Chapter Six
Whatever resentment I held toward Seth and the waitress faded pretty quickly when we got back to our room. He held me as securely as ever, kisses light on my skin and affection radiating around him like an immortal signature.
I let him sleep in the next morning as I blearily dressed and headed downstairs for day two of the trial. To my surprise, there were a lot less spectators than the previous day.
“They saw what they wanted to see and went home,” Luis explained to me. We stood near the entrance to the room, drinking coffee. “A lot of this is just sensationalism. The thrill is gone, though some might come back for the sentencing.”
I glanced over at the jury’s table. “At least none of them left. I kind of expected it.”
“Nah. They know better. There’d be serious consequences if they took off from something like this.”
Apparently, though, none of the demonic jurors felt they had to do more than just be present. They proved just as negligent as yesterday. The suspect today was a demon named Kurtis.
“Kurt,” he corrected Margo.
“Kurtis,” she said, “can you tell us about your relationship with Anthony?”
“Relationship? We barely had one date. I’d hardly call it that.”
A few people laughed at his joke. He’d chosen a lanky form and pale skin, with hair that kept falling into his face. If he was concerned about being accused of murder, he didn’t show it. His chronic smile indicated how silly he thought all of this was, Margo most of all.
She glared at his impertinence. “What I mean, Kurtis, is how did you know Anthony?”
He opened his mouth, and I would have bet anything he was about to crack another joke. Just then, he happened to make eye contact with Luis, and the accused demon’s face sobered a little bit.
As the story unfolded, we learned that Kurtis had once been Anthony’s archdemon. This perked the jurors up a little bit. Archdemons, as the leaders and power players in our world, tended to be better at self-constraint. Luis, Noelle, and even Jerome were good examples of that. If archdemons did take on others, it was their peers—not underlings. If Kurtis had indeed destroyed Anthony, it would be a juicy scandal. An archdemon undergoing a five-hundred year flaying would be equally compelling.
“Nothing’ll happen to him,” murmured the demon sitting beside me, as though reading my mind. He was the one who was into peanut butter. “He’s here because they wanted to make it look like they had a full group of suspects. You know, like they’d really researched all the possibilities. There isn’t enough evidence against him.”
I was surprised to hear something so astute from one of my colleagues. “That must be why he’s so laissez-faire about all this.”
“Yup.” The demon’s eyes studied Kurtis, then gave me a curious look. “What about Nutella? You into that maybe?”
When Anthony had worked for Kurtis, the two had apparently had a fair amount of tension between them. It wasn’t entirely clear if Anthony had done something to warrant the antagonism or if it was just a personality conflict. Regardless, Kurtis had taken retaliatory measures against his unruly employee.
Margo was pretending to read her clipboard again. “So, let me get this straight. You burned him alive?”
Kurtis shrugged. “If you can call it that. I mean, it didn’t do any permanent damage. And really, are we alive? Don’t we just exist? Or, in his case now, not exist?”
“And you locked him in a box at the bottom of the ocean for a month.”
“It was a roomy box.”
“And you decapitated him.”
“No.”
Margo looked up from her clipboard, eyebrow raised. “I have several witnesses who say otherwise.”
“I only partially decapitated him,” Kurtis countered. “His head was still attached…technically.”
Margo continued to go through a laundry list of assorted tortures Kurtis had inflicted on Anthony. Horrible or not, I had to admit the archdemon was pretty creative. Anthony had finally filed a complaint with higher authorities and gotten a transfer. He’d also gotten in very good with a high-ranking demoness. She’d made arrangements to ensure Kurtis was punished for his transgressions. No torture, though—well, at least not in the physical sense.
He’d been transferred to Belgium.
The mention of this dimmed Kurtis’s humor a bit. The transfer was still a bitter point with him. It had happened four centuries ago, and he was no happier about his current locale than he’d been then. He’d apparently spent these last four hundred years being quite liberal in his slander and criticism of Anthony.
“And you’re up for a possible transfer now, aren’t you?” asked Margo.
“Yes,” he replied.
“Hmm. Coincidental timing.”
He snorted. “Hardly. Why would I destroy him now? You think I’d want to risk getting in trouble when my review comes along?”
“Or,” said Noelle, suddenly speaking up, “maybe you wanted to make sure he wouldn’t be able to influence the review committee.”
Kurtis gave her a tight, mirthless smile. “That’s your own wishful thinking, Noelle. You have no fucking clue who did this, and you’ll take anyone you can find.”
“I’ll take whoever’s guilty,” she replied. She’d matched the steel in his voice but still wore her usual composure. “And I’ll make sure they pay.”
I left the proceedings that day with mixed feelings about Kurtis. With his history of violence and casual attitude about said violence, he did make a suspicious figure. On the other hand, I had to agree with him about the danger of taking out Anthony with the transfer hearing so close at hand.
