by Lily Cahill
A man.
An extremely hot man.
He was tall, wearing low-slung jeans and the kind of T-shirt that was so tight it might have been more decent for him to just go shirtless. It clung to his well-defined chest, and Felicity felt herself go still in blank shock. What was more improbable--that this sculpture-come-to-life had just thrown around a rude customer like a sack of potatoes, or that he had done it for her?
The Adonis towered over the quivering businessman, who was still lying on the floor. He toed at the guy with his shoe. "You should apologize."
"Fuck you, man," coughed the businessman.
Adonis crouched and reached out like he was prepared to haul the other man up again, but the businessman slithered away, cowering. "Okay, okay! I'm sorry, all right? I'll leave."
"Go," Adonis commanded. The guy got to his feet, grabbed his briefcase, and scurried out the front door, not even looking over his shoulder.
Leaving Felicity alone with her rescuer.
Her very well-built, extremely gorgeous rescuer.
Her stomach tied into knots.
"Wow," she managed. A blush crawled up her cheeks. All this stranger had just done, and her first word to him was wow? He probably thought she was a total idiot. She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders before looking up and meeting his gaze directly. "I mean, that was--that was something else. Thank you for stepping in, but I could have handled it."
Adonis smiled--a slight thing, barely turning up the corner of his mouth, but it made something inside her chest flutter with excitement. He was by far the most handsome man she had ever seen. His black hair was curly and just a little long. She wanted to run her fingers through it.
Felicity tried to shake the thoughts out of her head, but they just kept coming.
His skin was a perfect tan, and his eyes--his eyes. They were so dark they were nearly black. They seemed bottomless, fathomless. She was suddenly sure that she could stare into his eyes every day and still never get closer to understanding the emotions hidden inside of them.
He broke the gaze, glancing over her shoulder at the chalkboard. The spell lifted, and Felicity realized how ridiculous she sounded. This man, whoever he was, was in perfect shape. He looked like he could bench press a small car, and she couldn't look at a pastry without feeling a craving. She didn't know why she was deluding herself.
"I know you could have handled it," he said, and that wasn't fair, either. Now that his voice wasn't tight with anger, it was low, smoky--sexy. How dare this singularly perfect human parade himself in front of her. He continued, "Next time, I'll let you take him down verbally. This time, however, I couldn't help myself. I couldn't stand by and let him speak to you like that."
She snapped her fingers, and a chocolate chip cookie floated into her palm. Felicity held it out to him. "Who said I would have taken him down verbally?" She smiled back at him and resisted the urge to fiddle with her hair as he took the cookie from her. "That's on the house, to thank you. You plan on being around every time I need to give someone a piece of my mind?"
"What would you do if I said yes?" He was grinning, now, but his eyes were dark and serious, and Felicity felt her stomach drop. Was he--was he being honest? It was hard to breathe. She didn't even know this guy's name, was calling him Adonis in her head, and yet there was something about him that made her hope he was being serious.
She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. She felt caught up in his gaze, in the mounting intensity of the moment, and she wanted to--
The door between the kitchen and the front room burst open, and Joy appeared, tugging at the bottom of her black work polo. "Lis, I know you said I could skip today, but I can't sleep if I'm feeling guilty, and ...." She caught sight of the two of them and her voice trailed off. Felicity wanted to blush, but then she saw something else.
Joy's eyes narrowed, and not in a way that meant she was unhappy. No--she was focused. It was the Joy-equivalent of "target acquired."
Felicity's stomach plummeted toward her feet. Of course. Of course Joy was here, of course Joy was able to look like a runway model even when she was hungover and running on almost no sleep. Of course Joy was going to bewitch this guy--the only kind of bewitching she was capable of, as mortal as she was. The Valdez family magic may have skipped over Joy, but she had a power all her own, and it was her ability to get any man she wanted.
And from the look she was giving Adonis, she wanted him.
"I'm Joy," she said, sticking out her hand. Adonis reached across the counter to shake it, and Felicity couldn't help but analyze the movement. Was that touch lingering? Did either of them appear to be affected by it?
I'm being ridiculous, she thought. Him flirting with me doesn't give me any right to be jealous.
She didn't even know if he had been flirting with her. Maybe when a man looked like Adonis, he made a habit of beating up men who were acting like jerks to women, and then charming said women.
"Damien," Adonis said. He dropped Joy's hand and shoved it into his pocket, turning his attention back to Felicity. "And you're Lis?"
"Felicity," she corrected. "The only person who calls me Lis is this one." She poked Joy in the side.
"Felicity." The way he repeated her name made her insides feel warm and liquid. Was this a spell? This kind of attraction, it couldn't possibly be real. It couldn't be organic. She'd never experienced anything like it. "I hope we see each other again soon."
She swallowed. "Well, I'm here most days."
He took a few steps back, never looking away from her. "Then I suppose I have a new favorite coffee shop."
He turned and was gone, the only indication that she had not hallucinated the entire encounter the tinkling of the bell above the door that signaled his departure.
#
"Who was that?" Joy demanded as soon as Damien had disappeared.
