Taming Demons for Beginners (The Guild Codex Demonized #1) - Annette Marie Page 0,3

I’d have preferred to stay in my parents’ home, where I’d lived my whole life, but as the executor of their estate, Uncle Jack had sold it. Against my wishes. I’d handed the keys over to its new owners last week.

“I understand if there are delays with the life insurance,” I said, “but what about their belongings? They left me several heirlooms, which I would like to get from—”

“Your parents left you their house and everything in it,” he interrupted. “Everything you inherited was in the house. Didn’t you put it all in storage?”

Every time he interrupted me, my thoughts scattered. I pulled them back together. I’d had to put all of my and my parents’ belongings in storage because he’d sold our house. And no, I hadn’t gotten anything from the sale, even though the money was mine. The fees for storing an entire house’s worth of furniture and belongings was bleeding my savings dry.

“I’m talking about the heirlooms they placed in a special facility,” I clarified. “I spoke to the estate lawyer and he said—”

“You spoke to the lawyer? I’m the executor. Why didn’t you ask me?”

Because he ignored me, dismissed me, and interrupted me, that’s why. “The lawyer said accessing items in storage should be simple, and—”

“It’s not simple, whatever that fool of a lawyer told you. I’m working on it, but I don’t have access yet.” He tapped a stack of papers on the desk to straighten them. “I have work to do, Robin. I’ll let you know when I have an update.”

Dismissed, again. Mumbling a farewell, I speed-walked into the hallway. Out of petty revenge, I left the door open a crack. He’d have to get up and close it himself.

Oh yeah, I was so bad. Look at me, the rebel niece.

Disgusted with my latest failure to get anywhere with my uncle, I stumped along a hall lined with oil paintings and ten-foot-tall windows with heavy drapes, then passed a parlor, a formal living room, and a dining … hall. Not room. “Room” was too plebian, too small and contained. The dining hall cradled a table long enough to seat eighteen.

Uncle Jack hadn’t been kidding about demon summoning being “lucrative.” This house had so many rooms that I was still getting lost on my third day.

Stopping at a window, I glared at the sprawling lawn, bathed in an orange sunset. Despite my uncle’s assumptions, I hadn’t moved in here because I needed somewhere to live—though I did. I was here because he hadn’t given me anything I was supposed to inherit from my parents. Money, even though I desperately needed it, wasn’t my main concern.

I wanted the heirlooms too precious to keep at home—specifically one keepsake that meant more to me than anything—and I was staying right here in this house until I got it.

I squinted at my reflection in the glass—my blue eyes narrowed ferociously behind black-rimmed glasses, my shoulder-length hair wild and dark around my pale face, my small mouth pressed into an angry line. Why couldn’t I give Uncle Jack a look like that? Instead, I crept around him like a scared mouse, staring at my feet and flinching every time he interrupted me.

Shoulders slumping, I headed toward the kitchen. Voices trickled out, followed by a cheerful laugh. The scent of tomato sauce and melted cheese reached my nose.

The chef’s kitchen dominated the house’s back corner: a high breakfast bar with beautiful marble counters contrasted with a monster-sized, stainless steel island with a double gas range, two ovens, and a massive range hood that descended from the ceiling.

Uncle Jack’s daughter, Amalia, and stepson, Travis, were bent over something on the stovetop that steamed in the way only delicious food could steam. Amalia was twenty like me, while Travis was a couple of years older. Unaware of my arrival, they dished food onto plates while Travis joked about something and Amalia laughed.

I hovered awkwardly, debating what to do. Telling my social-interaction jitters to take a hike, I got up the nerve to speak. “Hey guys.”

They didn’t react.

Too quiet. I tried again. “Hey guys. What are you making?”

Holding plates heaped with spaghetti noodles and thick red sauce, they turned around. Amalia’s gray eyes, edged in heavy eyeliner, went flat and the laughter on her face died. She swept her messy blond waves over one shoulder, grabbed a fork, and exited the kitchen without a word.

My innards shriveled like seaweed drying in the sun.

Travis shifted his weight from foot to foot. “Hey Robin. How’s it