I reminded myself to stop by his office and thank the whining asshole who’d answered the phone for all his “help.” “Where are you? I need to talk to you. Now.”
“I’m at home. I’ll be at your place in twenty minutes.”
“No, I’ll be at yours in two. I guess you didn’t hear me knocking.”
“Oh. That was you?” He cleared his throat. “Sorry. I was, uh, busy.”
“I’ll bet,” I muttered. “How’s Dom?”
Adam hesitated. “He’s fine,” he finally said, but there was something funny in his voice.
I wanted to ask what was wrong, but there was no reason to talk about it on the phone when I was right around the corner. “Whatever,” I said, figuring I’d grill him about it in a couple of minutes. “I’ll be there in a few. And just so you know, I’ll have Brian and Raphael with me.”
“Wonderful,” he said sourly. “I’m in the mood for a party right now.”
“Don’t get pissed at me! If you’d answered your phone when I first called, this would have been a lot simpler.”
“Whatever,” he said, and I guessed that funny voice was supposed to be mimicking mine. His impersonation could use a little work.
I couldn’t think of anything else to say, at least nothing that wasn’t so snarky it would get us off on even more of a wrong foot, so I just hung up and waited for Raphael.
Raphael must have been alarmed by my call even though I’d told him I wasn’t in any more trouble than usual. He showed up in less time that it would take me to cover half the distance. People had gathered at the bus stop, and though like typical city dwellers they were all pretending they were the only people around, I knew full well we couldn’t afford to talk about the situation in anyone’s hearing. So when Raphael strode toward me with the obvious intention of giving me the third degree, I jerked my thumb toward the corner.
“We’re going to Adam’s,” I said, and started moving before he had a chance to reply. I felt his eyes boring into the back of my head, but I did my best to ignore it. Brian fell into step beside me, and moments later, I heard Raphael hurry to catch up.
“You gonna tell me what’s going on?” Raphael asked when he reached my other side.
I wished Adam’s call had come just a couple minutes earlier so I could have avoided Raphael’s company, but I supposed if he was to serve as one of Lugh’s advisors, it was for the best that he come along. Besides, if he’d been following Lugh’s orders, maybe he’d found some more information about the Houston facility. And maybe the information I’d gotten could fill in some of the gaps.
“When we get inside,” I answered. I still felt like Raphael was staring holes in me, but I refused to confirm my suspicion by looking at him.
Adam was waiting for us when we arrived. I didn’t even have to knock. It looked like he’d dressed in a hurry. His T-shirt was only haphazardly tucked into his jeans, his feet were bare, and his hair was mussed. He gave Brian and Raphael each a long look, then opened the door wide enough to let us in.
When Dominic was playing hostess, any conversations that took place in this house happened in the kitchen, usually accompanied by food. But there was no sign of Dominic now, so Adam directed us to the living room instead. I hoped Dom was upstairs wrapped in blissful post-coital slumber. However, Adam seemed pretty tense, and I worried about what that might mean.
Much though I wanted to ask about Dom, he couldn’t be my first priority at the moment. So instead, I forced myself to stay on topic and explain to Adam and Raphael what had happened.
I wasn’t surprised when there was a long silence after I’d finished. I sure wished I could read their minds like Lugh could read mine. And I sure hoped Adam was enough of a cop to want to help Claudia’s daughters, even if sticking his neck out for them might not be in Lugh’s best interests. After all, Lugh didn’t seem to have any objections to the idea of mounting a rescue. Or if he did, he wasn’t stupid enough to think he could bully me into keeping out of it.
The silence went on a little too long, and like an idiot I rushed to fill it.
“I didn’t find out about all this until this morning,” I said, then squirmed a bit, knowing no one was going to like hearing what I had to say next. “All I knew last night was that Claudia had ‘fired’ me and that some goons thought beating me up would make me back down.”
Adam fixed me with one of his black looks. “What did you do?” he asked, and I tried not to wither under his preemptive disapproval.
“I, um, stopped by The Seven Deadlies.”
