Claimed by the Demon

She snorted. “The only crushed ice you had,” she said, with as much asperity as she could muster, “was the cool taste of it on my lips.”

That did it. He looked at her as though briefly stunned, stuck there—his eyes so clearly on her mouth. And then he said, with some visible effort, “You did that on purpose.”

She tossed her head ever so slightly. Just enough to shorthand that she’d done it. “You looked like you could use a reminder.” She headed for the sidewalk, and she knew what her legs looked like in the shorts and what her ass looked like in retreat. She glanced over her shoulder at him. “Not just fast-talking. Smart.”

“I...” He took a deep and audible breath, if only to finish his response in a mutter. “I consider myself reminded.”

Chapter 7

I have to think.

That’s what he’d told her. Cowardly in its way, but true enough.

There was too much new, too much different.

And though Mac thought he’d learned to deal with this blade, to compensate for it...

He was no longer so sure.

Either the balance had changed, or it simply wasn’t working any longer.

Understanding how Gwen’s pendant—how her father, how she—fit together with the blade, or how any of them fit with what was happening here in Albuquerque...

He definitely needed to think.

Even if he pretty much already knew what had driven Gwen’s father. And even if he wished it didn’t give him some clues about what was happening with him.

The hell with that.

“Fierce,” Gwen said. They sat at a table in the diner, and the waitress served them with a knowing smile. When he glanced at her with question on his face, she said, “Your expression. Fierce.”

“Good,” he said as she forked a piece of his burger right off his plate. He feigned offense. “You sure make yourself right at home.”

“You betcha,” she said. “Your hotel room, your food. Can’t imagine what’s next.” And then bit her lip, clearly hearing how the words sounded outside her own head, eyes wide...until she went for the head toss. Perfection, that toss—so understated, so perfectly paired with the gleam in her eye.

“No,” he said, deadpan. “It boggles the mind.”

Deliberately, she took a baby carrot out of his salad, crunching hard to bite it in half, and then pointed the remainder at him. “Your turn.”

Yeah. It was.

But he thought it would be nice to have just a few more moments of this. Normal meal, normal diner, even though he ate around a gash inside his mouth and she mooched entirely off his vastly overloaded plate.

“That’s better,” she said—softly now, and he realized he’d smiled. “For being the inscrutable hero type, you’re awfully easy to read.”

He snorted. “The what?”

“You heard me.” She sat back, cocked her head. “Of course you wouldn’t know it. That’s just all the more perfect.”

He only stared at her, just a little narrow-eyed, just a little thoughtful.

She asked, abruptly, “Do you have family?”

It startled him. “Do I—”

She acknowledged the suddenness of the question with a lift of one shoulder. “For some reason, I’m thinking of my father. It’s where my mind went. I wonder what my father would have thought of me—of how I turned out, thanks to what he did. Of what’s happening here today. And I wonder what makes a man like you.”

He smiled, shook his head. “Nothing exciting there. Two parents, an older brother and younger sister, all in the family printing business. All back in Washington state, still wondering why I ever left it to work my way around the country.” At the question in her eyes, he added, “For the sake of seeing it.”

She briefly pursed her lips. “I don’t actually get the impression that’s what you’re doing now. Seems to me the emphasis isn’t quite right.”

“Seems to me,” he said, brow raised, “that you see too much.” But he was still looking at her mouth as she said it, drawn by the curve of the lower lip and the full, wide nature of the upper.

“And know far too little.” She said it with her own pointed look and went for one of his steak fries.

“Actually,” he told her, “I think you know a lot.” But of course that only made her frown. He tipped his head at the door...a question. Because this wasn’t something he intended to talk about here.

“Oh, look,” she said brightly. “Here comes someone with a big take-out box. I can’t imagine how she anticipated you would need it.”

He looked at the pile of food before him, more than half of it ordered with the intent of takeout and an evening snack—for he was still fueling up in the wake of the healing, and in the more recent wake of the day’s events.

“I intend to be hungry this evening,” he told her—leaving her pondering, narrow-eyed, if she’d just been handed a warning or a promise, or if he was talking about food after all.

But when they walked back out into the late afternoon heat, she with the food and one hand wrapped lightly around the inside of his arm, he with the sense of equilibrium restored, everything changed. As if a shadow had dropped out of the sky to encompass them, with the blade crying warning, Gwen stiffening in alarm, every nerve and muscle shouting for him to act while every instinct called out for him to wait until he knew—

There.

Behind them. The corner of the diner.

It’s a video game. A never-ending round of hate and violence. And he and Gwen had become so tangled in it—

Her grip on his arm tightened. The knife sliced through his thoughts—a snarl of displeasure and warning, letting him know that these men weren’t angry, weren’t despairing, weren’t any of the things it loved to drink.

These men were doing a job.

“He said you’d find us.” A faint cockney accent behind those words, the voice itself without concern. “And that you’d know we’re ready for you.”

Gwen’s grip squeezed even more tightly, if only for an instant. Confirming it. They had weapons, and no doubt the weapons were discreetly already trained on them.

“No guns, he said,” the man continued. “But mate, I’m telling you—these Tazers pack a hell of a punch.”

Mac didn’t have to turn around to know it. They were out of range. He could throw—deadly accuracy, that throw—but he wouldn’t get the blade back in time for number two.

And number two might yet be silent, but he was there.

“Look, now, he only wants a chat.” So reasonable.

The blade spat its sour resentment at their calm—at the way they gave it nothing to work with. No fear, no hatred, no resentment, no frenzied high. It floundered, unable to muster its deadly song.

He could still use it—would, if he got the chance—but not at peak. Not with the avaricious hunger that made it so very deadly.

“Mac,” Gwen whispered, close enough to read every line of his body—including his hesitation.

“Come on, then,” the second man said, joining the conversation with a deep and lazy voice. Even less invested than his partner, and well chosen for this chore.

By someone who knew what the blade needed? How the hell—