Page 32 of Devil in the Details

But if demons were involved, the solution wouldn’t be quite that easy.

The drive to the dealership was quiet enough, though, and after he’d paid the driver and gotten out of the car, Caleb tried to reassure himself that he’d get this handled eventually. Just another hiccup, one he could get straightened out one way or another.

He had a sneaking suspicion that Delia was right, however. The Porsche was a gorgeous car and exhilarating to drive — well, when he wasn’t trying to weave his way through a crowded intersection with failed brakes — but it would probably be smarter to drive something that didn’t attract every eye in a hundred-yard radius.

First things first, though.

The service department wasn’t as busy as he’d feared, so he was able to talk to the manager right away.

“We’re looking at her right now,” the man said. He looked like he was probably around forty-five or maybe a little older, dark-haired, not very tall but with the kind of shoulders that made it seem like he could lift a Porsche using brute strength and nothing else. “Give us about twenty minutes or so. There’s coffee and tea and snacks in the waiting room.”

Caleb thanked the manager and headed into the space reserved for the people whose vehicles were being worked on. At the moment, it had only one other occupant, a tall guy with a shaved head and heavy eyebrows. He sent Caleb a sideways look but didn’t say anything before returning his attention to his phone.

Well, he hadn’t come here to socialize, so no biggie.

And while he’d already had coffee this morning, he figured a second cup couldn’t hurt, especially when he could accompany it with a large, luscious-looking bear claw. After putting together his impromptu breakfast, Caleb sat down in a chair nowhere near the bald guy, just to make it clear that he had no intention of intruding on the man’s absorption with his phone.

Once he was done with the bear claw and had wiped his fingers on one of the paper napkins provided, he pulled out his phone to see if he’d missed anything important.

Nothing.

His brows drew together, but he told himself it wasn’t a big deal, not when he’d already made his plans with Delia the night before. She’d be at the casino at four o’clock to cheer him, just as they’d arranged. Honestly, the lack of any contact was probably a good thing.

The last thing he wanted was a text from her telling him she needed to cancel at the last minute because something real estate–related had popped up.

He checked the weather, and then, just for shits and giggles, he went over to Facebook to see what the Greencastle gang was up to. Even though he was supposedly deceased, his mother hadn’t thought to deactivate his Facebook account, and he guessed that if anyone noticed he was active on the site, they’d probably just think it was Brooke logging in to keep up with her son’s old friends.

Not much was going on that he could see. Well, Tiffany Adams, who’d been about to get engaged to one of Caleb’s fellow quarter demons when they were all dragged to Hell, had just announced to everyone that she was engaged for real this time, to a man Caleb vaguely remembered from his high school days. A quiet, studious guy, about the polar opposite of Sean.

But it seemed that Jon had just finished his doctorate and been hired as an associate professor at DePauw University, the college all of them had attended, so Tiffany had probably decided it was safe to start thinking about getting settled down and starting a family. Judging by all the congratulations Caleb saw in the group, no one seemed to think it strange that she’d moved on so quickly.

Except it hadn’t been all that quick, had it? More than two and a half years had passed since that fateful night at Rubel Castle in Glendora when all the Greencastle half demons and quarter demons had been banished from this plane, even though it felt like the blink of an eye to Caleb.

Actually, scratch that. Every moment spent in Hell had been an excruciating eternity, and yet it was hard to remind himself that lives had moved on during those two years, and people were building the futures they wanted to see for themselves.

While he…?

Caleb wasn’t sure he wanted to think about that too hard. Yes, he’d gotten out of Hell and had begun to build a life for himself — a life on the surface that looked pretty damn good — but he was already beginning to understand that he didn’t want to continue in this same vein indefinitely.

And a whole lot of that depended on what Delia decided to do.

Deep down, he knew that wasn’t entirely fair. She’d been nothing but friendly and supportive, and he knew he shouldn’t be looking to her to make his life complete, or whatever. At the same time, though, he couldn’t quite bring himself to start dating anyone. Delia knew the truth about him and accepted it, warts and all, while Caleb couldn’t convince himself that he’d ever feel comfortable enough with someone else to tell them exactly who — or what — he was, where he’d come from.

Luckily, he was saved from having to ponder that thorny topic any further, since the service manager paused in the door to the waiting room and said, “Mr. Lowe?”

Good thing he was used to answering to that name by now. He got up from the chair where he’d been sitting. “Yes?”

“Let’s go into the garage.”

That request sounded somehow ominous. He’d always gotten the impression that mechanics didn’t want people hanging around their cars while they were being worked on, but it didn’t seem as if the service manager had too much of a problem with him being back there.

He followed the man into the engine bay, where the Porsche was already being rolled off the lift where the techs had been inspecting the vehicle.

“What did you find?” he asked, and the service manager shook his head.

“Nothing.”

“‘Nothing’?” Caleb repeated. It wasn’t that he hadn’t heard the guy clearly, but more that his brain didn’t want to acknowledge that single word.

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