“Hush,” Raphael said quietly. “No one’s upset with you.”

Dick/Devon looked enormously relieved, then broke out into a goofy smile. “My name is Dick,” he said with renewed confidence.

Thinking of those gunshot wounds to his head made me think of how impossible what I’d witnessed had been. Those wounds would have killed any normal demon host. And then I remembered the bits and pieces of information Raphael had reluctantly coughed up about the Houston project’s goals. Goals like accelerated healing.

My stomach gave an unhappy lurch, but luckily I had nothing left in it or I’d have been puking in the bushes again.

Dick was one of the Houston superhosts, and if this was his real personality we were seeing right now, he must have been possessed for a long time. Certainly throughout the course of his marriage. But it made no sense! It couldn’t be a coincidence that two Houston superhosts ended up living in the same house. And if Dick/Devon was a superhost, then what the hell was he doing living the life of the idle rich?

I turned to glare at Raphael. He was trying to act as baffled as I felt, but he looked too nervous to pull it off.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked him.

“I want to go home,” Dick said plaintively.

But how could we take him back to Claudia and the girls like this?

“We’ll take you home,” Raphael promised, “but we have some things to take care of first.”

“Yeah, like you telling me—” I began, but of course he cut me off.

“I’ll explain later. Right now, let’s figure out what to tell Claudia and get out of here.”

“We can’t take him home to Claudia like this!” I insisted.

Raphael grimaced. “That’s not what he means by ‘home,’” he said cryptically. “I promise I’ll explain, but right now we have to get back.”

I wanted the full explanation now. But Claudia was probably still terrified that the demons were going to come for her children again. I couldn’t leave her like that while I satisfied my need for answers. “All right,” I agreed reluctantly. “But what are we going to tell her?”

Biting my tongue until I could have some quality alone-time with Raphael was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. Especially when I felt like I had three cases of flu all at the same time.

I let Raphael do all the talking when we got back to the Brewster place. He was, after all, a consummate liar. He told Claudia that her husband had been possessed, and that he’d attacked me and then run off when Raphael had come to my rescue. Naturally, Claudia was devastated, and I would have felt sorry for her if I weren’t so busy feeling sorry for myself. Dick—who’d shown no indication that he thought of Claudia’s house as his home—lay on the backseat of Tommy’s car, keeping out of sight, while we tied up loose ends. I’d have been worried about him running off, if it weren’t for his childlike—and guiltinducing—faith that Raphael and I would help him get home.

Deciding to pin the three dead bodies all on Brewster’s demon, Raphael called Adam and asked him to come “investigate.” He and I and the mysterious “Dick” headed out of there before Adam arrived. Sometimes, it’s useful to have the Director of Special Forces in your pocket when you’re constantly finding yourself at crime scenes.

When we were a few miles from the house, Dick sat up in the backseat. “Will you take me home now?”he asked, and there was a lost, forlorn sound to his voice. Clearly, his elevator didn’t go all the way to the top floor, and I wondered what we were going to do with him.

“Not quite yet,” Raphael said. “It’s late right now. We’ll get you on your way in the morning.” I started to say something indignant, but Raphael cut me off before I got started. “We’ll talk later,” he said, with emphasis on the word “later.” He gave me a significant look, and I understood the message: not in front of our passenger.

I didn’t like it, but again I held my tongue. “So where are we going?” I asked instead, slumping down in my seat and hoping I wasn’t about to be sick again as my stomach heaved. I was sweating and shivering at the same time.

“To Adam’s house,” Raphael answered. “Dominic’s expecting us. They have a guest room where they can keep our friend for the night.”

I turned in my seat to look at Dick, then regretted the motion when my head started throbbing even harder. He was staring straight ahead, his gaze unfocused, almost vacant. I wondered if he had brothers named Tom and Harry. I imagined some demons would have found that funny.

Obviously, Dick was a product of Raphael and Dougal’s eugenics program, and obviously they’d made much more progress than Raphael had ever admitted. And since they considered intelligence a drawback in a potential host, I guess they must have been happy indeed with Dick. I bet he’d never set foot outside the laboratory until some demon had decided to make use out of him.

I wished letting Lugh take control again wouldn’t make me even sicker. Because when I got Raphael alone in a room, I’d love to have enough strength to beat the shit out of him.

We arrived at Adam and Dom’s place, and we installed Dick in the guest room. The same guest room I’d stayed in a couple of times—you know, the one with the locks? I didn’t think Dick was going to try to go anywhere, but I had to agree that keeping him locked in was a necessary precaution.

Afterward, we all went downstairs to the kitchen, and Dominic made a pot of extra-strong Italian coffee. It smelled heavenly, but my stomach still felt awful, and I didn’t dare drink any.

Dominic wanted us to wait for Adam before I began my interrogation of Raphael, but I didn’t have that kind of patience. Besides, I’d waited long enough.

“It’s time to start spilling the secrets,” I told Raphael. “Now!” He was actually uncomfortable enough to squirm, and that raised my paranoia level even higher. “What the hell is Dick? How could he heal a bullet wound to the head in ten seconds? And is Tommy the same?”

Raphael squirmed some more, then took a big sip of his coffee before straightening up in his seat and raising his head to meet my gaze.

“I suppose a demonstration will explain things a little better than words,” he said. He took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. Then suddenly, there was a loud cracking sound, and Raphael let out a cry of pain.

I was on my feet before I knew it, hand grabbing for my Taser, eyes scanning the kitchen for enemies. But it was just me and Dominic and Raphael.

I opened my mouth to ask Raphael what was wrong, but the words died in my throat when I got a good look at him. My knees gave way and my ass thumped down hard on the chair.

Tommy Brewster was attractive enough in a bland sort of way, if you could get past the sullen expressions that seemed natural on his face whether he was possessed or not. His least attractive feature was his nose, which was a little too large for his face and hooked a bit at the end.

But as I watched, I heard more popping and cracking noises, and that hooked beak of his started to flatten out. Raphael was gripping the table with both hands, sweat dewing his skin as his eyes squinched shut and his teeth clenched.

It took maybe thirty seconds, but by the time Raphael let out a sigh of relief and relaxed, Tommy’s nose was straight and perfectly proportioned to his face.

“Shit,” Raphael said, wiping the sweat from his face, “that hurt like hell.”

Dominic and I looked at one another, and I’m sure my face looked as confused and alarmed as his. Neither one of us spoke. For once in my life, I couldn’t think of anything to say.

Raphael, still panting a bit from pain and effort, stared ahead at nothing as he spoke. “I told you the Houston project was working at making hosts with more malleable flesh. You saw the evidence of how much progress they’ve made tonight. I’d say Dick up there is from the same generation as Tommy.”