by Brianna Jean
“Here, Annalise,” Cabe said from beside me, reaching across the bar to hand her what she ordered. I tried—and failed—to hide my grin as she took the drink.
She scowled a little in his direction before I saw an idea flit across her features. A mysterious smile stole across her lips as she looked me dead in the eye and put the rim of the glass to her fuckable lips. She tipped the glass back and downed the whole thing in one go. Then she took the plastic sword that held her olives and ate them one by one—all while never breaking eye contact.
I couldn’t look away from her even though my insides were melting, my dick straining painfully against the zipper of my jeans. Her eyes flashed, pupils dilated, giving away her arousal.
I bit back a groan as a sexy as hell grin spread across her mouth. There was no doubt about it—she was fucking hot.
After breaking eye contact with a wink at me, she set the glass down on the counter and slid it to Cabe. “Fill ’er up, handsome.”
The poor sap cleared his throat and shook his head to center himself after the scene she put on for us.
“Yes, ma’am.” He gave a small chuckle and kicked my shin under the cover of the bar. I turned and followed him, walking a few feet away from her as he collected the ingredients for her drink.
“We are in over our heads. She is in a bar full of fucking Demons and still managing to grip our balls in her tiny fists. Who the fuck is this girl?” I asked in a harsh whisper. My skin felt hot as my beast had unfurled itself from the back of my mind, coming to stand front and center, watching all the action unfold.
“She’s…” Cabe started as he began mixing her next martini. “I don’t even fucking know, Lanier. I don’t know what the hell is going on right now. I don’t know this girl; I never got to see this side. Toward the end, she was always alone, never with people. I’m beginning to think that parts of her life were hidden on purpose.”
He was anxious and angry. I could see it in the way he tossed the bottles around on the countertop with more force than necessary. Cabe was always calm and controlled, but this girl was throwing him off balance. He had seen a different side of her, a side he was prepared to handle—had grown to love—but the side we were seeing was hard and unapproachable. She didn’t have a hint of warmth in her eyes. Instead, she was guarded and never hesitated to bare her teeth.
But she was affected by us, that much I knew. I saw that she was just as turned on as I was during that little show she put on. Even if it was just sexual, she was affected. I could feel her in me, in this bond I was trying to ignore.
I spent all this time trying to find the answer, to find my mate, and now that she could possibly be here…I wasn’t sure what I wanted anymore.
“Alright, let’s just see how the next hour plays out. She’s bound to hit the dance floor or something. Someone will try to talk to her, and she’ll whip out her fancy strength and get herself into trouble.” I reached into my pocket and checked the time on my phone. “It’s eleven o’clock. We have exactly an hour to get this done.”
Cabe nodded and took her drink over to where she sat at the bar. I stood back and took her in. Her tight leather jacket hugged the muscles of her arms, and the white crop top she had on gave me a perfect view of the creamy skin of her stomach. Her tits were covered, but they were big enough to still be mouthwatering, even covered in a layer of fabric.
If she was truly my mate, I was screwed.
I had a reason for wanting to Fall, a damn good one at that. I deserved it, I deserved to be alone for eternity, living in Hellfire with my demons—letting them out to play freely amongst creatures just like them.
I couldn’t be distracted.
She didn’t bother to look at Cabe as he set the martini down in front of her. Instead, she took hold of the glass without even eyeing it and began to sip slowly as she stared at something across the room. She wasn’t even listening as her ex talked, she was absentmindedly nodding her head at whatever he was saying.
Following her line of sight, I rolled my eyes. Quint was across the room with a brunette Siren sprawled across his lap. He had his face buried in her neck as he licked her skin like a lollipop. The bastard wasn’t doing it for the Siren’s pleasure…he was looking straight at Annalise.
And she was looking at him.
I studied her posture, almost shocked to find her shoulders tense, her spine ridged as she watched Quint rile up the girl on his lap.
Tension filled the air around me; I could smell the anger rolling off Annalise, but there was something sharp in the scent—envy?
Oh. My little creature was jealous.
Quint’s eyes flashed as he fed from the emotions that saturated the air around the room. She fell for his trick easily, not seeing it for what it really was.
He was testing her.
As if she heard my thought, her head whipped to me and Cabe. She rolled her eyes and barked out a humorless laugh before downing the rest of her drink and slamming the glass down on the bar in front of us. She pulled out a fifty-dollar bill from her back pocket and placed it not-so-gently in the empty glass.
Turning to her ex, she said, “Let’s go, I’m bored.”
He looked at her funny for a few seconds, but she didn’t even turn around to see if he was following her as she walked to the front door of the bar.
“Fuck!” I looked at Quint, who had a twisted smile on his face. Well-fed and slaphappy, he was beaming.
“No, wait, this is good.” Cabe put a hand on my arm before I could round the bar and go after her. “One of the Demons will follow her, try and get to her on the street. Let’s go out back and see how this plays out. No doubt, this is our chance.”
I nodded, agreeing. As soon as the door closed behind her, Quint dropped the Siren he had in his lap straight onto the floor and walked behind the bar, smiling at us.
“Worked like a goddamn charm. She took the bait, let’s follow her.” He put an arm around my shoulders.