Brian looked vaguely ill at the mention of the club; Raphael looked worried; Adam, predictably, looked furious. I wondered if talking fast and loud would keep the boys from letting me know what they thought of me right now. I decided it wouldn’t hurt to try.
“I figured Shae knew more than she was telling us, so I had a little chat with her.” Adam looked like he was about to kill me, so angry I caught the faint glow in his eyes that meant his demon was shining through. I kept talking, though my instinct for self-preservation suggested now would be a good time to run like hell. Adam has a very effective death glare.
“I found out that Tommy’s been paying her to procure women for him.”
That surprised Adam enough to dim the glow in his eyes. “Come again?”
There seemed to be more oxygen in the room now that he wasn’t glaring at me like that, and I heaved a sigh of relief. “She apparently can get a great deal of information about her regular customers. Tommy wanted her to find him women whose families have a history of hereditary cancer. And it sounded like he specifically selected ones who might be a bit careless about their birth control.” Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Raphael, seeking any clue that this meant something to him. Unfortunately, he has an effective poker face, unlike mine.
“She doesn’t know why, but I can make an educated guess.” This time, I faced Raphael full on. “Care to tell me your theory?”
He lifted one shoulder in an elegant shrug. “I haven’t gotten any new information since we last spoke, if that’s what you’re asking. But it does seem pretty obvious that Tommy’s trying to spread his genes.” He looked thoughtful. “My guess would be that Houston had more success with their project than I’d realized. Tommy must be a pretty valuable specimen.”
“He’s not a specimen!” I snapped. “He’s a human being. And don’t give me any bullshit about how he’s not human because you demons have been mucking with his DNA.”
Raphael held up his hands in a gesture of innocence. “I wasn’t going to. What we call him doesn’t matter. What does matter is that the Houston project was successful enough that they want to spread his genes in the human population.”
“Are you sure that’s what it means?” Brian asked, startling us all, I think.
“What do you mean?” I asked, turning to face him.
“I’m just wondering… They’re keeping their human subjects captive in or around the facility somewhere. Even if they’re keeping them in the most inhumane conditions, they’d need a lot of room to have a viable breeding population. Maybe now that they’ve had some success, they need to introduce a little more genetic diversity.”
Raphael was nodding. “You could be right. We definitely had trouble with that at The Healing Circle. We tried to manipulate the DNA as much as possible to counter the effects of inbreeding, but it got progressively harder with each new generation.”
My lip curled with distaste. “So what you mean is they’re sending out Tommy to act as a stud, and most likely if any of those women get pregnant, they’re going to suddenly disappear, never to be heard of again.” Bad enough that the demons were raising humans as lab rats. At least those humans wouldn’t know any better. But to snatch some unsuspecting pregnant chick and stick her in some kind of sick breeding facility… I shuddered and gave Raphael another glare of disgust. His lips thinned, but he had no answer for my accusation.
“So what about the cancer?” I asked. “Why does Tommy want girls with cance
r in their families?”
“I don’t know,” Raphael answered, “but I can take a guess. It may be that they’re trying to harness and accelerate the rapid cell division that comes with cancer. If they can make the cells divide at super speed, then maybe they can heal faster.” He shrugged. “It’s sort of what we do when we heal our hosts now, only we’re limited by what the human body is capable of.”
I shook my head. “Remember when you were trying to tell me how breeding these hardier hosts was actually to those hosts’ benefit?”
Raphael squirmed a bit and didn’t look at me. “I could be wrong. I’m just guessing what the significance of the cancer is.”
“Doesn’t matter! There’s no way it’s good for anyone to have their chances of getting cancer genetically increased. We are so exorcizing that damn demon.” I no longer cared if it was illegal. If it was the last thing I did, I was sending that creature back to the Demon Realm. It sure would be nice if I could just kill it, but much as I disapproved of Tommy’s life choices, I wasn’t ruthless enough to burn him to death to kill the demon.
Adam shook his head. “No, we are not.”
