by S. K. Falls
I leaned against the side of the building and breathed deeply. The fragrance of wet grass and the icy smell of winter curled into my nostrils. The woods were still quiet across the road, and I figured Shuck was still on duty.
The door jingled as someone came out, but I didn't bother looking. Probably just some drunken reveler ready to go home.
"Hey."
I looked toward James and smiled wanly. Oh, great. He was going to talk about my dad some more. And I didn't have a cigarette.
Embarrassed at being caught in my lie, I blushed. "Um, couldn't find a cigarette," I said, patting down my pants. "Must've left them at—"
He came closer, towering over me. Now that I was getting used to Dax's smoldering heat, James felt strangely cool by comparison, even in the chill of the night.
"Cara," he said softly. "I didn't mean to upset you."
I sighed and looked away, back toward the woods. "It's fine," I muttered. "It's not you."
"I wondered after you left, you know," he continued. "If that was why you were so stubborn about getting gone."
I didn’t say anything.
A moment later, James spoke again. "Two years ago, there was a pretty big wildfire out on the Blue Ridge mountains." He gestured with his chin toward the range in the distance. "We got called out, like all the departments in nearby cities. There were three casualties." He stopped and cleared his throat, his eyes still locked on the misty swirls that covered the peaks in the distance. "One was from our department. My cousin Roger.
“The day after his funeral, I came home, packed all my stuff into my truck, and took off. I didn't know where I was going or what I was going to do when I got there. I just knew I didn't want to live in Eden anymore. All of a sudden, I was sick of it. Sick of the mountains, the woods, the damn fires we have every year ‘cause tourists who don't know their ass from a hole in the ground leave smoldering campfires."
I rubbed my nose. It was ice cold and numb. "Wow. What...how come you came back?"
"I lived out of my truck for a couple of days and then my chief called, asking where the hell I was. Another fire, a smaller one, had broken out. So I came back."
I smiled a little. "Just like that?"
He chuckled. "It sounds 'just like that,' but it was actually a life changing thing. I realized that I could blame myself and hate everyone and hate the job and the city, but when it came right down to it, I needed to be here. I had a job to do. I had a service to provide. And Roger would've wanted me to, no matter what. He'd hate to be the reason I quit." He looked at me, his face serious. "I think your daddy, wherever he is, is probably happy that you're back. That he's not the reason you quit Eden."
I shook my head and pushed off the wall. "He wasn't the reason I left. I left to get away from myself."
"Did it work?"
I sighed and shook my head.
"Yeah. It's like they say, you know. Wherever you go, there you are."
I laughed softly. "That's definitely true."
I turned so I could face James. I didn't remember saying more than a sentence here or there to him in high school or before. To be honest, I'd never really given him much thought. It was crazy how friendship could develop years after you'd known a person. It was as if your brain was waiting for you both to mature, for your personalities to line up before it really made the effort to get to know them. "Thanks."
He shrugged. "Sure." There was something serious about his face, and I tensed. I knew that look. "So, are you...seeing anybody?"
Yep, that was what I'd been afraid of.
Dax’s gorgeous face popped into my mind. I thought about what he’d told me about betrothal, how insistent he was that he was bad for me. How he said he loved me. That electric charge. How I'd tried to kiss him and he'd pulled away. The lump was back in my throat at the memory of the rejection.
"Sort of," I whispered. "It's complicated. I want to, but he..."
I trailed off, unable to explain the situation. I didn't know what Dax wanted. I didn't know how it was for demons, what love meant to them.
James's face fell, but he recovered quickly. "Well, if you decide he's not worth it, just know there's someone waiting for you." He smiled, but I could see the pain behind it.
My heart hurt for him. I wanted to be friends without any of that other complicated stuff.
"Can I give you a hug?" The question blurted out of me. James had struck a chord. He was just one of the world's genuinely nice people, and I cared about his feelings.