The fucker planned it.
He knew, somehow, that she’d get angry at him and leave the bar.
Which only meant one thing: she was just as affected by us as we were by her.
Fuck.
My blood was boiling, and Bestia was a fucking mess—snapping her jaws and pacing in her cage.
Fucking Quint.
One minute I was sipping my drink, and the next I looked over Joey’s shoulder to see Quint with some mermaid looking girl draped all over him, his tongue licking her skin like a goddamn ice cream cone.
Of course, he stared at me with a smirk on his perfect face the whole time he did it. The bastard was taunting me, and fuck, it worked.
I was so fucking angry. Irrationally angry. I couldn’t figure out why I was pissed, but I couldn’t stand being in the same room with him anymore. Watching him sucking at her neck was enough to make me want to peel her skin from her body.
I was fucking jealous.
Why?
Who fucking knows.
I wanted it to be me in his lap, and I was pretty sure my feelings were completely out of my control, because I didn’t get jealous. I never fucking cared.
I knew what I brought to the table—I could bring any man to his knees.
Yet here I was, raging over a guy I hadn’t spoken to more than twice in my life.
Was it fucking crazy to be jealous over someone I’d literally said maybe twenty words to? Yes, it was. But did it matter? Apparently not. Because even ten minutes later, with a mile between me and him, I still wanted to rip my hair out at the memory of him touching someone else.
“Okaaaaaay,” Joey said awkwardly from behind me as we walked down the street, away from Hellhound and the three guys within it. “What was all that about?”
“Nothing, just drop it,” I snapped, not bothering to elaborate. “I’m going home.”
“Home?” he yelled, jogging to catch up with me. “Annalise, why the fuck would you go home? We just got started, and I haven’t even had a drink yet!”
; “Then go have a drink, Joey! I’m going home.” I could feel him staring at me from his place to my left, no doubt ready to grill me about why the hell I was acting so strange.
I walked faster, trying to get some distance between us, but Joey was hot on my tail.
“Hey, hold the fuck up!” He grabbed my arm and pulled me to a stop on the sidewalk before I could walk any farther. He took my chin between his thumb and index finger, bringing my face toward his, looking at me with a mix of confusion and concern. “Talk to me, Annie. What the hell is going on with you? What was that back there?”
I didn’t know what to tell him, so I decided to change the subject to something else that was bothering me. “I’m getting stronger.”
His eyes narrowed for a moment before he said, “You train at that damn gym every day, Annie. That’s kind of the point.”
“No, you don’t get it. I’m getting stronger without my training—I’m not even lifting anymore. I’m spending all my time sparring, and my hits are…” I hesitated, not sure how much to tell him. This was almost too much for even me to believe. “They’re not the same, Joe. Something is going on, something is wrong with me.” I huffed out a bitter laugh. “Something more than usual, I guess I should say.”
“Annie, what can I do? How can I help you?” His voice was barely above a whisper. His brown eyes had gone soft, like melted chocolate, and I knew that I was flirting with crossing the line I drew between us. We weren’t together anymore, but he’d tried, many times, to get close to me again. I was always conscious of how I acted around him. I didn’t want to lead him on, but in this case, I had no one else to talk to. “What does this have to do with those guys?”
“That’s the thing, I don’t know. When they cornered me in the alley last night, they seemed to know something about me. They said that I didn’t know what I was. Like I might be something else, something not Human? But when I disabled them in less than two minutes, they seemed shocked.” I took a step back and sucked air into my lungs, trying hard to calm myself down. I was running on pure panic and anger. The whole night had become too much for me to handle, and I knew it was because of my strange reaction to the three guys back at the bar.
I could still feel their eyes on me. I was hot and flustered and turned the fuck on.
But before I could continue to explain my situation to Joey, I stopped myself. I’d said enough, way more than I’d planned to tell him. “I don’t know, Joe. I’m just in a shitty mood, I guess—it’s fine.”
I turned around and started walking in the direction of our apartment. Just as I began to enter the alley by the warehouse, the one from the previous night, I felt a blank space in the air behind me. Like I walked into someone’s line of sight.
Someone was watching me.
Looking around quickly, I saw nothing out of the ordinary. The alley was dark but no darker than normal—I knew it like the back of my hand. I took a deep breath and turned in the other direction to see if maybe there was someone across the street.
Nothing.
“Annie?” Joey asked, confused. I put up a hand signaling him to be quiet.
I closed my eyes, pushing my hearing out farther, and scanned the area for any weird sounds. It was all calm and quiet for a few seconds just before…
There.
A ticking noise was coming from the darkness of the alley—like a metronome but…faster. So fast that it sounded more like a hiss. Like a rattlesnake?
I hadn’t paid much attention to the weather or my surroundings before that moment. The air was balmy with humidity, the city lights off in the distance were bathed in nighttime darkness, the scent of rotting garbage and piss filled my nostrils.
I didn’t like the feeling I had. The hairs on my arms pebbled at the strange noise, and Bestia started to rapidly pace in her cage. She was growling low, the sharp fur on the back of her neck rising as she listened for the threat.
Quickly, I turned to Joey and whispered harshly, “Go home. Get in a cab, don’t walk.”