Just like the day before, I was the only one to ask any real questions. I wanted to know when Kurtis and Anthony had last seen each other and if Kurtis had an alibi. He did, but again, I didn’t doubt a demon could come up with any number of people to lie for him.
Post-trial parties held little appeal for me today, so instead, I decided to go straight to Seth’s diner. The notion of just hanging out and doing something mundane like watching a movie had astonishing appeal. Besides, I was feeling guilty about my neglect.
When I stepped inside the elevator, I was surprised to see Noelle riding down as well. We stood there in that awkward silence elevator passengers often have, our eyes trained on the numbers as we descended. Daring a sidelong glance, I again admired her pretty features and remembered what Luis had said about her loving Anthony.
The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. “I’m sorry about Anthony.”
Her sea-colored eyes flicked from the numbers to me. Bitter amusement glinted in them.
“You’re the only one, I think.”
I thought so too. “I…I know it’s hard to lose someone you’re close to.”
“Close, huh? You’ve been talking to Luis. He might be the only other person who cares about this too.” A small frown wrinkled her brow. “But I believe you. You do know what it’s like. That’s the thing with you lesser immortals…you’re always around humans, getting caught up in their muddled emotions. Loving them. Losing them. Getting betrayed by them. You’d be better off staying detached from all that. Save yourselves a lot of pain.”
I wanted to tell her that if she’d loved Anthony, then she wasn’t a very good role model as far as emotional detachment went. Instead, I said something completely asinine.
“Well. I don’t think you can really have happiness if you don’t have pain too.”
Something like a snort caught in her throat. Noelle’s eyes swept me, and I felt as though she suddenly could see my life story without the benefit of a reading.
After several moments, she replied, “You must have a lot of happiness then.”
I held back a glare and left the elevator when it opened, murmuring a polite good-bye as I stepped out.
I walked down to the diner and caught sight of Seth through the window. He sat at the same table, and so help me, that fucking waitress was there again. The door was propped open to let in the nice weather. I started to step through, hesitated, and then retreated. There was a small overhang around the side of the building, obscured from the rest of the street. I sidled over to it and shape-shifted into invisibility. Returning to the front door, I crossed the threshold, hidden from mortal eyes.
Beth was laughing when I approached. “Really?” she asked. “You get love letters?”
“Sure,” he said. The abandoned laptop sat before him. Didn’t he have deadlines or something? “Not sure I really deserve it…but they show up more than you’d think. I’ve actually gotten poetry too.”
“Like dirty limericks?”
“No, thankfully. Got some haikus once, though.”
She laughed again. “The more you tell me, the more I really want to read your books. I’ve got to go pick up one.”
Seth shrugged. “No need. Give me your address, and I’ll send you a couple.”
“Oh, no. You don’t have to…”
He waved her off. “They send me boxes of them. It’s not a problem.”
“Wow, thanks.” She grinned. She had a cute smile for a shameless tramp. “That’d be great. Maybe…maybe I could get you coffee as a thank you. I mean, coffee not from here.”
Seth didn’t quite catch it at first, then I saw the surprise register on his face. “Ah,” he said. The social ease and banter he’d just had abruptly shut down. “Well. I…” He hesitated, and suddenly, suddenly, I wondered if he was hesitating over whether to accept rather than choosing words to refuse her. After what seemed like an eternity, he shook his head. “No. I can’t. Not…no. Not really. I’m, um, probably busy.”
Her face fell a little. “I understand.” A moment later, she mustered a smile. “Well…let me check on some tables, and then I’ll be back.”
She sauntered off across the restaurant, and I wished that dress wasn’t quite so snug on her ass. Seth’s eyes followed her, a bit regretful.
Suddenly, I didn’t want to talk to him quite so much after all.
I left the diner, my emotions in a tangle. I discretely shifted back to a visible form and headed down the street, moving toward the hotel but not really sure I wanted to go back there either.
“He likes her,” a voice suddenly said beside me.
Startled, I turned to find Kurtis walking along with me. He’d appeared out of nowhere. I didn’t bother asking what he’d just seen. Demons could move around with their signatures masked, and I supposed it was time for his bribe.
“No, he doesn’t,” I said immediately.
Kurtis laughed, the same unconcerned laugh I’d heard in the courtroom. “Of course he does. She’s hot.”
“He loves me,” I said.
“Love doesn’t stop people from betraying each other.”
It reminded me a bit of my conversation with Noelle. We passed near a bakery, and he beckoned me toward it.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s talk. This place makes great éclairs.”
Which is how, five minutes later, I found myself sitting at a table and eating a cinnamon roll the size of a car tire with another potential killer.
Kurtis didn’t speak until he was halfway through his second éclair. “So. Where were we?
Ah, yes. Your naive belief that love can keep a man from cheating on the one he loves.” He fixed me with a knowing look. “Honestly, I never thought I’d hear that from a succubus. You of all people should know better.”
