The Witch's Familiars_A Reverse Harem Fantasy Page 15

  "Darren isn't like that," she said, jerking away. "He loves me the way I am."

  "Does he?" Hermes challenged, propping his cheek on his hand. "Or does he just see you as a poor, brainwashed soul to covert? The sermon changes, but preachers are all the same."

  Jordan cringed as Hermes echoed Darren’s words. "My love life is none of your business."

  He laughed loudly. "Oh, honey, if your love life was a business, you couldn't give away the shares. I'm just concerned about you, that's all. I'd hate to see you escape one hot-headed egoist only to fall into the arms of another on the opposite end of the spectrum."

  "That's awfully kind for someone who leaves me threatening phone calls," she muttered. "And I know you were the one who tipped my father off."

  Hermes frowned in confusion. "The phone call I'll take credit for. Sometimes my associates get a bit zealous when it comes time to close a deal, but I didn't say anything to your father. Why, did he show up here?"

  Jordan eyed him warily, struggling to decide whether he was being sincere or not. His words struck her as genuine, which was something that didn't seem to come easily to him. "You really didn't know?"

  The demon stood up straight and raised a hand to his forehead. "Scout's honor. What did he do?"

  Jordan frowned. "Nothing. It doesn't matter. Look, if you want me to believe you actually give a damn about me, then back off and tell your 'associates' to do the same."

  "Ooh," Hermes said with a low whistle. "The choir girl needs to put a nickel in the swear jar. That vet really must have hurt your feelings."

  "It's nothing," she said tersely. "Please just go. It's been a rough night as it is and I don't have the energy to keep up with the witty banter or fend off your advances on my soul."

  "Alright," he said, holding his hands up. "Would you let me stay if I promised no more shop talk?"

  She hesitated, doubtful of the fact that she actually had a choice in the matter. "Fine," she said, digging through her dresser for a nightgown, "but you're sleeping on the floor."

  "Even if I look like this?"

  By the time Jordan turned around, there was a wide-eyed white cat in a pile of clothes on the floor. He sauntered over to her, trilling as he rubbed against her legs. Jordan groaned, tossing a blanket over the cat to trap him so she could change in privacy. She was too tired to argue with a feline.

  Jordan climbed into bed, and when the cat wriggled closer to her underneath the covers, she pushed him away. After the third time, she gave up and let him nestle into her side, his purrs echoing into her chest. As much as she didn't want to admit it, there was something inexplicably comforting about the creature's presence. She had always wanted a pet when she was younger. Something to dull the loneliness when Ezekiel was away.

  Jordan found herself absently stroking the cat's smooth white fur as her eyes fell shut. When they opened hours later, Hermes was gone. She sat up quickly before reminding herself that it didn't matter if he had run off. He certainly wasn't helpless, even if he was more tolerable in his cute and fuzzy form.

  It took a moment for her bleary eyes to make sense of her surroundings. Somehow, she was no longer in her room at all. In fact, judging from the way the bed rocked and swayed, she doubted she was even on land.

  Jordan got to her feet, holding her arms out to steady herself. “Hermes,” she hissed into the darkness, sure this was somehow his doing. The musty stench of the cabin and the deadness of the air were too real to be a dream.

  Jordan looked around for any sign of where she was or at least where she was going. There was a boarding pass in the nightstand drawer that had the name Adam Beltran printed in big blocky letters, but she’d barely put it down before the door flew open. A boy with tousled dark hair appeared in the doorway, his gray eyes so wide Jordan was sure he recognized that she wasn't supposed to be there. He couldn't have been a day over seventeen, but his evident malnourishment might have been making him seem younger than he really was.

  "I'm sorry," she began. "I don't know how I got in here."

  He rushed at her and she raised her hands to shield her face, but he passed right through her, causing her body to flicker like a screen projection interrupted by a passing object. Jordan stared down at herself, trying to sort out which one of them was the ghost. The way his knees thudded when they hit the cabin floor didn't bode well for her corporeality.

