Page 34 of Demon Queen
“Demon, what you instinctively want to do is unwind all of those tapes, but if you do that, I’ll cut off your tail. Your choice. Sandra, sit here. Demon, grab that lamp and bring it over. Not by the cord.”
Mixl tossed the lamp and caught it by the lampshade that time. “Why are you such an old human?”
“Plug it into the socket. Why are you such a young demon? These things happen.” Tom sat me down in an old metal chairwith a ripped yellow vinyl seat and cut the toilet paper and Dorian’s shirt off my arm.
“You’ve got a lot of glass in here,” he said, pulling out one of the big pieces with his slender fingers.
“Ah, that’s why humans wear the leather jackets, to protect arms from the glass,” Mixl said, nodding soberly. “Next time I will remember. Boots and jackets.”
“Next time, you do that,” Tom murmured before he went and rummaged around, coming back with his old medical kit which had a lot more than band-aids and antibacterial ointment.
I sat there kind of blank until he pulled out a really deep sliver of glass and I yelped.
Mixl snarled at Tom and landed on the desk where we were sitting, digging his claws into the wood. “You can’t hurt the human,” he hissed.
“I can, easily, but I won’t. This is one of my humans. She’s my wife’s sister, and my own old friend. The glass has to come out, or her body will just keep bleeding, and it looks like she already lost a lot of blood recently.”
“I did. Lucy bit me.”
He tsked. “That’s a pity. She must have gotten lax around humans. She hasn’t made a mistake for some time.”
“The Grand Master’s bride?” Mixl asked, sounding slightly interested, but he was still right there, his face inches from my glass-embedded arm.
“Fairly fresh. She’s adapting well to her new state, other than this unfortunate recent accident.” Tom patted my shoulder and then pulled out another piece.
I jerked and then forced myself to hold still. “Sorry.”
“I’m sure you are. Hopefully you use your demon’s head to break windows next time.”
“Yes,” Mixl said with a firm nod. “My head can break glass easily.” He flexed his hand, bringing out razor thin claws, andthen he started plucking out the shards of glass one after another, quicker than Slippin’ Slides.
Tom grunted and continued his slower work. Working together, my arm was glass-free very quickly, and then came the fun part, getting cleaned out and having my deep cuts sewn back up.
First, he poured vodka on my arm, then handed me the bottle while he stitched me up. I usually didn’t drink a lot, and I shouldn’t have drunk then because I had to open the store early tomorrow morning, but that’s all the pain reliever he had on hand. So I drank until my stomach churned and the pain receded to a bearable distance.
“Now, why don’t you tell me why you were breaking into my theater,” he said once the last stitch was knotted and my arm looked like Frankenstein’s monster.
“I need to look at your book.”
He raised his brows. “You couldn’t call?”
“I don’t have my phone. I left it with my outfit.” I looked over at Mixl who was trying to put the pieces of glass together, like it was a puzzle that would fit. “Mixl, why don’t you go up on the roof to watch for Dorian?”
He blinked at me. “You don’t want me to hear you talk? Maybe you’ll do more than talking.” He wiggled his brows.
Tom cuffed him upside the head. “Speak respectfully to women. Particularly to your king’s mate. Get on the roof and watch unless you need to be stuck in a barrel until you’re more agreeable.”
Mixl made a face at Tom and then slipped across the room and out the high window. Tom followed him and then closed the window before coming back to me.
I was shocked that Tom had hit him. “Tom, you can’t hurt him. He’s just a baby demon.”
“Yours?”
I blinked at him. “No. He remembers his mother dying. How awful is that?” My heart ached for the poor little guy.
“Weird. Usually they die if their mothers die. They’re very attached to their mothers. What book did you want to read? Maybe you can tell me exactly what you’re trying to figure out and I can help you find your answers.”
I grabbed his wrist and leaned close to stare into his eyes. “I ate a demon.”
