Sins of the Demon

“He was in my house. In my basement.” I kicked at the carpet and scowled. “He took pictures of my summoning chamber!”

“The basement was clean,” Eilahn reassured me for about the tenth time. “He saw nothing.”

But surely he could sense the arcane residue from the diagrams. Would he be able to figure out the configuration? No, I decided after a moment’s thought. Without knowing the structure of the sigils it would be impossible. I’d been able to figure a lot of it out on my own, but it had been that one particular sigil that Rhyzkahl gave me that jump-started my whole thought process.

“Is he working today?” Ryan asked. “Maybe we can get into his house while he’s not there and see what we can find. Do you know where he lives?”

In answer I looked to Jill. She was the one doing the fancy computer work. “Hang on,” she said as she slid her finger on the touchpad. “Got his address—lives in Lakewood Heights subdivision. And according to the shift schedule, no, he’s not working,” she said, mouth tight. Ryan grimaced.

Yeah, that would have been way too easy. “Okay, so we don’t have shit for info on Raymond,” I said, “but what do we have on Tracy Gordon? He had to go through a background check to get hired.”

Jill bent her head to the screen again. “Good point.” She chewed her lower lip as she did her computery stuff. “Hmm. Well, according to this, Tracy Gordon is about two years older than Raymond, and ran away from a foster home in Colorado about a year before Raymond took off.”

“They met as runaways,” Ryan murmured. “Something must have happened to the real Tracy—died or was killed, and Raymond took over his identity.”

A terrible chill walked up my back. Is that why Ryan and Zack’s backgrounds are so perfect? Did they replace real people? I tasted bile in the back of my throat. Somehow I knew that was the truth. Nothing else made sense. Whoever exiled Ryan…did they kill the original Ryan and Zack? Or were their deaths fortuitous and convenient?

“It gets better, folks,” Jill said, frowning at the screen. I forced myself to pay attention. “Tracy went to a shelter for runaways when he was sixteen, got his GED, and was accepted to LSU—possibly because his standardized test scores were through the roof.”

“He’s definitely not stupid,” I said.

“Uh huh, and then he proceeded to graduate with a degree in chemistry, and went on to—ta-da—pharmacy school, though it looks like he dropped out after three years.” She cocked an eyebrow at me. “I think any doubt that he’s our man is gone gone gone.”

“And then for some reason he decided to become a cop,” Ryan murmured. “When did he get hired?”

Jill clicked some more keys. “Early summer of this year.”

I met Ryan’s eyes. “Right after we stopped the Symbol Man.”

“He read between the lines of the news reports and figured it out,” Ryan said, eyes narrowed. “Figured out you were a summoner. Maybe had you assessed to be sure.”

“And whatever his plan is,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose, “he needs a summoner or someone with a decent level of arcane ability.”

Jill looked up from her keyboard. “So, is he also behind these attempts to summon you to the demon realm?”

“No,” I said with a shake of my head. “Or rather, if so, certainly not directly. Whoever’s doing that is actually in the demon realm. A summoning is just that—a summons, or call. It’s not possible for someone to push or send me through from this end.” I glanced at Tessa and Eilahn for confirmation.

“Correct,” Eilahn answered as Tessa gave a nod. “The summoning attempts must be considered a completely separate threat.”

I sat down on the fainting couch and dropped my head back to stare up at the ceiling. “Right, because one threat simply isn’t enough for my boring ol’ life.” I sighed as another realization came to me. “Y’all do realize that there’s no way we can prove Tracy killed those people, right?”

The answering silence told me that if they hadn’t realized it before, they sure as hell did now. I lifted my head to look around at them. “Seriously. I doubt he conveniently left behind a To Do list that says, ‘Murder Kara’s enemies’ on it.”

“Maybe not,” Ryan said, “but he seems pretty hell-bent on fucking with you. There isn’t enough evidence to have you arrested right now, but what if that’s his next step?”

“But if I’m in jail, how can I go do whatever it is he wants me to do with whatever’s in that hot zone?” I shook my head. “No, I don’t think that’s part of his plan. He has something else in mind.” Sitting up, I shot a hard look over at my aunt. “You need to stay tight within these wards, y’hear me? If he’s gunning for revenge for his grandparents, you’d be a target.”

Tessa pursed her lips. “I doubt there’s any way for him to know of my role in what happened the night his grandparents died, but I agree that caution is called for until he can be contained. He’s been going after your enemies so far, but that doesn’t mean he won’t start in on people close to you.” She eyed me with a fierce glare. “But I think we can all agree that you’re his primary target.”

“But why?” I said, but even as the words left my mouth I knew. “Crap. Nevermind. Probably because I’m getting it on with the demonic lord who killed his grandparents.” Damn. Probably shouldn’t have blurted it out like that with Ryan in the room. But when I slid a cautious glance his way he didn’t seem to be fazed by the comment. Maybe he really was getting a better handle on how he felt about the whole thing.

Or at least better about hiding how he felt about it.

“Well, I was thinking more of the fact that you’re Rhyzkahl’s sworn summoner,” my aunt said. “But the sex thing probably doesn’t help.”

Jill closed her laptop. “How would he know?”

“He could have learned it from any of the demons he summoned,” Eilahn spoke up.

“Well, either way, he’s shit out of luck,” I said, “because I have no intention of going to wherever it is this drug is wanting me to go until he’s out of the way, and I can take care of whatever’s there safely.” Standing, I reached for my coat. “I’m going to go home and summon a kehza. They can assess, right?” I asked with a glance to Eilahn. At her nod I continued, “Then I say we go to his house, sic the demon on him—which will have the combined effect of neutralizing him and making sure he’s our guy. Then we take it from there.”

Ryan cocked an eyebrow at me. “And what if he’s not a summoner? We’re oh-for-two right now.”

“Then we’ll get to figure out a way to convince him that the big scary creature that grabbed him wasn’t real,” I said.

Jill let out a snort of laughter. “Has anyone ever told you that your plans suck?”

“Constantly!” I grinned. “It’s either this, or Eilahn and I go in, throw the cat on him, and then take him down ourselves.”

“I think I prefer plan A,” Ryan said, his voice dry. He eyed me. “And what would the rest of us be doing in this oh-so-complex plan of yours?”

“You’d be standing by to snag him if he rabbits, or for when things go to shit.”

“When?” Zack asked.

I gave Zack a look. “How long have you known me? Do you really expect any of this to work the way we want it to?”

Zack blew out his breath. “True.” His gaze swept the room, taking in our meager army. “Good thing we have the cat.”

While the others set up a command center in my aunt’s living room, Eilahn and I returned to my house.

My thoughts raced as I trotted up my steps and entered. A kehza would work, right? I probably didn’t have quite enough power for a reyza or even a zhurn. A kehza would be the perfect combo of muscle and ability to assess, even though they had a tendency to be slightly twitchy and unpredictable. One had to be very clear in instructions with the seventh-level demons.

Pulling the basement door open I flicked on the light switch. Two steps down the stairs I paused. What’s wrong with the floor?

“Oh no…”

My heart slammed as I skittered down the rest of the stairs. The sound of trickling water came from one