Sin & Chocolate (Demigod of San Francisco 1)

He waited patiently for me, his gaze intense, his focus absolute.

I looked away, embarrassed and not sure why.

“Start by saying thank you for saving your face,” Daisy coached, still playing the unasked-for role of my business manager.

Though she did have a point.

“Thank you.” I inched my eyes up, finding his again. They pulled at me, sucking me into a place that lacked gravity. I hovered there, lost in those eyes. In his intensity.

“And now ask what he wants,” Daisy said slowly, as though talking to a child.

And she might as well have been.

“Right. Sorry.” I tore my gaze away. “I’ve had a lot of visitors tonight. I’m a bit out of it. Um…” The throng of onlookers continued to watch our unimpressive show. “This is when stage presence would really come in handy.”

“Yes, it would. Just work with what you got,” Daisy said.

A tiny smile played on the stranger’s full lips, but he continued to wait patiently.

“What’s your nam—”

“No,” Mordecai said, his eyes rooted to the stranger just as surely as the stranger’s eyes were rooted to me. “Do it the same way you usually go about this.”

Daisy rolled her eyes.

Far be it from me not to trust the guy just because he was developing shifter tendencies.

“Sure. Fine. Just back off, you two. Sorry,” I said to the stranger, wanting his name. Wanting to be on more intimate terms with him.

Except he was a stalker, obviously dangerous, and it was annoying that a couple of kids had way better sense than I did.

“Okay. Let’s get to it.” I snapped and half considered borrowing a chime from whoever kept ringing the thing a few stalls down. I needed to jog myself out of this daze. “What is it you’re after?”

“What is it you offer?” he countered.

“I thought you knew all that. I can see spirits. Or…maybe just ghosts, if spirits and ghosts are different.”

“She definitely needs to learn more about her craft before we make a thing of this,” Daisy whispered.

“Agreed,” Mordecai responded.

With effort, I unclenched my jaw. “That’s it. So if you have a ghost plaguing you, or if you want to try and contact a ghost, I’m your girl. The exception is if the ghost is on the other side of the Line, and is content to stay there. Then you’re out of luck, because it’s not right to disrupt a soul because of your selfish desires.”

He didn’t comment.

“Sorry.” I shrugged. “That’s all I got.”

His stare beat into my head, and I tried desperately to tear my eyes away. His acute focus had unearthed all of my old insecurities. No one had ever noticed me this much, or for such an extended period of time. It was like he had shrugged off the rest of the world, could only hear and see me, and was enraptured by what he was witnessing.

“We won’t speak of my desires at the moment, Alexis,” he said, making shivers coat my body. “What we will speak of is how you have been grossly mislabeled. Mislabeled and mishandled. Regardless, take me through your skills. Guide me.”

What was he saying? I’d been me for twenty-five years. Whatever power he thought I had, my magic didn’t do a lot more than the gamut I’d taken it through tonight, and the only people willing to fork over real money for my abilities were career criminals. Besides, I’d been magically assessed like everyone else. Yes, I might have fudged my power level, but magic type was magic type. That couldn’t be changed.

I frowned at him, knocked out of the moment. “Well…”

“Show him the cards,” Daisy prompted.

“It’s like a never-ending car wreck,” I muttered, grabbing the tarot because my brain had completely stopped working. “The thing is, I don’t guide people unless I can see people lurking around them.”

“People, meaning spirits?” he asked.

“Ghosts…?” I lifted the end of the drawn-out word, making it a question. He was making me question everything now.

“They are the same thing.” His lips tweaked upward, as though he were trying to ward off a smile.

“Laugh it up, chuckles,” I muttered. “Fine. Whatever. But you don’t have spirits lurking around you. So unless you have a question for someone specific and can call them here, I’m not much good to you.”