  The boy withdrew a small pocketknife from his tattered slacks and sliced open his lifeline. With his right hand, he dipped his fingers into the pooling blood and began painting something on the floor. It didn't take long for Jordan to recognize it as a sigil. She frowned as the lines and curves took on a vaguely familiar shape, but the more her mind fought to place it, the more it felt like she was pushing against a wall.

  The boy leaned over his finished work, his shoulders sunken with exhaustion. "I know you can hear me," he said hoarsely. "Please, tell me what to do. I know you're the one sending me these visions. There has to be a reason you led me to this ship. Why show me that all these people are going to die if there's nothing I can do to stop it?"

  No answer came in reply to the boy's desperate plea. The sigil remained nothing but a bloody stain on the floor and the lad's request went unheard. His shoulders heaved and tears that seemed to have been held in for a long time began to fall, washing away bits of his rudimentary work.

  All at once, a brilliant white light emanated from the corner and drowned out nearly everything else in the room. Jordan shielded her eyes, but it did nothing to block out the all-encompassing light. No less than a dozen glowing orbs hovered in the middle of the room and spun around in interlocking rings. A shrill sound made it impossible to hear the ship's creaks and groans. Jordan didn't need to see the orbs clearly to know they were eyes. She had seen them once before. Her heart filled with terror on the boy's behalf, but there was no fear in his eyes as he turned to face the monster hovering within the rings.

  The look on the young man's face was nothing short of adoration as he reached out to touch the angel and face his death.

  Eighteen

  Jordan woke to the sound of her own screams, but a cool hand clamped over her mouth, muffling them. She found herself staring into those strange green cat eyes as Hermes looked down at her, fully human, and a veil of white hair cascaded down to form an intimate shroud around them both.

  The demon lifted a slender finger to his lips. Jordan nodded feebly and his hand slowly uncovered her mouth. She lay beneath him, drenched in sweat and gasping for breath. She could still feel the dream clawing at her and she could still smell the dank ship, even if the scent was fading into the fresh green aroma of the plants that filled her apartment.

  "That must have been some nightmare," Hermes said, rolling away from her. He got out of bed and, to Jordan's relief, pulled on the pants he had abandoned after shifting into his feline form.

  Jordan sat up, still panting but feeling less like her heart was going to explode in her chest with the very next beat. "It wasn't a nightmare," she said, throwing the covers off. "It was a vision. I think."

  "I wouldn't be surprised. You used a lot of power between healing yours truly and Stu Herbert," Hermes said thoughtfully. "Your other abilities should be coming to the surface."

  Jordan leaned forward, rubbing her temples in an attempt to erase the shrill ringing in her ears. "Please, I don't want to talk about any of that right now."

  "As you wish," he said, sitting next to her on the edge of the bed. "What did you see that made you scream?"

  "A monster," she said through gritted teeth.

  "A monster?" He chuckled. "You'll have to be more specific. Werewolf, demon, chupacabra?"

  "An angel," she said, giving him a warning look just in case he thought of making a quip.

  Fortunately, he didn't seem to be as easily amused as usual. "What's so bad about an angel?"

  "Not just any angel," she muttered.

  His eyes widened. "The one you saw as a child?"

  Jordan
nodded.

  "Ah. I can see how that would be unsettling."

  "It wasn't just that. He was about to do it again," she murmured, hugging her knees to her chest. "I could feel it."

  "Do what again?"

  "He was going to kill all those people," she replied quietly. "There was a ship, and a boy. He summoned the angel with a sigil to ask for help, but I'm sure it was just using him like it used me."

  "Did you see the angel?" he asked, frowning.

  She hesitated. "No, it was too bright. I saw the rings of eyes, though."

  “Good. An angel can be dangerous to behold in its true form, even if it is just a dream. An angel rarely shows grace and allows a human to look upon it without dying or going mad.”

  “Why would they do that?"

