by Mina Carter
Table of Contents
One Night with the Demon Prince
Copyright
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
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About the Author
One Night with the Demon Prince
Paranormal Protection Agency Book 9
MINA CARTER
NEW YORK TIMES & USA TODAY
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Copyright
Copyright 2015 Mina Carter
Cover Art by Mina Carter
Edited by Tina Winograd
Published by Blue Hedgehog Press: October 2015
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
EBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared, or given away. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is a crime punishable by law. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded to or downloaded from file sharing sites, or distributed in any other way via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000 (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/).
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real in any way. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Author's note: All characters depicted in this work of fiction are 18 years of age or older.
Chapter One
Coffee Girl was back. Hopefully, she’d have pastries again.
There were few things a demon, even a half demon like Rat, liked more than darkness, fire, and brimstone. Coffee was one of them. Pastries ranked a close second.
Hidden high on the fire escape opposite the back entrance to Frankie’s Coffee Shop, he eased himself out of the shadows and surveyed the alley. His sharp gaze focused on the young woman below him with interest. A tray in her hands, she kept the door opened with one hip as she peered around the shadowed alleyway. Her apprehension was obvious.
She should be nervous. Dusk was hours away but it might as well have been the middle of the night. Darkness crowded into the hidden corners, creeping into his peripheral vision until he turned his head and banished them with a direct look. Crammed between high-rise buildings, the alley rarely saw direct sunlight.
Which was the reason Rat was camped on the fire escape. Something of the supernatural persuasion had decided to take advantage of the permanently near-nocturnal conditions. Bins rooted through weren’t so bad, all food-based businesses were used to that. Stray cats and dogs were endemic in the city…there were even a few wolfweres—the opposite of werewolves—who ran loose occasionally, even though the resident wolf packs tried to keep them in line.
But when those stray cats and dogs were found, their guts shredded and chewed on, shit got real, fast. Whatever it was had graduated from scavenging its dinner to hunting it. So the owners of the coffee shop had called in the Paranormal Protection Agency to deal with the problem.
Rat knew predators. It wouldn’t stay on small prey long. Which meant he needed to find out what the fuck it was and shut it down. Fast.
“Hello?” Coffee Girl called out, obviously unwilling to leave the safety of the doorway. Rat took pity on her, and grabbing a rail, dropped from his perch, unrolling on the way, to land lightly onto his booted feet in the center of the alley. Coffee Girl was human, so she needed to be wary of whatever lurked in the shadows, but Rat wasn’t human. Nothing anywhere near.
Oh, he looked it right now. Tall and broad-shouldered, he’d pass for a big human male at first. One look at the electric blue of his undercut hair and the heavy muscles under his leather jacket soon dispelled that notion. He looked like the pixie he was… and that wasn’t his dangerous half. Something far more lethal lurked beneath the surface.
“Hi.” He flashed a small grin when he spotted that she had, indeed, brought pastries.
Her relief flavored the air, palpable to a creature like him and she thrust the tray forward. “I thought you’d be hungry, being out here all day.”
Her shy little smile pulled at the hidden side of him, and not for good reasons. He quelled it with the ease of long practice. That way led to bad things, dark and dangerous urges this pretty little human would run screaming from if she had any clue what he really was. No human could hope to tempt him and survive.
No, he needed something more exotic and dangerous… Like a dragon. The thought slipped through the cracks in his armor before he could stop it. Hurriedly, he stuffed it back and locked it away.
“Thanks.” Plucking a coffee mug from the tray, he turned to sit next to her on the step by the door. With him here, she needn’t worry about anything that lurked in the dark. The mug was tiny in his hands, the same size huge in hers. Setting his feet apart, he leaned back with a sigh. The warmth from the drink caressed the skin of his palms, the small, mundane heat a lure to his demon nature.
Coffee Girl turned to take a pastry and his gaze locked onto the delicate curve of her jaw and the plump temptation of her lips. But he wasn’t seeing her. Instead, he saw another woman with fiery red hair and golden eyes. His mug paused mid-air as a wave of fierce longing stole his breath.
Baby. The dragon queenling the PPA had helped rescue from a deranged human with delusions of grandeur. The one woman in the world he shouldn’t—couldn’t—want.
She was never far from his thoughts.
He blinked, and something else caught his attention. The edge of a dark shadow on Coffee Girl’s skin. The growl ripped from his lips, his hand snapping out to hold her still. She froze, her gasp of fright mellowed instantly at his touch. Whether or not she realized what he was, her body reacted like every other human’s at the touch of a demon and became pliant.
With fingers as gentle as he could make them, he peeled away the fabric over her shoulder to reveal a deep, still-purpling bruise. Feral rage ripped through him. A man had done this. Used his superior strength and raised a hand to this delicate creature.
