Chapter 6
The subway ride to Queens had never felt so long.
Victor stood close in the crowded car, one hand on the rail above her head, his body forming a barrier between her and the press of commuters. The position put his chest inches from her face. She could smell cedar and smoke.
Saturday night crashed back unbidden: his couch, his hands in her hair, the rough edge in his voice. In about thirty seconds, I’m going to forget this is fake.
She’d spent two days trying not to think about it. Two days of careful distance and safer topics and pretending her body didn’t remember exactly how he’d felt pressed against her.
“You’re nervous,” he said.
“My best friend is about to interrogate my fake demon boyfriend.” Ava adjusted her bag on her shoulder, using the movement as an excuse to create space between them. “Of course I’m nervous.”
“We handled the senior partners this morning. Lilith’s suspicions. Grimm’s questions.” His voice was low enough that only she could hear. “How much worse can your roommate be?”
She thought about Mia’s text from lunch: Bringing wine. And holy water. And possibly a priest. The cute one from St. Anthony’s who did that blessing last Easter.
“You have no idea.”
The train lurched. Victor’s free hand caught her elbow, steadying her without thought. His fingers lingered a beat too long before he let go.
They climbed the stairs into the September evening, the city noise swallowing them whole. Queens spread out in its familiar patchwork of bodegas and brownstones, fire escapes and corner delis. Ava had walked these streets a thousand times. They’d never looked quite like this before.
That bodega on the corner, the one where Mr. Navarro had been selling lottery tickets since before she moved here, did he know about the supernatural? That woman walking her Pomeranian, was the Pomeranian actually a Pomeranian, or something wearing a Pomeranian like a suit?
“Your face,” Victor said. “You’re wondering if everyone’s secretly supernatural.”
“Are they?”
“Most humans live their entire lives without knowing we exist.” He didn’t look at her, his gaze tracking the street with the casual alertness of someone who’d survived centuries by noticing threats before they noticed him. “It’s safer that way.”
“Safer for who?”
He didn’t answer.
Their building stood ahead: five stories of aging brick with a door that never latched right and a super who’d been promising to fix the hallway light since the Clinton administration.
The stairwell always smelled like someone’s grandmother’s cooking, tonight it was garlic and something fried, drifting down from 4B.
Ava had lived here for three years, splitting rent with Mia while they both chased dreams that seemed increasingly impossible.
Mia waiting tables between auditions that never called back.
Ava buried in law libraries, drowning in debt, trying to justify her parents’ sacrifice with grades and honors and a career that was supposed to mean something.
Now Ava worked for demons and Mia was about to serve dinner to one.
“Third floor,” she said. “No elevator.”
“I’m aware.”
Of course he was. He probably knew her shoe size and her blood type and the name of her childhood goldfish. Ancient demons didn’t do anything by half measures.
Including, apparently, fake relationships that refused to stay fake.
The stairs creaked under their weight, each step announcing their arrival. Music pounded through apartment 3C’s door, Mia’s pre-battle playlist, all bass and attitude and Beyoncé telling the world exactly what it could do with its opinions.
Ava knocked, even though she had a key. “Mia? We’re here.”
The music cut off.
The door flew open.
Mia stood there in ripped jeans and her faded “brOADWAY OR BUST” t-shirt, a wooden spoon raised like a weapon.
Her dark curls were piled on top of her head, secured with what looked like a chopstick from their favorite Thai place, and her brown eyes locked onto Victor with the intensity of a casting director during finals week.
“You’re taller than I expected,” she said.
“You’re exactly as Ava described.”
They stared at each other. The hallway felt very small.
She counted to five. “Can we come in? Or should I get popcorn for the standoff?”
Mia stepped aside, still watching Victor like he might sprout horns at any moment. “Shoes off. House rules.”
Victor paused, barely perceptible, but Ava caught it.
An ancient demon, master of contracts and souls, stopped short by the request to remove his shoes.
He bent and untied his Italian leather oxfords with precise movements, placing them neatly by the door beside Ava’s worn sneakers and Mia’s collection of character heels.
His socks were black. Of course they were.
The apartment was exactly what it had always been: small and cluttered and entirely theirs.
Mismatched furniture rescued from street corners and estate sales.
A kitchen that opened into a living room that doubled as Mia’s rehearsal space, the coffee table perpetually buried under scripts and headshots and highlighters in six different colors.
