K Stewart - A Devil in the Details

I flopped into my seat and propped my sore leg up on the one in front of me. If someone came to sit there, I’d take it down, of course, but until then it felt better up. If the guys noticed I’d been limping my way up the concourse, they hadn’t said anything. That meant they either hadn’t noticed at all, or they had, and they were worried. I wasn’t sure which I preferred.

Kansas City was just heading back to the dugout after their warm-up, and the buzz in the crowd escalated when Arizona took the field. I could see people craning their necks to see if Nelson Kidd was in the bull pen. He would be, of course. Any coach would be insane not to play him when he was so hot.

It was almost physically painful to watch the excited faces around me. If they only knew what their hero had done. Ah well, it wasn’t their fault, and even if anyone would have believed me, I wouldn’t have told them. Sometimes, people just need heroes.

“Dude, you okay?” Will nudged my arm, frowning. “You look constipated.”

“Shut up, asshole.” I swatted him and did my best to drag my brain out of work thoughts. “Get me a beer.”

“On it.” Yeah, they’d noticed my leg. There was no way Will would have agreed to fetch if they thought I was fully functional. For a few brief moments, I debated going to get my own beer, just for pride’s sake, but good sense won out for a change.

We settled with beers and some nachos of dubious quality right as the game started. I managed not to grimace when I stood up for the national anthem. As the innings started ticking by, I completely forgot my sore leg, and demon contracts, and soulless pitchers.

By some miracle, we were winning in the fifth inning (3-2) with runners on first and second when the hot dog vendor wandered through the section, giving the usual “Hot dogs, getchyer hot dogs here!” chant. I’m not sure what made me look over, seeing as how I didn’t want a hot dog. But look I did, and the vendor met my eyes.

He looked to be fiftyish, potbellied, with dark hair and a spindly mustache. The deep tan of his skin spoke of something exotic in his heritage, be it Hispanic or something else. He grinned at me, flashing a gold front tooth, and his eyes gleamed red for a split second.

My stomach dropped to somewhere around my feet. “Oh hell.”

The hot dog vendor ambled up the stairs, carefree as all get out, still hawking his wares. I scrambled over Marty to follow him, committing alcohol abuse in the process.

“Dude, my beer!” Marty gave me a dripping wet glare, but I hardly noticed.

I made up something about using the john and buying a new beer and hurried up the cement stairs as fast as my leg would allow. The vendor got to the top of the stairs without pausing to make a single sale, then made a left toward the next aisle.

“Hey, watch it, buddy!” A businesswoman in a pin-striped suit gave me a glare when I lurched into her, my leg betraying me with every step. She muttered curses after me as I mumbled an apology and kept climbing. I didn’t remember our seats’ being so far down the section before, but the top seemed impossibly far away.

When I reached the peak, the man-demon was gone. I turned in a slow circle, eyes searching the aisles for the dark-haired hot dog vendor, but he had vanished into thin air. Had it been Axel, causing his usual trouble, or someone else? Given Axel’s little display of shape-shifting earlier, I had no doubt he could take on any form he wanted. If I stopped to think about it, that was a little scary-okay, a lot scary.

The river of baseball fans parted to pass around me, the crazy man standing in the middle of the walkway. I thought about asking if they’d seen a hot dog vendor, but on some level I knew they hadn’t. I limped over to lean against a concrete pillar near the men’s bathroom, intending to rest my leg for a moment before I began the trek back down to my seat.

“Hide-and-seek, peekaboo.” Warm breath wafted over my left ear, and I swung before I thought. It was a rather pretty backhand sweep, technically perfect in every way, but I sensed my target duck before I ever laid eyes on him. I pulled the blow a hairbreadth from slamming my hand into the pillar.

Axel, in his blond Mohawk punker guise again, stood up from a low crouch, whistling. “A swing and a miss!” He grinned, lounging against a trash can. “Scared ya?”

My heart thundered in my ears, and the adrenaline washed away all traces of pain in my right leg. I held the loose fighting stance for long moments, until it became clear Axel wasn’t moving. Idiot. Of course he wasn’t moving. He couldn’t hurt me unless I gave permission. I forced my hands to relax at my sides, just another guy standing near the bathrooms at a baseball game.

“What do you want?” Man, I was sick of hearing myself say those words.

“You were thinking about me. I came to see why.”

For a moment, I felt cold. Then reality slapped me in the face, and I gave him a disgusted look. “You can’t read minds.”

Axel snickered. “Well, no, but you should have seen the look on your face.”

“Was that you? The hot dog guy?”

His eyes, blue as any normal human’s when he wasn’t being all demonic, roamed the crowd around us. His nonchalance didn’t fool me for a moment. “Maybe I just like baseball. Did you ever think of that?”

“Not for a moment.” I still didn’t believe it, and it didn’t escape me that he hadn’t answered my question. “I don’t want you here.”

“Public place, Jesse. I’m a free-range demon here.”

I glanced around quickly to see if anyone had heard him. Of course, what would they think? A couple of loonies having a talk over a trash can? Had one too many brews, maybe? “Leave these people alone.”

He laughed. It was a joyful, rich sound. It was my laugh. Shouldn’t demons have nasty, evil laughs? “What, you’re going to take responsibility for the entire stadium? I indulge you too much by letting you extend your protection to your coworkers as it is. Even you aren’t worth giving up all of this.” His sweeping gesture took in the whole stadium, and maybe the world beyond. “You’re good, Jesse. You’re not that good.”

“So… what? You’re here hunting souls?”

The demon shrugged his lanky shoulders and sighed. “Nah, one of the others pretty much has the baseball market sewed up tight. I think you’ve met him.” I hated that grin; that smug I-know-more-than-you smirk. “I just came out to annoy you, taunt you, generally make myself a pest.”

“Mission accomplished. You can go now.” Dammit, I spilled Marty’s beer for this? I knew I was glaring when I turned to walk away, and I didn’t care who saw it.

“Whoa, hold on! I’ve done the annoying bit, but I still have some taunting to get in.” He grabbed my elbow, and something snapped between us like a bad static shock. With a hiss, Axel snatched his hand back, shaking it. “Damn protection spells…”

Mira. All her gods bless her. I did my best to look as if I knew that was going to happen. “You know, those only work against people who mean me harm. You got something you wanna tell me, Axel?”

The blond man snorted, flexing his fingers one at a time to see if they still worked. “I want your soul. It doesn’t get much more harmful than that.” He cradled his hand close to him now. It may have felt like a static shock to me, but he was hurt-interesting. “And yes, there’s a lot I want to tell you, but I can’t just blurt it out. There are rules, Jesse, and I’m as bound by them as you are. I shouldn’t even be doing this much, but there are certain things you need to know!”

Across the concrete walkway, two small boys started tussling in the popcorn line. The noise drew my attention long enough to be sure the parents were going to separate them, and then I looked back to my pet demon. Axel’s gaze came back to my face. He’d been watching the kids fight, too.