“Who did this?”
He could compel the answer from her, but she was already scared enough. He didn’t need to be an ass and add to her distress. She tried to pull away, impressive considering humanity had no natural defenses against his kind. Tears sparkled in her eyes.
“It’s nothing. I was clumsy, that’s all. Walked into a door…”
“Uh-huh.” He put her top into place and sat back, watching her carefully. “And how many times were you where the door wanted to be?”
“It wasn’t like that.” She looked down, face calm but the tremble in her hands around the mug gave her away.
“Really?”
He didn’t believe her for a moment. He’d lived in the seven hells long enough to recognize the evidence of a man’s aggression. His lips curved into a humorless grin. They called his kind monstrous, but the evil humans perpetrated on each other…it’d make even his father proud.
He extended his senses. She had b
ruises, no torn skin nor internal injuries. She hadn’t been raped. Opening his mouth to demand the truth, a sound in front of them in the alley made him stop dead.
“What?” Coffee Girl picked up on his tension immediately, drawing closer to him. That amused him. A human looking to a demon for protection, who’da thunk it?
“Shhh.”
Holding up his hand, he strained his ears for the sound again. There it was. A small clip against the ground and a familiar whuffle. It was a sound that chilled even his blood and one he hadn’t expected to hear in the middle of the city.
“Shit.”
Instantly he knew what it was, and why it was hanging around Frankie’s Coffee Shop. A bead of cold sweat ran down his spine. Without taking his eyes off the alley around them, he leaned closer to Coffee Girl. Kept his voice low. Between them.
“I apologize for the indelicate question but…have you ever… you know, slept with anyone?”
Amusement flooded him in the silence after his words. Him, a demon, asking carefully if a woman was a virgin. His father wouldn’t have bothered with the question. He’d have just seduced her…and tempted the wrath of the creature watching unseen from the shadows.
“What?” He could feel her cheeks burn and the sharp gaze as she leaned away from him. “No, not that it’s any business of yours!”
He let out a wry chuckle. “Sweetheart, I’m not coming on to you. I’m trying to save our lives.”
Well, his. He was fairly certain she’d be okay. For a while.
Movement tugged at the corner of his vision. Turning his head, he focused on a darker patch of shadow by a dumpster. He had excellent night vision, all demons did; a side effect of living in any of the seven hells. But if they were dealing with what he thought they were, then it wouldn’t matter. What watched them wouldn’t be seen until it wanted to be.
The shadows moved and gave a vague impression of shape. Twin pinpricks of red flared for a moment. Farther apart than he’d thought. Crap, it was already the size of a Rottweiler and infinitely more dangerous.
“What do you mean?” she asked warily. He sensed her movement before it began and slammed a hand out to hold her in place.
“Stop talking and don’t move.”
If she ran, she was done for.
Carefully, he reached inside his jacket pocket and withdrew his cell. A quick swipe over the screen dialed the most frequent number and a second later a chirpy female voice filled his ear.
“Paranormal Protection Agency. How may I he—”
“It’s Rat.” He tightened his grip on Coffee Girl’s wrist as she moved, her growing fear tainting the air. “Tell the boss lady I got a Reem down at Frankie’s Coffee Shop. I need Cal and Gran here, like yesterday, and put a call into the animal control unit.”
Confusion colored the woman’s voice. “A Reem? What the hell is a Reem?”
He hissed through his teeth, feeling his horns ache on his forehead. Crap, he just had to get the newbie on the switchboard, didn’t he?
“A unicorn, lady,” he hissed, his voice nowhere near human. “I’ve got a juvenile unicorn down here.”
“Awwwww…how cute!” Coffee Girl exclaimed as the unicorn chose just that moment to sidle out of the darkness. It was small, with a glowing white coat and a mane that needed its own shampoo commercial. She made to move forward but he had a death grip on her arm.
“How do you know it’s a juvenile?” the girl on the phone wanted to know.
Rat’s control on his temper slipped a little. “Because it’s not tried to eat my fucking face yet. Just get Cal and his brother down here. Now.”
Clicking the phone off, he slid it back in his pocket and stood in one movement, pulling Coffee Girl up with him. Still cooing at the creature in front of them, she tried to shrug off his grip but he pulled her in tight. Lover tight. She was human and so far under the unicorn’s glamour, she only saw what it wanted her to see: the small, cute, defenseless creature.
Glamour didn’t work on either demons or pixies. Which meant Rat saw the white coat was splattered with blood and the lips curled back to reveal, not the flat teeth of a herbivore, but sharp, pointed teeth designed for tearing flesh. The teeth of a carnivore.