  He shrugged. "There are a few reasons. Usually it's because the angel has a message to deliver to a special human--a prophet."

  "And the other reasons?" she asked warily.

  “The same reason humans tell people their darkest secrets, I suppose. Vulnerability. Intimacy."

  She shuddered. "I don't know why anyone would want to be intimate with one of them."

  Hermes gave her a knowing smile. "Angels have their charms, you know."

  "Yeah, I'm sure that makes it a lot easier to manipulate us."

  "Yes," he said carefully, "but angels can love, too. Guardian angels, for example.”

  She scoffed. "Mine is either dead or drunk."

  "Look on the bright side. At least you have a guardian demon to pick up some of the slack."

  Jordan gave him a look. "Right, because demons are known for their altruism."

  "It's not altruism. You're important to me for the same reason you were important to the angel your father was working with," he said. He must have caught sight of her widening eyes, because he added, "Yes, I know who it is, and no, I won't tell you."

  "I thought you wouldn't lie to me," she said dryly.

  "There's a difference between lying and not telling you things," he said, lightly tapping the tip of her nose. "The less you know the better, especially without being under the protection of a contract."

  "Nice sales tactic."

  He grinned. "I'd be happy to sweeten the deal if revenge against the angel you saw in your vision is what you're after."

  Jordan hesitated. "I wouldn't say it's revenge, but after what I saw, I'm sure that the fire from my childhood wasn't an isolated incident."

  "You think it was the same angel?”

  "I do," she said, staring down at her hands. "The vision was set in the past, but I have no doubt that he'll do it again. Maybe next time I can stop it."

  "You'll need power if that's the case," Hermes said pointedly.

  "Mhm. And I bet you know exactly where I can find it."

  He shrugged innocently. "My offer still stands."

  "No offense, but making a deal with the devil isn't exactly how I want to solve my angel problems."

  "The devil?" He pressed a hand against his chest. "You wound me."

  She rolled her eyes. "Fine. Cat demon of questionable origins, then. Same difference."

  "That does have a certain ring to it," he mused, glancing out the window at the rising sun. "If you don't want my help, how do you plan to stop the angel? Even if there is a pattern of tragedy, you don't know when or where it'll happen again."

  "Research, I guess," she murmured. "I think I know the name of the boy in the dream. Adam Beltran. I figure I'll start from there."

  "Adam is a pretty common name."

  "I know, but he was on a ship where a lot of people died," she said. "I also know there was no electricity at the time, so that narrows it down a bit more. Unless you're offering your investigative services free of charge, that's the best I can do."

  He smirked. "Nothing in life is free. You know that."

  Jordan sighed, climbing out of bed. She didn't have anywhere to be, but going back to sleep after a dream like that was a lost cause.

  Hermes wandered over and began sifting through her closet with a grimace. “Why does everything in here look like it was curated for a special ‘day at the library’ collection?” He grabbed a corduroy skirt and a light sweater, tossing them on the bed in disgust. “The only remotely passable outfit. When you inevitably cave and become my witch, we're going to have to go shopping."

  Jordan picked up the clothes and when she glanced back, she saw that Hermes had already averted his eyes. "You're weirdly chivalrous, you know," she said, deciding to test him. She kept him in her peripheral vision as she changed quickly, but he never once tried to steal a peek.

  Maybe it was disinterest more than chivalry, but either way she was relieved.

  "When you've been around as long as I have, a few of the old fashioned virtues stick," he said, finally looking her over. "Careful, Nancy. If Ned sees you in anything above the knee he just might have a heart attack."

  Jordan leaned against the wall, watching him curiously. “You’re making Nancy Drew references now?” she asked. He just grinned. “I have a strange question for you. Purely academic."

  He cocked an eyebrow. "You want me to settle that fight with your boyfriend, don't you?"

  Jordan bit her lip, realizing she had been caught. "It's not like he'd trust you as a source even if I told him about you. I'm just curious since you're a powerful ancient demon and all that."

  "Flattery will get you everywhere. I'm listening."

