Page 3 of The Demon's Sinful Serenade
For the first time in months, I felt powerful again. In control. Like the music was flowing through me instead of fighting against me.
I scanned the crowd, taking in the faces and feeding off the energy. The tall guy with kind eyes nursing a beer near the window, the dark-haired stranger in a leather jacket leaning against the bar, even the bearded local I vaguely rememberedbullying the band geeks in high school… They watched me with appreciation, withwant, and I felt a little flutter of feminine satisfaction.
How long has it been?The last year on tour had been consumed by Julian's jealousy and paranoia, his increasing suspicion that I was sleeping with roadies or sound engineers or anyone who showed me basic human kindness. Even before his addiction got really bad, his possessiveness had made dating impossible. And after... well, grief and career implosion weren't exactly aphrodisiacs. Add in a mysterious stalker, and dating had fallen off my priority list entirely.
I transitioned into an older song, letting the driving beat push away my thoughts. The crowd was mine now, swaying and singing along to the chorus. This was why I'd come back to Silvermist. This was what I'd been fighting to reclaim.
Then the feedback hit.
A shriek of electronic noise tore through the speakers, so loud and sudden that half the crowd covered their ears. I yanked my hands away from the guitar, but the sound kept coming, building to an almost unbearable pitch.
Above my head, one of the stage lights flickered.
"Look out!" someone shouted from the crowd.
I dove sideways as the heavy fixture crashed down, missing my head by inches. Glass scattered across the stage, and the feedback finally cut out, leaving only shocked silence and the hammer of my pulse in my ears.
No.Not here. Not now. Not when I was finally feeling like myself again.
"Shit." Vanin's gravelly voice came from behind the bar. He was over the top and beside the stage in seconds. "Are you hurt?"
I shook my head, too stunned to speak. My gaze fixed on the broken light fixture, the twisted metal where it had been attached to the ceiling.
That wasn't an accident.
My stalker had followed me home.
"Just a little technical difficulty, folks," Vanin announced to the crowd as he helped me to my feet. "Show's over for tonight. Drinks on the house."
The distraction worked. The crowd's attention shifted to the promise of free alcohol, though people still murmured and pointed. Vanin planted his hands on his hips and glared between the fallen light and its preferred location, muttering about incompetent installers.
But I saw the doubt in his eyes. The same doubt I'd seen in venue managers across three states.
Poppy pushed her way to the stage, face pale.
"I'm fine," I said before she could ask. I wasn't fine. I was terrified and furious and so damned tired of looking over my shoulder. "Just... rattled."
"That's it," she said firmly. "You're staying with me tonight."
I shook my head. "Your place is too small, and I'm not kicking you out of your bed."
"Then we'll figure something else out, but you're not staying alone."
Vanin cleared his throat. "Look, I'd offer my security guys, but they're all vampires. Daylight hours..." He shrugged apologetically.
I nodded, understanding. Silvermist's supernatural population kept different schedules than the human residents.
"But there are some merc monsters who moved to town about a year ago," Vanin said thoughtfully. "Fire demons or something."
"Ifrit," Poppy corrected primly. "The Kadhan clan. They're specialists."
"Specialists in what?" I asked.
"Problems that regular security can't touch." He lowered his voice. "If someone's really targeting you, they'd know how to deal with it."
I wanted to argue, but exhaustion washed over me. What did I have to lose at this point? My career was hanging by a thread, my reputation in tatters. If fire demons were what it took to get through the festival alive, so be it.
"Where do I find them?"
