Gabby glanced at the open bathroom door. “What about the broken sink and the mirror?”
“No one will care. That probe packed enough force to punch a hole into our space. Capiria will want to sage the whole house, and anything else that could be used as a portal. Including the courtyard birdbath.”
“I didn’t expect…I mean, I wasn’t prepared.” Gabrielle stopped, knowing she babbled.
“This isn’t your fault,” Raven replied, locking the bathroom door so no one fell prey to whatever lingered. “You didn’t call the probe to us. Someone is throwing mud at the wall to see what sticks. As for not being prepared, I’ve had a decade’s worth of research, and I still shook in my shoes when Aiden and I faced that juvenile demon in New Orleans. Don’t beat yourself up. The moment you think you’ve got it down is the moment you lose to a demon. This briefing is important, so do what you have to and then get to the meeting.”
Gabby walked ahead of Raven into her bedroom. She stripped out of her pajamas and then misted herself with body spray. Reaching for a pair of yoga capris and a matching top, she dressed quickly, pulling her hair up into a high ponytail, blonde and bouncy.
It was game on.
Luke first. Demon bastards second.
Chapter Three
Gabrielle walked side-by-side with Raven, the gravel drive crunching under their feet as they headed toward the chateau.
Raven talked strategy the whole way, but she didn’t hear a word. She loved her best friend, but right now she was preoccupied with how to break the news to Luke without blurting it in front of everyone. Ray was right. She needed to deal with it before anything else, or no one’s head would be in this dangerous game.
Least of all her.
Now the sentinels were back, shit would hit the fan. After Aiden’s briefing, it would be strategy and action. With all that ahead, Raven had enough to worry about, without anyone else adding to the pile. Especially not a best friend with an unexpected paranormal pregnancy. Whether Aiden or any of the others wanted to admit it, their best shot at dispatching these demons was Raven. It was the unspoken reality over the past month. Ray knew it, too. She was demon bait.
This demon was a cunning entity with no face, and yet a thousand faces. An in spiritu demon. The kind that took you over body and soul, eventually leaving an empty husk behind, instead of a vital, living being.
Of course, there was the other demon, thrown in for shits and giggles. An incarnate demon. A fully fleshed, shapeshifting demon currently tear-assing around the eastern seaboard of North America.
Ray dubbed it Big Daddy. Mostly for its taste for unsuspecting and naïve humans, and the malformed, feral lesser demons it bred. The entity had a huge inferiority complex, and a hard-on for the Sentinel Brotherhood. Particularly since sentinels dispatched its progeny the moment they’re discovered.
Between the two evils, it seemed most of their group had a target on their back. Including Luke. Still, the blood witches were an incarnate demon’s worst enemy. Shifters could match its strength and speed, but a blood witch could match it with energy, and their hodgepodge force had four blood witches in residence.
With Raven’s ability to pull energy, and augment and direct it full force, and now Gabrielle’s complete control of all elements, they had definite bargaining power if it came down to it.
Blood witches could influence two out of the four elements, but only control fire and earth. Elementals were kissing cousins, or so said Capiria. It was how she recognized Gabrielle’s latent power. Together they were a fearsome feminine force.
“Gabs, you haven’t heard a single word I’ve said.”
“I know, Ray. I’m just thinking. Running events through my—” She caught sight of Luke at the carved balustrade off the chateau’s second-floor balcony and stopped mid-sentence.
Ahead, the gravel path split. Right toward the front of the house. Left toward the lake and the boathouse, or straight ahead to the back veranda…and Luke.
He wasn’t facing them on the south path. He looked west, out at the lake. Gabrielle stopped, her feet planted exactly at the crossroads. Left or right. Straight ahead or retreat. The irony of her standing on a crossroads wasn’t lost. If Raven was right, and she usually was, the fates were upping their game.
“What’s the matter? Are you nauseous again?” Ray asked, putting a hand on Gabby’s arm.
The moment Raven touched her arm, she smiled, following Gabby’s line of sight to the balcony.
“Well, at least you won’t have to convince him to step outside so you can talk. He’s alone, Gabs, and he’s all yours.”
A flutter tickled Gabby’s belly. It wasn’t anything she’d felt before. It wasn’t sensual like this morning, when an X-rated cascade of memories made her ache for Luke. Her hand slid below her bellybutton.
It couldn’t be.
Unsure, she looked at Raven. “I think the baby just moved.”
“That’s impossible.” Raven’s gaze slid to her friend’s stomach. “Like you said, you’re only two weeks gone.”
“I know, but I swear it’s true. When I saw Luke, I stopped in my tracks, and I swear the baby fluttered.”
“You sure it wasn’t your own nether bits fluttering? We haven’t seen the guys in what feels like forever. I know that’s an exaggeration, but for shifters and their mates, it’s a whole other sex story.”
Gabby rolled her eyes. “Talk about complete transformation. My nerdy, academic friend is now a full-fledged nympho.”
“You should talk, Ms. Wham-bam-send-in-the-next-man.”
“Those days are over, Ray. I swear. All joking aside. The baby moved. It’s like she sensed Luke or something.”
“She? Your Elemental Spidey senses say the baby’s a girl?”
Gabby looked at her hand on
