The Price of Possession, Dakota Brown [i have read the book a hundred times .TXT] 📗

There was nothing he could say, so he simply noddedsadly.

"S'okay, mate. I forgave you a long time ago.Guess I'll let you drag me back in." Cursing myself as I finished off mypizza and sucked down the ginger beer, I tried to prepare myself for anexorcism.

I was good. Maybe one of the best, and for five yearsI'd managed to leave all that life behind and focus on my family's pizzaparlor. They'd died in a fight with a demon prince they'd had no business evenbeing involved with. That part had been accidental. My folks, bless 'em, wereas normal as you could possibly get. How they'd come up with me? Well, if Ididn't look just like them, I'd suspect I was a changeling of some sort.

Note, I'm not. I checked. Handy spell, that.

Darius still blamed himself for the incident with thedemon prince, though it had happened several years after he became a priest. Iblamed me. Either way, it was five years past and I'd managed to focus on thefamily business and not get involved with anything more esoteric than a coupleof really awful boyfriends. The last of which had a restraining order on him,and I'd been done with that for over a year. Determined that it would be justme, myself, my vibrator and I, for the near future, I was happy to focus onpizza.

"So, how'd the cops take an actual demon landingon top of them? And how'd they know to call you?" That was a curiosity.Outside of the religious types and a handful of folks actually in the know, asit were, most people thought demons weren't actually real. I was one of thosein the know and I didn't even fully understand what all was out there.

Darius concentrated on a slice of pizza for a minutebefore he shrugged. "This is technically not information I'm supposed toshare, but one of the cops on the detail that brought the man in happens to goto my church. He's quite religious and the incident freaked him out enough thathe came to me. Obviously, I recognized the signs of possession and got him totake me in to see the man. The deputy in charge of the investigation is notwhat you would call a believer, but she's also willing to accept something that'sso obviously in front of her eyes."

"Huh. Wonder how they'll explain this in theirofficial paperwork."

"Not my problem." Darius chuckled.

"No. Guess not."

Finishing the last of his side of the pizza, Dariusstood and pulled out his wallet.

I shook my head. "Pizza's on the house. Tip thewaitress."

He smiled, threw a twenty on the table, and gesturedfor me to lead the way.

I waved at Mandy before heading for the door. "I'llbe back!"

A few of the nerdier students of the eighties laughedat my inadvertent movie quote. We had 'quote wars' night a couple of times amonth, and the tables that managed the most entertaining quotes would getdiscounts on their pies. We were generous, but the locals really got into itand it wasn't hard to award the discounts liberally on merit.

The evening heat smacked into me when I left theairconditioned building. Only an extreme dedication to 'the look' kept me in myleather jacket with the pizza on the back and the anarchy symbol on the front.

Fortunately, while my car looked like it was a pieceof shit, the air conditioner worked really damn well, and the engine was bigenough to power it. Got next to nothing for fuel economy, but I didn'ttypically have to drive far, anyway.

I got into the gray sedan. Darius had parked his smallHonda next to it. Though I knew the way to the jail, I followed just in casethey had taken the prisoner someplace else. I wasn't sure how I felt about beingon the police radar, though. I'd moved back to Santa Fe to get away from mydemons, not find new ones.

Sure enough, Darius headed west out of Santa Fe proper.The houses thinned out as we drove out into the flat openness of the desert. Afew miles down the road, a quick swing south, and we were at the sheriff's office.They would have a holding cell there, so I guessed we weren't actually going tothe jail itself. Suited me fine. An exorcism in a jail just seemed like an evenworse plan than doing an exorcism at all.

I parked next to Darius, quickly shed the handful ofknives I had in various pockets, and slid out of my car.

A deputy sheriff, her nametag said McClellan, met usat the door. She shook Darius' hand before eyeing me. I looked up at her. Shewas taller than Darius, probably at least six foot. Her dark hair was pulledback in a bun, and she had a deep tan to her skin and high cheekbones that mademe think she was part Native.

"This her?"

Darius nodded. "If anyone can figure it out,Chris Price can."

Deputy McClellan looked skeptical, but she shook myhand anyway before leading us through a door that required a keycard, and backinto the main part of the building. The carpet was old, but serviceable, thepaint job relatively new, and the occasional artwork southwestern.

We went down the hallway and back into another roomguarded by a keycard reader. I'd been on the wrong side of the law in enoughminor scrapes to be a touch nervous but this time I wasn't in cuffs, sohopefully getting out of here wouldn't be a big deal.

Darius, as if sensing my unease, glanced at me andwinked.

I shook my head and flipped him off.

He chuckled. Deputy McClellan ignored us.

This room looked like a typical interrogation room,concrete floor, paint chipping on the cinderblock walls. Normally there wouldbe a table and a couple of chairs, but this room was empty other than the man triedto a chair in the middle of a chalk drawn circle. Out of habit, I inspectedDarius' containment spells and found them adequate. Though if what he said wastrue, the demon would probably have respected a lesser containment. Still,better safe than sorry with these things.

The man's eyes tracked me, but they were human eyes,human anger, a