His gaze finally flicked away, hitting the kids. A moment later, it bounced back, tensing me up again. “I am confident you will be, in time.” His words dripped with innuendo, and a flurry of butterflies exploded through my stomach. “As for now, how do you handle someone who’s in my position asking for your services?”

“I haven’t had many clearly important stalkers blow through, but tarot is a good place to start.” The cards snapped as I shuffled. A glance revealed people were still gathered around us, taking it in. “What is it you do aside from following innocent, unassuming women around and making your demands known?”

He didn’t shift, flinch, move, or answer me, all things a normal person might’ve done if that question was randomly lobbed at them. The only change was a subtle gleam lighting his eyes.

“All right, then.” I reached the deck forward.

He looked at the offering, but didn’t bend forward in the chair to collect it.

“Really?” I lifted my eyebrows. He still didn’t bend for it. “Do you want them on a silver platter?” I stood and reached the cards across the TV tray, getting them closer to him.

Finally, he extended his hand and took them.

“Happy days,” I mumbled, sitting back down. If he’d been someone else, I definitely would’ve told him to get bent and find someone else to wait on him. “Go ahead and cut those.”

His eyes dipped before he turned the deck over and fanned out the cards, looking at the pictures. A small crease formed between his brows, but he didn’t comment. The cards slid against each other as he shuffled, not nearly as practiced as me.

“Sure. Shuffle, if you want,” I muttered. “Have you done this before?”

“What do you mean by this? Visit a horror show intent on displaying the worst of our magical society and beasts that could not choose their fate?” He paused for a beat. “Yes. I’ve torn a great many of these things down. This one, however, wasn’t on my radar. It isn’t very large compared to some I have seen. It didn’t seem of pressing importance. I’d had no idea that magical slaves and imprisoned beasts were the preferred fare, however. Thank you for bringing it to my attention.”

“Me?” I flinched back so hard that my chair went up on two legs. That was all I needed—the people in this fair thinking I was the tattletale who’d fucked them out of a job. “Whatever enlightenment you’ve found has nothing to do with me.”

“He followed you here.” Mordecai spoke in a level voice, but I could hear the wariness coating each word. “He came because of you.”

“Oftentimes, the answer to a question can be gleaned by seeking out more information,” the stranger said. “Only, in your case, the puzzle keeps getting more intricate.”

“I have no idea who he is talking about right now, because Alexis is, literally, the most boring adult I’ve ever met,” Daisy said to Mordecai. “Except for her weekly jaunts to the bar, she has, quite literally, no life.”

“You’ve reached your quota on using the word ‘literally,’” I said dryly. “And we can still hear you.”

I didn’t think I needed to remind her of the kind of adults she’d known prior to meeting me. It was what had landed her with me in the first place.

“Or did you mean,” the stranger said, ignoring our family squabbles, “have I paid for the services of a Ghost Whisperer before in order to speak to those beyond?” He paused again. “No, I have not. Because they wouldn’t take my money for services rendered.”

“No offense, sir, but we’ll be taking your money,” Daisy said. “Ow! Keep it up, Mordie, or you’ll end up like Boromir.”

“Or do you mean—”

“I didn’t realize there were so many layers to such a simple question,” I said.

“—have I ever sat in a fold-out chair struggling to take my weight, in front of a rickety TV tray covered in a stained rug, across from a beautifully entrancing woman who is attempting to be a Ghost Whisperer, while two teenagers organize and practically run the business, with a crowd of onlookers at my back?”

“He called her beautifully entrancing,” Daisy whispered. “I think I just fell in love a little.”

“He’s been stalking her, without invitation, for days, and he won’t disclose his employment or any personal information,” Mordecai replied. “He’s someone we should call the police on.”

They both had a point, as usual.

“No, I have not,” the stranger said, still (somehow) ignoring the pubescent peanut gallery a few feet away.

“Okay. So you have seen someone who talks to spirits,” I said. Best to get the show on the road.

“Yes, I have,” he answered. “They were not able to answer my question.”