Maybe he should skip a day. See if absence did what it was supposed to do. Though he hated the idea of not seeing her.
He was horny as a human teenager, but strangely, he was enjoying himself. In the past, if he’d seen a woman he desired, he’d pretty much taken her. He’d never actually met resistance. Well, until Lily. She had resisted him. Not because she didn’t want him, but because she knew how much being together would hurt her family. While demons would happily form relationships with any of the other races, the fae were a reclusive lot and frowned upon affairs with outsiders. More than frowned upon; any offspring of such couplings were ruthlessly slaughtered. Which was ultimately why Lily had died. Unable to follow Ash into the Abyss when he’d been banished by Christian and the Order, and unable to return home for fear they would murder her child, she’d been stranded on Earth. She’d done what she could to protect their daughter but the effort had taken the last of her strength and she’d faded and died.
It was why Ash hated the Walker so much. As Lily’s uncle, he should have offered her protection, not made her fear for the life of her baby.
But even the Fae were changing. That they’d consented to be part of the newly formed committee showed they were willing to try. Though the Walker wasn’t contributing much. He sat in the corner of the room, watching Roz, a pathetic expression of longing in his eyes.
Did he gaze at Tara like that?
Probably.
Roz didn’t hate her father as much as Tara hated him. Of course, The Walker hadn’t been responsible for the rape, torture, and hideous mutilation of Roz’s best friend.
In his own defense, he hadn’t known the details. He’d released a whole load of lesser demons and told them to make Christian suffer. Tara’s friend had been in the wrong place. Ash could only breathe a sigh of relief that she’d been taken rather than Tara.
One day she would forgive him.
He hoped.
“Christian, did you find anything?” Piers asked, dragging Ash from his thoughts.
Ash hated meetings, but he was interested in what Christian had found out about MI13. He didn’t like Faith working in that place; he had a bad feeling about the whole thing. And if she learned too much and they decided she was untrustworthy—which they very well might if they discovered she’d warned Ryan after the initial meeting—she could be in danger. He wanted her out of there, but so far, she didn’t seem tempted by CRs offer of an alternative job.
“Some.” Christian said. “I talked to my contacts. It seems MI13 has been in existence for a long time, under various other names. It used to be referred to as MI11 and was pretty much known about by everyone. And the place was a joke. The community used to refer to it as RIP.”
“Rest in Peace?” Ryan asked.
“Actually, Research into Paranormal. But it was an in-joke that if you were transferred there your career was over—so yeah—Rest in Peace. That changed about ten years ago when apparently MI11 shut down. The general intelligence community believe it’s gone, closed and finished, that the government has accepted the whole supernatural thing was nothing but a piece of fiction. But there are rumors that it reformed under another name and this time it’s no joke. They’re taking it deadly serious.”
“So what changed ten years ago?” Piers asked.
“Nothing I can come up with. I did some mind reading and inserted a little compulsion and they’re going to look into it some more. See if they can come up with some names,” Christian said.
Piers turned to where Ash lounged against the back wall. “What about your girlfriend? Has she come up with anything useful?”
“The truth is she doesn’t know anything. Yet.”
“What does that mean?”
“Well, she’s actually a very good employee and refuses to talk about the job—apparently she had to sign a whole load of confidentiality agreements—but yesterday she was a little pissed off.” He grinned. He liked Faith when she was angry; she positively sizzled.
“Get the grin off your face and get to the point,” Piers suggested.
“They promised her on day one that as soon as the big boss had cleared her, she’d get access to all sorts of interesting stuff. So far—nothing. She’s convinced that they only took her on to get to Ryan and now me and that’s pissed her off even more. And she’s bored and that doesn’t help.”
“No, Faith doesn’t do bored,” Ryan said.
“You’re sure she doesn’t know anything?” Piers asked. “That she’s not playing you along. She could have told them that you came on to her and they’ve ordered her to keep seeing you as a way to get to Christian.”