Page 16

Inviting a Demon to Dinner

“W e have our own debts to pay back, and if we don’t find someone else to take our places when that happens…” Rafferty said. “It’s how they motivate us into joining the demonic Ponzi scheme. A small glimmer of hope that we can actually save ourselves,” Rafferty sai d calmly.

They had returned to the dining room, and he had shifted to his easier-to-be-around human form. To Helena’s surprise, most of the food Rafferty cooked had been destroyed, along with several of the dishes they had been sitting on, leaving nothing but ash in its place. Not her new Fiestaware for so me reason.

“And why did it damage all the food?” Helena asked, taking another sip of a new bubble water can. The original bubble water had turned brackish.

“The imbalance doesn’t really care what pays the price, just as long as it’s paid. Most food is made of organic compounds, fruits, vegetables, flesh. Living stuff, or recently living stuff from creation, but has no will any more to resist. Those sorts of sacrifices can replace the body price. It was easy an d nearby.”

Helena furrowed her eyebrows. “So like, the ancient feasts to the gods were really this sort of thing?”

“Humans have always tried to play with these forces. More than one civilization has been destroyed trying to keep up with the price. That’s why the majority of humans moved away from this sort of thing,” Rafferty said. “Because it i s stupid.”

Helena looked down at the floor of her dining room, trying to process. The floor itself was surprisingly clean. “But my house?” She indicated the wood table and wood floor. There was no damage that she could see. “Those things are made from organic compounds from creation?”

“Longer dead, older, covered in lacquers it would have to eat through. It would consume them eventually, but it would take longer and isn’t as easy. It would have devoured you first before it would start in on the floors. Even stone would eventually be crumbled into dust, turning all of this around it into a hellscape until the balance is paid.”

Helena looked down at her hands, which still shook. The skin hung dry over her bones, like all the moisture had been sucked out. She had been sipping water for a while, but when she had managed to crawl out of the kitchen with Rafferty, her tongue kept sticking to the roof of her mouth. She didn’t understand what any of this meant, or what exactly had happened to her, but she knew one thing—she was never going into her kitc hen again.

Helena had to fight the urge to run out of h er house.

“Are we safe now?” she asked in a sm all voice.

“Yes, the debt is paid, and if we don’t use any more demonic magic, we won’t incur any more debt. Except the one that I inherently already have just being here. The circle is more or less closed. If I hadn’t used demonic magic at all, I’m not sure it would have gotten thro ugh now.”

“I’m never going to sleep tonight,” she said, shaking her head at all this horrible inf ormation.

The next day dawned sunny and bright. Helena opened her eyes and stretched deliciously. She couldn’t remember the last time she slept so well. Luxuriating while she lay there, she tried to remember going to bed last night, but nothing came to her. Beside her, Pooka was curled up, eyes closed an d purring.

“Man, I must have been really tired,” she said to her cat, “but to be fair, it was a hard day’s work yesterday. Trying to get those appointments with the various catering services had been more of a challenge than I thought it would be.”

Pooka stared at her with slitted eyes. Off in the distance of her house, she heard a clinking, kitchen-y sound. The disturbance spooked the cat, who jumped off the bed to disappear under it.

“Ugh, if only it wouldn’t cost me so much to get the one guy I know could do a good job,” Helena muttered, unsurprised by her cat’s reaction, since she usually hid from strangers, and pushed back the covers. Slipping on her bathrobe, she did her basics in the bathroom, then made her way to the kitchen.

Pushing open the door, she smiled at the demon with a man’s face standing there, flipping a pair of eggs onto some toast that had green stuff smeared all o ver them.

“Good morning,” she said cheerfully and went toward her coffeemaker, only to be intercepted by an already stea ming cup.

“I don’t know how you take it,” Rafferty said, passing i t to her.

“But you know that I drink it?” she inquired as she redirected to the fridge to get her lavender creamer that she bought from the organic coffee shop just down th e street.

“Why else would you have the coffee maker?” he asked, and she had to concede t he point.

