They were back to that. “I’m not interested in preaching or a helping hand. Leave me alone.”
He stared at her a long moment, the light around him painful. Was it just her imagination, or were his eyes glowing? “I’m afraid I can’t do that,” he said softly.
This—he—was making her crazy. “You’d damn well better,” she snapped. “Stay the hell away from me, or I’ll go to the police and tell them you’re stalking me.”
She turned and stormed away. The man was unnerving, in more ways than one. One was the light around him—she guessed he must have an unusually powerful aura, although she knew very little about that stuff. Another was him knowing so much about her and her family, which should be impossible. They’d been dead for decades, perishing in the concentration camp at Dachau. The only reason she hadn’t died with them was because an SS soldier, who happened to be a vampire, had turned her—after he and his comrades repeatedly raped her.
She realized she was shaking and tried to calm down. She couldn’t change the past, couldn’t change what she was. Her only two choices were to meet the sun and end it all—or to survive. Maybe she was a coward, but she wasn’t ready to face eternity, and most likely the fires of hell, just yet. That meant she had to feed.
She drifted through the shadows of the underbelly of Dallas, walking past bars and strip clubs and adult bookstores. She didn’t pass any other hookers. Very few prostitutes actually walked the streets anymore. Most cruised northern Harry Hines in their cars, talking to clients on their cell phones as they looked for other johns to flag down. Then they either conducted business in their cars or at an hourly rate hotel.
But Rachel preferred to troll for marks as she had always done—on foot, and at the quieter end of Harry Hines. She didn’t have to worry about her personal safety, and if the police stopped to question her, she could glamour them into forgetting her. She also knew quite a few of the homeless people along this stretch, although they were scatted throughout the area.
She found her first mark for the night. He was a tall, beefy man in a work uniform, topped with an insulated vest. His complexion was ruddy, his hands rough and callused, with dirt crusted beneath his fingernails. But his money was green, and his blood red. Rachel tucked the crumpled bills into her fanny pack. She ran her hand up his chest and stroked his neck, her attention focused on his powerful jugular veins.
“So, big guy, tell me what you want,” she murmured, slipping into his mind.
He was a tits and ass man, wanted to see the goods before he sampled them. “Take off your shirt,” he ordered. He watched as she pulled her tight black sweater over her head, shaking her long, dark hair loose. She was braless, and her tits jiggled a little from her movements. His cock came to attention. She wasn’t all that large in the boob department, but they were nice and round, with pink nipples that puckered when he pinched them.
He told her to turn around and raise her skirt, and her nice, firm ass made him rock hard. He liked doing it from behind, liked to fondle the woman’s tits and rub her ass as he fucked her. And this woman was prime, nice and tight, bracing herself against the wall as he pounded into her, jerking her upward with each thrust. Yeah, tight like a fist, milking him in greedy gulps. He cried out as the best orgasm of his life crashed over him, wave after wave, riding him right into oblivion…
Rachel left him unconscious behind the Chicas Sexual club, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand as she reached the street. He was so big she’d been able to take a lot of blood without endangering him. She came around the corner of the building and almost shrieked in frustration when she saw Gabriel leaning against the front of the building. She glared at him, wondering what it would take to get rid of him.
He straightened. “Now that you’re not so hungry, we can talk. Why don’t you let me buy you some coffee?”
She was shocked. Had he seen her taking her mark’s blood? She always used allure to blur her activities, so passersby wouldn’t see what was happening. Yet this guy had apparently seen past her shields, which should be another impossibility. “What do you mean by that?”
He had the most intense gaze she’d ever seen. “I know what you were doing back there, Rachel. I already told you I know what you are. You just don’t want to believe me. You’re a little weak in the faith area, too. We’ll have to work on that.”
“What did I do behind this building?” she challenged. She had to know what he’d seen.
“What you have to do to survive. That’s not a sin.” He raised his hand, rested it against the side of her face. He was so warm, his gesture so tender, she felt herself softening inside. Not good.