Felicity could hardly find her tongue. His eyes, the weight of his stare on her, the way he made her body wake up and feel alive. They'd only seen each other a few minutes, but already Felicity felt more instantly attracted, more instantly connected than she had felt to any man she had met in a long, long time.
It felt like--
She was being ridiculous. He was just a man who had come into her shop and done a good deed. Just a man with chiseled abs and the kind of jawline that deserved to be etched in marble for all time so that generations to come could appreciate it.
There was a vicious pinch on her upper arm, and Felicity hissed and rubbed at the spot. "What the hell?"
Joy pointed at the door. "Do you know that guy?"
"Damien?" Felicity shook her head. "No. I mean, not really. He came in here and stopped this asshole from harassing me, but I--I've never met him before today."
Joy's eyebrows migrated upward, and she crossed her arms over her chest. "Oh really? Then what was all that?"
"All what?"
"Don't play dumb, missy. Even if you weren't the world's worst liar, I know you better than anyone. You totally want to see him naked."
Felicity went violently red. She wanted to spell a hole in the floor to open up and swallow her whole so that she didn't have to have this conversation with her sister. "I don't. Not the way you're implying. I'm just ... grateful."
"Right." Joy rolled her eyes, her tone sarcastic. "And I'm the Queen of England."
Despite the embarrassment making her go red, Felicity managed a curtsey. "Your Majesty."
Joy picked up an abandoned, balled-up receipt and threw it at Felicity's head. "You suck. Seriously, I wait fifteen minutes to come down, and in that time you manage to totally get the hottest guy in the universe eating out of the palm of your hand. I'm such a mess right now that he didn't even look at me."
While that wasn't exactly what Felicity had noticed, it gratified her to know that for the first time she could ever recall, her sister was jealous of her. About a man. This was a truly unprecedented event. Especially when, as Joy had so rightfully pointed out, he was the hotte
st man in the universe.
"Well, don't worry about it," Felicity assured her sister with a pat on the arm. "I'll probably never see him again."
"Are you kidding? He's definitely going to come back. And next time he does, I'm not going to look like the living dead." She knocked her elbow against Felicity's playfully. "May the best woman win, huh?"
As light as Joy's tone sounded, there was some steel in her eyes. She was just as unaccustomed to Felicity being the object of a man's attention as Felicity herself was.
But Adonis--Damien--he had been looking at her. Felicity was not about to walk away from that.
She nodded at her sister. "You're on."
Chapter Two
Damien
Damien slammed shut the front door to his apartment, reveling in the dark coolness there. He kept the air conditioning on low nearly all year round--the fire in his blood demanded it. His eyes adjusted to the pitch black of his living room. Heavy shades blocked the sunlight of the west-facing windows. A mortal wouldn't have been able to move around the room, but he was made for the dark, for the night.
He could see the shapes of his furniture, the couch against the far wall, and the large, flat-screen TV opposite it. He wasn't sure why he had allowed Vincent to convince him to buy the thing. He barely ever watched it. The screen was dusty with disuse.
It felt good to be back home. It slowed his erratic heart, helped him to center, clear his mind. He reached out to flick the switch on the wall that controlled the automatic drapes, but he hesitated. He didn't want the sunlight, the warmth. He wanted to relish his apartment as it was--a little too dark, a little too cold. Cave-like.
Homey.
Rolling his shoulders, Damien took a deep breath. HIs lungs expanded and contracted in his chest, and he felt like he could finally breathe again since the first moment he'd walked into that coffee shop looking for a cup of something strong and maybe a potion for Arryn's birthday next week.
When he'd stumbled upon a snarky businessman giving lip to the shop owner, he had been annoyed--and then when he'd seen the shop owner herself, it was like his heart stopped in his chest, and then had to gallop to catch up.
Her heart-shaped face was screwed up in annoyance, her dark brown eyes flashing as she'd tried to maintain some semblance of politeness toward the man. With her hands on her hips, she'd accentuated the beautiful curves of her body, the generous swell of her breasts and hips that she couldn't hide, even under her unflattering uniform shirt and apron. She had the most perfect complexion, brown skin darkened by time in the sun so that she seemed to glow. Her dark hair had been swept back in a pony tail, and he felt like he couldn't breathe. He saw her and felt the tug of something he'd never really believed in.
His father had told him and his brothers the stories as they'd grown up. Damien had heard all of them--the tales of destiny, of one mate who would be suited for him above all others on earth. But he'd never really believed any of them. They were fairy tales--and not the real kind, told by the actual fae. They were the kind of stories mortals drew animated movies about, where all the characters spontaneously burst into song. In a world where magic was real, where it could be seen and touched and felt, the idea of true love remained mythical. He'd never considered it within his power to believe in it.
And now he wasn't sure it was within his power to do anything but believe in it.
He had not consciously attacked the businessman. He'd see the woman's--Felicity's--face turn into a mask of shock and hurt as the man had demeaned her, and Damien's vision had gone red. He'd felt the beast inside him stir, threatening to rise to the surface--the hot curl in his blood that spoke of shifting, of growing, of flight and fire and her. Felicity. Even hearing her name caused a shiver to run down his spine. His cock stirred between his legs--he had bedded other women before, had desired other women before, but nothing had ever felt like this.
