Unless…
The idea danced in my head for a nanosecond before I shut down the party and switched off the music. Blythe hated Agarth. Despised him. Loathed him. She was thrilled that I had saved her from yet another evening with him.
Even if she didn’t sound all that thrilled.
Before I could dwell on the notion, my phone beeped with a text from Monique.
Don’t forget the brownies. Or else.
All right, already, I texted back.
I powered off my computer, ignored the table full of white favor boxes for the vow renewal and the roll of personalized ribbon just waiting for my mad wrapping skills, and headed out the front door of my office. I could knock out the favors after the shower tomorrow. In the meantime, it was me and eighty dozen Whatever Floats Your Boat brownies.
Or else.
Monique was Aunt Bella’s daughter. Maybe the brownies were just an excuse to lure me to the shower so that Aunt Bella could scare the daylights out of me again.
Maybe worse.
The possibility stirred a wave of prickles that raced along my arms. A faint breeze made the sensation that much worse as I headed for the side staircase leading to my apartment. The streetlight cast a dim glow on the front lawn, but otherwise the house was dark. Not quiet, of course. That would be too much to ask for. Snooki yapped away, a sound that did little to ease the goose bumps. My gaze slid to the curb, but other than a small, beat-up Datsun parked a few houses down, the street was empty. Obviously Cutter had taken me at my word and backed off.
I stifled my disappointment and turned back to my door. I hadn’t thought to turn on the porch light, so I fumbled for a few minutes with my key.
Finally the lock clicked, and the hinges creaked, and I rushed inside. I slammed the door and locked the deadbolt and started turning on lights one after the other until the apartment blazed and the prickles eased.
There.
Flipping on the TV, I scrolled through the channels until I found a rerun of Bridezillas. While a smart-mouthed diva named Cheyenne ranted over the unjust fact that her maid of honor refused to bow down and give her a foot massage at the bridal shower, I walked into my bedroom, changed into an oversize University of Houston T-shirt and shorts, and headed to the kitchen to feed Snooki.
A few minutes later I was clearing off the counter and pulling out my mixer. Soon brownie pans covered the countertop along with the batch of ingredients I’d picked up earlier. It was a tight fit in my small kitchen, but I could make it work. I had eighteen hours to make eighty dozen brownies. At two dozen per pan, four pans an hour, I could do it in ten with enough time left over for a quick shower, a few Red Bulls, and the usual just-go-and-get-it-over-with pep talk that preceded all family functions.
Soon the smell of rich chocolate filled the air, dispelling any lingering angst and bumping up my mood considerably. Snooki’s yapping faded into the sound of the bridal march when bridezilla Cheyenne finally walked down the aisle, albeit in a turquoise dress that was totally unsuitable for a wedding. But every good wedding planner knows, what the bride wants, the bride gets…
I even felt a tiny bit sad when her maid of honor refused to walk down the aisle after Cheyenne slapped her with the bouquet preceremony and called her a skanky ho.
Where do they find these people?
Anyhow, I was on batch number sixteen when it first hit me that something wasn’t quite right.
First off, there was no demon-hating dog yapping in the next room. Maybe Snooki was getting into the latest bride—Lakwanda—and her fierce temper tantrum because she wanted a lime-green limo instead of the traditional black. Maybe Snooki liked lime green, too.
And maybe it was just wishful thinking, because I knew in my gut that something was terribly wrong. Even before the doorknob started to shake.
A split second later the front door blew inward. A fierce gust of icy wind spiraled into my apartment, whooshing through the living room, straight into the kitchen. The bag of chocolate chips I’d just picked up sailed to the floor and scattered at my feet. A ringing filled my ears.
No, wait. That was a scream. My scream.
As quick as it had stirred, the wind died. Snooki started barking again and I clamped my mouth shut. I drew a shaky breath.
It’s almost over, I reassured myself. I would not be scared off. That’s all this was. A scare tactic. And it wasn’t working—yikes!