She knocked his arm away. “So you were spying on me?”
He nodded. “I saw you take his blood. I would apologize for watching you, but it’s necessary that I understand every aspect of your life to help you.”
Incredulity and anger and consternation all rolled through her in one tsunami-level wave. “You had no right to do that. Fuck you!”
“Like you did for him?”
How could he have known about that? It was all fantasy mind sex. There was nothing to see, even if Gabriel had been watching. She had to put a stop to this immediately. Last night, he had so imbalanced her she hadn’t thought to glamour him. But she intended to wipe his memory clean now.
She moved closer, let her hands slide up his arms, feeling some impressive muscles beneath the leather coat. She stared into his eyes, for the first time, seeing their true color, a deep blue, with golden sparks of light. For a moment, she felt their pull, as if they were mesmerizing her. She felt sluggish, disoriented. Whoa! She shook her head, broke eye contact. The odd sensation faded.
Still determined, she leaned within inches of his face, again gazing into his eyes. “You will forget everything about me,” she said in a low voice, directing the full force of her allure toward him. “You won’t remember my name, or what you just saw in that alley. If you see me again, you won’t recognize me. I’m a stranger to you.”
He blinked. Convinced she’d had him firmly in thrall, she turned to leave.
“I’m not going to forget you, Rachel. And I’m not judging you for what you have to do to stay alive.”
Panic stirred. She spun around. “Maybe I can’t make you forget me, but I can hurt you very badly.”
He didn’t seem at all perturbed. “But you won’t. It’s not in your nature.”
He was wrong. Her nature—the freakish thing she’d become—contained inherent violence. “You don’t really know as much as you think,” she hissed.
“Oh, I know a lot more than you realize.” He tilted his head, as if studying her.
He really did have a nice face, strong…noble—except for that sensuous, suggestive mouth. What was wrong with her? Was he enthralling her? Not possible.
She drew back, wrapped her shawl protectively around herself. She wasn’t sure what to do about him, but he was wrong to trust her. Even so, she didn’t want to inflict physical harm unless it was absolutely necessary. She’d seen way too much violence in her human existence, knew how its aftereffects reverberated through lifetimes. For now, she’d use words as a weapon.
She started to tell him what he could go do to himself, when his gaze shifted away from her. She turned to see what he was staring at, saw two punks threatening a homeless man, trying to get his bottle away from him.
“Sorry. We’ll have to resume this discussion later.” Gabriel headed toward the men.
She snapped her mouth shut, watched him reach the group and insert himself between the punks and the man they’d been hassling. She recognized one of the aggressors, knew he was a bully who could get violent if provoked. And here was this do-gooder, stepping into the middle of three guys who were either drunk or high, and most certainly crazy.
He raised his hands, and she could see he was talking, probably trying to calm them down. But the flash of a blade in one man’s hand was a pretty good indication it wasn’t working.
&nbs
p; Damn, damn, damn! Gabriel was an idiot—and he was going to be one dead idiot very shortly. She should leave him to his fate, should let those punks take his money and whale out their hatred and anger on him. It would serve him right—and would certainly solve her problem of what to do about him and the information he possessed. But…
Her feet were moving before she’d made the conscious decision. This was crazy, she told herself. The man was obnoxious, and he was a threat to her existence. So why was she going to keep his handsome face from being bashed in? Good question.
She didn’t have time to ponder it before she reached the group. She grabbed the knife-wielder by the back of his coat, easily lifting him off his feet. “Hey Bubba, that’s enough fun for tonight.” She threw him against the closest building; he hit the wall with a thud, slid to the ground, stunned.
She spun as the second punk rushed her, landed a kick in his solar plexus that sent him flying backward a good twelve feet. He crumpled into a moaning heap. The first punk struggled to his feet, brandishing the knife.
