Page 69 of Cookbooks and Demons

“If I can say one thing about what I have learned in my life it is this, and it’s not even mine originally, but the older I’ve become, the more true it’s proved to be. We, every being in existence, is a collection of good things and bad things. They are independent of each other and cannot be balanced against each other, though we as humans try. The good things do not always soften the bad, and the reverse is also true—the bad things do not invalidate the good things or make them unimportant.”

Then she reached out her wrinkled, yet still strong hand to rest on Helena’s younger one. “What made Chris your friend is still there and always will be, even as it’s time to let him go because his darkness is taking him away. As for what he could do to your work, there is nothing he can do that I cannot undo.” She squeezed reassuringly.

A clatter came from behind them, and both women turned to see Yosef hovering outside the door. He disappeared the second they noticed him.

“Oh my dear child. It’s so unfair to my dear Yosef,” Scarlet said, shaking her head after where he had been. “I didn’t believe it at first, but he is truly in love with me, and I will leave him sooner than later.”

Helena smiled warmly. “So, how did it happen? What’s your love story?”

“You know if I’m honest, I should really be thanking you,” Scarlet said, finishingher tea.

“Oh? Did I do something inadvertently?” Helena asked.

“It was after your dinner party,” Scarlet said. “I don’t know. There was something about that night that just pushed past the last bit of resistance for both of us had and it just … happened.”

The older woman was blushing now while Helena’s facewent pale.

Chapter 36

Just Knew

Something

Was Wrong

“Come on, Cin. Pick up,” Helena muttered as her phone kept ringing for the third time. She glanced at the clock. Having already called the hospital, she knew that her friend wasn’t working that day and had in fact taken the next week off suddenly with no explanation. All Helena could think was that something had happened to her, something involving the demon magic she accidentally fed to herfriends.

“Dammit, Rafferty, what did we do?” she asked softly, but he couldn’t answer her. She hadn’t officially summoned him yet to confront him, and she knew she really wouldn’t until she got home. And honestly, she had no concrete reasons to worry about Cindy. The most likely answer for her not answering her phone was she was sleeping. But still Helena couldn’t shake her anxiety. She just needed her friend to pick up the phone and assure her that everything was okay, and she was just beingparanoid.

Finally, she hung up the phone without leaving a message and checked her texts one more time. She had filled her screen with her blue colored bubbles, checking in on her friend, “Please call me as soon as you get this”messages.

Still, she made herself wait until the end of the day before deciding she would just head over to Cindy’s apartment and knock on the door obnoxiously until sheanswered.

Turning down the hall felt like she had entered a world of disquiet. Cindy lived in a fairly silent building, full of carpet and literal policies to keep all noises below a certain level. Helena knew several doctors who also lived there, attracted to that very aspect. Usually, Helena felt tranquil, but maybe it was just the anxiety in her heart; she just couldn’t shake that something was really very wrong.

Cindy’s door was a nondescript dark brown, set in a sleepy blue-gray wall. Brass sconces lit up each doorway with a nice yellow light that was meant to mimic old-world gaslight and add to the ambience. The only thing on the outside that indicated to her that this was Cindy’s place were the numbers beside the door, right above the doorbell, where Cindy had attached a gag cover of a man with googly eyes reacting to his bell button nose being pushed.

“Hey Cin?” she called through the door as she pressed the doorbell. Inside she heard the responding low-toned chime. After a count of twenty and nothing, she hit it again, then knocked. “Hey Cindy!” she called, daring to pitch her voice up over the allowabledecibel.

She knew she had her set of Cindy’s emergency keys, and she was prepared to use them if she didn’t get an answer soon.

Stillnothing.

That’s when Helena stepped up to the door to set her ear against it to see if she heard anything. Her foot squelched on the carpet closest to the door. Surprised, she stepped back and squatted to feel. It was soaked.

“Oh God,” Helena said. Whatever was wrong, it was very, very wrong.

With shaking urgency, Helena dug out her keys and flipped them through her fingers for the right one. Jamming two wrong ones before she got the right one, Helena kept calling Cindy’s name with a growing alarm.

Down the hall, someone opened their door and hushed her, then slammed it before she could respond or ask for help. Finally the door opened.

Immediately, Helena stumbled into a pool of water. While the entryway was carpeted, just to her right opened into the tiled kitchen. Water stood there on the floor, but the sink tap wasn’t on; it wasn’t coming from there.

“Cindy!” Helena shouted, bolting into the apartment, past the kitchen to her larger main room which was also empty.

She turned then to look into Cindy’s bedroom and office, both with doors open, the frames facing at a slight angle inward on the opposite sides of the start of the hall. And both were empty.

“Cindy, answer me please!” Helena called, but there was only one place left in the apartment she could be, and Helena moved toward it now. Double skipping down the short hallway, she reached to push open the bathroom door at the end. Her feet slapped the standing water, deeper as she came closer.

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