I glanced down at the spilled chocolate chips around my feet. Only they weren’t just lying there. They were moving. Walking.
Spiders.
Pans clattered as I scrambled onto the counter, yanking my knees up to my chest, holding tight. I hated spiders, and I hated being afraid of spiders, and I really hated whoever was messing with my head.
They’re just a trick. A trick to scare you off the wedding track and possibly punish you for last night’s bridesmaids’ fitting.
A scary, dangerous, possibly poisonous trick.
A tear slid down my cheek. Followed by another and then another.
Stop it. They’re harmless and they’ll go away. Eventually. Just hold tight.
Yeah, or maybe I was going to die right here without ever finding the man of my dreams. Or kissing the one man who haunted my fantasies. I was going to die hungry. Deprived. And then I’d be back in Hell. Still hungry. Still deprived. Forever.
I made a mad grab for the monstrous bowl of brownie batter, shoved my hand inside, and scooped up a mouthful. Sugar danced across my taste buds and sent a rush of ahhhhh through me.
I was going back for more when I noticed the smear of chocolate on the counter next to me and I froze.
Because it wasn’t just a smear. It was a warning.
I’m coming for you.
As I read the words, I felt a sensation on my arm. Glancing down, I shrieked. The bowl went flying as a single spider sank its tiny fangs into my flesh.
Get off. Get off. Get off.
I slapped at my arm, scrambling off the counter as fast as my legs would carry me. My foot landed on something soft and squishy and—ick!
My legs sailed out from under me and the floor slammed into my backside. The air rushed from my lungs. Pain gripped every nerve in my body and sent off tiny flutters of light behind my eyeballs. Through the thunder of my own heart I heard the sharp, shrill barks of a frantic Snooki and the deep, sexy voice of the demon hunter who’d haunted my sleep for the past few nights.
“Jess?”
In that next instant, I didn’t just hear him, I saw him. Tall, dark, and mesmerizing as he hovered over me. He wore black jeans, a black T-shirt, and a concerned expression. As if he actually cared that I was sprawled on the floor.
As if he liked me as much as I liked him—
Stop it. You don’t like him. He doesn’t like you. And this is just a hallucination.
I was having one final imaginary moment before I kicked the bucket for good and spent the next eon Down Under, waiting in line for my chance at another body.
I savored the moment, forcing my blurry eyes to focus, desperate to drink in one long look at Cutter Owens before I went south.
Oddly enough, he didn’t just look real.
He felt real.
Strong fingers closed over my arms, and before I could think about what that meant, everything shimmered and shook, and then—bam!—it all went eerily dark.
17
“Jess?”
The rich, masculine voice peeled back the layers of nothingness and yanked me back to my tiny kitchen and the all-important fact that Cutter Owens loomed over me. No, really.
“Wake up, sleepyhead.”
“I’m not sleeping.” I cracked one eye open to see Mr. Hot and Incredibly Sexy hunkered down next to me on the floor. “I’m dead.”
“Overdose?” He arched an eyebrow and I became keenly aware of the chocolate covering my hand. And my chin. And oh, no, my cheek too.
“Don’t judge.” I wiped my face and only succeeded in making it worse. When I tried to sit u
p, the room started spinning and I slumped back down.
“Take it easy.” One strong finger reached out and touched my chocolate-smeared cheek. He licked the sugary goodness off the tip of his finger and his eyes smoldered. “Not bad.”
“Thanks. Brownies are my specialty.” Among other things, a voice whispered.
Bad voice.
“With that much sugar swimming in your system, you’re going to be a little shaky,” he murmured as I struggled into a sitting position, my back against the cabinet.
“It’s not the sugar. It’s the venom. I was bitten.”
“By what?” He glanced around. “A brownie?”
“There were spiders…” My voice failed as I drank in the scattered chocolate chips surrounding me. “There were spiders. They were here just a second ago. Everywhere. One of them bit me and then I saw you but I thought it was just the venom and you weren’t real and then I felt you and then I lost it for a few seconds and then…” The words trailed off as my mind snagged on what I’d just said. “I didn’t think you were actually here. I didn’t see your car outside.”
