determine. It would help if we could figure out what type of demon he is. We need to crack someone in his inner circle, get in close to monitor him, but we’ve had no luck gaining entry.”

“So what’s causing the dissenting plans of attack?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Rohan said.

Nice blow off but I wasn’t that easily dissuaded. “You ended up here in Vancouver why?” I asked.

“King is shooting a movie and–”

“Hard Knock Strife!” I bolted upright in my seat.

Rohan ducked as the pen shattered in my grip, sending plastic shards flying.

“Josh, the lust demon that I–” I shot Rohan a warning look as I tossed pen remnants on the table. “Anyway, he’d been cast in that movie. I didn’t realize it was King’s.” I gnawed on my bottom lip. “How many of the other actors in the gang are demons? Samson is smart enough to cover his tracks. But what about the others? Josh didn’t strike me as the sharpest tool in the shed. Has King worked with other demons before?”

Rohan studied me with a coolly assessing look. “That’s a good idea.”

“Yeah, I get them when the moon lines up with Uranus.”

He didn’t appreciate my wit. “Except we already checked that avenue out. There was one demon that King worked with on a regular basis but my buddy Eyal took him out in Boston a couple of months ago. Probably how your boy Josh got the part.”

Rohan must have seen how bummed I was that I hadn’t provided the golden nugget needed to get close to Samson, because he added, “You’re off to a good start. Eventually, you’ll become a good fighter, too.”

“I have no idea how I specifically killed either Josh or his sister and I’m not thrilled about having to trial and error my way to survive every demon encounter.”

“Then learn about as many demons as possible and where their weak spot is located. That will keep you alive as much as your magic.” Rohan got up and walked over to one of the neatly arranged shelves where he extracted a thin, red, leather-bound book. He flipped through it. “All demons of the same type, say, all araculum, have the same weak spot,” he explained. “It gets trickier with the Uniques, the one-off demons like Lady Midday. In those cases we don’t have the multiple kills that have taught us where to aim for. Though if we’ve had a few encounters, then sometimes we’ve figured out the location for when we finally get close enough to make the kill.”

Rohan brought the open book over to me. He nudged my elbow away to perch on the arm of my chair, shoving the book under my nose.

I read the passage he pointed to. “Okay, this weak spot can be located anywhere in a demon’s body, ranging from the bottom of their foot to behind their eyes.” I scanned the rest of the page. “You know, I always thought that the way to kill a demon was through its heart.”

Rohan snorted. “What do you think a heart is?”

I twisted about half an inch to better face him. My arm skimmed his thigh, his muscles clenching in response. I could do this call and answer with his body part all day. “Does this weak spot have a name?” I asked.

He shifted his weight, his hip resting against my shoulder. “I told you, the heart.”

The words blurred meaninglessly on the page. I felt like I was back in ninth grade at the movie theater with Adam Kim, so focused on the minutiae of movements between our bodies that the entire screen had been a giant white blob.

My chest brushed his forearm. I was more than a bit curious if all this touching was a coincidence on his part or more of some endless game we seemed to be playing. “You aren’t being metaphoric, then.”

“It’s true on many levels.”

I ran my finger over the heart tattoo on his left bicep. “What baggage-laden break up led to this visual reminder, hmmm?”

“Focus.” His breath tickled the back of my neck as he leaned over me.

Dilemma. I was torn between prolonging any part of Rohan touching any part of me and giving in to being a curious kitten. I raised my eyes to his, unable to resist asking. “Come on, who was she?”

Rohan stood up abruptly, snapping the book shut.

Stupid curiosity.

“You can’t be buried in a Jewish cemetery,” I said, trying a different tack. “Not with tattoos.”

That got me a wry smile. “What gives you the impression I think there will be anything left of me to bury?”

Wow. These dudes were grim.

“How am I supposed to know which demon has which weak spot?”

Rohan replaced the book, waving a hand around the library. “You learn.”

Sure, Ari had shared some details of demons and hunting with me, but taking in the plethora of books now, I had a long way to go to even learn the basics. I sighed in resignation. “Where’s my Giles?”

Rohan stared blankly at me.

“You know,” I said, “the stuffy-yet-caring resident librarian mentor who provides helpful and timely info on a demon-by-demon basis?”