The walls held framed playbills from shows Mia had seen, shows Mia had worked, shows Mia dreamed of being in someday.
Tonight, she’d set their tiny dining table with their best plates, also mismatched, a floral pattern next to solid blue next to something that might have been from a diner, and lit a candle that smelled like vanilla and optimism.
“Wine?” Mia offered, already pouring.
“Please.” Ava needed it.
“I’ll have whatever you’re having,” Victor said.
Mia poured three generous glasses of the ten-dollar red they kept for emergencies and celebrations and Tuesdays that felt too long. Then she turned to Victor, glass in hand, and smiled the smile she used on directors who’d already decided not to cast her.
“So. You’re a demon.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re fake-dating my best friend.”
“That’s correct.”
“But you have real feelings for her.”
Victor’s hand stilled on his wine glass. The movement was small, a fraction of a hesitation, but Ava had been watching him for days now. Learning his tells. This one said danger.
“It’s complicated.”
“Make it simple.” Mia sipped her wine without breaking eye contact. “You’re an ancient demon who manipulated Ava into a protection arrangement. Now you’re catching feelings. Yes or no?”
“Mia,” Ava warned.
“No, it’s a fair question.” Victor set down his glass with careful precision. The movement bought him time, and Ava wondered if Mia noticed. “May I help with dinner?”
Mia blinked. “What?”
“Dinner. I notice you’re making pasta. I have some experience with Italian cuisine.”
“You cook?”
“I’ve had centuries to learn.”
Mia looked at Ava—is he serious?—then back at Victor. Her wooden spoon lowered by degrees, though she didn’t release it entirely.
“Fine. But if you poison us, I’m haunting you for eternity.”
“I accept your terms.”
Victor moved into the kitchen, rolling up his shirtsleeves with precise folds that revealed forearms Ava was definitely not looking at. He examined the pot on the stove, lifted the wooden spoon, tasted the sauce. Considered.
“Do you have oregano? Fresh, preferably, but dried will work.”
“Cabinet above the sink.”
He reached for the spice cabinet and paused, hand hovering over Mia’s organizational chaos. “Your system is… unique.”
“Alphabetical by how much I like them.” Mia crossed her arms, leaning against the counter. “Paprika’s in front because paprika’s the best. Everything else can fight for second place.”
“Fair enough.”
He found the oregano, wedged between nutmeg and something unlabeled, and added a pinch to the sauce. Then, almost absently, he made a small gesture with his hand.
The flame under the pot flared bright blue.
“What the hell was that?” Mia demanded.
“Adjusting the heat.”
“The flame changed color. Flames don’t change color.”
“Did it?” Victor stirred the sauce, his expression innocent in a way that fooled absolutely no one.
“Don’t play dumb with me, hell boy.” The wooden spoon came back up, pointing at his chest. “What did you do to my stove?”
“I may have enhanced the flame slightly. Better heat distribution. More even cooking.”
“Enhanced it with what?”
Victor continued stirring. “Nothing dangerous.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s perfectly safe.”
“You’re cooking our dinner with hellfire.” Mia looked at Ava, eyes wide. “Your boyfriend is literally cooking with hellfire.”
“Fake boyfriend,” Ava corrected automatically.
Victor’s hand paused mid-stir. His expression tightened before he resumed.
“Right.” Mia grabbed the Parmesan from the cabinet and began grating with aggressive enthusiasm. “Fake. That’s why you two arrived looking like you’d spent the entire weekend trying not to jump each other.”
“Mia!”
“What? I’m just saying.” She pointed the grater at them like evidence. “There’s fake dating and there’s whatever you two are doing. Which apparently involves hellfire pasta and enough sexual tension to power Manhattan.”
“The pasta is perfectly normal,” Victor said. “Only the flame is enhanced.”
“And I suppose you enhance flames for all your fake girlfriends?”
“I haven’t had a girlfriend, fake or otherwise, in over a century.”
Both women turned to stare at him.
“What?” He kept stirring, not meeting their eyes.
“A century?” Mia repeated.
“The 1890s, specifically. It was a different time.” His voice had flattened, the way it did when he was controlling something. “Different circumstances.”
“What happened?”
Victor went still. The blue flame flickered, then dimmed to normal orange.
“She died.”
The kitchen went quiet. Steam rose from the pot. Somewhere in the building, a door slammed.