Pax Demonica (4 page)

Which meant that if I wanted to end this demon, I was going to have to shove my finger into his eye socket. Gross, but it would have the effect of opening the portal that would suck the demon back into the ether.

The downside, of course, was that a sucked-out demon couldn’t answer my questions. He’d be gone, and I’d be left beside a useless shell of a body.
Useless
being the operative term, because a dead demon couldn’t tell me anything. And right then, I was jonesing for information.

Dammit, dammit, dammit! I’d known there were demons on the prowl, and yet I’d so desperately wanted a demon-free vacation that I’d called on toddler logic and pretended that if I just looked the other way it would all go bye-bye. There was a lesson there. Something about never ignoring the sign of a demon, because if you did it would surely come back to bite you on the ass.

At the moment, my ass felt well and truly chewed.

I used my free hand to slam my fist soundly into his nose. “What?” I repeated. “What do you think I have?”

“You know,” he snarled, and then he hocked back and spat on me. So help me, I flinched. Me, the woman who’d changed countless dirty diapers and nursed children through all forms of stomach flu. I faltered in the face of phlegm. And the demon took advantage of my weakness, wrenching his body to the side and forcing himself out of my grasp.

“Oh, no you don’t,” I said, grappling for him, but he was small and wiry and fast. He scuttled backward like a crab, then hopped to his feet.

“It will be ours,” he said. “The door will be opened.”

And then the little fiend turned and ran down the alley away from me. I started after him, but was halted by the sound of pounding feet behind me coupled with Stuart’s worried voice, now echoing down the alley. “Kate? Oh, shit, Kate! What happened?”

He was at my side in seconds, holding my arm to steady me, then bending down to pick up Allie’s backpack, which the little demon had dropped. At least I’d managed to accomplish that much.

“Are you okay?” He looked into my eyes. “Was it—”

“Gypsy,” I said. “Snagged Allie’s pack.”

“Jesus, Kate. You should have just let him take it. What if he’d had a knife?”

“Force of habit,” I said dryly. I rubbed the sore spot on my head as we walked back to the front of the B&B. “And all he had was a fist.”

“So it wasn’t a—a demon?” His voice dropped so far it was barely audible.

I shook my head, the lie coming too easily. “A kid,” I said. I told myself it was just jet lag and hunger. I’d tell him the truth later, after we all were rested. But honestly? I think I was lying to myself, too.

“
Mom!”

Allie’s scream had me racing inside, terrified that the demon had doubled back to my daughter, and equally scared that I was going to get caught in my very own lie.

I found her on the B&B’s narrow staircase, battling an unwieldy monster that was lurching down on her. “The brake!” I cried as I lunged forward, squeezing in beside her and taking the weight of the thing on my shoulder. “You need to set the brake! It can’t roll back on you if you set the brake.”

“Right. Sure. Got it.” She dropped down onto her knees while I held the thing steady, then she reached under the carriage to set the brakes on the two back wheels of Timmy’s monster-sized stroller.

Once the stroller was no longer trying to roll gleefully down the stairs, Allie squeezed in beside me and we maneuvered it back down to the lobby where Stuart waited with Timmy in his arms. In other words, exactly where the blasted thing had been trying to get all along.

“What were you trying to do?” Stuart asked.

She shrugged. “Paulo took the luggage upstairs. I was trying to help.”

“Maybe we should ask Mrs. Micari if there’s someplace we can store the thing downstairs. We don’t actually need it in the rooms.”

“Oh,” Allie said. “Right.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Stuart said, passing Timmy to his big sister. “Your mom’s done enough this morning. I’ll meet you in the room.”

I hauled my exhausted body up the two flights of stairs, glanced around just long enough to recognize our luggage and confirm I was in the right place, and then collapsed face down onto the bed. I’m pretty sure I managed exactly ninety seconds of quality nap time before I was awakened by the pitter patter of tiny feet bouncing dangerously near my head.

