Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Asmoday
Shit. I was usually much smoother than that. Something about Daruka turned me into a bumbling idiot. It probably wasn’t that bad, but it felt like it to me. I was a king of seduction. I was a literal lust demon.
“No one else is tripping over themselves to try to get in your pants,” she said, flapping her hand at a passing harpy, who gave us both once-overs before crossing the street and then increasing her speed for good measure.
“You want to get in my pants?” I asked hopefully.
Her response was a glare that could cut down a lesser man.
“You’re definitely a lust demon,” she snapped. “What gives?”
Her plan was to ignore the whole fated mates proclamation, apparently.
I took a sip of my cold brew. Selina had a fair number of really annoying traits. Making really excellent coffee was not one of them.
I admitted my truth. “It’s a spell. Keeps my pheromones under check. Well, it keeps everyone else from noticing my pheromones.”
The pheromones were working just fine, I now realized, courtesy of this attraction between me and Daruka. Or, more accurately, they were now singularly focused. Just as Dad had warned me.
She narrowed her eyes. “And the spell doesn’t work on me and Selina? Just the two of us?”
I sighed. “Selina is the one who cast the spell, and she excluded herself. Which, for the past four years, I’ve tried to convince her to adjust.”
What I didn’t add, because honestly, it was water under the bridge, was that the day I’d arrived in Arrythmia and had asked Selina to cast the spell, there’d been a price to pay. There was always a price to pay.
In this case, it was me, in her bed, for twelve hours. Naked. At her bidding.
And since I’d been single at the time and figured it was worth it to get everyone else off my back, I agreed to her terms.
Problem was, one time wasn’t enough for Selina. Which, I’ve pointed out to her, was a result of my lust demon nature and that all she had to do was include herself in the dulling spell.
Which she promptly ignored each and every time I pointed this out.
“Hmm,” Daruka said. She drank her coffee and nibbled at her scone and did not ask why she was immune to the spell.
Finally, I waved at the street and gave her an out. “You still need clothes.”
We crossed and headed two doors down to the boutique, where I introduced Queenie and Daruka.
And then I stepped outside and sank down onto a bench, because as much as I’d love to watch the process and offer my opinions, soak up the conversation I knew Queenie would coax out of her, I also knew Daruka needed a break from me. Room to breathe.
While I was curious about what brought her to Arrythmia—everybody who came here had a story—I could bide my time, let her come to accept our intertwined fates at her own pace.
River meandered up to me with his hands stuffed into his pockets.
Like most animals in this town, he had the ability to shift forms. Although even in his humanoid form, he still strongly resembled a bird with his beak-like nose, black eyes, and hair brushed away from his face like a spray of feathers on the back of his head, similar to the phoenix he was.
Before ending up in Arrythmia, River had a stalker who kept setting fire to wherever he happened to be at the moment, because they liked to watch him burn and regenerate.
Except the last time it happened, there had been other people in the building, and, although all the innocent bystanders had safely escaped, River had been traumatized. If they hadn’t escaped…
The experience ultimately led him to Arrythmia, where he now happily inked the inhabitants’ skin and hadn’t had to regenerate since he arrived.
“What’s going on, man?” he asked, standing over me, rocking on the balls of his feet.
I shrugged and tossed my empty cup into a nearby trash receptacle. “We have a new resident. Queenie’s fitting her with a new wardrobe.” I stabbed my thumb over my shoulder at the boutique.
River looked up, the wide shop windows reflecting in his sunglasses. “I heard there’s a new supe in town.”
Arrythmia was no different from every other small town in that gossip spread faster than, well, damn near anything.
“Yep,” I said, nodding.
“You said her. What is she?”
“A mermaid,” I said, and then added, “and demon.” That side of her nature was a lot more obvious, and ever since Gal opened the hellmouth, the residents had understandably been a little gun-shy about demons. “But she’s cool.”
“A mermaid, eh? Can’t imagine a mermaid would be happy here. Like, where’s the nearest body of water? The Gulf?” River was apparently not one of the residents who was nervous about demons living here.
I frowned. He had a point. Mermaids needed water. Like, literally, Daruka could die without it. Sure, everyone needed to drink water, but Daruka needed to actually soak in it on the regular.
I still wasn’t sure whether they had sex organs while in their mermaid form. Hopefully, I’d find out in person one of these days.
“Hey,” River said, “come to my shop while you’re waiting. I drew some new designs. I’d love your opinion.”
River’s designs were, generally speaking, spectacular.
I hadn’t added any fresh new ink in a while.
And I knew from firsthand experience that Queenie needed time to work her wardrobe magic.
Even when she’d outfitted me with a single velvet smoking jacket and a dozen vests and matching leather pants, it had taken a solid two hours.
Plus, the tattoo parlor was directly across the street. I could keep an eye on Queenie’s shop, head back when I saw Daruka was ready to leave.
I bounced to my feet. “Let’s go.”
The tattoo parlor was tucked between the wine tasting room and the recently opened yoga studio, which was run by a selkie. I made a mental note to suggest Daruka check it out. A selkie, like a mermaid, needed water, so he ought to know where she could get her fix.
River’s place, Ink A New You, was decorated for Valentine’s Day, just like the rest of the businesses in town.
The resident vampire had started our tradition of throwing a Valentine’s festival and decorating the entire town with red and pink hearts.
The poor guy was more of a sap about love than I was.
On the door of River’s shop, underneath the name, was an elaborate painting of a phoenix, the tail curled and twisted to look like smoke. Phoenix had that exact image tattooed onto his back.
Inside, the walls were covered with photographs of his work.
I followed him past the counter that separated the work area from the lobby, all the way back to his office, which was the size of a closet and smelled faintly of ash.
He flipped on the bright lamp on his desk and waved at the drawing lying there.
As expected, it was extraordinary. A beautiful, sultry woman, vaguely resembling a pin-up model from the 1940s.
“I keep having dreams about her,” River said while I studied his artwork. “I finally had to draw her. But I’m not sure I’d be willing to ink her onto someone else’s skin.” He frowned, as if he didn’t understand his own words.
“No worries here,” I responded. “I’m in the market for new ink, but not a woman.” If I ever inked a woman onto my skin, it’d be a blue-haired mermaid. Except something told me Daruka would not be pleased if I put her likeness on my body without her permission.
“What about a mermaid?” I asked. “A generic one. Not blue. Not one that—”
“Looks like our newcomer?” River suggested with an eyebrow lift.
I’d glare at him if I weren’t fully aware of my own thought process. Instead, I shook my head. “Yeah, I should wait.”
Because I didn’t want a generic mermaid. And I didn’t have time to make a well-thought out decision about anything else I might be willing to permanently etch onto my body.
“I should get back so she isn’t wandering around town alone.”
“I understand,” River said solemnly. I suspected he really did.
Which was unnerving. Me, thinking such thoughts was one thing. The fact that my buddy could tell I was thinking such thoughts?
Unnerving.
I shoved my hands into my pockets and headed across the street. I could see Queenie through the plate glass window, fussing with a display and sliding clothes on hangers back into place on the rack. She was moving about as if she were alone in her boutique.
I kicked up my pace, burst through the entrance, triggering a sound like wind—or spirits—in the desert, because Queenie thought that was more fitting than a simple bell.
“Where’s Daruka?” I demanded.
Queenie glanced up from the mannequin she’d been dressing with pink and red strips of cloth. A Valentine’s Day mummy?
“Why, she left,” Queenie said. “Something about checking out the hellmouth.”
Oh, hell.
Literally.