The Yezer on the man’s shoulder gave Megan a cheery wave. Beside her Maleficarum snorted.

“I—I’m Matt. I’ve been gambling. I can’t stop.” Tears thickened the man’s voice; his pain reached out to lick at Megan’s hands. She’d been torn between laughter and calling the police herself. Now the first emotion disappeared, washed away by a red tidal wave of fury. How dare this man take advantage of these people, how dare he damage them—

“You haven’t been gambling. The demon has been gambling. What did he make you do, Matt?”

“I bet on horses. On sports. On how many seconds before a light turns green, on which elevator will come first, I play cards . . .”

“That’s not you doing it, Matt. It’s that beast inside you. It is the evil being which has attached itself to you and wants to send your soul straight to Hell!”

Several audience members gasped; Walther had, as he shouted the last few words, made a sweeping motion with his arm, his finger pointed as if he was condemning the entire room along with poor Matt. Which maybe he was, for all she knew.

Probably not, though. The Yezer on Matt’s shoulder and the one at his feet appeared totally unconcerned. One of them was picking at his toes, the other scratching behind his ear.

Matt began crying in earnest. “Help me. Please help me.”

This was appalling. This wasn’t healthy. Megan itched to run over to Matt and pick him up off the floor, to give him her card and the number of the local Gamblers Anonymous chapter.

“I can’t help you. You can’t help you.” Walther was really warming up now; sweat ran down his cheeks. “Only Jesus can save you. Only God can cast out that gambling demon and give you back your soul.”

“I lost everything. I took out a second mortgage on my house and gambled all the money away. I can’t do this anymore . . .”

Walther placed his hand on Matt’s head. “I’m speaking now to the demon trying to steal Matt’s body. It’s Reverend Bill Walther, you unclean beast. Show yourself! In the name of God, identify yourself! I command it!”

Beside Megan, Maleficarum’s big body shook with laughter. Roc had completely given up attempting to be silent; nobody but herself and the demons could hear him anyway. Same with the rest of her Yezer. Those bothering to pay attention were rolling on the floor, or lying flat on the pads of air above their humans’ shoulders, their shrieks of shrill laughter forming a background like demonic church bells pealing over the shouting of the reverend.

Even Matt’s scream didn’t drown them out. Sweat beaded Megan’s own head too. The screaming and Walther’s yelling and the demons’ laughing made her a little dizzy; the realization that Walther had essentially put Matt into some kind of trance, watching Matt’s face transform as his already battered psyche struggled to give Walther what he wanted, to create a demon for him, nauseated her. She swallowed hard.

“I am Azazael,” Matt shrieked, in the manner of a Monty Python character. “You can’t have this man back!”

Maleficarum hooted. Megan glanced over and found Spud and Malleus hanging on each other, their blunt-featured faces red with suppressed laughter. On her other side Greyson and Nick were biting their lips and staring at the ceiling; Carter just looked bored and annoyed.

Greyson caught her looking. His lips brushed her ear. “Azazael was a major player in Hell. The chances of him hanging around in this moron’s body in order to put twenty bucks on USC are pretty slim, don’t you think?”

“I never know what a man will do in order to bet on football,” she responded automatically.

Greyson’s hand slid down to her behind and stayed there. “Some of us have other interests as well.”

“Really? I never would have guessed.” But she let him keep his hand there—they were against the wall, and nobody could see anyway—and flashed him a quick smile.

“Be gone, demon! In the name of Jesus, be gone! I command you to leave this man alone!” Walther’s right hand flew into the air, pointing at the ceiling. For a moment he looked terrifyingly like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. Megan wondered if the Bee Gees were going to start playing in the background.

Yes, perhaps she was being flippant. She couldn’t help it. At least she wasn’t behaving like the brothers. Fat tears rolled down their cheeks; they looked on the verge of stroking out.

Matt screamed again. Megan caught a glimpse of his face—talk about someone having a stroke—and wanted to slap herself for forgetting, even for a second, what was actually happening and why they were there. That man’s already fragile emotional health was being further compromised; who knew where this could lead, what kind of trauma he was experiencing, whether this demon persona his fevered and desperate subconscious was creating would stick around after the so-called exorcism?

“You are gone! Be gone, foul thing!”

Matt collapsed.

Unfortunately, so did Maleficarum. He huddled on the floor next to Megan, shaking with laughter. That was bad enough. What was even worse was that the movement caught Walther’s attention. He stormed up the aisle—he reeked of Hai Karate, sweat, and psychotic—grabbed Maleficarum by the hand, and tugged.

Chapter 16

“No, you can’t—” she started, but Maleficarum was already pulling away from Walther’s hand.

“This man needs my help,” Walther informed her. “God has ordered me to help him.”

“Don’t be scared, brother!” someone shouted. “You can be saved!”

Maleficarum gave Greyson a helpless look. Megan knew exactly what Greyson was thinking, at least. To leave at this point, before they’d seen anything unusual—or, rather, anything that went beyond the special superdeluxe crazy and into the sort of supernatural crazy that had characterized the night before—would mean this had been a wasted visit, and they couldn’t afford to waste any time. She was acutely aware that somewhere out there someone was scheming to kill her, and she knew Greyson was too.

On the other hand, the thought of Maleficarum being subjected to such a thing mortified her. How the hell would he fake his way through that?

Of course, she, Greyson, and their friends seemed to be the only ones in the room who failed to see what a fantastic idea it was to let Maleficarum be exorcised. Malleus and Spud made incoherent mewling noises, they were laughing so hard. Roc had fallen to the floor with Maleficarum and stayed there. The laughter of the Yezer had increased to the point where Megan started fantasizing about the quiet and peace found in textile mills.

“What is your name? Why have you come to me today?”

Maleficarum shot Greyson a terrified glance. “I . . . I dunno.”

“Don’t be shy, brother! God knows everything. He sees into your heart.”

Maleficarum looked down at his chest, then back up. Megan’s lips twitched. No, this wasn’t funny. It was not funny. She had a duty not to laugh; she was a psychiatric counselor, for fuck’s sake, she could not start finding this horror show funny.

“Think maybe I oughter go.” Maleficarum tried to turn away, but Walther grabbed him.

“That’s the demon, the evil beast possessing you, speaking. It wants you to leave, it wants you to—”

“Aieeeeee!”

Megan jumped. She’d had no idea Maleficarum was capable of such a scream. Apparently he’d decided the best way to get out of being exorcised was to imitate Matt; his panicked glances at her and Greyson, the trapped look in his beady eyes, spoke of the kind of desperation that led animals to chew off their own legs.

Walther looked almost as shocked as the others, but then Megan saw his eyes. The flash of confusion left them, replaced by calculation, replaced by fervor. He was a true believer, all right; she knew that. But in that second she saw the showman, saw him realize that Maleficarum was faking and decide to continue anyway.