Up in Smoke - Katie MacAlister [82]
“Somehow, I have a feeling Magoth wouldn’t consider that torture so much as foreplay,” I said, getting on the elevator, Gabriel and his two bodyguards following.
“I admit, it does sound rather . . . intriguing . . . ,” she said, clearly lost in thought, only just managing to get into the elevator car before the doors closed.
Unfortunately, the ride to the fifth arrondissement didn’t take that long, Tipene being familiar with the area. Twenty minutes hadn’t passed before I found myself standing in the police station, reading with interest a notice about an attached crime museum. “It says they have a real guillotine blade,” I told Gabriel. “I’d like to see that.”
“A guillotine blade? Is there a torture section, as well?” Sally asked, pushing me aside to read the notice. “There’s nothing I love more than a good torture exhibit, unless, of course, it’s the actual practice itself.”
“What say we have a quick tour before we have to see Magoth?” I suggested.
A corner of Gabriel’s mouth quirked.
“Madame Northcott? This way, please,” a pretty woman said, giving Gabriel a not-very-subtle eye before she turned and started down a hallway.
“This is going to get old very fast,” I grumbled, taking his hand in a show of outright possession.
He grinned, and tickled my palm with his thumb.
“My darling wife!” Magoth said when the policewoman opened a door to a small interrogation room, standing aside for us to enter.
I stopped, glaring at him. “Do not call me that.”
“Why not? You are my consort, my queen, my second in command . . . or at least fifth or sixth in command. I have a cadre of wrath demons who are above you, I’m afraid, but you’re definitely in the top ten. Possibly twenty.”
I slid a worried glance to the policewoman. “I think that’s just enough about your cadre.”
He rolled his eyes. “Why you insist we play these games when things could be so much easier . . .”
“Magoth! Are you all right? Have you been abused in any fashion?” Sally asked, slipping around me to hurry to his side. “I don’t see any blood or even some bruising. Shouldn’t there be some blood? I expected there to be blood!”
“I like how your mind works,” Magoth told her.
She preened.
I felt it was time to break up their admiration society. “What in the name of the spirits of sanity were you doing to be arrested for indecent exposure?”
“Nothing at all,” he said with a dismissive wave of his hands. Someone had found him some clothing, a T-shirt and pair of jeans that weren’t his usual style, but he was incredibly handsome in them, regardless. “It is all a misunderstanding. I was visiting a quaint little fountain outside of a church, that’s all. No different from any other tourist.”
“A church?” Sally asked, startled.
I frowned. What was he doing near a church? Demon lords tended to avoid those places that were respected as holy ground, no matter what the religion. All too frequently sites were chosen because the ground was founded, or seeped in that quality that enhanced abilities that could be used against those of dark origins.
“Monsieur was witnessed by a wedding party of two hundred, including three cardinals, and a papal legate, as he attempted indecent acts with a stone mermaid that sits on the top of the fountain,” the policewoman said, turning her attention on him.
“Sins of the master,” Sally swore, looking at Magoth with something that looked very much like respect.
“You were trying to have sex with a statue in a fountain?” I asked. Gabriel’s lips twitched as if he was having a hard time keeping from laughing.
“It was a very large misunderstanding,” Magoth told me before switching his attention to the policewoman. The look he sent her was positively lecherous. “If you get my drift.”
The woman slid me a quick glance.
“Oh, don’t mind her,” he said quickly, leaning back in a wooden chair in a pose that was seductive despite the bleak surroundings. “We have an open marriage.”
“Very open, to the point of being nonexistent,” I snapped. “And while we’re on that subject, stop telling people we’re married. I’m Gabriel’s mate,