I peeled my eyes open, rolled to my side, and watched as Tim made a game of plopping butt first on the bed, bouncing twice, then giggling like it was the funniest thing ever.

Maybe it was, but I was too wiped out to smile.

Stuart joined us in the room with the announcement that we were all set, and the stroller was tucked away in an alcove off the kitchen. “How’s the bed?” he asked me.

I patted the spot beside me. “See for yourself.”

He took me up on the invitation and lay back with a long, slow sigh. I knew exactly how he felt.

“This so totally sucks,” Allie said. She was stretched out across the pillow-covered daybed that doubled as a sofa. “We just got here and you guys are already crashing. Hello? It’s morning. It’s Rome. We should be out. Doing stuff. Instead we’re stuck in this tiny room. I bet the
Forza
dorms are like a hundred times bigger.”

“Those rooms are even smaller,” I said gently. I couldn’t blame her for being disappointed. My original plan was to stay in the dorms and let her get a feel for where I grew up. More important, to let her see where her father and I met.

Once Stuart and Timmy had joined the excursion, I’d changed our plans, moving the family from the austere
Forza
dorms to the quaint little bed and breakfast that Father Corletti’s secretary had recommended.

“Sorry,” Allie said, but there was no apology in her voice. She shot a glance at her little brother. “But at least let the squirt sleep with you because if he wets the bed, I am
so
not going to be happy.”

Before I could respond, there was a sharp tap on the doorframe. Stuart hadn’t closed the door, and when I turned I saw Mrs. Micari standing in the doorway, her sparkling eyes focused on Allie. “You like the rooms, yes?”

My daughter’s brow furrowed. “Rooms?”

I caught Stuart’s eyes and saw my own grin reflected there. I considered chiming in to deliver the good news to Allie but decided to let Mrs. Micari take the role of fairy godmother.

“But of course. Is good for children to have their own space, yes?” She turned slightly and winked at me. “And good for the adults, too. For the
amore
.”

“Ew!” Allie said, but I could tell that the horror of contemplating
amore
between Stuart and me was completely overshadowed by the fabulous reality of her own room. Albeit one she had to share with her baby brother.

She turned imploring eyes on Mrs. Micari. “You’re serious? Timmy and I really get our very own room?” She didn’t wait for the innkeeper to nod. In one giant leap, she moved from her perch on the day bed to the mattress where Stuart and I had moved to sitting positions. Her arms went around me, knocking me backwards before releasing me and turning the same attention to Stuart. “Thank you, thank you!”

She turned back to Mrs. Micari. “This is the best hotel ever!”

Mrs. Micari’s grin widened. “In that case, it is not necessary for me to give you this?” She indicated the basket she held in her hand. “Is biscotti and fruit. And also,” she added with a sideways glance toward me, “the
Torta Barozzi
.”

“Seriously?” I’d started to rise from the bed.
Torta Barozzi
wasn’t a traditional Roman dessert, but I absolutely love it, not in small part because it provides a massive hit of both chocolate and espresso, two of the major food groups.

Allie got to her feet before I did and took the basket from Mrs. Micari’s outstretched hand. “Best. Hotel. Ever,” she repeated.

“Bed and breakfast,” I corrected, but she waved off my words.

“Can I see it? Can I see my room?”

“That you share,” I clarified.

“Yeah, yeah,” Allie said. “You know he’s gonna want to sleep with you guys.”

I considered arguing. After all,
wanting
and
getting
were two different things. And I fully intended to delve into that whole
amore
thing that Mrs. Micari had so expertly advocated. But time enough for that later. Right now I was just pleased to have a daughter who’d sloughed off her initial disappointment and was giddy about the accommodations.

Mrs. Micari smiled wide and stepped out into the hallway. Stuart and I followed. The B&B had five rooms, two on the first floor and three on the second. Our rooms were on the second (a fact that confused Allie since, in Italy, the first floor is the ground floor, the second floor is the first, and the third is the second). The room Stuart and I shared was on the left side of the landing, next to the huge, modernized bathroom. Allie and Timmy’s room was the first of the two rooms on the right. The third room had been let to a young woman who, according to Mrs. Micari, was traveling Europe with a backpack and a train pass.

