The Price of Possession by Dakota Brown (universal ebook reader txt) 📗

Aaron looked pained and hunched over again.

"He has a few bad habits," I explained.

Sabian laughed, but this time he kept his power incheck.

"Anyway, fortunately, Mal is pretty open mindedwhen it comes to Sabian."

"For his background, Mal is extremely open mindedabout a lot of things," Sabian added.

"Yeah, I guess that's probably true, isn't it?"I hadn't actually thought too much about it, but Sabian was right. The vampirewas positively liberal as far as I could tell.

"Okay, so you're shacking up with a demon and avampire and you're helping me out because the demons have you doing the samething Father Darius and Deputy McClellan are, except you're not giving thehumans all the information you have? That about right?"

I laughed. "Yeah, mate. Darius can't handle allof this. It's safer if I keep him out of it as much as I can."

"Okay," Aaron agreed. "And you have ahellhound."

"Yeah. Not sure why, but he's here."

The creature appeared from wherever he had been andwagged his tail. I pet him on his fluffy head.

"Okay. I need to process all of this. I also needto get a car. Can you give me a ride? I'm sorry to impose."

"Naw, mate, it's no problem. I gotta head over tothe shop for a bit and maybe I'll swing by Mal's and say hi. We should probablyget some more crystals if we're going to unbind any more demons, if nothingelse."

"Great. I really appreciate you helping me out,"Aaron said.

"Happy to. Sabian, you coming?"

"If Aaron has no objection, I'll stick with himtoday. We probably shouldn't leave him alone in case they make another attemptto grab him."

I glanced at Aaron. He took a deep breath as ifsteeling himself before nodding. "Yes, thank you."

"Great. Let's go."

Chapter 13

Price

I dropped Aaron and Sabian off at a car dealership andheaded for the restaurant. I just wanted to stop in for a minute and then I wasgoing to go bug Mal at his shop. I had a thought that we might want to see ifwe could figure out anything about Aaron's crazy eye tattoos. I needed to askhim about those, but it hadn't been the time earlier.

The air conditioning of my restaurant welcomed me outof the hot desert air, and I stood under the vent for a moment. I could notwear the leather jacket in the summer. It was a lighter one, but still, it washot. Yet, I couldn't bring myself to give up on my dedication to the punk look.Also, the jacket had actually saved my ass on more than one occasion. Even ifit was just because I usually kept holy water in a squirt bottle in one of thepockets.

The hellhound followed on my heels and it was too hotto tell the creature to stay outside. Besides, most people didn't seem tonotice him, anyway.

Wiping some sweat away from my brow, I headed the restof the way into the restaurant. The staff members that weren't busy greeted me.A few of them sported the jean jackets I'd told Billy to give everyone.

"So, we need new shirts, too," Billy said byway of greeting when I walked into my office. He was sitting at my desk workingon one of the projects I'd handed over to him. I collapsed into one of thespare chairs. The hound settled by my feet.

"Whatever you want, mate." I didn't have theenergy to argue about it, and it probably was time for an update.

"Seriously?" He stopped what he was doingand looked at me.

"Yeah, sure. The guys like it. You all like it.Isn't hurting me any." I shrugged.

"Okay. I'll get to work on some designs. Anddesigns on the official signs and all. Once I get it put together, I can run itby you?"

"Yeah, great."

"You okay, Chris?"

I nodded. "It's just been a very trying few days.I'd never expected to be involved with any of this again and now I'm neck deepin it."

"So, you mentioned the guys. Both of them?"Billy gave me a sly look.

I realized what I'd done, sighed, and gave Billy a 'look.'

He grinned in reply.

"I gotta go. Everything going okay here? AnythingI need to know about?"

"No, boss. It's all good here. No demons that Iknow of. Customers have been relatively under control. We've got this while youdeal with whatever that priest has dragged you into."

"Thank you, Billy."

"Yep, see you later, boss."

I got up and left, knowing he'd take care ofeverything, waved at a few folks while I made my way through the restaurant,and got back into my oven-like car. As I'd suspected, no one noticed the dog.

I'd go see Mal for a few minutes, ask him about thetattoos, and then head back to my place.

The trip to the touristy town square didn't take longand I found a parking spot relatively quickly, though I hesitated getting outof the car once I'd turned it off until it got uncomfortable from the heatoutside. Why was I suddenly uncomfortable? I doubted Mal would mind me swingingby, especially since I wanted to ask about occult stuff. Was I nervous? Okay,this was getting dumb. The hellhound woofed softly, possibly in agreement. Idoubted he was too hot.

I got out of the damn car, let the dog out, andslammed the door in frustration. Chris Price did not get nervous about men.Even sexy, dangerous, nerdy, fangy men. It just didn't happen.

Despite the pep talk I still dragged my feet a littleas I headed toward the store. Even with my hesitation, it didn't take longbefore I was pushing the door open to the shop and getting smacked in the faceby the heavily incensed air.

Mal glanced up from a computer, a smile lighting uphis face when I came inside.

"Chris, hello."

"Hey, Mal."

His brow furrowed. "Is something wrong?"

"No. Sorry." I shrugged and came over to thecounter. "I actually just was hoping I wasn't bothering you by stoppingby. I thought it might be wise to see if we could figure anything out aboutAaron's strange tattoos," I said in a rush.

Mal's lips twitched and I thought he was trying not tosmile. He reached across the counter and brushed his fingers along my cheek. Ileaned into his touch a little.

"Malak,