I cornered Merrifield again. “Your enemies tried to chase me down. You’re going to tell me why a demon’s after you.”

“Because…uh…”

“What? You slept with his boyfriend?” I’d meant that as a joke, but the look on his face was classic.

“You did sleep with his boyfriend. Smart. Not. Well, given what happened between me and them we’re probably about even.” I grinned at him. “Let’s send this one packing too. I got his use-name out of his servant, and I have contacts.”

“You know an exorcist?”

“I know one who can be trusted not to try and exorcise you or me while he’s at it.”

Merrifield laughed. “Got it, because, I…”

“…you’re not a fighter. I can tell that.” I flickered a grin. “I’ll do the fighting if you’ll help with the research. And tell me exactly how this all started. Deal?”

“Well, I didn’t know the guy was…” Merrifield paused. “It’s his mortal boyfriend I slept with. And I didn’t know he was dating a demon. I knew he was dating an asshole.”

“You were trying to rescue him?”

“Nah. I was trying to show him how a good person would treat him so he’d rescue himself.”

I laughed a bit. “And he…”

“He’s dead. I wasn’t able to stop it.”
Able or willing, I thought, but I wondered if there was anyone who could break the guy out of hell. He didn’t deserve to be there for having lousy taste in men, and he probably hadn’t known who or what he was with anyway. “So. Do you have the demon’s real name?”

“If I did, I’d have looked for an exorcist. I thought…I thought he wouldn’t harm kids.”

“How much experience with demons do you have?” I demanded, suddenly angry.

He looked away.

“You aren’t responsible for the actions of your enemies, but if there’s anything you can do to help Molly, please do it.”

Still not looking at me, he nodded. “There’s…I’ll give her a luck spell.”

A luck spell from a fairy probably meant quite a bit. “Thanks. There’s not much I can do for her other than point out Tyr manages well enough with just one hand. So…what was the name of the boyfriend?”

“Clint Marrick.”
“Okay.” I’d have Mike run that name, find out how the guy died. That might give me some other aliases the demon was using. Fighting his creatures, as easy as they were to defeat, wasn’t going to be helpful.

I needed to go after the being himself.