Page 11 of Secrets of the Frostbound Cottage

A demon! A fricking demon, here! No wonder so many dogs had been taken. When there were enough of them, the demon would have sacrificed them all and used their lifeblood to coalesce a permanent hold on its human host, locking itself in place with the screaming souls of the innocent. I went cold thinking about it.

Thank goodness for Rowena and BonBon, or this whole thing could have gone under the radar until the demon was too strong to beat. And I was lucky that Maddie had been practising with the Eternal Flame because she’d clearly wrought the strongest protections into that vial. It made my heart ache anew. I really should ring her; even with all that she represented, I missed her like hell.

The puppy licked my chin and her tail gave a tentative wag. I sagged against the desk, still stroking her soft fur with shaky hands. ‘We make a good team,’ I said. But as my eyes flicked back to the unconscious man, unease gnawed at me. If a demon had been possessing the human, had the man invited it in?

A moment later, he groaned and rolled over. It was the first sound he’d made and a sure sign that the possession was over. Picking up the pup, I walked over and kicked him none too gently. ‘Stay down,’ I growled.

Demons picked their hosts carefully. They went for the truly bad guys in the hope that people wouldn’t think their malicious behaviour out of character. Possession or not, this dude was surely a wretch who deserved whatever was coming to him.

He groaned again and moved as if he were going to stand. Whatever was driving him, I wasn’t letting him get away. I gave him a solid roundhouse kick to the head and he slumped back to the floor, unconscious. I checked his pulse to make sure he was out, then I cuffed him.

Once he was secure, I picked up my ridiculous bundle of keys and pocketed them, empty vial and all, then grabbed the happily wagging puppy and carted her away from her captor.

‘You did real good,’ I murmured to her as I jogged down the stairs.

She licked my face and her tail wagged even harder.

Chapter Eight

‘Before you go,’ I said to Gazza, ‘there’s a perp upstairs. He shouldn’t cause you any trouble – he’s unconscious and I’ve already cuffed him.’

The two officers exchanged a look.

‘It wasn’t my fault,’ I protested, raising a hand in my defence. ‘He came at me first.’

Gazza smirked. ‘For someone so petite, you seem to leave an awful lot of people unconscious.’

‘What can I say?’ I shrugged. ‘It must be my sparkling personality. It clearly overwhelms them.’

The grizzled cop chuckled. ‘Well, whatever you’re doing, keep doing it. And don’t worry – we’ll get this little Pom-Pom back to his owner now.’

‘BonBon,’ I corrected.

Tanya cradled BonBon in her arms. The tiny dog, with its ridiculously fluffy coat, looked thoroughly pleased by the attention and wagged his tail frantically. It was a far cry from the animal who’d been cowering in its cage when I first arrived.

‘Wasn’t he in the car?’ I asked curiously, noting how closely Tanya was now holding him. ‘I thought you didn’t like dogs?’

‘He was lonely,’ she protested. ‘And I’m not sure he counts as a dog, does he? He’s more like a living teddy bear.’ She had a point: BonBon did look more like a teddy bear than the golden retriever puppy I was holding.

‘Looks like that one’s yours,’ Tanya teased.

‘Oh no, she’s definitely not mine,’ I said quickly. ‘My life is not conducive to having a dog. I’m going to take her over to the animal handlers.’

‘Good luck with that,’ Gazza said, motioning behind me. I turned to see the red tail lights of three large vans pulling away. ‘I’m pretty sure they said they were completely full,’ he added. ‘And they seemed to be stressing over how they’re going to home so many puppies.’

I glanced down at the soft golden ball in my arms. There was no denying it, she was one of the cutest puppies I’d ever seen, not to mention the most fearless. And the love that resonated from her when she looked at me was so strong that you didn’t need a hint of magic in you to feel it. I couldn’t imagine it would be hard to find her a home: families, older people, young couples – thousands of people would love her.Anyone but me.

‘Could you take her?’ I asked in a last-ditch effort to palm off responsibility for the pup. ‘You could see if anyone at the station would like her?’

‘I’d love to.’ Gazza gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘But bringing her in will mean a week’s worth of paperwork and we just don’t have time for that. Trust me, she’s better off with you.’ He slid me a look that wasn’t as sly as he thought. ‘Or you could just leave her here to fend for herself…’

I gritted my teeth. He was obviously goading me; we all knew there was no chance that I’d leave her, but that only left me with one option.

‘Are you sure you don’t want to drop this one back to his owner, too?’ Tanya said. The use of the word ‘too’ suggested that she also assumed I was taking the puppy with me. ‘You were the one who found him, and itwasyour case.’

‘Thanks, but I have another matter that’s pretty urgent. If you don’t mind taking him home, I’ve still got a bit of a drive ahead of me tonight.’

‘I’m fine with that,’ Tanya said, snuggling him closer. ‘You know, I think I might quite like one of these. What breed did you say it was?’

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