He was right. I did know better. I couldn’t even keep track of how many men I’d lured away from the women they loved. Affection and reason tended to get a little murky when the body and its hormones took over.
“Seth’s different,” I responded.
“Of course he isn’t. He’s a man. He likes women, and that woman wants him so bad, her panties get wet each time she refills his coffee.”
“Doesn’t matter. She’s not his type.”
“She’s the female type. And she’s pretty.”
“She’s a waitress. Seth wouldn’t go for that.”
“She’s a waitress using her shitty job to put herself through college. You saying a geeky guy like him wouldn’t respect that?”
Yes, Seth would indeed respect something like that. But I still didn’t want to go along with any of this.
“He still wouldn’t do it.”
“Why? Because he’s getting it somewhere else?” He gave me a pointed look.
I honestly shouldn’t have been surprised if he knew everything about me. Still, I had to ask. “How do you know that?”
Kurtis licked chocolate icing off his fingers. “How do you think, little one? That guy’s got a soul brighter than a five-hundred-watt bulb. If he was sleeping with you, it’d show. And if you were going to do it, you’d have already done it.”
“He’s above physical needs.” It was quite possibly the stupidest thing I’d ever said, more so than the happiness and pain comment in the elevator.
“No one’s above physical needs. Not even demons. Look at Noelle and her insane obsession with all this.”
I tossed my hair back, putting on my best bland look. “Well, I don’t care if Seth wants to sleep with that girl. Not like he’d leave me for her. Besides, we have an arrangement. He knows he can get sex on the side if he wants. I don’t care.”
Kurtis threw back his head and laughed. “The fuck you don’t. I don’t have to be an angel to know you’re lying. It would kill you if he slept with someone.”
“It wouldn’t,” I said, even though he was right.
“Have you noticed that their names rhyme? It’s pretty cute.”
“Look,” I said angrily, “will you just leave my personal life alone and get on with whatever bribe you’re here to offer me?”
“Actually, your personal life is why I’m here. And I’m here to bribe you too.”
“Yeah? With what? Your compelling relationship advice?”
“Nah. You wouldn’t listen to it. I’m here to give you what you really want.”
“Yeah. Clyde said the same thing.”
“Clyde’s full of shit,” he scoffed. “I can give you the real deal. You don’t want to hurt your guy? I’ll give you a night with him, consequence free.”
I stared. The room seemed to stop moving.
“You can’t do that.”
“Of course I can.”
“How?”
“You belong to Jerome, right? I’ll get him to block you off from your power for a day.”
I blinked. I’d never thought of that. Hell, in its complicated love for hierarchies and chains of command, had a weird organizational system. An archdemon’s underlings were connected to him in such a way that their divine powers were “filtered” through him. It kept him in control of his subordinates and also gave him a sense of their whereabouts and well-being. It was also sort of like a string of Christmas lights. Take out an archdemon, and it’d cut off his lesser immortals from their powers until a new system was established. I’d never considered the notion of an archdemon willingly blocking someone out of the immortal chain.
The appealing fantasy quickly shattered for me. “Jerome would never do that. He doesn’t approve of my relationship with Seth.”
“Jerome owes me a favor.”
“He does not.” I had a hard time picturing my boss being indebted to anyone.
“He does.” Kurtis held his hand out to me. “I swear, if you vote for one of the other suspects, I’ll make sure you have a night with your guy during which he’ll suffer no damage to his soul.”
I felt the slight crackle of a demon offering a bargain. They could lie and swear about the most extraordinary things…but they were bound to their deals.
I swallowed, a brief image of being naked with Seth flashing in my mind’s eye.
“I can’t,” I said slowly. “I won’t vote because of a bribe. How do I know you didn’t do it?”
“Please. The evidence against me is ridiculous, and you know it. I could see it on your face at the trial.”
“Then why are you worried? Why do you need to bribe me?”
“Because there are plenty of jurors who’d enjoy convicting me just for the fun of it. I need to make sure that won’t happen.”
Temptation, temptation. The story of my life.
“I…can’t.”
He shrugged. “If you say so. Keep an eye on your boyfriend and that waitress, and you’ll see that I’m right about that. I bet he’s a great tipper, and I bet if he starts getting it somewhere else regularly, he might find it isn’t worth sticking around you. But, if you sleep with him sooner rather than later, you’ll keep him from straying.” He pushed his chair back and stood up. “Think on it. You vote for one of the others, and I’ll make good on my promise.”
His hand caught mine as he spoke, and a jolt shot through me. He’d sealed his vow.
I didn’t know what to say; my mind was a blur. Kurtis recognized that and grinned. “See you around.”
He walked out of the bakery, but I just sat there picking at my cinnamon roll, suddenly no longer hungry.