“I had a meeting this evening, so I had one of our rookies keeping an eye on you. I was relieving him when I heard you scream.”
And, of course, Cutter had come running to check on me because I was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen and he couldn’t shake his undeniable attraction to me.
That, or I was his one and only link to Azazel and he couldn’t afford to let his chance at revenge slip through his fingers.
I held tight to the second explanation and tried to ignore the lust making my thighs tremble.
“It was the spider. It creeped me out.” I struggled to my feet, shrugging off his hands as I reached for the counter. My gaze zigzagged to the spot where the warning had been smeared in chocolate, but there were no words now, just a swipe of batter. I’d imagined it all. Hadn’t I?
Real, my gut insisted. I knew it. I felt it.
Even if the feeling wasn’t as frightening with Cutter beside me. No, his nearness stirred an entirely different feeling. “Stop stalking me and go home,” I said, desperate for some air that didn’t smell like chocolate and hot, hunky demon slayer. “I’ve got it covered.”
He pushed to his feet and simply stood there, towering over me. Disbelief glittered in his green eyes. “You’re really that freaked out by spiders?”
“Why is that so hard to believe?”
“You’re a demon.”
“Yeah, well, I’m also a Pisces, and I’m allergic to fish. Go figure.”
A grin curved his lips and I felt a funny flutter in the pit of my stomach.
I scooted around the counter, desperate to put as much distance between us as possible. I needed to keep my head, and that meant keeping my hands busy.
Busy hands couldn’t reach across and grasp the soft cotton of his T-shirt and pull him close.
My fingers closed around the flour and I started pouring. “You really should leave. I’m totally fine.”
“A spider bite isn’t fine.” His gaze narrowed as he looked around, and I knew then that as unbelievable as my story was, he believed it. “What happened before the spiders?”
My mind did a quick rewind and I replayed the last few moments before slamming into the floor as I mixed up a batch of dry ingredients. “A gust of wind. A roaring in my ears.”
“Did you smell anything?”
“Just chocolate.” I eyed him. “Why? Should I have smelled something else?” He shrugged, and I added, “Did you see something when you came in? Someone? Maybe a little old lady in a black dress?”
“What?”
I shook my head. “Never mind.” So what if he didn’t actually see Aunt Bella? It didn’t mean it wasn’t her. She was the only demon I knew who hated chocolate. Violating a bunch of chocolate chips with her demon mojo would be right up her alley.
My hands trembled as I reached for my wet ingredients. Eggs first.
“You might need this.” His voice sounded a heartbeat before he stepped up next to me. One hard, muscular bicep kissed my shoulder and a shock wave vibrated through me.
“Thanks.” I took the bottle of vanilla extract and tried to pretend that his nearness didn’t affect me. Fat chance, but I was giving myself an A for effort.
“Oil?” He held up the bottle of Mazola.
I shook my head. “I use butter instead, but you can hand me a set of measuring spoons.” I motioned to the other end of the counter. “It looks like somebody knows his way around a kitchen,” I said when he handed me the plastic spoons.
“I manage.” He shrugged. “I used to help my mother every now and then back when I was a kid. She made the best chocolate pie, with melt-in-your-mouth meringue.”
“How high was the meringue?”
“Six inches or so.”
I let loose a whistle. “Impressive.” I added the vanilla to my mixture. “Fluffy meringue is hard to come by. I still haven’t found a good recipe, and believe you me, I’ve looked.”
“I’d share hers, but it’s long gone now. She and my dad passed away in a car accident when I was nineteen.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. It was years ago.” He retrieved several sticks of softened butter from a nearby plate and placed them next to my bowl. “What about you? Any family?”
“My mom.” I unwrapped the sticks and added them to my wet ingredients. “I never really knew my dad, but I do have three sisters.” I slid a sideways glance at him. “You?”
“I was an only child. I have a cousin, but otherwise I’m flying solo.”