The kids’ room had two beds, a recliner, and a small television, which attracted Timmy like a magnet. “
Blue’s Clues,
Momma?
Blue’s Clues?”

“Not here, kiddo.”

“There’s probably something for him,” Stuart said, flipping it on. “Disney’s international, right?”

Mrs. Micari laughed. “You speak Italiano? Is no English on television channels here.”

“Seriously?” Considering her tone, Allie might as well have cursed out loud.

“Allie.” Hopefully from
my
tone she could tell that she was walking a fine line.

She shot me an apologetic smile then glanced at Mrs. Micari. “It’s no big. We’re so totally not going to be watching television. And if the kid gets bored, we’ve got movies for him on the iPad.”

As she spoke, she took the remote from Stuart and randomly hit the channel button. Commercial. Commercial. Italian soap opera. Commercial.
I Love Lucy
(dubbed). News. Commercial.

News
.

My mind caught up with the image. “Allie,” I ordered, interrupting Mrs. Micari’s rundown of the room’s amenities—fresh towels, bottled water, treats every evening. “Go back.”

My daughter shrugged and complied. A second later, she and I were both staring at a televised scene from a familiar airport concourse—right in front of the men’s room.

A reporter was speaking in rapid-fire Italian as paramedics and armed
polizia
moved in and out of the facility. “—found dead, although authorities have released no additional information other than the man’s identity,” the reporter said in Italian.

Allie looked at me, waiting for me to translate. I was just about to do that when the reporter continued speaking. “The victim has been identified as Los Angeles resident Thomas Duvall, a passenger on TransAtlantic flight 832.”

“Which TransAtlantic flight?” Stuart asked as the image on the screen changed, the view of the concourse replaced by a single passport photo.

I didn’t answer. For that matter, I’d barely heard the question. All my attention was on the screen—and the larger-than-life image of Mr. Pepperdine looking back at me.

Chapter 4

I
stared at the television
, absolutely certain that if I could get my hands on the incident report, I’d see that Mr. Pepperdine—aka Thomas Duvall—and his stinky breath had been taken out by a ballpoint pen to the eye. Or something equally pointy.

Because there was no other way to kill a corporeal demon.

Actually, that’s not true. Beheading also tends to remove demons from bodies, but only because the demon doesn’t want to hang around anymore. The whole point of hiding inside the human form is to blend in with the general populace. Without a head, that whole blending-in plan doesn’t work out too well, and the demon voluntarily vacates its human home. Stick a pencil through the eye, and there’s nothing voluntary about the departure. The portal opens and—
poof
—the demon’s sucked back to the ether, swirling all around us without form, biding its time until it can try again with another dead body.

“Wasn’t he on our plane?” Stuart had edged closer to the television, and though he glanced at me, his attention was mostly focused on Allie. Apparently I wasn’t the only one who had noticed the way she’d spent much of the flight staring at a demon in a cute guy costume.

“Yeah,” Allie admitted. “He sat a few rows up from us.”

“Good God,” Stuart said, leaning in to turn up the sound, which made no sense at all, as Stuart doesn’t speak a word of Italian. “We were in that concourse.” His worried glance fell on me. “You were probably in the ladies’ room when that guy was killed.”

A few feet away, Allie gasped. “Mom, you didn’t—”

I twisted to face her, my expression dark with warning.

“—see anything?” she concluded lamely. “When you went to the bathroom, I mean. You were right there. Did you see something?”

“No,” I said firmly, because Stuart obviously hadn’t gone there yet, and Mrs. Micari was still standing in the doorway. And what was she thinking, anyway? That I’d take out a demon in the middle of the airport in Rome? Italian security officers patrol the airport with machine guns, and somehow I don’t think they’d believe me if I said I was saving the world. “I didn’t see a thing.”