Page 68 of In the Nick of Time
It had kept speaking though, switching almost frantically from one language to the next. Perhaps in an attempt to find something that would stop Nick from getting any nearer? He’d recognized Bulgarian, Spanish, something that sounded like old Scots, then had quit trying to parse them out.
None of it had worked on him. The closer he’d gotten to it, the more Nick’s skin had itched, as if he’d fallen into a patch of nettles or poison oak. He’d managed to ignore the sensations, telling himself it was just Lady Luck’s creepy magic rolling off him like water off a duck’s back.
“What are you?” she’d finally growled in English, her voice low and gravelly.
“Nick Sedgewick,” he’d replied with a shrug. “Nobody important.”
With that, guided by instinct—or more likely, not having any fucking clue what he was supposed to do—Nick had reached out and placed the flat of his hand against the unmoving demon’s skull. Then it had felt like a million ants crawling across his skin, being stuck with pins, and jamming his finger into a light socket all at the same time. After about a billion years, the demon’s lips parted and it let out a long, gut-wrenching shriek as it shrunk into itself like an apple in a dehydrator and dropped to the carpet.
That’s going to leave a stain, was Nick’s first thought. His second thought was,It looks like the dried apple head dolls my grandmother used to make. Shocked his ploy had worked, Nickstill hadn’t moved when the door burst open. The SPAM cleanup agents had arrived.
“Nice work,” Doug had said, rising to his feet and brushing off his suit pants.
“It actually wasn’t at all but hey, it got the job done.” Nick had allowed himself to preen a little when he said that. It wasn’t every day that his idea was the right one. “What was her deal anyway?”
“Lady Luck manipulated and collected emotions and probably appropriated powers she wanted as well,” the cleanup agent said before heading out the door with what was left of the demon. “We found the first two agents, the ones that disappeared before Schoenhut. She fed from her victims is the best way to put it, and if they had powers, she fed until they didn’t even resemble humans. But she won’t be any longer, seeing as how you disabled her until we could get here. I’ve never heard of Luck being a hunter before, more opportunistic, but I guess even demons change. Nice work, Agent Sedgewick.”
Nick hoped this was the last he’d see of her. It. Whatever. He was exhausted.
Now that the crew was gone, a thought struck Nick. “I’m sorry that we still don’t know where Agent Carroll is or if she’s still alive.”
“As truly harrowing as it was, having my final mission as Long Shot play out in my head in Technicolor detail has given me an idea,” Doug replied, rolling his neck and shoulders. “Adding that to what the cleanup guy said about her not being a hunter, I’m sure I’m on the right track.”
Frowning at the memory of Doug’s obvious distress, Nick moved closer to him, wanting to wrap his arms around him and tell him everything would be okay. “That’s what was happening? I could tell it was bad.”
Expelling a lungful of oxygen, Doug ran his hand across the top of his head almost as if the motion could somehow erase his memories. “It was bad. Everything that could go wrong did. At the end of the day, my partner, someone I called a friend, died because of it. An innocent bystander died as well. We got the bad guy, but at what cost? I quit the department and not too many months afterward, Rich—now my ex—started seeing someone else.”
“So, you think this is your ex’s doing?” Nick asked.
“No. Rich is far too lazy to plan a revenge plot. Besides, we were done long before that happened, before Todd died. He must have been an easy target for Melvin though. Melvin must have assumed I cared more than I did about the relationship and would try and get Rich back or some nonsense.”
“Melvin as in…?”
“As in Melvin Garon, the one and only Velvet Elvis.”
“Holy shit.” Surprised, Nick took a step back. “Seriously? Elvis? Did you recognize him the other day?”
“Not when we were at Nitti’s. He’s done some little things to alter his appearance. I do remember having a vague niggle of recognition when we saw him at the club the next night, but I suspect that the presence of Lady Luck made me dismiss it. But it’s him.”
“What now?”
“Now we take a trip to Nitti’s and confront Melvin. I’m certain he is involved in this. It was his boyfriend we were after that day. The day I took a shot at someone and for the first time in my life wished I could’ve missed. But how do Pork Pie and Melvin fit in?” Doug was obviously thinking out loud for Nick’s benefit.
“Luck is opportunistic, never does anything that doesn’t directly benefit themselves. My guess is that Melvin used Pork Pie’s odd ambition for powers to direct him toward SPAM andexact revenge against me specifically. They had no idea Luck was working the club,” Doug sighed. “I can’t believe it took me this long to put everything together. Agents Schoenhut and Carroll were used to lure me to Vegas. How did Melvin know which agents I’ve worked with? I don’t know. But it could mean that SPAM has a bigger problem than missing agents.”
As tired as Nick was, he was also beyond ready to get this assignment over with.
“Fine,” he said with a heavy sigh. “But I demand—no, I request—Nick Saved the Day Sex later. Save The Day Sexisa thing, right?” He frowned and glanced over at Doug. “If it’s not, it should be.”
Nick watched as the now familiar goofy smile spread across Doug’s face and that irresistible dimple made an appearance, and he almost melted into the carpet himself.
Stepping around the weird stain that absolutely wasn’t shaped like a religious icon’s head, Doug reached his hand out and tugged Nick’s chin upward. Leaning close, he pressed his lips firmly against Nick’s.
The kiss was over too quickly. Nick absolutely did not whimper.
“There’s more where that came from, but now we have a creep to catch.”
EIGHTEEN
