He was now eyeing me as if I were drooling and cross-eyed. I wiped the swollen side of my mouth just in case.

“No.” Then he thought about it. “But there was a young blond girl who died at the scene about a month ago. I gave her CPR, but we were too late. That was tough.”

“I bet. I’m sorry, too.”

The girl sighed. “Isn’t he the greatest?”

I snorted.

“What?” he asked.

“Oh, nothing. I just think that would be really hard.”

“Look, bitch.”

I concentrated with every fiber of my being not to let my eyes widen in reaction. It just looks odd to the living when you react to something they can’t see or hear. I eased around to the girl, pretending to take a special interest in the scenery behind us, and raised my brows in question.

“You can’t have him, okay,” she said from behind the wire barrier.

“Mm-hmm,” I whispered.

Officer Taft looked at me.

“This is certainly a beautiful neighborhood.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“I will scratch those eyes out of your ugly head.”

Ugly? That was it. Time to play cell phone. “Oh,” I said, digging through my bag. “I think my phone vibrated.” I flipped it open. “Hello?”

“I’d cut back on the glitter makeup if I were you. It’s not helping.”

“I don’t wear glitter—”

“And you’d best quit looking at him. He deserves someone much prettier.”

“Look, sweetheart,” I said, easing around to admire the scenery behind us again, hoping I didn’t look like I was talking to a dead person in the backseat and just pretending to talk on the phone. “I have my own impossible relationship with a guy I can’t really have. Comprende?”

She jammed her fists onto her pajama-clad h*ps and glared at me. “I’m just saying, bitch.”

“Would you stop calling me that, you little…”

I noticed Officer Taft’s brows slide together in concern.

“Relationships,” I said with a shrug. Of course, the cell phone trick worked best in silent mode. As I pretended to explain to my third party that sometimes there is a really bright light nearby and she should go into it, my phone rang out in Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, which meant Uncle Bob was calling. I almost dropped the phone, then smiled at Taft. “My previous call must have been disconnected.” I dared not comment on the fact that it had supposedly been on vibrate mere seconds ago.

The poltergeist in the backseat howled out an evil laugh. Where the hell did this kid come from? Then it hit me. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe she was actually from hell.

“Hell-o,” I said.

“You just want me to go into the light so you can make your move,” Demon Child said.

“That’s not what I want!”

“Okay,” Uncle Bob replied, a wary hesitance in his voice. “No more ‘hey, kiddos’ for you.”

“Sorry, Uncle Bob, I thought you were someone else.”

“I’m often mistaken for Tom Selleck.”

Taft perked up. “Does your uncle need anything? A coffee? A latte?”

Sucking up was so unmanly. “He needs someone to bear his illegitimate child if you’re interested.”

Taft’s mouth thinned into a solid line as he turned back to the road.

Okay, I admit it. That was rude. The demon in the backseat thought so, too. She took a swing at me.

I laughed when I dodged her fist by accidently-on-purpose dropping my cherry lip balm to the floorboard.

“I’ll take that as a can-do,” Uncle Bob said.

“Oh, right. My office, nine o’clock. Got it. I’m just going to run by my apartment and grab a bite, then I’ll be there.”

“Thanks, kiddo. And, are you okay?”

“Me? Always,” I said, just as the golden-haired demon dive-bombed for my eyes. She fell out of the car somewhere between Carlisle and San Mateo. “But I have to say, Uncle Bob, I’ve recently uncovered irrefutable evidence of why some species eat their young.”

Chapter Four

I love children, but I don’t think I can eat a whole one.

—BUMPER STICKER

I was worried Demon Child would follow me to my apartment and get her freak on, so I made sure she was nowhere in sight before I climbed into Misery and hightailed it home. Just in case, though, I stormed into my apartment, tossed a quick hello to Mr. Wong, then rummaged through my entertainment center to lay out all my exorcism equipment. I kept it in my entertainment center because exorcisms were nothing if not entertaining.

And, no, I can’t actually perform one, even with my auspicious status as the grim reaper. I can only help the departed figure out why they’re still on Earth, then lure them across planes afterwards. I can’t force them to go against their will. At least I don’t think I can. I’ve never actually tried. I can, however, trick them. A few candles, a quick chant, and—voilà—exorcism du jour. The departed fall for it all the time and end up crossing despite themselves. Except Mr. Habersham down the hall. He just giggled when I tried to exorcise him. Old fart.

Despite Mr. Habersham—and, come to think of it, Mr. Wong—I loved living here. Not only does my apartment building, the Causeway, sit right behind my dad’s bar and, thus, my office, it’s also something of a local landmark.

I’ve lived here a little over three years, but when I was young—too young to know that evil existed—this old building became fused into my memory, through no fault of its own. Later, when my dad bought the bar, I stepped into the back parking lot and saw the building again for the first time in over a decade. Looking up at the intricate medieval carvings along the entrance, a rarity in Albuquerque, I stood transfixed as a montage of memories, dark and painful, rushed through me. They made my chest hurt and stole my breath, and I became obsessed with the building from that moment on.