Dropping a dollop of the sweet, scented stuff, she let it mix naturally as she replaced the creamer in the fridge, then turned to head back to her dining room. Before she got there, Rafferty went ahead of her, bearing the plate, which he set down at her spot like a waiter. He stepped back to pull out h er chair.

“What are you doing?” she asked as she set the coffee next to h er plate.

“Being of service,” he sa id simply.

“Why don’t you sit down and join me?” she invited as she sat down so he could stop do ing that.

“I’m fine,” he stated, backing up so he could take a spot against the wall, his arms behind his back.

“You’re making me feel like I’m in a hotel,” she said, looking at him over her shoulder.

“I think it would be better for both of us if we kept a distance,” h e stated.

Helena wondered what had happened between yesterday and that morning. Yesterday had been the first time she had felt comfortable around the demon, seeing him all vulnerable like that after he had gone a little crazy cooking all those dishes. She had loved his wide-eyed amazement at the Food Network channel.

“What happened to all the food by the way?” she asked. She remembered eating that delicious French Toast sandwich, but not really anything else from h is feast.

“I made it go away. It was a foolish mistake of mine, and I apologize, mistress,” Rafferty said, bowing his head like a penitent.

“Oh, that’s a shame. It all looked so good,” she said. “What a waste.”

“It was not wasted, mistress. It was like it never existed.”

“Why are you calling me mistress all of a sudden?”

He averted his gaze, resting it on the floor instead. When it became clear that he wasn’t going to say anything more, Helena sighed. Two steps forward, one s tep back.

“Rafferty, this is your vacation. And you are creeping me out by standing where I can’t see you. Come sit down.”

She hated to order him to relax, but this time, the demon obeyed. He crossed to take the seat kitty-corner from her, and they eyed each other as he slid to sit, folding his hands on the table. He looked ready to spring up an y moment.

Helena sighed, accepting what little victory she could and looked down at her plate. “Avocado toast?” she guessed.

“Yes, with a poached egg on top,” her reluctant guest c onfirmed.

“Did you see this on a cooking channel as well?” she asked, picking one of the pieces up so she could tak e a bite.

A guilty look crossed his face, his way of co nfirming.

She chuckled as she took a bite. Lime had been splashed onto the avocado, just enough to make the natural brightness of the savory fruit sing even brighter. The egg capped that brightness just as it was about to be too much, easing the taste on he r tongue.

“Hmm,” she cooed as she chewed, then took a second bite that got a bit of the yolk. The yolk inside was still runny, and it burst into her mouth with creamy goodness. She didn’t even mind the little bit of yolk that dribbled down her chin.

Rafferty’s eyes seemed to devour the sight of her eating as he watched her every move, but she didn’t mind it.

I’m getting better at understanding him. She contemplated the situation he was in. She couldn’t imagine what it had to be like to not be able to taste anything. What was letting him devour the memories of her food really going to do to her anyway? There was a second piece of toast.

“Do you want to try this?” she asked, pushing the plate a little toward him to offer him the oth er piece.

“No, this is yours,” he insisted.

“You looked starved,” she noted, though he really didn’t when he was in his human form. The emaciation of his demonic form was well hidden under the human skin. It was his eyes that looked s o hungry.

“No,” he said firmly, pulling his folded hands toward his chest like he was turtling up. “I cannot feed off your memories at every meal you have. You won’t make it two weeks if we do that.”

She mulled that over. “Okay, so then we gotta make it count. Is there anywhere in the city you would lik e to eat?”

That invoked an eyebrow raise. “ Anywhere?”

“Well, sure. There are lots of great chefs in the city, and I need to do some tastings for work. Plus I think it’s more fun if you let someone else cook for you. You get to see what they would do differently and stuff.” She didn’t know how persuasive she really was being, but she kept smiling at him, hoping for the best.

Rafferty flattened his hands onto the table while he thought hard. “I… I think I could do that,” he said carefully. A tremor of excitement cometed through his starli ght eyes.

Helena smiled even brighter. “Great!” Then she eyed his caterer’s uniform. It was only then that she realized he had worn the same one every day that he had been in her presence. “Do you have anything else you can wear?”