The Devil You Know Read Free Page A

the low-level demon hiding in your child, well, I’m available three nights a week. Just saying.
    “Nick . . . ”
    I threw back the covers, naked as the day I was born, the Camel clamped in my steel-trap jaw. Call it a point of contention, but I don’t need Morgana doing my work for me. “I’m gonna go open up. I’m already late.”
    Morgana turned over to watch me dress in the dreary grey light of morning filtering through the one window. She’s a witch, but still a woman, and she gets off on watching me dress, go figure. “Don’t be angry. I’ve been using tantric exercise to expand my powers.”
    I buttoned my jeans and turned to glance at her as I pulled last night’s pullover back on. “And that’s why you milked me the way you did last night.”
    “It was more exhausting than I’d anticipated.”
    “Which means you shouldn’t be doing it yet.”
    “You are one crabby bastard in the morning, Scratch, do you know that?”
    Then she smiled, and I smiled, and, as always, we forgave each other. I went over to her and pushed her long, mussed white-blonde hair aside and kissed her on the forehead. Like Malach, she and I have a history, just one that’s a lot more enjoyable. I owe Morgana much. Well, everything, really. She patted me companionably on the ass and told me I looked like hell and to get the patch already.
    For the record, I don’t have an actual romantic relationship with Morgana. We’re very good friends with very good benefits, in more ways than you think. I naturally generate a great deal of ambient chaotic energy. Morgana has the unique ability to absorb and tune that energy. With it, she can increase her own magic exponentially for a short while, heal herself of injury, or restore her natural abilities after a particularly exhausting spiritual session, like last night. She can siphon the excess energy from me through either blood or sex. Sex is a great deal more fun than letting someone cut on you, let me tell you.
    I wended my way down the backstairs, rubbing at my chin and throat. For a blondie like me, shaving is optional rather than a daily necessity. In any event, I figured if anyone complained about my unruly appearance today, I could just tell them I was rocking the Don Johnson look and hope to hell they were old enough to know what I was talking about. Maybe after tea I’d change my mind, shave nicely, dress better, and stop smoking. Not likely, but hope springs ever eternal, at least according to Morgana.
    In the delivery alley behind the shop I found three parcels waiting for me, all bearing return labels from our supplier in Salem. They weren’t heavy, but I was still obviously in recoup mode. As I lifted them, my nerves jumped slightly under my skin as if I’d been beaten with Nerf bats for a good long time. Morgana had said I was positively humming with energy last night, overflowing with it. She’d pushed me down onto the bed, climbed on top of me, and milked me for a good twenty minutes, until my eyes had rolled up in my head and I had started speaking in tongues, literally. Then she wanted to know who Vivian was.
    I knew I should probably tell her, just not right now. It was possible that Vivian would never call, never enter my life again, and there would be no need to mention her. The thought was fatally depressing as I set the parcels on the counters in the back room and started on the tape with a utility knife. Behind me, through the open door, I could smell autumn—fertility wilting, that damp, warm rush of leaves and apples and the promise of cold rains that just makes you want to sleep all day. I left the door open to air out the cinnamon incense in the back room, and just because I love the scent of fall in the mountains.
    I don’t get out nearly enough, despite living in the center of backpacking and camping central. It helps to have someone to go with, I suppose. I wondered if Vivian was into kayaking, camping—all the things New Yorkers swarmed this town