Page 73 of Speak of the Devil

Delia’s mouth opened, but then she stopped herself. Had she been about to offer him some words of sympathy?

He didn’t want that. No, all he wanted was to get to the bottom of this thing with Robert Hendricks and the demons.

If they were even connected. Delia seemed dubious, and Caleb supposed he couldn’t blame her, not when all they really had to go on was a Tarot reading that could have been interpreted in a variety of ways.

“Well, you seem to have settled into the Las Vegas lifestyle pretty well,” she remarked.

With that comment, he knew she wouldn’t bring up the sore subject of his mother again unless he was the one to initiate the conversation.

It was the sort of thing a friend would do.

Were he and Delia friends?

He honestly couldn’t say for sure. Some kind of business associates, he supposed, but he still couldn’t get a clear read on how she felt about him.

Maybe that was for the best.

“Working on it,” he said.

The waiter arrived with their food then, so they thanked him and were quiet for a bit while they picked up their sandwiches and had a few bites. Even though Caleb probably could have gone another hour or so before eating again, he had to admit that it felt good to take this break and replenish his stores of energy.

Being on edge all the time could take a lot out of you.

But once they paused to have some iced tea, he ventured, “We really need to pin Hendricks down. Maybe you’re right and he really doesn’t have anything to do with any of this. If we could get some kind of confession out of him, though, we’d have a better idea of what we’re dealing with.”

Delia wiped her fingers on her napkin and sent him a level stare. “Get him to confess how? We’re not the police. We don’t have any kind of leverage over him.”

All right, she had a point. On the other hand, Caleb could think of a few ways to put the screws to the guy if necessary.

“Threaten to expose him,” he said easily. “If he’s been summoning demons to do his dirty work, I kind of doubt that’s the sort of thing he wants spread around town.”

“I don’t do blackmail, Caleb,” Delia said, her tone flat.

“It’s not blackmail,” he countered, even as he realized there were obvious limits to how morally gray Delia was willing to be. “We’re not trying to extort anything from him. We just want the truth — and to get him to back off from sending his imps after me.”

“If they’re even his imps at all.”

Since Caleb didn’t have any definitive proof that Hendricks had been controlling all those demon attackers, he knew hedidn’t have much of an argument to provide on that particular point. Instead, he dunked his beef dip in itsau jusand took a bite first so he could collect his thoughts.

“Right,” he said. “There’s a whole lot we don’t know. But the only way we’re going to get anywhere is to go to the guy directly.”

Delia didn’t look too impressed by that line of thinking. “And risk offending someone who’s technically a client of mine.”

“Whatever he’s paying you, I’ll double it,” Caleb said. After all, it was only money…and he could always get more.

“It’s not about what he’s paying me,” she responded. “It’s about offending someone who has a lot of connections in this town. If it turns out we’re wrong, he’s going to tell everyone that I’m a crackpot who believes demons are real.”

Even though Hendricks was the person who’d first brought up the subject of demons to Delia. However, since Caleb was forced to admit her concerns were valid, he only said, “Well, you do get rid of ghosts.”

“Not the same thing, and you know it.”

They lapsed into an uneasy silence then, each of them returning to their food because they weren’t quite sure what they should say to each other.

But after he’d eaten one half of his beef dip, he sipped some iced tea to wash it down, then said, “I know I’m asking a lot of you.”

Her cool green eyes met his. “You are.”

“If I’m right — if he really is the one who summoned those demons — then this is the only way to stop him. People who dabble in this kind of stuff don’t want to be found out.”

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