Jenna Black - The Devil You Know

Andy made a strangled sound in the back of his throat, and Raphael gave him a penetrating look. “No, I didn’t kill him, if that’s why you look like you swallowed a live frog.”

Andy managed to look scared and skeptical at the same time. “So there’s someone out there who knowingly summoned you to the Mortal Plain, knowingly transferred you into an illegal host, and has lived to tell the story?”

Raphael’s ice blue eyes fixed on Andy in a chilling stare. “He won’t be telling anyone anything, but not because I did him any harm. Amazingly enough, it’s possible for someone to host me for a couple of days without hating me.”

Andy’s lip curled in a sneer. “Or becoming an animated turnip?”

For someone as scared of Raphael as Andy seemed to be, he had quite an attitude, but I had the feeling I’d stepped into the middle of a long-standing feud. I figured it would do no one any good if I let the hostilities escalate, so I interrupted before Raphael could retort.

“All right,” I said, “so the vegetable Adam told me about wasn’t your former host, and you hate each other’s guts. Why don’t you tell me what the hell you’re doing here? Or is that a deep, dark secret? Because if you’re here just to pick fights with my brother, I’m going to pump you full of electricity and let him work out some of his hostilities on you.” I pointed the Taser for emphasis.

Raphael gave me an unfriendly look. “You really are a cast-iron bitch, you know?”

“Your point being?”

That drew what sounded like a reluctant laugh. He shook his head and quickly sobered. “When I returned to the Demon Realm, I told Dougal that you were no longer hosting Lugh. I told him you’d managed to ditch him into a different host, one whose face I never saw.”

“Oh, thanks a lot!” I said, appalled. “Now I’ll have every demon in existence after me.”

He shrugged. “I had to tell him something. He was mad enough at me already for not just letting his people summon Lugh into the sacrificial host. If I’d refused to tell him who I’d chosen to host him, I wouldn’t have been in any position to help you right now.” I supposed he had a point, but I still didn’t like it. “Dougal’s sent me back to the Mortal Plain with a twofold mission—to find out from you who’s now hosting Lugh and to eliminate Andrew, who by all rights should have been dead the night I left the Mortal Plain.”

My Taser hand sprang back to the ready, but Raphael showed no sign he was about to attack.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to do it. You may find this hard to believe, but I do respect Lugh, even if he and I will never be the poster children for brotherly love. If you would let him surface, I know he’d command me not to kill your brother, and I would respect that command.”

I snorted. “Yeah, like you respected his command to tell him what the hell you know about Dougal’s activities?”

He shrugged. “I have my reasons for that.” He turned his head to look at Andy. “Besides, Andrew knows me well,” he said with what I could only describe as an evil smile. “I’m sure he has some idea what the consequences would be if he said something inadvisable.”

Of course, Raphael had been living in my brother for ten years before he’d fled back to the Demon Realm, which meant he should have known me pretty well by now, too. While he was giving Andy the evil eye, my finger tightened on the Taser.

I didn’t consciously decide to shoot him, but somehow the pressure on the trigger became just enough. The Taser popped, and the probes rocketed across the room and buried themselves in Raphael’s back. He screamed and collapsed, his muscles quivering helplessly. I worked hard to resist the urge to go beat on him some more while he was down.

Over the distance between us, Andy’s and my eyes met, and he smiled faintly. “Remind me never to get on your bad side.”

“Too late,” I quipped back, ejecting the Taser cartridge and reloading while I waited for Raphael to pick himself up and dust himself off. It would take a while. Demons take Taser shots even harder than humans do. “That was a gentle warning,” I told Raphael, who glared at me as he lay twitching on the floor. “Not only are you forbidden to hurt my brother, you’re forbidden to threaten him.”

He bared his teeth at me like a dog. He was either growling at me or gritting his teeth in pain. I hoped it was the latter.

We all waited in silence until Raphael regained control of Dr. Neely’s body. “That was unnecessary,” he said when he had the breath to spare.

“Maybe. But it was fun.”

He shook his head at me and sat up. “You’re supposed to be pleased I’m not here to kill Andrew. Instead, you shoot me.”

“Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?”

He sighed. “I suppose not. Do you want to hear what else I have to say, or would you rather punish me some more?”

I couldn’t claim to be real anxious to hear anything else he might have to tell me, but I figured it wasn’t something I could avoid. “Why don’t you just shoot me an e-mail?” I grumbled, but he knew I was caving.

“It wasn’t me who left an empty host behind for your buddy to find.”

“Adam is not my buddy,” I retorted, though I knew how unimportant the distinction was.

Raphael gave me a knowing look. “Whatever. It wasn’t me.”

“I heard you the first time.” Then I noticed the concerned look in his eyes, and I frowned. “Are you telling me you know who it is?”

“I have a suspicion.”

That worried the hell out of me. “Who is it?”

He smiled condescendingly. “No one you know.”

“Do you want me to shoot you again to loosen up your tongue?”

The smile faded. “You and Lugh make a great couple. I saved your life, remember?”

I couldn’t help laughing. “You don’t get credit for saving my life when you’re the one who put it in danger in the first place, asshole. And you tortured my boyfriend, and God only knows what you did to Andy in the ten years you were with him. I don’t owe you a goddamn thing.”

It didn’t look like he appreciated that at all. He scowled at me, then rose to his feet despite the fact that I’d rearmed the Taser.

“Fine,” he snarled, moving toward the door. “Maybe I don’t owe you a goddamn thing, either. You’re more trouble than you’re worth.”

“Tell me who just entered the Mortal Plain!” I demanded, but Raphael kept moving toward the door.

“Fuck you,” he said, and jerked the door open.

My finger twitched on the trigger, but I stopped myself from shooting him again. Yeah, it might get him to hang around, but somehow I didn’t think it would inspire him to talk.

“I’m sorry,” I said, belatedly realizing I should have kept a muzzle on my temper.

In case I didn’t get the message the first time, he gave me the finger. And he slammed the door behind him when he left.

I had a hell of a hard time falling asleep that night. Too much on my mind, I guess. Too many secrets hovering outside my grasp, too much turmoil in my heart, too much fear for my future. And not enough trust to fill a thimble. Andy was lying to me. Raphael was only marginally one of the good guys. Adam tolerated me only for Lugh’s sake. Lugh—nice as he was, for the most part—would do whatever was necessary to further his cause, no matter what happened to me or those I cared about in the process. And it had been over a week since Brian had made his last overture. It looked like he had finally given up on me.

Which was exactly what I wanted, I told myself as I flopped around in my bed and punched the pillow. He had suffered enough on my account, and I hadn’t been good for him even before I’d acquired Lugh.