I shot to my feet, an indignant response on my lips. Brian, who was sitting next to me on the couch, grabbed my arm and hauled me back down. I was so surprised I just sat there and stared at him.
“I doubt jumping up and down and yelling is going to be very effective,” Brian said reasonably, though far be it from me to be reasonable when my dander was up.
I wasn’t sure who I was most pissed at right now, Brian or Adam. I chose Adam. I stayed in my seat as I prepared to ream him out, but he beat me to the punch.
“If Tommy suddenly shows up sans demon, who do you think is going to be the prime suspect?” he asked, sounding as reasonable as Brian.
I clenched my teeth. I already knew that, had already made the same argument to Claudia. But, damn it, I couldn’t just sit back and do nothing! I had to stop that demon from making any number of women into broodmares with cancer-riddled children. And I had to stop his buddies from hurting Claudia’s daughters.
My heart pounded with my fury, and my nails dug into my palms as I tried to think of an argument that would convince Adam and company that it was okay to perform an illegal exorcism. After we gently convinced Tommy’s demon to tell us where the children were, that is.
“So maybe he shouldn’t show up sans demon,” Raphael said, and we all turned to him. His expression was studiously neutral, but I thought I detected a hint of excitement in him.
“Explain,” Adam urged.
But I was pretty sure I knew what Raphael was about to say, and it was hard to hear him over the sudden pounding of my heart.
“I agreed to move out of Andrew if I felt safe enough to do it and if we could find me another host. I believe Lugh and I have reached a formal peace, and that Morgan wouldn’t kill my host just to send me back to the Demon Realm. It therefore occurs to me that Tommy could fulfill the latter requirement for me. After all, considering his rather extreme prejudices, I expect he is not faring well with his current demon and is unlikely to be intact after an exorcism.”
No one said anything. I don’t know about the rest of them, but my mind was yammering at me nonstop. I could save my brother and save Tommy’s herd of broodmares all in one fell swoop. All I had to do was give up a God’s Wrath fanatic who would cheerfully burn me at the stake if he had a chance.
Brian put a comforting hand on my back, and, despite my audience, I leaned into the touch. There were so many problems I could solve just by letting Raphael take Tommy. And yet my conscience balked at it. I wanted to scream in frustration and confusion. Then Adam went and made things worse.
“There is another demon we’ve been hoping to find a host for,” he said, and I couldn’t suppress my groan.
My head felt too heavy to hold up, so I lowered it into my hands. This wasn’t fair! Sure I was a control freak, but it was only my life I wanted to control. I didn’t want to have to make life or death decisions for Andrew, or Tommy, or Dominic. And yet even with my head buried in my hands, I felt the weight of everyone’s expectations.
I don’t know whether it was merely because I was hosting Lugh, or whether it was because I was so naturally bossy, but somehow all three of these strong, decisive, confident men had handed the reins of leadership to me. How was I supposed to make a decision like this? Lugh? I pleaded. A little guidance, maybe? Of course, I didn’t hear a peep out of him. Either he, too, considered this my decision to make, or my subconscious had once again shored up my defenses.
“I seem to have missed a memo,” Raphael said, interrupting my pity party. “Who is the other demon in need of a host?”
I’d forgotten Raphael wouldn’t know about Lugh’s decision to summon Saul to the Mortal Plain. Luckily, Adam saved me the discomfort of having to explain.
“Ah,” Raphael said when he was finished. “So my brother would have both me and Saul serving on his council. Well, it certainly won’t be boring.” He answered my question before I even opened my mouth to ask it. “Let’s just say that Saul and I don’t get along and leave it at that, shall we?” Adam made a sound between a cough and a choke, and Raphael gave him a quelling look. “And because of your attachment to Dominic, you don’t wish Saul to return to him. Is that the situation?”
“Yes.”
I heard the edge in Adam’s voice, so I forced myself to sit up straight and get ready to intervene should things get ugly.
“I would have expected you of all people to put your duty above your own personal desires,” Raphael said to Adam.
