Demons of Good and Evil by Kim Harrison

            Doyle was silent, and, brow furrowed, I pulled his hand from his middle to see. Blood gushed, and I felt myself go white. “Holy shit,” Jenks whispered, then darted away.

            “Man down!” I shouted, pressing my hand atop Doyle’s in panic. “I’ve got a deep knife wound. I need some help! Now!”

            I looked up, my hands slippery and warm. People were beginning to filter in, and I pressed harder, not liking how still he had become. “Doyle? Stay with me. Jenks went for help. Don’t you dare close your eyes!” I threatened, and his eyes flashed open, black and scary.

            “What are you doing?” he said, voice flat. “Go after her.”

            Oh, shit. He didn’t just die, did he? I wondered. “She’s gone, and I’m not leaving you until someone gets here,” I said, and then I was pushed away by two paramedics. I stumbled to my feet, hair in my eyes as my hands went cold in the breeze from the entrance. They were red, and I stared at them as the two women began a fast triage, voices terse.

            “Is he going to be okay?” Jenks asked. Doyle was trying to sit up even as the paramedics were forcing him down, and my worry grew.

            “Rachel?” Doyle called, a slight quaver to his voice giving me hope he was still alive. Arm shaking, he raised his hand as the paramedics tried to get him to lie still. There was a bloody wad of something in it. “Find her,” he said, and I realized he was holding a mass of bloodied hair. “Time and materials,” he added, and I leaned forward to take Parker’s hair, ripped from her skull.

            “Deal,” I said as I held the ugly mess up in my hand, and he grinned—until his expression went slack and he fell unconscious.

            “Is he alive?” I asked, and one of the paramedics nodded. “Good.” Finding my feet, I looked at my bloodied hands . . . and smiled. Vivian wanted a peek at my life? That was exactly what she was going to get.

            But maybe I should clean up first.





CHAPTER


            21

            “I don’t think more dust will help,” I said as I caught sight of my blurry image in the walls of the elevator, and the pixy hovered, his expression serious in scrutiny.

            “Meh,” he said noncommittally, then darted forward, dusting me anyway.

            Trent’s apartment was a scant two stories down from the world-class restaurant that spun at the top of Carew Tower, but unless I wanted to make the trip in the dumbwaiter, I needed to go down to the tenth floor and grab a public elevator to reach it. It was something I was sure that Trent would put some thought, if not money, into.

            But the up and down elevators aside, even I had to admit that the ten-minute walk from the I.S. tower to Trent’s unfinished apartment had been far easier than taking a cab across the river to the church and back. I was lucky, really, that I’d left both books in Trent’s unfinished study this morning.

            Unfortunately, not going to the church meant I was still in the same clothes I had on yesterday. Two showers without product or charms had left my hair totally out of control. I could undo the new, flyaway-ridden braid Jenks had put it in and let the thing halo, or leave it as it was, staticky and falling apart. I went for falling apart, as the alternative would be really scary.

            “This isn’t going to go well,” I whispered as I hoisted my book-heavy shoulder bag higher up my shoulder.

            “Rache, ain’t no one up there that is going to know what’s in your bag.”

            “It’s not the books I’m worried about,” I muttered as I glanced at the curse ring on my finger. Now that I knew it blocked the curse, I wasn’t going to take it off until I recovered its twin. Either Vivian would believe me when I said it was set for the cure, or she wouldn’t. I was betting she would, but there’d be another coven member with her, a complete unknown, seeing as Vivian was the only member left from the original group. You couldn’t retire from the coven of moral and ethical standards, but you could take disability. Apart from Vivian, the few members who had survived trying to best the demon Ku’Sox had done just that.

            “I don’t know why you’re worried,” Jenks said, wings humming as he came to rest on my shoulder. “It’s not as if you dress like a hooker anymore.”

            “It’s not my clothes,” I said, and Jenks made a scoffing snort. “Okay, maybe some, but how smart is it bringing two demon tomes into Carew Tower’s restaurant?” Exhaling in resignation, I glanced at my phone for the time as the doors slid open and the soft, peppy eighties-gone-classical spilled in. Five minutes late. Not bad.