Children of the Sea 01 - Sea Witch

garbage— grease and beer and cigarettes, spoiled meat and rotting vegetables—trickled down the alley, covering the fresh scent of the sea like an oil slick.
     
    “Came to see if Maggie was all right,” Bart muttered.
     
    Caleb shook his head in disbelief. “So you decided to skulk outside until you caught her taking out the trash.”
     
    “Saw him ,” Bart explained. “Stopped.”
     
    “Saw who?” Caleb asked sharply. “Where?”
     
    His father jerked his head in reply. There .
     
    In the narrow space between the store fronts, sheltered from the wind and shielded from the gulls, a man huddled among the clumps of weeds and sodden paper cups like one of Portland’s homeless.
     
    Caleb inhaled sharply. Dead or alive?
     
    Something about that long, angular figure . . . “Whittaker? ”
     
    Behind him, the birds circled and cawed. Cries of warning? Or calls of distress?
     
    The figure raised its head from its chest. Even in the shadows, his face was very pale. His eyes burned feverishly in their sockets. Caleb fought a shiver.
     
    “Man’s hurt,” Bart said. “Needs help.”
     
    Maybe .
     
    He didn’t appear injured. There was no sign of blood— his blood or another’s—on his khaki pants and button-down shirt.
     
    “Mr. Whittaker, can you hear me?”
     
    243
    The lawyer’s face twisted. “Of course I hear you,” he said in his usual pissy tones. “I’m sick, not deaf.”
     
    Caleb released his breath. He had to get a grip. Not everybody he encountered was auditioning for a starring role in The Exorcist . “Can you stand?”
     
    “I’m not drunk either,” Whittaker said. He got awkwardly to his feet, using the stone wall behind him for support. Just for one second, he staggered. His gaze sought Caleb’s. “Help me,” he whispered.
     
    The hair rose along Caleb’s arms and on the back of his neck. “What do you want?”
     
    How much had he heard?
     
    Whittaker blinked rapidly. “Well, for starters, you can help me to your car. I need a ride home.”
     
    Caleb assessed the situation. This was his chance to get another look inside Whittaker’s house. All he had to do was give a lift to a man who might be possessed by a soul-sucking, flesh-shredding demon.
     
    Not a problem. He had ridden with murderers in the back of his squad car before. He’d dealt with other evil that wore a human face. He had even lived through the desert hell of Iraq.
     
    Keeping Whittaker in his peripheral vision, he walked around him to the curb and unlocked the Jeep.
     
    Whittaker balked at getting into the backseat. “I’m not a criminal.”
     
    “Passengers ride in back,” Caleb said. “Department policy. ”
     
    “You could make an exception.”
     
    “He didn’t for me,” Bart contributed unexpectedly.
     
    Caleb hooked his thumbs in his pockets. “You want a ride or not?”
     
    Whittaker grumbled and got in.
     
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    Caleb shut the passenger door with relief. Demon or not, he didn’t think the lawyer was going to claw his way through the metal grid between the seats.
     
    Anyway, Caleb was armed. Whittaker wasn’t.
     
    He was trained in combat. Whittaker wasn’t.
     
    He was prepared—hell, he was spoiling for a fight. And Whittaker, poor SOB, probably had no idea and no defenses against the thing that had taken him over.
     
    If the lawyer had been taken over.
     
    Caleb got behind the wheel, keeping an eye on the rearview mirror.
    Whittaker slumped in the back seat, too weak even to sit up. His father loomed on the curb like a chain saw-carved totem of a man. They looked sick, stiff, unnatural.
     
    But still human.
     
    Caleb glanced down as he turned his key in the ignition. Maybe he was wrong about Whittaker.
     
    And maybe, he thought grimly, he was making the biggest mistake of his life.
     
    Tan’s gaze drilled a hole through the human’s thick skull. How he would love to take this one over. Tan wouldn’t ride in the back then. Oh, no. He could do . . . He smiled slowly. Whatever he wanted.
     
    Opening his mouth, he breathed in the human’s mingled scent of sweat and spirit. Tasting. Testing.
     
    The man’s will burned like copper on Tan’s tongue, flat and bright as an angel’s blade.
     
    Tan pinched his lips together.
     
    Perhaps he would not exchange bodies just yet. His current host was still useful. Compliant. Tan did not want to expend energy establishing mastery over a rebellious host with his mission still only half