Page 56 of Cookbooks and Demons

She grabbed Rafferty’s shoulder and turned him away, now terrified. “We need to go now!” she ordered and he came willingly. Sure enough, his eyes were smoldering with unholystarfire.

Ironically, the worker who had been serving them stood near the exit, holding a paper take out box as he stared with his own wide eyes at the whole situation.

Helena moved to rush past, but Rafferty plucked the box out of his hands, startlingthe man.

“Thank you,” Rafferty said, slapping the man on the arm in a friendly way and followed Helena straight out of the kitchen, the shop, and back to the safety of the citystreets.

“Holy shit. I can’t believe that just happened,” Helena said, shaking from the whole encounter.

“Are you alright?” Rafferty asked, following beside her, clutching their contraband in his hands.

“No, I am not alright!” she declared in no uncertain terms. Her whole self was shaking so badly, and she wanted to scream and run and fightand rage…

“It’s okay. I’m here.” She found herself pushed into a nearby alley, out of the sight and sound of the main road, which wasn’t that busy actually with only a few cars rolling by and a couple of people walking dogs at that time of early evening. It was dim in the alley and there was a doorway sunken into one of the buildings that made a walled-in alcove that no one could see from the street. The door was boarded up, so no one was coming out of the building either.

Wings were around her then. A dark, leathery wall encompassed her while arms did the same, holding her close against a strong, sturdy body. Naturally, she tucked her face into the crook where the neck and the shoulder met, and she gripped a waist that didn’t flinch with how tightly she squeezed. She even felt a tail wrap around her bare ankles, and she didn’t care how weird that was. She wanted all of it, to be held by Rafferty’s whole self.

“Oh God, I was so scared,” Helena said.

“I’m here. I wouldn’t have let him hurt you,” the chest she clung torumbled.

“Oh God, your face!” she said, leaning up to try to look at it, but the arms squeezed tighter to try to keep her from moving away.

“Please don’t. Don’t look at me like this. Just let me hold you, please.”

She realized then that he was shaking too.

“It’s okay. It’s okay, Raffie,” she soothed, drawing more strength from soothing than being soothed. She laid her head on his chest and sank into the spicy aroma of his natural self. He still wore the black shirt, the cloth the only thing between her cheek and hisheartbeat.

She had no idea how long they stayed that way, but after her own heartbeat had calmed and the shaking for both of them had subsided, she asked, “Do you want to go get Thai food?”

Chapter 29

So We Went

for Thai

“See? I told you these were much better noodles than what that Executive Chef made!” Helena crowed delightedly as she spooled some crinkly glass noodles into her mouth.

“Yes, but that was never going to be much of a stretch,” Rafferty argued before he tucked the same thing into his own mouth.

They were sitting on a pair of stools, like at the outdoor eatery kitchens in Asia, at one of Helena’s favorite places on Little Thai street. The street itself wasn’t actually officially called “Little Thai” street, but all the locals called it that, probably for marketing reasons, and every sort of Thai food could be found on that street so it fit. There was even an Asian grocery store at the end of the street that catered not only to the restaurants but to patrons who wanted to try to capture those flavors at home. Or could at least try.

To Helena, this felt more like a date than their meal at the Tower Top Restaurant. They had a perfect pair of seats, right in front of the outdoor heater that was going at full blast against the winter night. While perched on their stools with big ceramic bowls before them, their feet were crossed together at the ankles, so they could touch and eat with both of their hands at the same time. It felt like she was playing footsie with him, and to anyone else not them, that was exactly what it looked like, but she also didn’t care. She was enjoying herself too freaking much.

The food itself was her favorite. Glass noodles, made from bean sprouts, with shitake mushrooms, slivers of carrot, bamboo shoots, green onions, and little slices of green bell pepper, tossed with shrimp. Mildly spicy.

Rafferty scooped some floppy mushrooms into his mouth, fumbling with his chopsticks. “Dammit,” he muttered when he lost one, managing to catch it withhis bowl.

“It’s not so easy, is it?” Helena teased, delicately plucking one of his mushrooms to feed it to him from her own chopsticks. He ate, even as he shot her a black, annoyed look that she just couldn’t take seriously anymore. He had returned once more to a normal-looking guy, and she had never felt safer than when she waswith him.

Carefully, she helped him reclaim his chopsticks and guided his fingers to hold them properly again. “I can’t believe in all your years of cooking, you never once needed to make Asiancuisine.”

“It just never came up,” he admitted, his eyes wandering over to the cooks behind the bar itself, stirring, sautéing, and flipping their woks full of colorful vegetables and different meats.

One of the cooks came up, his eyes smiling as big as his mouth, to set a small plate of fried dumplings between them with a soy dipping sauce.

“You want to learn how to make all this, don’t you?”

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