“Then find it,” the demon commanded. It reached out and hauled me to my feet.
“Sure thing.” I reminded myself that throwing something pointy at it would only hurt Jax. “I’ll just pull the location out of my ass and we’ll be on our way.”
Jax’s eyes narrowed and the demon folded his arms. “Do not toy with me. Humans can’t do that.”
I stared, wondering for a brief moment if Jax had somehow managed to steal back control. Of course, it wasn’t him. The deadpan, almost irritated glare fixed on me was a neon reminder.
“How?” I threw up my hands and reached the doorknob. “How have you made it through so many lives?”
Chapter Seven
Azirak/Jax
It took some convincing, but Sam finally managed to persuade Azi to take her to a library. We found one and waited till it opened, and she’d been sitting in front of a public computer for the last hour now. As hard as it was to believe, there were actually three bars in the United States called Comraderies. Based on what she’d seen in her flash, she was able to rule out one because it was a biker bar. That left two to check.
“Which of the remaining two is it?” The demon was getting restless. It was sometime after ten in the morning, and it was pacing my body back and forth. It reminded me of the way Sam stalked the kitchen as she waited on the coffee machine in the morning.
Sam pushed the keyboard back. She stood and tossed the demon a nasty glare. The woman at the desk on the other side of the room had been watching us. Every time Azi moved in close to Sam, she stiffened, a puff of gray rising into the air around her. “How the hell should I know?”
Azi looked from the computer to Sam. Irritation coursed through my body. “Do you not understand—”
An explosion of red burst into the air. Sam shot forward and jammed her finger against my chest. “I understand that you repeatedly whining in my ear about how important this is won’t do anyone a damn bit of good.”
“You dare use that tone with me?”
Brows knitting together to form a deep V, she poked me again, this time harder. “Oh, I dare.”
“Is there a problem?” The woman came around the desk and stopped a few feet from us. Her attention was trained mostly on Sam, but her eyes occasionally darted to me, full of suspicion.
Sam opened her mouth, then closed it with a snap. I knew that look. It was the I’m about to go postal and shred your ass look. With a deep breath, she shook her head and gathered the notes she’d made on the bars’ locations. “No. Sorry about the noise.”
Azi shouldered past the woman. Sam made a move to follow, but the librarian grabbed her hand. “Sweetheart, you don’t have to go with him.”
Don’t say a thing!
I felt the demon gearing up to attack the woman—verbally or physically, I didn’t know. Neither would be good for our cause, though.
Let Sam handle it.
“While I appreciate the concern, my boyfriend is an asshole at the moment. I promise he’s just going through…” She glanced back and narrowed her eyes. “A temporary phase.”
The librarian hesitated. Her colors swirled, a mix of fear and uncertainty, but she stepped out of the way instead of arguing, probably happy with herself for trying but thrilled to not get truly involved.
Sam forced a smile, then dragged my body out the door and into the cold air.
Azi let her lead us to the car before ripping my hand from hers. “No more distractions. We need—”
“The rock,” she finished with a sigh. “Yeah, yeah. Broken demonic record.”
It took the paper from her. “One of these places is in Virginia. The other is in New York.”
“The one in New York obviously isn’t a huge issue, but Virginia might be a problem.”
“We have a vehicle.”
“We do,” Sam agreed. “But it requires fuel to get from point A to point B, and last time I checked, I had about twelve dollars in my bank account, and Jax has even less than that.”
“If you need currency, then take it from someone who has it.”
“And who, exactly, should that be?” It didn’t answer her, but a response wasn’t necessary. She knew exactly what the demon was hinting at. Sam’s eyes narrowed, and she tensed. “You’re not going to mug random people.”
“It won’t be random. I will choose someone that I feed from.”
“The hell you will.” Deep red burst into the air around Sam’s shoulders as she came at us. With an impressive shove, she let out a growl. “What you do is bad enough—but robbing them, too? There has to be a line.”
Azi’s confusion was so thick that it nearly choked me. “I will stick to the human’s rules when I feed, as I have since taking control.”
“Rules?” Her face was tinted red, and the muscles in her neck stretched taut. Sam wasn’t normally high-strung, but this whole thing had to be taking a toll on her nerves. “What frigging rules?”
“I will only assault evil men.” A flicker of amusement flooded my system. “Unless you wish me to feed by other means.”
I will fucking kill you…