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shadow of a warm smile touched his cold lips. “Now, these little fellows are really something… ugly as sin when born, no breath or heartbeat, but it runs around like the very dickens for the first seven years or so. Then it becomes increasingly difficult to differentiate one from a human. A cambion eventually becomes devilishly cunning with the face of an angel. Persuasive too. Can talk a saint into dropping his drawers on Sunday and a nun to give up her habit.”
    “So what the hell am I supposed to do?” Keenan’s senses turned to melting marshmallows the more Reggie talked.
    “Haven’t the foggiest.”
    “Great.” A cold breeze snuck in between Keenan’s legs, shrinking his already shriveled privates. He smashed his knees together and adjusted his coat. “Why didn’t you guys warn me? Where the hell did you all go?”
    “Ghosts are not omnipotent, you know. They are human,” Reggie said, lifting his chin. “There are certain spirits that scare even the dead. Ghosts usually flit away before anyone can say, ‘Bob’s your uncle.’ Not me, of course,” he added, clearing his throat. “I wasn’t even there at the time. Checking the twins out again, you know.”
    Anger was beating the hell out of Keenan’s better judgment and the earlier warmth was turning into a deep chill. He wasn’t sure which feeling was making his knees shake when he leaned across the table.
    “So what do we do about it?” he whispered.
    Reggie inspected the nails of his right hand. “Dashed if I know. Let her do it again and see how it goes?” he asked hopefully.
    “Fuck you.”
    Reggie smiled and rose to his ethereal feet. “Sorry I can’t be more help, old cocker, but I have to hurry off to a previous engagement.” A pair of gloves appeared out of the air that Reggie slipped onto his hands in a blink. Tucking a walking stick under his arm, he tipped his head to Keenan. “I know I’m coming across all mouth and no trousers, but I wouldn’t worry about it any. It’s probably an isolated incident, never happen again. You survived. That should bring you some comfort.”
    Keenan scowled up at the apparition as he drifted past the table. “What the hell does that mean?”
    Reggie stopped and regarded Keenan over his shoulder. “A succubus can kill you, old buck…and usually does after a while. I think you…how do you Americans say it… dodged a bullet?”
    Without another word, Reggie disappeared, leaving Keenan to contemplate his mortality.

 
     
     
     
    Chapter Four
The Spirit Is Willing…The Flash Is Weak
     
    One blustering night years before, Keenan found himself lost in the Oltrarno district of Florence, Italy. Flanked by towering cement buildings on both sides and a narrow cobbled road under his feet, try as he might, he could not seem to find his way out of the ancient maze. Finally, being young, bold, and relatively ignorant, he stumbled into a smoky tavern.
    He knew at once that this was probably a local hang out. Dark, angry men, some old, some young, glared at him when he came through the door, dripping rainwater onto a stone floor that bowed in the middle where hundreds of years of footsteps had worn it away. Keenan adjusted the portfolio tucked under his cloak when an old woman approached and led him to a table without saying a word.
    She set a mug in front of him and filled it with Chianti, grabbed a bowl from a nearby sideboard, wiped it out with her apron, and then filled it from the pot sitting over an open flame. Keenan liked ribollita, a bean stew common to the area, and imagined the place only served one dish per day. The woman held out her hand in the universal gesture of “pay me” and Keenan fished some coins from his pocket to give to her. She counted the coins with a huff, then grabbed a rough loaf of black bread from the same sideboard, plopped it onto the table to accompany the stew, and then scuttled off into some hidden recess of the tavern.
    Keenan ate as he watched the patrons