Rachel glared at him. “You want some more of this, you bastard? Then bring it on.”
He took a staggering step toward her, grabbed his head with a groan. He glanced past her to the other man heaped on the sidewalk. “You’re crazy, bitch,” he growled. He looked at Gabriel. “And who the hell are you, man? Fuckin’ stupid. I’m outta here.” He limped off, leaving his companion behind.
The homeless man was long gone, having bolted at the first opportunity. To Rachel’s utter amazement, Gabriel walked over to the remaining punk, helped him to his feet. “You all right?” he asked him.
“Get the hell away from me!” Still groaning, the guy headed the same direction as the first one.
Gabriel walked slowly back to Rachel. “You are insane,” she said. “More than the people around here. But maybe you’re smart enough to remember what I just did to those guys, because I’ll do the same to you if you don’t leave me alone. Got that?”
He just looked at her with those glowing blue eyes. “I’m not afraid of you, Rachel.” He straightened his leather coat with a jerk. “You didn’t have to interfere on my behalf. I could have handled those men.”
She couldn’t believe it. That was gratitude for you. “Fine, then, Gabriel whatever-your-last-name-is. I won’t come to your aid again. And believe me, if you hang around here with that baby-faced innocent look, you will soon be facing those punks again, or others like them.”
“Baby-faced?” He seemed genuinely affronted. “Is that how you see me?”
Not really, but she wasn’t in the mood to stroke his ego. She folded her arms across her chest and nodded.
He looked heavenward. “She thinks I’m baby-faced.” His gaze returned to her. “As I told you, I can handle anything that comes my way.” He extended his arm, palm up. “Watch.”
She didn’t want to. What she wanted was to put as much distance between this man and herself as possible. Besides the fact that he made her very uncomfortable, there was the little problem of his knowledge about her and his being immune to her glamour. “Forget it. I’m leaving.”
“Wait. Watch.”
There was a powerful compulsion in his voice, and she simply didn’t want to expend the energy to fight it. He wasn’t a vampire, so what, exactly, was he?
A sudden shaft of light exploded from the palm of his hand, shooting upward. Rachel was so startled, a small scream erupted from her throat, and she stumbled backward. But she couldn’t take her gaze off the beacon of light. It was both mesmerizing and terrible, a swirling mass of blue and gold flames within the brightly glowing beam, which went way up into the sky, disappearing into a starburst of more light. It crackled with energy she could feel, even as she backed away. The air around them was charged, sending tingling sensations through her body.
Gabriel was lit up like a freaking solar explosion, with bursts of light shooting out from all around him. And his hair was blowing around his face, even though there wasn’t a hint of a breeze. All the while, that horrifying light kept streaming out of his palm. Oh, my— No. She was not saying His name. Add one more thing to her list of dislikes about this man: He scared the crap out of her. She was out of there.
Rachel whirled and ran. He called after her, but she only ran faster. Terror shot adrenaline through her body, making it hard to breathe, to think, to function. But the primal need to survive was strong and clear. It was no longer a question of who this man was, but what he was. She didn’t want to know. In a world where vampires were a certainty, the possibility of numerous other monsters was too real. Not to mention the human monsters plaguing the world throughout history.
With her superhuman speed and the adrenaline jolt, she ran the miles to the hospital parking garage in record time. Heaving a sigh of relief, she dug her keys from her fanny pack as she jogged up the ramp to the third level. She looked toward her car, and utter shock jolted through her. The keys slipped from her fingers, clattered on the concrete.
“I didn’t mean to frighten you.” Gabriel pushed away from where he’d been leaning against her car and came toward her.
She backed away. “Don’t come near me.”
He stopped. “I won’t hurt you, Rachel. If I had evil intentions, I could have fulfilled them at any time. Right?”
That made sense, except she was so freaked, her mind wasn’t functioning very well at the moment. She took another step back.
“I’m here to help you,” he said. “I swear on all that’s holy it’s the truth.”
