Demon Hunting with a Dixie Deb - Lexi George Page 0,135
face. His big hands roved over her body, checking for injuries. “Are you harmed?”
“No—well, a little, but I’ll be all right.” Sassy threw her arms around him and burst into tears. He smelled so wonderfully Grimmish. “Oh, Grim, I’m so glad to see you. I love you so much, and I was so afraid that . . . that . . .”
“I know.” Grim’s voice was hoarse. “I feared the same. Ah, gods, Sassy, I have been in anguish, thinking you might be hurt or . . . or . . .”
Boom. Something hit the ground. Sassy lifted her head from Grim’s broad chest. Monster Evan held an uprooted tree in one hand like a club. He was as enormous as Sassy remembered, and he was naked. Monster Evan had a big gray butt and legs like a redwood.
“What’s he doing here?” she asked.
“He followed us,” Grim said.
“Witch.” Evan smashed the huge cudgel into the ground. “Ebban kill witch.”
He spotted Sassy and snorted in recognition. “Sass?”
“Sassy is fine.” Sassy pointed. “If you’re looking for the witch, she went thataway.”
Evan grunted and thundered off.
Mr. Collier popped out of the bed of Evan’s truck, visibly shaken.
“Told you there was something off about that feller.” Trembling, Collier climbed out of the vehicle. “He blowed up. Scared the bejesus out of me, so I hid. You folks okay?”
Monster Evan crashed across the plowed field and decimated the stand of trees that separated the farm from the river.
“Uh-huh,” Collier said. “Cuddly as Godzilla, that one.”
“Knew she was my mother,” a raised feminine voice said. “You knew and you didn’t tell me.”
Cassandra and Duncan stood beneath the spreading oak, and it was clear they knew one another. They were having an argument, which piqued Sassy’s curiosity.
“How could I be the bearer of such dread news?” Duncan said. “I would sooner tear my arm off than hurt you.”
“So you thought you’d kill my mother and not tell me about it?” Cassandra said. “That is so typically arrogant of you.”
“She’s a monster.”
“She’s my mother.”
“You know what she is. She has to be destroyed.”
“I know. I know.” Cassandra threw her arms up in the air. “Forget it. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Cassandra,” Duncan said. “Be reasonable. I sought to spare you pain.”
“Always the noble Dalvahni.” Cassandra’s violet eyes swam with tears. “Too noble to be tainted by a dirty demonoid. So you left.”
“I was wrong to leave you. I was wrong about so many things.” Duncan reached for her. “I came back.”
Cassandra jerked away. “Too late. The children were dead. I couldn’t save them.” She brushed her wet cheeks. “I didn’t know about the Hag. You did. You could have saved them, but you left.”
Turning her back on him, Cassandra stormed over to a Silverado truck.
“Cassandra,” Duncan said, starting after her. “Come back.”
“Leave me alone, Duncan.” Cassandra climbed into the vehicle. “Leave me the hell alone.”
She slammed the door. The engine cranked and she roared off.
“Arrgh,” Duncan shouted, shaking his fists at the sky.
With a clap of thunder, he disappeared.
“Those two have issues,” Sassy said. “Fortunately, I’m a pip of a matchmaker.”
Grim shook his head. “Sassy, I do not think—”
A brilliant poof of light set the horizon on fire.
“Mother-of-pearl, did you see that?” Sassy made for Evan’s truck. “I have to see what’s happening.”
Blip. Grim caught up with her and pulled her close. “Hold. My way is faster.”
Sassy braced herself for the Dalvahni time warp. To her surprise, Grim picked her up and ran. In the blink of an eye they crossed the harrowed field, zipped through the swath of broken trees Evan had left in his wake, and reached the river.
A battlefield lay before them. The Hag had made a stand on a sandbar. Brown water swirled around the raised, sandy ridge. A swarm of fairies buzzed about her in a stinging cloud. Those without wings skipped across the water, light as thistledown.
Cursing and muttering foul incantations, the Hag fought back. Dark spells singed the air, and fairies fell by the hundreds, their tiny bodies floating on the water like popcorn hulls.
The swarm withdrew to regroup.
Monster Evan and Mea were on the riverbank. Mea’s headlights glowed red, and her hood curled away from her engine like a snarling lip. She quivered, a mechanical mountain lion ready to spring. If the witch came ashore, Mea would be waiting, jaws open.
From his position onshore, Monster Evan hurled threats and anything he could get his hands on at the