Page 1 of Demon Hunter

Chapter 1

Matt

Six months ago

The shrill ringingof my phone pierces my dreams, and I force myself—reluctantly—from sleep. I feel like I only just drifted off, dammit. If this is a job that’snoturgent, I’m going to murder the dispatcher.

I roll over and grab my phone from the nightstand that’s become as familiar to me as my own, then put it to my ear without glancing at the screen. “H’lo?”

“Matty?”

My best friend’s voice has me blinking all the way awake, and I sit up. Ian wouldn’t call me at what-the-fuck o’clock if it wasn’t important. Has something happened to our brothers?

My whole body goes cold at the thought that the demon Ian’s been secretly dating might have done something to him.

“What’s happened?” I glance around in the dimness of the room, trying to remember if I brought my kit in or left it locked in the car. It’s an eight-hour drive from here to the compound, but if Ian needs me, I can get there faster.

“Where are you and how soon can you get to Mannix? There’s shit going down in the otherworld, and… I need you here.”

Whoa. So much to unpack there. Belatedly I remember that he and Marc—his demonic boyfriend—are visiting our brothers this week so Marc can do some Q&A sessions at the Illinois compound about why demons aren’t all that bad.

“I can leave now. First flight,” I assure him. “Are you okay?”

“I’m… Yeah. I am now. Marc had to go back, and for a while I thought he was going to die. But he’s okay now… I think. I’m looking up flights for you.” There’s a note of pained vulnerability in his voice that I donotlike. Nobody makes my brother-bestie sound that way.

“I’m in San Francisco,” I tell him before he can book me a flight out of San Diego. “What do you mean, you think he’s okay? Is he back?”

“What are you doing in San Francisco?” he asks, just as the man I’ve spent the last few hours wrapped around groans and rolls toward me.

“Why are you being loud?” he mutters. “Who is that? Tell them to fuck off.”

“Ohhhh,” Ian’s voice says in my ear, sounding amused. “That’swhy you’re in San Francisco.”

“Text me the flight details,” I reply. If he can laugh at me, he’s okay. But that doesn’t change the fact that he said he needs me. Whatever crap might be going down in the otherworld, it's also likely that our brothers have found out about him and Marc, and I’m not leaving him to face that alone.

“Thanks, Matty.” The vulnerability is back. “See you soon.”

He ends the call just as a lamp is switched on, and I squint in the sudden brightness.

“You have to go?”

Turning, I marvel as always at the way my heart clutches when I look at him. And god knows, he’s not at his best rightnow, with bedhead and a pillow crease on his cheek, but he’s still so beautiful, I want to stop breathing.

Fucked if that makes sense.

“Yeah. I’m sorry. Ian?—”

He laughs, moving closer to rest his head on my shoulder. “Babe, you don’t have to say sorry. I’ve always known that being with you meant adopting Ian too. Is he okay?”

I sigh and lean my head against his. The second-best day of my life was when we went from friends to more. The best was when he said he loved me. “I don’t know. He’s safe, but something’s not right, and he said he needs me.”

“Then you gotta go. Want me to dig around online?”

“I don’t think it’ll help. From what he said, Marc had to go back to the otherworld because there’s something going on there.” My phone dings in my hand, and I look down at the email notification from the airline. “My flight’s in two hours.”

He straightens. “You need to get moving, then. Even in the middle of the night, it’ll take you time to get there and through the TSA checkpoint. Wanna leave your kit here?”

I don’t, but there’s no way I’ll get it through airport security and onto a plane. Gabe and Connor will have extra equipment at the compound if I need it. “And my car, if that’s okay. I’ll Uber to the airport.”

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