Page 1 of My Bounty Hunter is a Demon (Demons for Hire)

1

ASPEN

What a fucking dump .

Then again, hunting cabins weren’t supposed to be luxury vacation homes, but this one looked like it was a gust of wind shy of falling down. I stood at the edge of the tree line, looking at the dark, rundown cabin nestled in the middle of the Smokey Mountains. No lights shone from the one window that wasn’t boarded up. A frown creased my brow.

My intel told me that the rogue witch I’d been tracking for weeks was inside. Or had been. But my gut told me something wasn’t right. The place seemed completely deserted, abandoned. That could result from someone not wanting me, or anyone else, snooping around. However, the uneasy-something-doesn’t-feel-right feeling had nothing to do with the lack of life in the cabin. The faint essence of magic was familiar, yet I wasn’t able to pinpoint why.

I scanned the area and opened my senses, searching for signs of anyone nearby. The only sound was the rustling of leaves in the trees and the occasional movement of animals in the forest around me.

The cabin sat on the outskirts of a fairly new cult compound. The rogue witch I tracked here was one of enforcers for the cult. It was why I’d jumped on taking this job—and all others that involved magical cults. I had to stop them from doing to others what was done to me.

"What's the status, Asp?" Van’s voice crackled through my earpiece.

Sullivan “Van” Drach was one of my adoptive brothers, and the Drach Security tech genius. He was also the youngest of the five of us. I was closer to him and our sister Harland than I was to our older brothers.

I tapped the communicator in my ear while walking a little further west, staying hidden in the shadows of the forest. "Looks empty from out here. No lights, no activity. Plus, the place looks like it’s about to fall down. Could be bad intel...or our target got tipped off and hauled ass."

"Hmm. Go check it out, but watch your back in there."

"Always do." I smirked faintly. Van was a genius hacker and tech wizard, but sometimes he fretted over me like a mother hen. All my siblings and my parents did. From the moment my father found me in the basement of a dark witch cult when I was fifteen, the whole Drach clan welcomed me like I was their own. Van had only been ten at the time and followed me around everywhere. He was curious about me since I was a demon.

"I mean it, sis. This rogue is slippery, and witches are dangerous. Stay alert."

"Yes, dad," I teased.

I left the earpiece turned on as I slipped from the shadows of the trees, gliding silently toward the cabin. I used my demon magic to wrap around myself like an invisibility cloak. To any watchful eyes, I would be nothing more than a ripple, a fleeting shadow.

At the weathered door, I paused and listened. There was no sound coming from inside. As I studied the door and the exterior walls framing it, I frowned. Sparks of dark magic touched my awareness. Lifting my hand, I touched my fingertips to the splintery surface and recoiled with a gasp. Yep, definitely dark magic.

“What?” Van asked.

“Someone sealed the front door with a spell. The magical signature is dark.” And familiar. I wasn’t about to tell Van that just yet. No need to have my siblings panicking until I had proof.

“Can you break the spell?”

“Nope. I planned to yank the door open and hope for the best.” I laughed at the low growl rumbling through my earpiece.

“Not the time for your smart-ass comments.” There was a hint of a smile in his voice.

I rolled my eyes. “Then don’t ask stupid questions.”

Focusing, I held up both hands with my palms facing the door. For a moment, I studied the spell, learning what I could from it. The cult that killed my birth parents and took me to their compound had taught me how to hone my demonic powers. For ten years, they trained me, along with a few other demon kids, to become their perfect soldiers. One of my specialties was undoing spells and curses.

Once I learned all I could from the spell, I tore it down in layers. Seconds later, the magic dissipated. I opened the door and slipped inside. “I’m in.”

The interior was pitch-dark and musty. I conjured a small orb of light in my palm, casting soft white light through the one-room cabin. “Looks like an old hunter’s cabin.”

There was an old cot along one wall, with a small dresser beside it. A few feet away was a five-gallon bucket I guessed was used as a toilet. In the center of the room was a ratty couch and a coffee table made of a tree stump. Across the room from the cot was a small dining table, and behind that, a wood-burning stove.

Talk about roughing it.

The same magical signature as the spell on the door hung heavy in the air. Whoever had stayed here had left not long before I got there.

"What's the situation?" Van asked.

"The place is empty, but someone’s definitely been squatting here recently. Bare minimum supplies, like they didn’t stay long." I moved to the small dresser next to the bed and rifled through a drawer, finding only a handful of nondescript clothes. No identification, no clues to who this witch might be or why their magic felt so disturbingly familiar.

As I turned to leave, a glint of metal on the floor behind the cot snagged my attention. I bent down and picked up a heavy silver amulet emblazoned with a twisting sigil. An icy chill crawled down my spine. I knew that symbol. It was his mark. Laris’ mark.

The amulet tumbled from my numb fingers, clattering to the floor. Memories filtered in at the edges of my mind. A child's wails, the sizzle of flesh. The zealous gleam in cold eyes as Laris stood over me, scalpel in hand, crooning that it was almost time, that I would be his crowning achievement.

Bile scorched my throat. I squeezed my eyes shut, fighting to shove the past back into its cage. This couldn’t be Laris. It couldn’t. Laris Blackman, leader of the dark cult my father freed me from, was dead.

Van’s voice came through my earpiece, pulling me back from my thoughts. "You with me, Aspen?"

I sucked in a shuddering breath, my fingers curling into fists at my sides. "Yeah," I managed, hating the tremor in the single word. "I'm here."

"Talk to me. What's going on in there?"

Of course, he heard my uneasiness. I swallowed hard, forcing the words past the barbed wire in my throat. "I found evidence linking this place to the cult. Van, I found an amulet with Laris' symbol on it."

Silence hummed across the line. When Van replied, his tone was low and serious. "Okay. This changes things. I’m pulling up everything I can find on this location and any known associates. I’ll call Harland in for backup. Don’t go to the compound without her.”

“Acknowledged.” Harland was my sister. She had taken me under her wing when I first came to live with the Draches.

Harland would have my back, like always. Like all my adoptive brothers did. The Draches were my rock. My safe haven.

Squaring my shoulders, I strode out of the cabin, the warm afternoon air a welcome caress against my chilled skin. My phone pinged with an incoming text as I descended the rickety steps. I glanced down at the screen, expecting an update from Van.

Instead, an image stared back at me, stealing the air from my lungs. A man’s face, all sharp angles and piercing eyes, the hint of a smirk playing at the edges of his mouth. Beneath the picture was a name.

Damian Hart.

The rogue witch I’d been hunting. Until now, I hadn’t had his full name, nor had I seen a clear photo of his face. While I didn’t recognize the man, I recognized the man in the background, talking with a few others. Laris.

“Van, my contact texted me a name. See what you can dig up on Damian Hart.” I told him about the photo and Laris being in the background.

“Laris is dead.” Van said the words with a growl.

“Apparently not.” I was going to kill him myself. And this time, I’d make sure he stayed dead.