Page 99 of Demon and the Raven

I chuckled and lifted my hands to him. He had to basically drag me to my feet, but when he draped an arm around me as we started back across the field—retrieving the rifle he’d left in the grass, breaking contact only for as long as it took to lean over and get it—I felt the happiness of being beside him. No matter what was happening anywhere else, between us there was an electric, sustaining energy. He was absolutely the best thing for me.

“Start talking,” I ordered him.

“Like I said, or more importantly, like Elen did, the land can kill the demon. So we just have to lure it on.”

“You make that sound so easy,” I said as we arrived at the pond, and I went first, jumping from one stepstone to the other. Once on the other side, he was back beside me, and he took my hand again, leading me home.

“Well, I’m less worried about that at the moment and more about finding the demon.”

“What do you mean?” When he didn’t answer, I turned to look at him. “Lorne?”

“I never in a million years thought I would say that I was worried about finding a demon,” he said, shaking his head. “My life has gotten so strange since I met you.”

I wasn’t sure what to say.

“Strange in a good way,” he rumbled, drawing me into his arms, hugging me.

I really needed that hug.

Once we were walking again, he asked if Shelby could find the demon since she was clairvoyant. Did I think that possible?

“I would be concerned about having her interact with a demon. She had trouble in the cemetery, and though that charm I gave her is ghost-proof, a demon might be more than she, or it, can handle.”

“Yeah, that was stupid. I don’t wanna put her in danger. I mean, I don’t want you in danger either.”

“Well, I will be. There’s no getting around that,” I said flatly. “Both of us will, but we can’t run it out of town and send it to another.”

“That wouldn’t be very heroic of us,” he teased me.

“No, it wouldn’t,” I said, leaning on him as we walked. “I keep thinking it would be so helpful if we knew precisely what kind of demon it was. I really hope Father Dennis’s friends come through.”

“In the meantime, we have to come up with some places to look,” he said as we reached the greenhouse. “And exhausted or not, we’re gonna have to try and narrow it down tonight.”

He opened the door for me, and I stepped inside, slipping out of my clogs and picking up the bag of casting herbs I’d made for Shelby. All the windows in the sunroom were open, as they’d been when we left, but the breeze no longer stung as it had when I was with Elen, having returned to a normal, gentle summer breeze, rolling indolently through the house.

When we entered the living room, we found both girls passed out on the couch, Shelby snoring. Not loudly, but constantly. The necklace was around her neck, and when I looked at it, it glowed slightly to let me know it was where it was supposed to be.

“You saw that, right?” Lorne asked.

I smiled at him. “I did.”

“I’m thinking that’s a good thing, yeah?”

“It’s a very good thing,” I promised him.

TWELVE

Lorne checked on the kids, made sure Argos was all right, and I took a shower. By the time I got out, it was nearly one in the morning.

“Oh, Lorne,” I said, drying my hair as I walked into our bedroom. “It’s so late.”

“Or early,” he teased, smiling, having changed into a pair of sleep shorts, his T-shirt still on. “Either way, we have to talk.”

I sighed, feeling drained. “Well, we can try.”

“I know what’ll help,” he said, taking the brush from me. “You forgot to put the hair oil in. Go do that, and then I’ll brush it.”

“I can⁠—”