“Anna”—he was looking around him, searching for what I saw, but he wouldn’t be able to hear the threat, not like I could—“what’s going on?”
“For once, don’t question me, Joey. Just go, please,” I snapped. “Now! Go!”
He looked at me for only a second, searching my eyes. He must have seen how serious I was, because he reached forward and placed his hand on the back of my head, bringing me toward him to place a soft kiss on my hair. He looked at me for just a moment before turning around and walking across the street.
He’d beat himself up the whole way home for leaving me, a girl, in this situation. But he knew that I could handle myself better than he could.
I knew I’d made the right choice, because as soon as he was gone, I heard a voice come from the alley.
“Come here, Angel.”
I didn’t move.
My heart kicked up to a consistent hammer in my chest—so loud I could hear it just as clearly as the ticking sound. I felt sick.
The voice was low and rough like gravel. The ticking got louder, faster. It seemed to be coming closer.
“Come on, now. Surely you aren’t afraid of me?” It wasn’t a male or a female voice, it was something from another world, another life. It was something that dripped darkness and pulsed a threatening beat.
I was about to dance with evil.
For the first time in my life, I was terrified. I’d never felt fear like this before. Even when my foster father first came for me, I was never this scared, because I knew him. I was shocked and upset and a myriad of other emotions during those initial beatings, but I never feared him. I, sure as shit, was fearful now—I was out of my element.
I wanted to pull Bestia out, but I couldn’t seem to reach her. She was whining and whimpering in her cage, trying to come for me, but her sharp claws weren’t doing anything against the padlock holding the cage shut.
I took a deep, centering breath. I could do this. Hell, I had to do this. I wasn’t about to lose my life to whatever the fuck this thing was, even though Death and I were old friends.
“How about you come out here?” My voice sounded more confident than I felt, thank god. I was trying not to let the thing know that I was afraid—it probably ate fear for breakfast.
“Gladly,” it replied.
I tried to brace myself for anything I might see, but nothing could have prepared me for what appeared.
I screamed.
Then I ran.
For the first time in my life, I ran from something.
The creature was massive. Easily eight or nine feet tall, with horns that protruded from its skull, adding another foot to its height. It sort of looked like the creature was burning alive, but I couldn’t see any kind of fire. The only evidence was the skin that turned to ash and the black soot that was dripping onto the ground around it.
There was only one way to describe the creature: a Demon.
Straight from the burning depths of Hell.
Blood was everywhere on its body. One of its eyes was hanging out of the socket, while the other stared at me—seemingly seeing right through me.
The skin on its jaw was missing, so my eyes connected with rows and rows of sharp teeth sitting inside its mouth through a hole where its cheek should have been.
And it was fucking fast. I sprinted down the sidewalk and took a sharp left into another alley, but it didn’t take long for the creature to catch up to me. It slammed into my back, and not a second later, I felt the gooey texture of its skin against my body, blood and soot soaking through my shirt. I screamed again—so loud I thought my eardrums would burst.
I was so fucking scared.
We fell to the ground, and I heard the bones in my wrist crack, the pain of the break licking up my arm before racing to my lungs and stealing my breath. I bit down on my lip hard enough to break skin as I fought to breathe. Blood dripped into my mouth and fell down my chin from the hole I’d made.
Using my good wrist, I tried to
lift myself up and throw the creature off, but it wrapped its arm around my waist and squeezed.
Oh hell no.
I slammed my head back into its chest, and I heard the sternum crack under the force of my skull. Yeah, that was the strength I was talking about. I shouldn’t have been able to do that—no Human would be able to.
The creature let out a guttural scream so loud I was sure I’d be deaf after this fight was over, but it gave me the chance to scramble away. I stepped two feet from it before turning around and using the distance to give my body the chance to gear up for my next hit.
Leaping forward, I landed flush against its chest and used my elbow to slam its chin skyward. I figured if I hit it hard enough, the head might fall off. The bones in its body weren’t covered in solid skin—just ash, fat, and fucking muscle wide open for the world to see.
Or at least for me to see.
The move worked well enough to crack a few bones in its neck, forcing the head to lull to the side, but not enough to get it clean off the body.
That’s when the thing fucking laughed. A high-pitched sound that made my stomach bottom out. I swallowed the bile that came up my sore throat.
The sound proved my theory—otherworldly, multilayered. His laugh was made of screaming souls.
This thing was definitely not Human.
I went for the next hit but was quickly forced back as it reached forward, snaked its bony hand around my neck and squeezed.
All the air was immediately stolen from my lungs. I tried and tried to kick it off me, but my foot just sank into its wet, bloody body.
Spots started to dance along my vision. I’d have about a minute before I passed the fuck out. I had no options but to keep kicking.
I tried clawing at its arm, but I only managed to pull muscle off the bone. My stomach churned at the sight, but I fought the nausea and focused on my options, trying to come up with a plan.
I closed my eyes briefly to find Bestia. She was foaming at the mouth in her rage. The sound of her roars filled my head as her whole body seemed to get bigger, filling out the metal bars of her cage. Her hair was coming through the bars on top and at all three sides.