His smile widened. "Of course." He stepped forward and bent down so I could wrap my arms around his neck. Even with heels on, it was a reach. When I stepped back, he smoothed a curl off my forehead, his fingers lingering on my skin a moment longer than necessary.
"I better go," I said, feeling myself flush. Had hugging him given him the wrong impression? Dammit, I was totally screwing this up. "I have an early morning tomorrow."
"Okay," he said. "Do you want me to walk you home?"
"No, that's all right," I said. "I'm just going to take a shortcut through the woods."
"If you're sure," he said, crestfallen again. "See you soon."
"Definitely." I smiled. "Here." I handed him my new cell phone. "Put your cell number in there. I'll call you."
He brightened as if I'd given him the best birthday and Christmas presents combined.
I made my way through the woods. It was eerie, not hearing anything except the pressing silence, like I had cotton batting against my eardrums. My heart pounded hard and loud, my body uncomfortable with the eerie quiet.
I glanced around over and over again, hoping to catch a glimpse of Shuck so I could wave or tell him to come so I could pet him...if that was the sort of thing you could do with a Hellhound. In any case, he kept his distance, so I pulled my jacket close and walked through the rolling mist.
Eden really was beautiful. The Spanish moss that hung low from the tree branches, glistening with dew, the thick roots of trees sprouting up through the ground, twisting and tangling together in a lover's dance. It was—
My breath whooshed out of my lungs in one swift exhalation. I didn't have time to scream. I didn't even really have time to think.
One moment my feet were firmly on the ground, and the next I was traveling vertically up through the air, up into the thick branches of the tall oak tree, someone's steel trap arm around my waist, scalding skin seeping its heat through my jacket and the top underneath.
Marion.
It had to be. He'd found me and now I was his. No one would even hear me scream way out here.
A moment later, I was standing on a thick branch twenty feet off the ground, my back pressed into a tree trunk three times as wide as me. I found myself looking into a beautiful demonic face, but it wasn't Marion's. It was Dax's features I was drinking in.
His copper eyes burned into mine, shining in the moonlight. The heat wafting off of him turned my muscles to liquid. He had a smile on his face—half-mischievous and half-smirk—possibly at my incredible mortal slowness. I hadn't even been able to react in the time it had taken him to snatch me and spirit me up the tree.
He leaned in toward me, so close our noses were almost touching. His wood smoke scent intoxicated me, and without even thinking about it, I breathed him in. His smile widened.
"Surprised?" he asked, his voice a deep, throaty rumble that made something in my belly ignite.
"What...what?" I wasn't able to manage any more than that, with the proximity of his skin to mine.
He wore a dark button down shirt and jeans that rode low on his hips, his golden skin flushed with pleasure. His eyes held mine steadily and constantly without any qualms, not at all like humans who had to look away every four seconds during a conversation. But Dax didn't follow any such norms. He stared at me like he wanted to devour me. And I liked it.
"I’m kidnapping you," he whispered, his breath sweet and tantalizing. His pupils dilated as he said the words, his scorching hands running up and down my arms. My
skin, through layers of fabric, seemed to blaze as if it were on fire.
I struggled to maintain a semblance of rational thinking but my hormones were taking over, that incredible electric attraction between us incinerating any resolve I had to not show just how badly I wanted him. I leaned in farther, pressing my body against his.
The heat was overpowering. It felt like stepping into a sauna, or too close to a bonfire. In the chilly night, it was the most delicious pleasure. "Why?" I asked finally, making sure to inject some pique into the question. I knew stepping back just a touch would make my point much better than my body pressed up against his, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. My need for him was physical, mental, spiritual. "At my mom's house, you didn't seem to..." I trailed off, blinking and looking away as his hands stilled on my elbows.
"What?" He asked, his voice low but urgent. "Seem to what?"
The stupid lump was back in my throat. "I wanted to kiss you," I whispered, my gaze automatically going to his perfect, velvet lips and then back up to his eyes. "But you didn't even want to be near me." I swallowed, my voice cracking pathetically on the last part of my sentence.