  "Do you believe in soulmates?"

  "Of course," he said without hesitation. "But that doesn't mean everyone has one, or that you're guaranteed to be united with yours in any given life. Some people even have more than one."

  Jordan blinked. "How does that work?"

  "It often doesn't. Is that all you wanted to know?"

  "Yes," she said hesitantly.

  "You don't seem satisfied with the answer. Maybe you were hoping I'd tell you that every soul in the world is paired up to a perfect match and all it takes is finding your better half to achieve your happily ever after?" he asked dryly.

  "I was not."

  "Of course you were," he purred. "That's what everyone hopes for secretly, even if they won't admit it. Even Darren. In fact, it's usually the people who long for a fairy tale ending the most who tell themselves it isn't possible. Sometimes it's easier to accept that something doesn't exist than it is to know that it's real and just outside your grasp."

  "I guess so…”

  "Buck up, kiddo," said Hermes, rising to his full height as he lightly tapped her chin with his fist. "Just because not everyone gets a happy ending doesn't mean you won't."

  Jordan's breath caught in her throat as she stared up at him. Sometimes he seemed as benign as the house cat he so often resembled, but others his otherworldly nature was evident. "How do I know when I've found it, then?"

  He chuckled. "Sorry, I reserve the spoilers for my subscribers."

  She couldn't help but smile. "You make a hard sale, Hermes.”

  "Honey, you have no idea."

  Jordan picked her purse up off the hook by the door and lingered for a moment. "I'll see you again next month for the final pitch, won't I?"

  "Count on it," he said, slipping his hands into his pockets as he watched her from the center of the room.

  "Well, just lock up before you go," she said, slightly reluctant to leave him alone in her apartment but even more reluctant to stay.

  "I'll do my best, but no promises," he called after her. "I do have a habit of leaving doors open."

  Nineteen

  After avoiding Darren in town and ignoring his phone calls for a couple of days, Jordan had finally worked up the courage to go to his office. She couldn’t tell him about the dream, of course, or her suspicion that it was somehow connected to the tragedy in her own childhood. He would just take it as the delusion of a poor, brainwashed girl and give her that pitying look she knew all too well.

  Jordan knew avoiding Darren was childish, but she had never been in a relationship b
efore and couldn't settle on what she would say to him when she saw him. Her encounter with Hermes was still fresh in her mind and whenever she thought about the supernatural chaos she was pulling Darren into with her very existence, it made her even more uncertain about making amends.

  Taking a deep breath, she pulled open the door to Darren's clinic and the bell rang overhead. She still didn't know what she was going to say to him, but she figured that apologizing was the only place to start.

  The lobby was empty, but she could hear voices from behind one of the closed exam room doors. A moment later, Darren stepped out wearing the same lab coat he had put on during their fateful encounter so many months ago.

  "Jordan?" His face lit up with simultaneous relief and concern and when he pulled her into his arms without hesitation, Jordan felt like the weight of her guilt might crush her if his embrace didn't. "My God, you don't know how worried I was." He pulled away but held her by the shoulders, looking her over. "What happened? Why haven't you answered any of my calls?"

  "I'm sorry," she murmured, unable to meet his eyes. "I told Mrs. Herrin to let you know I was fine."

  "She did, but I was still worried," he said, frowning. "I understand why you're upset. I was an asshole the last time we talked, but --"

  “It’s okay. It wasn’t just that. I’ve been in a weird place lately,” she admitted.

  "Dr. St. Clair?" a woman called from inside the exam room. "Lulu is going to have another panic attack if you keep us waiting any longer!”

  "Just a second," he called gruffly, turning back to Jordan. He squeezed her hands. "I have to finish up with this patient, but please don't go anywhere," he said, fumbling in his pocket. He pulled his keys out and placed them in her hand. "Go up to my apartment and wait, I'll be done in twenty minutes tops. We'll talk then."

  “Okay,” Jordan said, pocketing the keys. ”Take your time."