God, he'd even given her his real name. His driver's license proclaimed him to be John Fullerton, but his birth name had fallen out of his mouth before he'd been able to stop it. What did it mean, to have this kind of instant kinship with someone?
He wanted to shift. No, he needed to. His apartment was woefully bare just in case of moments like this, where something threatened his control and he couldn't be sure he'd get to the woods before he transformed into his other self. His dragon self.
The temptation was there, telling him to do it, to give in and let his body expand. There was the familiar prickling feeling over his shoulder blades--his bones were shifting, reforming, becoming larger and lighter. His back hunched, and he could feel the skin split as his other form sprouted up, the tips of his wings popping through, unfolding.
There was a knock at the door.
Damien snarled, steam billowing from his nostrils. He was caught between his forms, not quite man but not quite anything else. He willed the fire in his veins to cool as he sucked in a deep breath. A moment later, the heat in his chest was gone, his posture was more human. The wings that had only just burst forward refolded, and he was again himself, a mortal man.
Or so the world thought.
#
Damien swung open his door, his polite smile dropping as soon as he saw who it was. Blayze was leaning against the frame, smirking. From the look on his face, Damien could tell his brother knew exactly what he had interrupted.
"What's got you so riled up this afternoon?" Blayze asked as he breezed past Damien. He flicked the switch on the wall, and in turn the shades began to move up. The room was flooded with light, illuminating his lone couch and his television. It highlighted just how barren the place was, and Damien thought, not for the first time, that the real reason he liked living in the dark was because he couldn't see how empty everything looked in the light of day.
Slamming his door closed, Damien turned and leaned back against it. His brother had made himself comfortable, draping himself across the couch. They looked nothing alike--Blayze was as fair as Damien was dark, and he seemed to be in his element in the heat of the sun.
"I wasn't expecting visitors," Damien ground out. Annoyance still ran hot inside him, urging him to become his other self, but he resisted. Blayze would never let him live it down if he couldn't control himself now. As much as he loved his younger brother, the kid--and he would always be a kid to Damien, no matter how old they got--also tended to drive Damien insane.
Lounging even further back into the cushions, Blayze scoffed. "Apparently not."
Damien's patience was wearing thin, and he took a deep breath in and out. "What's going on, Blayze?"
"Well, I wanted to ask you for a favor," Blayze admitted, slowly. His eyes were steady on Damien's face. "But now I think you might not be in the right frame of mind to hear it. So."
Great, Damien thought. He wants money.
Blayze always wanted money. He went from job to job, never staying in any one place long enough to do more than flirt with every girl who also worked there and piss off his bosses. He was not a bad man, but he was an immature one, an impractical one. During the lean years, when Damien was still a teenager with three younger brothers to protect and no idea how to do it, he'd scrimped and saved and carved out a life for them. He'd done it so that none of his brothers would have to struggle like he had, and sometimes he'd only succeeded because of luck. Blayze's frivolity was always a sure-fire way to spoil Damien's mood.
"You're right," Damien said. "I'm not really in the mood to give you another handout."
Blayze frowned. "They're not handouts. I have this investment offer that I think can make us all a lot of money--"
"I gave money to your last get rich scheme, and I'm not doing it again, Basilton."
"Don't call me that. You know I hate it, and I didn't come here to fight with you." Blayze sat up. His eyes were hard, and he ran a hand through his fair hair, pushing it back away from his bright blue eyes. When he looked up at Damien, there was a hint of resolve there. "Why are you acting like a dick?"
Damien flipp
ed off his brother, but the gesture was more affectionate than angry. "I'm just tired of you behaving like this, Blayze. I wish you were serious about something."
"That's not it." His brother stood and moved across the mostly empty room until they were standing face to face. He stared at Damien like he was trying to read all of his secrets. "Tell me what's going on. Something's happened. What is it? Is something wrong with Vincent or Arryn?"
"What? No."
"Is it money? Is it this apartment--did you burn something and lose the security deposit? I told you, man, you need to move closer to the woods so that you can change whenever you need without risking so much. But no, you just have to live in the center of town." Blayze studied Damien when he didn't answer, the serious expression strange on his face. "Did someone find out? Does someone know about us, about what we are?"
Damien shoved past his brother and stalked across the living room to the adjacent kitchen. He threw open the door to the refrigerator and scoured it for something, anything to eat. Nothing felt like enough. He needed to assuage his dragon's hunger today, not his own.
Blayze was hot on his heels. "Did you tell someone?"
"Of course I didn't!" Damien burst out. He slammed the fridge closed so hard that he could feel the reverberation of the hit on the floor beneath his feet. "I wouldn't risk our safety like that. I'm not stupid. I know how important it is that the four of us to stay below the radar."
"Good. Because we're the last, you know? If the Others find out about us, they'll kill us. They won't think twice. And don't get me started on the mortals, they've always hated us--"
"You don't need to lecture me," Damien cut in. He was not used to being the one on the receiving end of lectures. He could see why Blayze disliked it so intensely. "I swore to our mother the night she died that I would keep the four of us safe. I am not in danger of giving us up. I would never break that promise."
