Street Magic

been on a kick for the Anti-Nowhere League and I play them loudly."
    "Love them," Pete shot back. Jack grimaced.
    "You're bloody mad to pick me out of all the possible sofas you could sleep on, Caldecott. I mean—"
    "I've accepted that, Jack. Nowhere I'd rather be."
    He sighed and stepped away from the door, pulling it wide. "Then you're welcome, is what I was going to say if you'd let me finish."
    Pete grinned at him, and he finally grinned back, shaking his head. "You mean it?" she asked. Jack nodded once.
    "I mean it. Come in."

----

    Read on for a preview of
    Demon Bound

By Caitlin Kittredge
    Coming from St. Martin's Paperbacks in December 2009

    Jack Winter has a problem. Thirteen years ago, as he lay dying on the floor of a tomb in Highgate Cemetery, Jack called up a demon and bartered his soul for his life. Now the debt has come due, and the demon has appeared to take Jack to Hell. Trouble is, Jack has finally found a reason to live. Her name is Pete Caldecott.
    Pete saved Jack from himself—she got him clean, helped him control his psychic sight, and with her help, he's making a living cleansing ghosts and minor supernatural annoyances in the greater London area. Pete doesn't know about Jack's bargain, but she knows that something is wrong. Something vast and terrible is moving out of the supernatural realm of the Black. A magical cataclysm, and she won't be able to stop it without Jack's help…

----

    Part One

    Clockwork
    Listen to the army march across my coffin lid Fire in the east and sunrise in the west I'm just a dead man, walking with the rest.
    —The Poor Dead Bastards,
"Dead Man Marching"

    A crow sat on the dead branch of the dead tree that watched over two gravestones in the corner of Brompton Cemetery. It watched Jack Winter with its black eyes like beads, and he watched the crow in turn, with eyes that most people called ice, but that he simply called blue.
    Jack drew a Parliament out of the air and touched his finger to the tip. He sucked a lungful of smoke and blew it at the crow, which flapped its wings and snapped its beak in irritation. "Fuck off, then," Jack told it. "Not like I want you hanging about."
    "Leave that beast alone," said his companion. "If the map I got from Tourist Information is right, the graves should be around here, very close." Her circular ramble through the graves came to a stop next to Jack. "Oh."
    "Mary and Stuart Poole," Jack said, flicking the end of his fag at Mary's headstone. "Who says the gods don't have the occasional bout of humor?"
    Pete Caldecott gave Jack what he'd describe as a dirty look, and not in the manner that led to being naked and sweaty. She strode over and picked up his litter, shoving it into her coat pocket. "You're a bloody child, you know that? Emotionally twelve."
    "I've been accused of worse," Jack said. He felt in the inside pocket of his motorbike jacket for another Parliament, but thought better of it when Pete put a hand on her hip.
    "We've a job to do, and if we don't do it, we don't get paid, so are you going to stand there all day with your thumb in your arse or are you going to get to work?"
    Pete was, at the first look, nothing to write your mum about, but Jack knew better. Shorter than he by a head, big green eyes straight from the Emerald Isle, Snow White in torn denim and an army-green jacket. Lips plump like rubyfruit, a body that a bloke could spend hours on and still feel like he was starving for it.
    But right now, she was glaring at him, tapping her foot on the dead grass over the Pooles' final rest. Jack picked up the black canvas tote they'd brought along and crouched between the headstones. Out of a host of attributes, the one Pete used with greatest efficiency was her temper, and besides, she was right—they did have a job.
    "Stupid bloody job, just like I said when you took it," Jack told her. Pete folded her arms.
    "I spent near a decade of my life pushing paper around a desk at New Scotland Yard, so once you've dealt with expense reports and a DCI who thinks that equipment that works is a luxury, not a necessity, you can jabber on about stupid jobs."
    Jack grimaced. "This is
my
talent, Pete, and I'm not a party trick. This is… well… frankly, luv, it's demeaning."
    Pete pointed down at the grave. "Get to work, Winter. Before I lay you a smack in the head."
    Jack heaved a sigh and unzipped the satchel, pulling out his spirit heart. The clockwork contraption, about the size of a melon, round, and made of