His hands tightened just the slightest bit around my elbows then, and I could tell he was restraining himself, trying hard not to be too rough with me. His jaw was tense, his expression somewhere between fury and sorrow. "Are you distressed? Because of me?"
I sighed and leaned my head against his chest, my heart thumping wildly when he didn't move away or make me stop. His own heart was trotting along, much faster than any human’s heart would ever be. Heat blazed through the fabric of his shirt and almost singed my skin.
"Not because of you," I murmured. "Because of myself. I just...I want you so badly. And I don't just mean in the physical sense, although that's enough to drive me crazy." I chuckled softly, but he was quiet, waiting for me to continue. "I guess it's because of the betrothal thing, but it's like I can't function without thinking of you. You're on my mind all the damn time. When you're near me, I want to be touching you, I want to be with you, connected to you.
And then, when I tried to kiss you, you backed away. I knew then that—" I cleared my throat, embarrassed. "I knew then that you don't feel the same way. Your...I know you called it love, but I'm not sure if it is, not in the human sense anyway. In any case, your feelings for me aren't as ardent as mine are for you." His hands tightened a little again, and in spite of the sharp pain in my elbows, I continued. "I shouldn't find that so incredibly hurtful, honestly. You're...you're on another plane, Dax. You're beautiful, immortal, perfect. And I'm just me. It's natural that you wouldn't—"
"Stop." He didn't raise his voice, but it was undeniably a command. I pulled my head back to look at him. His jaw was clenched, his eyes on fire. "Don't ever say that."
"Say what?" I asked, intimidated by the way he was looking at me—livid, upset, furious.
"That I'm not as ardent as you are. That my love"—he practically stamped the word into my mind with the force he used to say it—"is anything less than what humans experience." He pulled me closer, his hands on my lower back. He dipped his head so our lips were just barely touching, his velvet skin whispering against mine as he spoke. "You. Are. My. Betrothed."
I drank in his words greedily, my mind spinning in the haze his sweet words created.
"Do you understand what that means?" He continued to speak with his lips on mine. The sensation of his lips and stubble, his heat—all of it was driving me crazy. A breeze rustled through the leaves, wrapping me up in his fragrance. "It means I would rather die than see one single hair on your head harmed. It means I will do anything to keep you safe in this parallel universe into which I've pulled you. It means loving you and not killing you is a painful dichotomy I must deal with somehow."
Blood pulsed through my veins as if it were gasoline and Dax's voice fire, igniting until my soul burned. "But I thought...I thought that betrothal for you, for demons, was mainly physical. That the whole point was to mate with a human and steal their soul. How could your emotional connection be anything like mine when you're meant to kill me?"
He pulled back and was already shaking his head before I was done talking. "I spoke with Oscar and... I suppose there are a few more things you should know. There are several different types of demons, different races. They’re sort of like nationalities in humans."
I frowned at this seeming change of subject. “Okay.”
“Each demon race has a different power. I’m what they call a Beleth demon. It means I have the capacity to cause feelings of love in my targets. To make stealing souls easier, I suppose.”
"Oh." Boy, was I a willing target, in that case.
"Allegedly, there's some fine print about Beleth demons and their betrothed that I didn't know." He took a deep breath, like he was trying to steady himself. "With the other types of demons, it's absolutely true that their betrothals are purely physical and nothing else. But there've been instances in history where the Beleth forms an equally potent link with his human betrothed as his betrothed does with him. And the feelings between the two are about a thousand times stronger than what humans experience. We don't just mate for life, Cara. We mate for eternity."
For eternity. The words echoed in my ears, in my mind, in my soul. Dax was in love with me. And almost better: Dax was mine for eternity. He wanted me as much as I wanted him.
I stared at him in wonder, a small smile playing on my lips. "Really?"
