Page 43 of I Accidentally Summoned a Demon Boyfriend

“You could have told me.” She smacked my arm. “You had me ready to round up the girls. I put in a police report and everything!”

“You did what?”

“Girl what did you expect? I called your mom, your dad, hell, I even found that crazy aunt of yours on Facebook. She preached to me for two hours about how your soul was where it was supposed to be!”

“She said what?” I couldn’t help wondering if my aunt knew more than we gave her credit for but refused to go down that rabbit hole. “Keri, I’m okay. I’m sorry I ghosted out. I won’t do that again.”

“You better not.” She hugged me. “Rayna, you’re my sister. You can’t do that to me.”

Keri refused to leave my side for two days after that. When she was forced to go back to work, she called me in between meetings and video chatted with me on her drives home. I appreciated her, not only because it made me feel loved, but also because whenever I wasn’t buried in work or trying to repair the relationships I’d shattered with my absence, my thoughts returned to him.

I started to question myself. Maybe I had made it all up. Maybe Keri was right to be worried about my sanity. I spent night after night waiting for a demon to appear in my bedroom. I worried if he was hurt, if the unseen monster who’d beat him up had finally finished the job. I couldn’t get him out of my mind, and it was so bad that eventually, even work couldn’t keep my thoughts from him.

The second month, I returned to therapy. For reasons I hadn’t unpacked yet, I didn’t give my therapist all the details. I told her I had a mental break, but that was all. Things got tough, and I just needed a reset. She could tell I was holding back, but the thing about a good therapist was that they let you get to the truth on your own time.

Two months later, and I was sitting across the table from my fifth date in two weeks, feeling hopeless. This guy, like the two before him, seemed really nice, but my gut told me not to get my hopes up. The two previous, though we connected on many levels, completely ghosted me. I wondered if it was my fault. Sure, a demon preoccupied my thoughts, but I still managed to appear mostly normal on the dates.

With both, the first date went great. I waited for a call, a text, a damn carrier pigeon, anything to let me know they were interested. It never came.

The last guy, a doctor named Dennis, I’d actually run into after our date. Walking through the pharmacy, hands full of overnight pads because they were on sale, and I run into the man who ghosted me! I might have tried to say something witty, spark up a conversation to find out what went wrong, but he didn’t give me the chance. The man ran away! He bolted like he’d just seen a damn ghost.

The date ended, and Chris, a radio personality with an upcoming deal for his own television show, sounded excited about the future.

“I had a great time with you.” We were standing outside the restaurant when he pulled my hand into his. “It was great meeting you in person finally.”

“You too.” I smiled. “Get home safely.”

The valet pulled up with my car. Chris paid for me and tipped the driver before putting me in the car. I was three blocks away when I realized I had left my scarf in the restaurant and chose to double back. That would have been the third one lost since the temperature dropped. Christmas music played over the radio and just as the singer proclaimed she wanted “you” for the holiday, I pulled up to see Chris looking terrified as a tall, dark figure spoke to him.

“What the hell?” I gripped the steering wheel and squinted to make sure I was seeing things clearly.

Chris stepped away, face pale, and I squinted, trying to see who the guy was. What the hell was this man wrapped up in? I couldn’t get involved with someone who had thugs chasing him down. I waited at the end of the street to see if I could catch a look at him.

He turned around, and when I saw his face, my mind raced to put the pieces of the puzzle together as the doctor’s frightened expression flashed in my mind. Purplish black skin, horns retracted. Metice. No fucking wonder none of my dates were calling me again. How many times had he done this?

I pulled the car forward and stopped next to him. Rolling down the window, I called out, “Get in.”

“Rayna?” He clearly hadn’t expected to see me. This time, it was Metice who looked like he’d seen the walking dead.

“I don’t want to hear it. Get in!” I hit the button on the door handle, and the click of the locks disengaging sounded.

10

Sabotage

Metice climbed into the car after the attendant returned to his post and gave the two of us a suspicious stare. He clearly recognized me from moments before when I’d picked up my car.

“Is everything okay?” He lumbered over.

“It’s fine,” Metice muttered as he got into the car.

Too irritated by his presence, I put the car in drive and took off, forgetting all about my scarf. I grumbled a string of complaints to myself, refusing to speak to him. Whenever I felt my blood pressure rising, I slapped my hand on the steering wheel. I did it so many times, my palm felt sore. The demon sat next to me, unbothered by my outbursts as we dove together in silence, not a word spoken until we pulled into my garage.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” The second the car was parked, I jumped out and ran around to his side, swinging his door open.

“Rayna.” He leaned forward, and I swear, the ancestors claimed my hand, because I couldn’t remember deciding to slap him, but that’s exactly what I did. Then, I cursed my foolishness, because my hand was already burning.

Metice gripped the door and gritted his teeth. “What was that for?”

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