Holy didn’t have a place in her life anymore. “I keep telling you I don’t want any help. Go away.”
He sighed. “I can’t do that. Look, maybe I shouldn’t have shown you that power flash, but I wanted to assure you that I can take of myself. And to give you a glimpse of who I am.”
“I don’t care who you are. I just want you to leave me the hell alone.”
“I already told you I can’t do that.” He took a step closer, held out his hand as she turned to bolt. “Running is futile. I can track you wherever you go. Why don’t you hear me out before you do anything rash? You know you want to.”
There it was again—that hint of compulsion. She resisted it, as she debated what to do. She sensed sincerity behind his words. The fact he’d beaten her to her car—hell, that he even knew what she drove and where it was parked—showed he was very powerful. She probably couldn’t defeat him. She hated feeling powerless. When she left Germany, she had sworn she’d never be helpless, or at anyone’s mercy again.
“This isn’t about control or domination,” Gabriel said quietly.
Startled, she stared at him. Was he a mind reader as well? Here in the semilighted garage, he didn’t look very threatening. He appeared to be just an attractive man with thick, dark-blond hair and unusual blue eyes. Even the brightness he emanated was less obvious here, probably because of the lighting.
“I know you’ve suffered a lot, Rachel.”
She stiffened, realizing he was suddenly in front of her. How had he moved so quickly, without her seeing his movement?
He touched her, clasping her shoulders. Warmth tingled from his hands into her chilled body. She gasped, tried to step back, but he tightened his grip. “I’m here to show you how to move from a minimal existence to a full, meaningful life. The life you were denied in Germany. The life God wants you to have.”
That word again. “I don’t believe in Him. Let go of me.”
He ran his hands lightly down her arms. The electricity followed. “That doesn’t matter. She believes in you.”
“She?” Rachel realized she was getting distracted, brought her attention back to the matter at hand. “Never mind. I don’t want to know.”
He grinned, and the light around him surged. Damn. She needed sunglasses. “We can accomplish a lot without talking about She whose name you will not say,” he said.
How did he know about her aversion to God? And…She? “I still don’t understand.” Rachel tried to tug f
ree of his grasp, failed. Tried again, using superhuman force this time. Failed again. “Damn it! Let me go.” When he just looked at her, she considered, added, “Please.”
He released her, and the chill returned. She rubbed her now-cold arms, her mind running through options. She was smart, had been very bright when she was human, the top of her class in school. But it really didn’t take much intelligence to conclude she might as well listen to what he had to say. She couldn’t glamour him, couldn’t outrun him, and couldn’t overpower him. He had the upper hand—for now.
“So talk,” she said.
He stepped back, shoved his hands into his pockets. “You already know I’m here to help you. You suspect I’m some sort of monster. That’s not exactly right. I am, however, a supernatural being. But I’m on the good side.”
She couldn’t stop the question that tumbled out. “What are you?”
His gaze locked with hers, and his eyes grew even more luminous, taking on an otherworldly glow. “I’m an angel.”
Chapter 3
RACHEL stared at Gabe, her dark eyes huge in her porcelain-white face. She was fairly tall, probably around five feet, seven inches, but she was very slender, almost delicate. Her boots and suggestive clothing, along with her attitude, made her appear bigger and tougher, and her current incarnation as a vampire gave her superhuman strength. But he knew she was emotionally vulnerable.
“I don’t believe you.” She took a step backward. “Angels don’t exist. Just like G—Just like He…Her—oh, hell, whatever, doesn’t exist. You’re just another weirdo. Go mess with someone else.”
“We do exist. If I’m not an angel, how do you explain the burst of light from my palm earlier? Would you like a replay, just to be sure? Or some other display that might convince you?”
She shuddered. “No.”
“Then I guess you’re just going to have to accept my word in good faith.”
“Faith,” she scoffed. “Just what exactly should I have faith in?”
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