Silence descended for a few moments as I added the dry ingredients to my wet mixture and turned on the mixer. Whirring filled the air as we stood there, side by side.
Oddly enough, the sexual tension radiating between us seemed to morph into something as comforting as it was stimulating. I had an oddly domestic vision of us whipping up a mountain of pancakes the morning after.
I killed the mixer along with the crazy thought and retrieved a cake pan.
“So you like to bake brownies,” he murmured as I poured the batter into the pan.
“Actually, I like to eat brownies.” I spread the dark chocolate with a spatula. “Baking them is the evil necessity.”
“I always liked grilling, myself. Ribs, brisket, chicken—you name it, I grilled it.”
Glancing over at Cutter leaning against one end of the counter, I imagined him standing outside in the hot summer sun, wearing nothing but a pair of blue jeans and a smile as he flipped hamburgers. Sweat glistened on his shoulders and muscles rippled as he worked the spatula.
I swallowed against my suddenly dry throat and fed the brownie pan into the oven. “That makes sense.”
“How so?”
I set the timer for twenty-five minutes. “You look like the outdoorsy type.”
“I did know my way around a tent.” A grim expression covered his handsome face as he took the mixing bowl and set it in the sink. “I used to go camping and hiking every weekend. I’d set up camp and cook out over an open fire. It was nice.”
“Was?”
“I was camping in Palo Duro Canyon about ten years ago when I met Azazel. One minute I was pouring a cup of coffee and the next I was facing off with an ancient demon. My parents had just died and I was in a bad way, and there he was. He told me he could take away all the pain if I would just give him my soul. I said no, and then he just took it.” Pain twisted his features. “One minute I was telling him to get lost and the next I was hunched over. I couldn’t move. I could only feel.” His shook his head angrily. “My priorities shifted then. Azazel was all I could think about. I saw him in my sleep and every waking moment in between.”
“That’s understandable. You want revenge.”
“It’s not just about revenge.” His gaze collided with mine. “I want my soul back. That’s why I’m after Azazel. He took everything that was good from me.”
As I stared into his eyes, I saw
exactly what he was talking about. Rage swam in the deep, dark depths. Torment. Loneliness. And lust. I saw that too. But nothing softer.
“Is that even possible? To reclaim your soul?”
“Some of the higher-ups in the Legion think so, but no one’s ever actually done it before.”
“So it might not work.”
He nodded. “But maybe it will.” For a second, I saw a spark in his eyes. Hope? No, there was little hope left in Cutter now. More like determination. And the lust. The lust simmered and bubbled as he looked down at me. “And if it doesn’t, at least he’ll die for what he did. What he’s done a thousand times over.”
“I hope it works,” I said softly.
His gaze widened as if I’d just confessed to being an alien. “You know you just violated about a zillion different demon laws by saying such a thing?”
“I know, but it’s the truth.”
“Demons don’t tell the truth. You know that too, right?”
“What can I say? I like breaking the rules.”
He stared at me for a long, silent moment, his face dark and unreadable. The air seemed to sizzle around us as the tension wrapped tight and refused to let go.
He wanted to kiss me.
And I wanted to kiss him.
And how.
Heat sizzled from the tips of my toes, working its way through my body until I felt as if I were suspended over an open flame. Erogenous zones tingled. My stomach fluttered. My lips twitched.
I knew even before he leaned down that he was going to kiss me. And as many times as I’d promised myself no more dead-end trysts, I licked my lips anyway. Realistically I knew there could never, ever be a future between us, but old habits died hard. I leaned up on my tiptoes. My eyes closed. I felt his breath on my lips and smelled the intoxicating scent of dark desire and wild intent.
Yum.
“This is the worst idea I’ve ever had,” he murmured.
“Terrible,” I breathed. And then his tongue swept my bottom lip.
Excitement thundered through me as I struggled to remember every reason why I needed to put a stop to this right now. I was the sexual demon. I controlled the situation. And that’s what I fully intended to do. Just take the bull by the horns and put an end to this.
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