Revealed in Fire (Demon Days & Vampire Nights #9)(24)

I grinned. “Touché. Well, if anyone can figure out a way to make it profitable, or useable, it is you.”

“Your confidence in me is inspiring,” he said dryly.

I laughed and signed off with him. Before sleep pulled me under, I wondered how long it would take for demons to start invading my town again. I hoped not long. I felt like kicking a little ass.





Seven





“Hey, Red.” I dug my thumb into the soft spot at the edge of his jaw and just under his ear. The hard clang of a metal band spilled out of the doorway to my back, and people ambled by in the failing evening light with smiles and staggers, holding clear plastic cups with straws and lids, taking in the musical scene. Late summer in the French Quarter, my kinda jam. “Miss me?”

I’d gone against Darius’s wishes and left the ward without him, but at least I had waited until he was nearly able to travel outside. I called that quite responsible.

Red, a dog shifter who acted as an informant for Roger’s pack, let out a high-pitched squeal before clamping his mouth shut to save a little face.

I marshaled him up to standing and against the wall for no other reason than I was pretty sure he expected it.

“Re-Reagan,” he stammered, his lithe frame shaking. “I didn’t know you were back.”

“And now you do.” I let him go. “Fancy a drink?”

“You know I don’t drink.”

“True. Let me revise. Fancy watching me have a drink?”

“Not really,” he said miserably, hunching as I grabbed his upper arm and pulled him down the sidewalk.

“What’s new? What’s the scuttlebutt around here?”

I stopped in front of the doorway to the shifter bar, smooth jazz flowing out of it, the opening blocked by a large guy with a unibrow and an entrancing mystery he just would not help me solve.

“Hey, Jimmy,” I said, glancing at his package. “Knock up any mermaids lately? Or even just bumped uglies with them?” He went out into the gulf every year for a “knock ’em up” situation, along with all the other merfolk in the area, and it drove me mad wondering how they procreated with big fins getting in the way. They were annoyingly mute on the subject.

“Reagan.” His dark-eyed gaze flitted to Red and then away. “Been a minute. Who’re ya looking for now?”

“No one, actually. I’m the one people are looking for this time. What an amazing new age we live in, huh?”

Jimmy smirked and stepped to the side to admit me. “I hadn’t heard you were on the watch list. Must not be Roger looking for you.”

“No, he found me. It’s the vampires.”

He grunted. “Steve will be happy to hear it.”

“Nah. Wrong vampire. I’m still banging that one. Speaking of, when you go on your merman retreats, and you’re in the water…what happens then?” I looked at his package again.

“You need to find something new to wonder about.” He gestured us in as two giggly girls stopped behind us.

“If you’d just explain the dynamics of merpeople banging to me, I would be glad to find something new to wonder about.” I dragged Red inside with me.

“They don’t like to talk about what happens at sea,” he said, yelling to be heard over the frenzied notes of the piano and short blasts of the trumpet.

“Yeah. That’s why I’m obsessed. For a guy who gathers intel, you sure miss the obvious.”

I didn’t let go of him until we reached a few empty chairs on the far side of the bar. When I settled onto a barstool and rested my elbows on the counter, he grudgingly took a seat beside me. I knew he didn’t try to run because he wanted to hear about my drama. Which was exactly why I’d searched him out. I wanted word to spread, and he was the best one to make sure it happened.

“Hey, Reagan, long time no see.” The bartender, Trixie, stopped in front of me and braced her hands on the edge of the bar. Tattoos crawled across her breastplate and down her arms. A ring on her left nostril caught the light.

“Hey Trix. Gimme a hurricane, please. Make it a strong one. I can’t have that many.”

“Oh no?” She turned, reached down, and pulled open a fridge door before extracting a chilled pint glass. “What’s the occasion?”

“I’m expecting an attack and don’t want to be too drunk to thwart it.”

Red perked up, as I’d expected he would.

“You guys seen any demons around this place?” I asked as she started pouring ingredients into a metal shaker.

Red’s expression closed down. “I thought you said Roger found you…”

“Yes, Red, I know there have been demons. All kinds. I’m wondering about lately. As in the last couple of days.” I put up my hands. “I’ll be helping this time. I’m not bounty hunting right now.”

“They took out a few yesterday,” Trixie said before pausing to shake the mixture over her shoulder. “Marcus’s pack took them out, no problem.”

“So they weren’t that strong, then?” I asked.

Trixie loaded the pint glass with ice before pouring in the contents of the shaker. “No. Not like the ones a week ago, right, Red? They couldn’t kill those.”