I laughed. I couldn’t help it, though the laughter took on an edge of hysteria. Both Adam and Raphael glared at me. Brian, my rock, simply rubbed my back in silent support. I bit my tongue to stave off the hysteria.
“Sorry,” I said. “But you’ve gotta admit, Raphael pontificating about duty and self-sacrifice is pretty damn funny.”
Adam made a snorting sound that might have been agreement, laughter, or a burp. Raphael stuck with the death glare. Okay, so maybe it wasn’t funny to him.
“It’s not Adam’s decision anyway,” I said, meeting Raphael’s glare. “It’s Dominic’s.”
“So you would prefer to summon Saul into Tommy, when he already has a demonstrably compatible host available to him, and leave me in your brother? And here I thought you cared.”
I was about to snarl at him, but Brian startled me into silence.
“Aren’t we getting ahead of ourselves?” he asked. “Perhaps we should worry about what to do with Tommy after his demon’s been exorcized—and after we’ve figured out what to do about the children.”
Ouch. I guess I shouldn’t lecture Raphael about being self-centered after all.
Adam visibly relaxed, stepping away from the edge of battle. After a moment, Raphael did the same, and some of the weight lifted off my chest. The issue wasn’t going away, and I felt sure I would have to face it again soon. But “soon” was better than “now.”
I looked at Adam. “May I assume you agree that we’re better off handling this off the books?”
He waved a hand dismissively. “Of course.”
“And may I also assume that you’re not going to argue we need to sacrifice those kids for the greater good?”
“I don’t think the ‘greater good’ is at issue. You, of course, will stay far away from Tommy and his pals so Lugh isn’t at risk. I’ll see what I can do about finding the kids.”
I swallowed the protest that tried to crawl out of my mouth. If Adam thought I’d sit idly by and let him take care of everything, then he didn’t know me very well.
He smiled at me suddenly, his eyes glowing with a spark that had nothing to do with his demon. “I know I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. You really need to work on your poker face. You leave me with no choice but to make an executive decision. You’re going to stay here while I go have a talk with Tommy, see if I can find out where he and his friends are ho
lding the children.”
Damn it, damn it, damn it! When was I going to learn how to control my facial expressions? I began sliding my hand to the side, though I figured the chances of me getting to my Taser, arming it, pointing it, and shooting before someone stopped me were approximately zero.
I was right. Brian grabbed my hand and gave it a squeeze. He made it look like it was just a gesture of support, but I knew he’d read me as easily as Adam had. I glanced at Raphael, wondering if there was any chance I could convince him to take my side, but that was a stupid idea. Raphael would never agree to let Lugh take any “unnecessary” risks.
I jerked my hand from Brian’s and crossed my arms over my chest. “Fine!” I said, sounding sulky even to my own ears. “I’ll sit on my ass while you go out and play hero.” Adam gave me a knowing look, and I gritted my teeth. “Don’t look at me like that. I got the point. You’re going to lock me up.”
Beside me, I felt Brian start. There was a lot he didn’t know about the water under Adam’s and my bridge. I supposed I should fill him in on some of it someday. But not now.
Raphael rubbed his hands together. “So Adam is going to play policeman, Morgan’s going to twiddle her thumbs, and I presume Brian’s going to resume his usual daily activities. Do I have an assignment, or may I follow Brian’s lead?”
Instinct told me there was something off about Raphael’s voice, but I just didn’t have the energy to think about it right now. “I doubt you want to hear the instructions I have for you,” I muttered, loud enough for everyone to hear. Raphael didn’t seem to find it as funny as the others did.
Our impromptu council meeting broke up after that. Brian had been a bit startled when he discovered Adam planned to lock me up, but instead of arguing for clemency, he offered to keep me company. I imagined it would have been fun, but I was way too surly to be in the mood for fun.
“You’ll keep her safe?” Brian inquired of Adam, which, naturally, pissed me off.
“I’ll keep my own damn self safe!”
Adam shook his head at Brian. “I can’t imagine how you could actually want to be in her presence.” Lucky for him he’d been smart enough to confiscate my Taser already.