Wicked Nights

“No matter how strong your draw is for the demons, they should not have found you in my cloud. Should not have come for you.”

“What exactly draws them?” At the institution, he’d mentioned hatred, lying and the urge to commit violence, but she’d done her best to focus only on good things.

“What I told you before is still true,” he said, as though reading her mind, “but you are a special case. Your body carries the essentia of the demon who marked you, and that essentia radiates from you.”

She blinked in surprise. Such a simple answer, yet totally life changing. There was nothing she could do to stop radiating an essence she couldn’t even feel. “How did he mark me?”

Zacharel stalked to the dresser and dug through the drawers, finally pulling out a robe.

Urgency bombarded her, and she barely stopped herself from gripping his shoulders and shaking him. “Tell me! He kissed me and he licked me, but I had to have come into contact with him before that because the change in my eyes happened before that, and as you once so sweetly told me, my eyes belong to a demon.”

He said nothing.

She continued. “The morning of his attack, my eyes felt as if they’d been scrubbed raw and bleached. And after that, my parents… That first demon…” She cleared her throat. “I don’t understand why he came. It was my birthday, and I’d just had the most amazing dream. It should have been a perfect day.”

Zacharel stiffened. “Dream?”

“Yes.”

“You remember it?”

“Of course. I’ve relived it a thousand times.” She’d hoped to figure out what was wrong with it. At first, she’d loved it. But the more the scene had played through her mind, the more she’d realized something had been… off.

“Tell me.”

“A smoking-hot Prince Charming saved me from fire-breathing dragons and asked me if I was willing to help him. I said yes. He said I love you and want to be with you and I said how sweet, and he said will you be my woman, and I said yes, and he said then we are one. Then I woke up in the most agonizing pain.”

Zacharel ran his tongue over his teeth. “The prince was the demon, and he tricked you into agreeing to his claiming.”

“Uh, no. It was just a dream.” A dream that had stuck with her for years…

“No, you only thought it was a dream. He manipulated your mind, vulnerable as it was in sleep. When he asked you to be his woman, and you agreed, you became his slave.”

“But that’s… I didn’t mean…would never… They can do that to people?” she squeaked.

“If a human allows it, yes.”

“But…how could I have known what was happening?”

“You could have, if you had been trained to distinguish the truth from the lie.” When he stood in front of her, he tugged the robe over her head. “To keep you clean and warm.”

The material bagged on her, draping her arms and pooling at her feet.

“Do you wish to remove the leather?” he asked.

“Yes.” Since the robe shielded her body, she was able to contort this way and that to extract herself from the dirty, chafing clothing.

When she finished, she realized her skin was tingling and her cells fizzing, as though hundreds of butterflies were giving her a sponge bath. It was the strangest feeling, and she wasn’t sure if the robe or Zacharel’s nearness was responsible.

He lifted her hair from the collar, his fingertips brushing her nape, making her shiver. His nearness. Definitely his nearness.

He didn’t jerk away, as she expected, but lingered, saying, “Soft.”

Well, what do you know, she thought. He wasn’t as opposed to touching her, after all. “Why did you avoid coming into contact with me before?” she asked, veering away from the subject of demons. Right now, her mind needed a break. “And don’t try to say it wasn’t deliberate. You basically contorted your body to maintain distance, a move I invented to establish boundaries with other patients.”

“I lose track of everything important when you’re near me,” he grumbled.

Everything important, he’d said. Meaning, she was not. Nice. “Such a romantic,” she muttered, slapping his hand away. “You’re lucky I’m not one of those girls who burst into tears at every little insult.”

“That was not an insult.” He frowned, and while she knew he hadn’t meant for his expression to pulse with sensuality, his lack of chill caused just that, an erotic throb inside her, where want blended with need. “And I am not trying to romance you.”

“Believe me, I know.”

Frown deepening, he stepped away from her, at last ending the contact. “Do you want me to romance you?”

Yes. “No.” You’re not very fond of men right now, remember? Not even sexy angel men.

“Then as we were saying.” Zacharel cleared his throat, and even that was steeped with his innate sensuality. “We must kill the demon who made that claim on you.”

Demons again. The break was over.

“When you agreed to be his slave,” he continued, “you gave him permission to do whatever he wanted with you. However, when he dies the marking will fade and the others, the weaker minions, will lose interest in you.”

“So…the hunted must become the hunter?”

“Exactly. If we do not do this, you will never find peace.”

Wait. “You said we.”

“Yes.”

“You’re willing to help me?” He’d promised to train her, yeah, but this was more than training. This was dedication to a cause that was not truly his own.

“Yes,” he repeated.

Gratitude nearly overwhelmed her. “I owe you, not the other way around. Why would you—” She pressed her lips together. If she continued along this line, she might talk him out of helping her. “Thank you. Just…thank you.”

“You are welcome. Once you are free of the demon’s essentia, you can live a long, happy life on your own. I am not saying there will never be another storm; those are simply a part of life. But you will never again experience thunder and lightning like this.”

With his words, the answer to her unfinished question slid into place. Zacharel wanted to be free of her. That hurt, but she wouldn’t complain. Aid was aid, no matter the reason behind it.

“I know you’re going above and beyond duty already, but I need something besides assistance from you,” she said, peering down at her feet. “Will you…well, uh, will you spend the next month with me…away from the heavens unless you have a battle to fight? Without asking me why?”

A pause.

A really long pause.

She glanced up.

Fury and pleasure blazed in Zacharel’s eyes.

Why the fury? For that matter, why the pleasure?

Doesn’t matter.

“Please,” she said.

“I will not ask why you want me out of the heavens. There is no need. I know the way of the angels, and I can guess. I want to know if you negotiated,” he said sharply.