“We are going nowhere. I am going to see the police. I suppose if you two wish to come, you can, but, Jim, you have to be silent around mortals,” I told Jim as I opened the door and stepped out into a gloomy drizzle. “Cyrene, you will please remember that you are a guest of Drake, and not refer to his brother as a bastard.”

She harrumphed.

“Let me think. . . . There is a new cockfighting arena that I have been asked to open, but that is not until this evening,” Magoth said with a glance at his watch. “And my appointment to get a Brazilian wax is early afternoon. There is a collection of circus-freak memorabilia up for private auction that I wish to peruse—so many good memories there—but I can put that off, since the owner, a deliciously wicked poltergeist, wishes me to show her how to design a truly effective iron maiden. Yes, I will be able to accompany you now, wife, although if you wish to participate in sex afterward, we will have to hurry. I refuse to be rushed when it comes to pleasures of the flesh.”

I stared at Magoth. “You’re just one long, unending pain in the butt, aren’t you?”

A leer touched his lips. “I would be happy to do so, although I had no idea your taste ran to that.”

I closed my eyes for a second, battling both irritation and the dragon shard, which had been trying to force me into contact with Magoth. I had no idea why the shard was suddenly seeking power from whatever source it could find, but determination filled me. I would not yield to it. “I’m leaving now. And stop calling me wife.”

I marched down the stairs, not caring who followed and who stayed.

“I thought cockfights were illegal?” Cyrene’s voice drifted to my ears as I stopped at a corner for a traffic light.

“Mortals are so uptight about things like that,” Magoth answered her. I was aware he stopped directly behind me, since the air near my spine cooled a good ten degrees. “But since they have outlawed human battles to the death, one must take one’s pleasures where one can.”

“I take it back what I said about you when you couldn’t hear me,” Jim said softly, brushing my hand as it cast a glance backwards toward Magoth. “You’re not nearly as bad as a real demon lord.”

The ride to the Metropolitan Police station was long and filled with my warning all three members of my little troupe to behave themselves.

“No talking in front of anyone mortal,” I told Jim, one eye on the taxi driver. He had a small portable radio blaring out Middle Eastern music, so I doubted he’d hear.

Jim sighed and adopted a martyred look. “Just once I’d like to go somewhere without someone telling me to shut my yap.”

“That day will never come. And you . . .” I pushed Magoth’s hand off my thigh and fixed him with a stern, unyielding look. “. . . you remember what Gabriel said he’d do if you tried to touch me again.”

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.”