Me and My Shadow - Katie MacAlister [66]
I wanted badly to lay down the law to Magoth, but knew it would do no good. He was still technically my employer, and although I might have his powers, he was more than aware that I’d never use them.
He gave me a coy look, lolling back on the seat of the taxi, taking up far more than his fair share of the seat. “And what will you do if I am good, sweet one? Will you reward me?”
“Reward you how?” I asked cautiously.
His eyelids dropped to half-mast. The look he gave me would have melted a lesser woman, and as it was, I had a hard time struggling with the shard to keep my hands in my lap. “I think some playtime will be in order. Say tonight? Ten o’clock? Your room? Bring your dragon scales.”
“Ew,” Jim said, shuddering. “That’s just so wrong. A demon lord and a dragon.”
“Don’t worry, it’s not going to happen,” I told it. “Magoth will behave himself.”
He examined a fingernail and said in a deceptively bland voice, “You have no way of ensuring I do so. I understand the mortal police take very seriously accusations of arson.”
“You wouldn’t dare,” I said, fury shoving aside the irritation that was my normal response to him.
“No?” He raised his eyebrows and gave a long cool look. “Perhaps not. But perhaps you should reconsider my invitation for tonight. Acceptance of such is likely to satisfy me for a while.”
I ground my teeth, annoyed at having to deal with him, but there was no way short of locking him up somewhere that I could stop him. “Fine, you want to come to my room tonight at ten so I can tail smack you around? You got it. Just bring a jumbo bottle of aspirin, because I plan on knocking you out cold for hours.”
He shivered in delight, suddenly lunging forward to grab me, his fingers digging into my arms as he kissed me. The dragon shard roared to life, making me part my lips under the onslaught of his mouth and tongue, but even as it delighted in the contact, my heart shuddered and shrank away. The mouth moving on mine wasn’t warm and spicy. The tongue moving in a sinuous dance didn’t stir me. And the black eyes that burned down into mine held no heat. I gathered up my strength and heaved, shoving Magoth backwards.
“Gabriel will kill you for that,” I said, wiping my mouth.
Magoth smiled a long, slow smile. “He can try.”
Chapter Ten
Gabriel called while I sat in the office of the arson-investigation unit.
“I can’t really talk right now,” I said, smiling brightly across the desk at a middle-aged, balding man as he shuffled through some paperwork. “Detective Inspector Flores is explaining to Magoth and me the results of their investigation thus far.”
Gabriel swore. “What is he doing there?”
I pulled my hand back from where Magoth had been caressing it. “Oh, you know Magoth. Whither does he wander, and all that.”
“My wife must be speaking with her lover,” Magoth told the police inspector, who shot me a startled look.
“Erm . . . is she?” he said.
I smiled again, trying not to strangle Magoth on the spot. “Ignore him,” I told the inspector. “He found a few mushrooms in the park this morning and ate them. We’re hoping his hallucinations fade soon.”
Gabriel muttered a few choice words under his breath that I wholeheartedly agreed with. “Can you not get rid of him? Is he making things difficult for you?”
“No, and of course, but I’m coping. Magoth was most interested to hear, as was I, that it was a faulty gas line that blew up the house, and wasn’t arson at all, as we thought.”
“Most interested,” Magoth said, grabbing my chair and hauling it closer to him so he could drape an arm over my shoulders. “My darling one, sit closer to me. I cherish the nearness of your lush, ripe body.”
The inspector pursed his lips and looked from Magoth to me, speculation rife in his eyes.
“Ah, so it was a faulty gas line?” Gabriel asked, his voice amused for a moment. Clearly he hadn’t heard Magoth in the background. “I am relieved to hear it was that, and not something