Page 47 of Curses & Cold Brew
I wanted her to stay.
I wanted her tucked away doing arts and crafts, laughing, and cooking until we crawled into our bed at the end of the night.
Together.
The simplest of simple pleasures, the most terrifying to attain.
But Iris wasn’t here for that. No. She was only here for protection and a debt that she still owed . . . and perhaps the curiosity of what one night with a demon could be like.
23
IRIS
Ioffered to do the dishes after dinner. It was the least I could do after Ramona had made me one of the best meals of my life. She insisted that she load the dishwasher because she had a special agreement with the machine, and if I broke it, she’d make me her dish servant until it was fixed. Never mind that she could have it fixed with a wave of her hand or a call to the local repair ghoul. I suspected she enjoyed the ritual of it. I suspected even more that she’d have enjoyed keeping me chained to her kitchen sink for a week just for entertainment.
Having the lion's share of one and a half bottles of wine at dinner wasn’t my smartest choice, but it was making me bold and rather warm all over.
Was demon wine stronger than normal wine? Surely, nothing was stronger than witch wine.
“So, where am I permitted to sleep now that I’m fed and thoroughly exhausted from arts and crafts?” I lazily dried my hands on a dish towel. “Your couch looks really fancy, but with a few blankets, I’m sure I’ll sleep just fine after I finish this.” I held up the last two sips of wine in my glass and swigged it back.
“Do demons even have beds?” I mused. “Like, vampires have coffins and ghouls have graves. But you don’t look like you’d enjoy getting dirty.” My cheeks burned as soon as the words left my mouth, and I braced myself for her reply about just how dirty she could be.
I didn’t miss the mischief that blazed in her side eye, but instead of rising to the bait, she said, “How about I take you on a tour of the house before we settle in and I kick your ass at checkers?”
I guffawed. “Are you actually an elderly woman possessing a demon?”
“I do go to bingo every once in a while.” She shrugged. “But only if Mable is calling.”
“Do zombies have some special bingo-calling abilities I’m not aware of?”
“Her cousin owns The Bloody Mary, so whoever wins gets a free round afterward.”
“Ah.”
With that, she walked out of the kitchen with a quick, “Come along,” over her shoulder.
I hung the towel over the edge of the sink and caught up to her in the living room. Its modern styling reminded me of the waiting rooms in some corporate buildings. The angular couch and glass table were the main components of the austere room. There were a few pieces of art on the walls, but nothing as colorful as the floralginas in the kitchen.
“There is a bathroom just down the hall, across from the garage door. Nothing particularly notable unless you have a thing for Portuguese masonry,” she announced and took a step toward the stairs. I had no idea what that meant. “There’s also a linen closet that I suggest you stay away from unless you want to be transported to the fiery pits of the fifth circle of hell. Itwas an . . . impractical choice in hindsight, but nothing can be perfect.”
Her sense of humor was so dry, I couldn’t tell if she was joking or not.
And I didn’t want to find out.
“Upstairs, there is another bathroom and two bedrooms, but there’s only one room with a bed. Mine.”
“Does the other room lead to the sixth circle of hell?”
Ramona only rolled her eyes. “No, but I do keep all my favorite . . . tools in there. So, for someone, it could be a special sort of hell.”
The knots in my stomach twisted, from excitement or nerves, who knew, but I wasn’t going in that room either. At least not tonight.
“There are towels under the sink,” she said, a jarring return to a normal house tour after mentioning hell pits and torture rooms. “You can find a new toothbrush in the medicine cabinet. And fresh bed linens are in the closet there. No portals required.”
I followed her to the top of the landing and peered over her shoulder. The space was lit by the large bay window at the end of the hall. Ramona opened the door to our right and stepped to the side for me. “This is the bathroom.”
To no one’s surprise, it looked straight out of a luxury hotel. The freestanding clawfoot bathtub could fit two people easily. I didn’t want to think of how many people Ramona had managed to fit under the multiple showerheads in the steam shower either.