"Really." His eyes were clear, true. "At your house...Cara, this is so new to me. I've never before felt so utterly powerless in someone else's presence. And to think of the harm I could do you if we lost ourselves." He shook his head and looked away. "I couldn't bear it if something happened to you. There, in your house, it seemed all too easy. I could smell you, and in that enclosed space, I could almost taste you." When he met my gaze again, his eyes glowed. His skin was heating up—I was starting to sweat. "I wanted to taste you. I wanted to have you in my arms, without clothing creating a barrier between us. I wanted to feel you—every part of you."
Every inch of my skin was on fire. I had never been more aware of my body than in that moment, still pressed up against the hard planes of his, feeling his arousal so clearly against me. "I wanted that, too," I whispered. And I wanted it right then. If he'd asked me, I would've given myself willingly in those woods, in that little universe on the big oak tree.
Dax put his hands up to my face, his scorching fingers gently rubbing over my eyebrows, my chin, my cheeks. "But don't you see?" His breath blew across my face. "That's dangerous. Entirely too dangerous." His eyes devoured my face, drinking in the shape of my lips, the color of my eyes. I was so utterly bared to him. I had let Dax in, deep inside me, where nothing was hidden. "You're too precious to me."
"Why…why are you telling me this now?" I said, struggling to keep my mind on the conversation.
His eyes sparked with anger. The muscles in his jaw clenched. "I saw you speaking with that mortal boy at the bar. And I heard what he said, about courting you." He took a deep breath. "I suppose I should thank him for bringing me to my senses. It about drove me mad to hear the yearning in his voice; it made me realize what Oscar said is true. I am absolutely, completely in love with you, Cara. And I'm unwilling to let anyone else try to win you over, selfish as that may be." He looked genuinely remorseful.
I smiled and shook my head. It was amazing that he still didn't see how mutual that feeling was. "No one else could win me over." I snuggled back into his chest. "You're the only one I want, Dax. Without question."
His arms tightened around me gently, his warmth infiltrating every cell. I sighed, completely at ease.
"Are you sure?" he asked, his tone tense and tight, as if so much relied on my response.
I didn't hesitate. "Without question," I repeated.
"In that case..."
I pulled back to look at his face, confused.
He reached into his pocket and came out with his fist closed around
something. "Will you accept a gift? A token of my love?"
I frowned. This was probably something much too expensive. "You don't have to give me anything."
"I know I don't have to," he said gently, smiling. He looked so painfully beatific in the moonlight, like an angelic apparition, something ethereal and fleeting. "But I wholeheartedly want to. Please?"
My heart melted into a puddle and trickled into my stomach. I nodded, unable to tear my eyes away from his soft copper gaze. He flipped his fist over and opened it.
My breath caught in my throat. The piece of jewelry glinting in his hands was more beautiful than anything I'd ever seen, even browsing the Tiffany's catalog. I couldn't tell if it was a necklace or a bracelet, since it had pooled in the center of his big hand.
The metal caught the moonlight and twinkled. It was soft, rose-toned silver, a hue I'd never seen before. The pattern of the chain was intricate, like finely woven lace.
"It's gorgeous.” The sentence came out in an embarrassingly girlish whisper.
Dax had the bracelet around my wrist in another blink of an eye. He did the clasp gently and then took my hand, extending my arm so he could see the bracelet on me.
"It suits you," he declared smugly. "As if it were made just for you and no one else. Don't you think?"
I thought the bracelet was so beautiful that it would've looked just as gorgeous on anyone else. But I was glad it was mine. "Where did you get it?"
"From my parents." His tone was abrupt. I could tell I wasn't supposed to ask about them, so I didn't. "It's many hundreds of years old. Do you really like it?" He ran his fingers along it and my skin burned where he touched me.
"I promise." I marveled at its ancient beauty. I looked back up into his eyes and caressed his face gently. He closed his eyes, his expression blissful. "Thank you."
He leaned down, his lips coming closer to mine. I held my breath without meaning to, anticipating the burning that would only half have to do with his temperature.
