Ship It(49)
The first time Smokey had sex, it was with the pretty and curvy young bartender of a dusty hole-in-the-wall just outside Austin who’d been shamelessly flirting with him all night. What the hell, he thought, and let her drive him back to her apartment, a studio by the airport with a fuzzy orange couch that was missing most of its fuzz and a live oak brushing against the outside of her window. He poured whiskey for them both, but it turned out he didn’t need it. As soon as she guided his hands on her, letting him run his fingers over her belly, her back, reaching down her skirt to find she had lost her panties somewhere between the door and the kitchen, he was ready to go. If he was nervous about performance, he didn’t need to be, because she was assertive and wasn’t afraid to tell him exactly what to do and how slow to do it. He left town three days later with her number in his phone and explicit instructions to text her the next time he was in Hill Country. And he would have, but then the portal opened, and hell literally broke loose, and Smokey met Heart and found that he had a purpose larger than himself.
Smokey and Heart were always meant to be enemies. A man dedicated to sending demons back to hell wasn’t supposed to just up and befriend a demon. But Heart wasn’t like the others—he was smarter and seemed to understand Smokey, and unlike every other demon that crossed Smokey’s path, Smokey couldn’t kill him. They were an even match, and not just physically. Like Smokey, Heart’s words seemed to suggest a past that was less than sterling, and a deep well of pain that he could cover up for polite company but that haunted him in moments of solitude, or toward the bottom of a bottle. Smokey knew that pain well and didn’t wish it on anyone else, not even a grossly attractive Hellhorn Demon who didn’t know how to stay in his lane.
Yes, Smokey had met so many people in his short life, had kept track of most of the ones who didn’t piss him off or end up dead, and he was certain that despite many attempts, he had never fallen in love with anyone.
This September, after he and Heart had accidentally worked together to send a Redbeast Demon back to his home in hell, they had decided to attempt a tenuous truce at last. And, to make it more official, they sealed it with a clink of glasses of Bulleit and a game of pool in the back room of a roadside place they both happened to know outside Denton.
The bar was dark and smelled of day-old chicken, fried steak, and spilled beer. Lit mostly by the neon signs hanging on every wall, it did two things right: good billiards and cheap prices. The other patrons—looked to be mostly regulars—eyed Smokey and Heart but gave them no guff, just tossed their peanut shells on the ground and ordered their doubles in peace.
The first game of pool nearly ended early after Smokey accused Heart of moving the cue ball when he wasn’t looking. Heart laughed him off, which only made Smokey angrier. Strong words were exchanged, and the whole ordeal would have blown up in their faces if Heart hadn’t generously offered to buy the next round. Then, while he was at the bar, leaning over the counter, Smokey caught a glimpse of Heart’s shirt riding up in the back to show off a tiny sliver of pale brown skin above his waistband and felt a familiar hitch in his chest.
Stop it, he whispered angrily to himself. Not now, not here.
Smokey could slay demons all night long. He could stare down the dirtiest, ugliest dreck that hell chose to spit out at him, and he could do it with a fire in his eye until his legs gave out from exhaustion. He could do all that and keep the fear in his belly at bay, but he couldn’t have a straightforward conversation and game of pool with Heart without feeling like he had to lob a bomb in the middle of everything and make his escape. His bravery had a county line, and Heart was far, far on the other side of it.
Half a bottle later, Smokey found himself subject to an impromptu pool lesson from Heart. A patronizing one—Heart explaining that Smokey’s bridge was too stiff, that he needed to put a little give in it, here, like this… and then Smokey found Heart’s fingers molding his own, Heart’s body brushed up against his side, the unnatural heat from the demon blood that coursed through his system making the hairs on Smokey’s arm stand up.
“I… I got it,” Smokey coughed out weakly, softly, not nearly rough enough to get this man away from him.
No, not man, demon. Demon. He couldn’t let himself forget that.
Heart didn’t move away. Instead, he leaned into Smokey’s ear, his whiskey-thick breath warm on Smokey’s neck, and whispered, “Are you sure that’s what you want?”
Smokey shivered, the goose bumps crawling unbidden up his arms. His heart jackhammered in his chest as he tried to ignore the growing knot in his stomach.
Smokey couldn’t take it, the warmth in his voice, as if Heart gave a shit what Smokey was feeling. As if Smokey mattered. He focused on steadying his breath so that his next words came out clearly, without wavering: “I said, I got it,” he growled, rough and low.
Heart let go, almost immediately. “Okay,” he said, “sure.” As Heart pulled away, the cool air flowed back in between them, and Smokey felt only disgust in himself for his cowardice. How long had he thought of a moment like this, and he had just let it slip right through his fingers. The swirl of emotions in his gut blackened into anger—at himself, at Heart for making him feel this way and for being a demon, at this bar for existing, at the world for going to shit, at himself, always at himself.
Heart stepped farther away as Smokey spiraled. “I’m sorry,” Heart murmured low. “It didn’t mean anything.”