Touched by Fire (Demons of New Chicago #1) - Kel Carpenter Page 0,5
lips pressed together. While I preferred to hunt those that might be of use, I couldn’t always afford to be picky. Literally. “What’s the most expensive one you have?”
He reopened the file he’d been looking at and scanned it over.
“Human. Pair of them. They decided to pull a little Bonnie and Clyde act stealing from one of the boss’s warehouses. Two grand if they’re brought in hot. Fifteen hundred cold.”
I cursed under my breath. “Two grand?” I repeated. “These days that’s barely enough to keep my lights on for a week, Anders.”
“I don’t make the jobs or decide their worth, Pip. I’m just the middleman. You know that,” he said, pulling a cigarette from his jacket pocket. He snapped his fingers once, and the tip of his thumb caught fire for a brief second, just long enough to light the end.
I rolled my eyes.
“How much did that parlor trick cost you?”
Anders inhaled deeply before exhaling in one smooth stream of smoke. He grinned. “Three days off my life.”
I stared at him, shaking my head. “Doesn’t that shit kill you fast enough as it is?”
Anders snorted. “Coming from the bounty hunter with the highest kill rate on the job. What is it that you do so differently that you leave a trail of bodies a mile long in your wake?” He pulled over the crystalline tray from the side of the table and flicked the end of the cigarette. Ash dropped into it, disappearing instantly because freakin’ magic. “Isn’t the job dangerous enough? One might think you’re looking to get hurt,” he mused.
I groaned. “Piss off. I get the hint.”
He winked in good nature, not at all bothered by my words.
“We live in a world where magic exists. Some of us like it for the ease. Some like the novelty. Others like the power . . .” He trailed off. “But not you.” He tilted his head, as if thinking about that. “Why is that?”
I leaned back, my gaze sweeping over the casino floor and falling on the jazzy fairy once more. “All magic has a price,” I found myself saying softly. “Some of us don’t want to pay it.”
He looked thoughtful for a moment as he took another huff of smoke.
“Fair enough,” he said on his exhale. “The reason you don’t want to pay it have anything to do with the witches and warlocks you interrogate before Ronny gets ahold of them?”
I kept my face neutral, not giving a thing away as I replied, “The reason you spend your Friday nights here have anything to do with the picture in your left back pocket? You haven’t changed it in the three years I’ve been working with you. You don’t talk about him.”
The ‘him’ in question was the face of a little boy, no older than seven or eight. While grainy, he had the same eyes and weak chin as the man sitting before me. The picture never changed. Never updated. I could be wrong, but I had a feeling I wasn’t.
Anders’ face lost all of its amusement for a moment as surprise overcame him. He hid it quickly, but I still saw. “You don’t miss much, do you?”
“When you got a kill rate as high as mine, you can’t afford to,” I replied with a tight smile. Anders let out a laugh, taking a swig from his glass of water.
“No, you damn well can’t.” He took another drag of his cigarette and I moved to stand.
“It’s a pleasure doing business with you—” I started, getting ready to head out.
“Wait,” he said, letting out a sigh. “I don’t have a bounty per se, but there is something that might be of interest to you.”
I settled back in my seat and lifted an eyebrow. “I’m listening.”
“We got word recently of a coven planning to attempt a demon summoning,” Anders said, lowering his voice to a hush. A chill ran through me. “I don’t think I have to tell you how exponentially stupid that is.”
“Do they have enough power to succeed?” I asked, running the tip of my finger along the edge of one of the folders.
“To summon it? Yes. To control it? Absolutely not.” He looked away and shook his head.
Demon summonings were rare. It took a strong coven to call it, and a near-invincible one to control it. Or so the theory went. No summoning had ever been successful. Every single one documented had ended with the members of the coven slaughtered, and that was the best-case scenario.