Equus Ferus Reem, known in mythology as the unicorn. As often happened though, mythology had gotten it wrong. Unicorns weren’t all sweetness, light and fluffy. They were vicious fuckers always looking for their next meal.
Their food of choice? There was a reason for the virgin thing. Male or female, it didn’t matter which. Like demons, unicorns were fascinated by innocence and the only human who had a chance of surviving an encounter with a unicorn was a virgin. Done the down and dirty? You were a goner quicker than you could say fuck.
By that reckoning, Rat had been done for a couple centuries ago.
“Can you dance?” he asked quietly. “Or sing? We need to distract it.”
But not by running. Even a virgin would become a meal that way, the unicorn’s predatory instincts taking over like a shot. Dead virgin running.
Slowly, she nodded. Her eyes were wide, gaze riveted on the unicorn in front of them. His continued touch started to negate the creature’s glamor and she could see it for what it was. He felt her heart hammering in her chest where she pressed under his arm.
“Slowly then,” he advised, taking a half step back and away, but keeping his hand lightly on the back of her neck.
If he let go, the glamor would reassert itself, and she’d run forward into the creature’s embrace. From there, it was anyone’s guess what would happen. Beguiled and enraptured, the creature probably wouldn’t hurt her. Probably. There was no definite when dealing with a juvenile unicorn. An adult—and they were always male—would have been a different matter. They were more interested in fucking virgins than eating them, unless it was in a fun way.
She started to sway. Graceful, delicate movements that drew the interest of the unicorn. Unleashing a little of the power within him, he started to hum softly. A melody she picked up and wove within her dance. Despite himself, he smiled.
They might just get out of this alive…
***
A few hours later, animal control had the unicorn locked down nice and tight, Coffee Girl returned home no harm done, and Rat’s ears rang with praises from the boss. Closing the door to Iliona’s office behind him, he allowed himself a small smile and set off down the corridor.
As always this late on Friday night, the place was packed with people. He had to weave between operatives on his way to the locker room. The PPA offices were more inclusive than a traditional office building. Hell, the whole business model was totally non-traditional. Because of the nature of its work and operatives, the PPA was more family than business.
Iliona never turned away a paranormal in need of work. Whatever their skills, whether they’d make operatives or not, she found them something. Money in the pocket, and a place to stay. The building itself wasn’t set up like the office block it appeared to be.
Sure, there were offices on the ground and first floors, but several floors above were given over to locker rooms, leisure areas, and a large gym. The rest of the rooms contained accommodation and the roof had a landing pad. Not for helicopters… but dragons. There weren’t many businesses in the city that could boast that.
Right now, though, Rat wasn’t interested in what thread-count the sheets in the accommodation up top were. All he wanted was to get through the crowd of operatives milling about before they went out for a night on the town. His immediate future contained a chest and arms workout with enough weight to bulk his muscles up for the night. Only a little. Just enough to make the white T-shirt hung in his locker fit juuuust nice. The ladies did love a good tight-fitting top on a ripped man.
Of course, he didn’t really need the strength training. Half pixie/half demon, the physical power he could muster had nothing to do with musculature. It came from within him, something not physiological, something…other. His demon form was heavily muscled
, obscenely ripped and shredded. He could push a little of that into his more human form.
But he liked the feeling, the pain and the burn, when he worked his muscles so hard they screamed. He liked punishing himself with weight a dragon would struggle to lift. No one ever said demons were mentally stable. Him least of all.
Frustration filled him as the corridor ahead filled with chattering women, some PPA operatives and office staff. At this rate, he’d never get into the gym. Breath released in a hiss, he contemplated bellowing to get them to clear out of the way. But then they moved, the motion reminding him of the bait ball in the deep sea, parting to reveal a tall, curvy, redhead at the center of the group.
His breath punched out, muscles locked into place and gaze riveted as the world stopped turning. Every cell in his body was attuned, yearning for the female in front of him.
Baby. His Baby…
His brain got with the program and he realized she was dressed for a night on the town. He’d only seen her in jeans and a T-shirt, her fiery hair scraped back from her face. Except for one time. When she’d first been freed, she appeared different. Her magic had dressed her in a dragon scale dress that draped and protected her form at the same time. She’d taken his breath and stolen what little heart he had the same time.
She was the last shadow-dragon queen, and far too good for the likes of him.
Since then, she’d kept her dragon side carefully under wraps, appearing solely human with an interesting bloodline. He didn’t blame her. As far as anybody knew, there were only four shadow-dragons left so she was queen of a very small kingdom. Shadow- dragons weren’t popular with other dragon races, so they were keeping her under wraps.
A demon prince could protect her, the little voice in the back of his head whispered in temptation. He ignored it, even though it had a point. A prince of the Seven Hells would have enough clout to protect even a dragon queen, but for that, he’d have to deal with his father.
