Chapter 14 #2
“We even said it before, that she was writing less, that her tone changed. It’s Greg.
He introduced her to the idea of demons.
Look, here, where she’s talking about his friends.
‘I’m not quite sure what to make of them.
Like Greg, they’re very sophisticated, talking about things I don’t always understand.
My sheltered upbringing never prepared me for this, and it makes me uncomfortable but also makes sense?
I think. I’m so confused. I wish we didn’t have to see them this weekend. ’” He looks up triumphantly.
“How did we miss that?” Kieran wonders, and then we all jump when Joe slams his hand on the table.
“You missed it because she could be easily talking about politics instead of demons. It’s only when you look at the context that it becomes clear. You’re idiots, but not that stupid.”
Wow, Joe’s in top form tonight.
“So we’re agreed? Greg introduced Emma to the concept of demon summoning, or at least to the occult in general?” Josh looks around the table. We’re all nodding. “Which makes her plan for vengeance even more personal—she was going to use his own, uh, hobby against him.”
I grin. “Hobby?” I tease.
“Shut up. What else would you call it?” His scowl is so adorable, I can’t resist the urge to lean over and kiss him.
“Um, hello!” Skye’s shriek makes me wince. “What the actual fuck just happened and why didn’t I know anything about it?” His eyes go wide. “Is this who you’re dating? Ewan?”
I smile at Josh. “You told him we’re dating?” That makes me all warm and squishy inside.
His face is beet red. “I needed advice. But I didn’t mention your name yet,” he mumbles.
“No, he did not,” Skye snaps. “And we’ll be having words about that. But first I need to know everything.” He jerks his head around to look at Daniel. “Did you know about this?”
My best friend and roommate shrugs, somehow still eating even though he’s already consumed enough food to sustain an army. “Of course.”
The sound of indignation Skye makes is high-pitched and wordless.
“He’s only known since last night. After we found the diary,” Josh rushes to assure Skye. “And we’ve only been dating since… are we even dating if we haven’t been on a date yet?”
“If I may interrupt,” Kieran says dryly, and it occurs to me—with a sinking feeling of dread—that we possibly should have mentioned to the boss that we were planning to officially get together.
Josh goes pale, and I know he’s worrying about losing his job.
I take his hand and squeeze it reassuringly. Kieran’s not an asshole.
He proves me right by saying, “We keep getting off track. Could we try to stick to the important stuff, please?”
Josh blinks at him. “Y-You don’t care that Ewan and I are… dating?”
“Of course I care,” Kieran rushes to assure him.
“I’m happy for you both, seriously. And if you want to talk about it, we can.
Totally. But can we deal with the demon in the basement first?
Because I haven’t slept properly all week, and I’m going to have to buy shares in Pepto if this goes on for much longer. ”
The deep sigh of relief Josh gives makes me bite back a smile. “That’s great. I just… I don’t know the policy about it. So… but yeah. If you’re fine with it, there’s nothing to talk about. Let’s get back to demons.”
“There definitely is something to talk about,” Skye mutters. “And we’ll be talking about it later. But fine. Demons.”
“Where were we?” Josh asks, ignoring most of what Skye said.
“Greg was Emma’s gateway to demon stuff, and she was going to use it against him,” Daniel summarizes, finally pushing his plate away. “It could even be likely that she got that diagram thingy from him. The handwriting on it is different from the diary.”
I lean over Josh’s shoulder to look again. He’s right.
“Whether she got it from him or bought it or copied it out of a book isn’t as important as what happened next and what we are going to do next,” Kieran says, his patience seeming to fray.
“We can’t help Emma. She’s been dead for fifty years.
We need to act to prevent that from happening to anyone else.
” He pauses. “Maybe after we’ve done that, we can track down this Greg guy and slash his tires or something. ”
“Keying his paintwork is worse,” Skye volunteers. “If you do it right, it costs a hell of a lot to repair. And you can write words to let everyone who sees the car know what an assmonkey the owner is.”
Note to self: don’t piss off Skye.
“So… we’re going to contact the person from the website?” Josh asks.
“No!” Joe snaps. “No strangers.”
Kieran sighs. “Joe, it’s an option we can’t ignore. This person seems to have information we can use.”
“I swear I’ll make it as hard as I can for them to find out anything about me,” Josh promises.
“We’ll get a VPN and create a special email account with fake information.
From a different state. Or even a different country.
There are tons of haunted castles in Scotland, yeah?
I’ll say I found a diary and the diagram in a haunted castle in Scotland and now I want to write a book about it. ”
Joe’s scowling, but it’s his thinking scowl instead of his “fuck no” scowl. “What’s a VPN?”
“It hides where you are on the internet,” Skye says. “Someone who knew what they were doing could still find out, but most people have no idea. Including us. Otherwise we could do some fancy hacker thing instead of paying for a VPN.”
The scowl now seems more confused than anything else, but Joe nods grudgingly. “Fine. But I still don’t like it.”
“Noted. Thanks, Joe.” Kieran looks around the table. “Any other objections?” Silence. “Okay, so what are we putting in this message? Aside from Josh’s new identity as a Scottish wannabe author.”
“Keep it simple.” Daniel drums his fingers on the table.
“Hi, I noticed you seem to be the only person here with brain cells. I’m writing a book about a woman who goes to a haunted castle in Scotland to try to summon a demon.
The research I’ve been doing is really vague on what she’d need to do that, but I found this drawing.
Can you tell me what kind of demon this would summon?
And once she’s summoned it, how does she send it back?
I want this book to have a happy ending. ”
“That’s good,” Josh says, scribbling notes, “but they’re so going to think I’m trying to summon a demon.”
Dan shrugs. “So? Do you care what they think of you?”
“I care about them deciding not to reply to my message because they think I’m a crackpot who wants to summon a demon.”
“Good point.” Dan looks at me. “How does one ask about summoning demons without sounding like one wants to summon demons?”
“Don’t refer to yourself as ‘one,’ for starters.
It makes you sound like the kind of douche who’d want to summon demons,” I advise.
“Uhhh… What if we come at it from another angle? You’ve bought a house in Scotland or wherever that you know is haunted, but since you moved in, the ‘ghosts’ have been nasty—violent.
Aggressive. You found this old diary and drawing under a floorboard or something, and now you’re worried that what’s in the house is not actually a ghost. Can NEDDT tell you if the drawing would summon an actual demon and if so, would they act like that?
Describe some of the stuff our demon was doing before the ghosts trapped it. ”
“Who?” Daniel asks.
“Not Even Demons Deserve This. NEDDT,” I explain.
Kieran points at me. “Yes. This. I like it. The acronym and the plan.”
“And it’s a great opener to ask if they know how to get rid of the demon,” Josh adds, scrawling down the idea. “I’m kind of bummed I don’t get to be a wannabe author, though.”