Demon Marked

Relief struck him like a punch to the heart, and he clenched his teeth against the need to get up and to seek her out now. He’d stayed up, waiting for her to come back, keeping the fire high and the cabin warm, but when 2 a.m. passed and Ash still hadn’t returned, he realized she might not want to return until she was certain she’d be alone.

He probably should have realized it earlier. Leaving the house had made the message pretty clear: Even the cold was better than in the cabin with him.

But she had returned, if only because of the bargain. And since it was his only hold on her, Nicholas still wouldn’t release her. It was the only reason the bargain mattered now. He didn’t care if Madelyn came.

He just didn’t want Ash to go.

But she already was. He shot out of bed when he realized her footsteps were crossing back to the door—as if she’d only come in to retrieve something, and was leaving again.

Not yet. “Ash?”

At his voice, she paused in the doorway, her shotgun in hand. The moonlight gleamed on her pale hair, left her face in shadow. “It’s one of the wolves, I think. I’ll take care of it.”

The door closed. Nicholas shook his head. The wolves. What was she taking care of?

He crossed to the front door. The freezing air immediately bit at his bare skin. The moonlit clearing lay empty, and the darkness beyond the tree line impenetrable. She could have gone any direction, and the snow wasn’t fresh enough to follow her tracks.

Disappointment eating a hole in his chest, he turned back—and heard the faint noise. A sharp, plaintive bark followed a series of ululating yips. An animal, obviously in pain. What was Ash planning to do? Take care of it?

Jesus. She shouldn’t do that alone. Helping it might mean getting close to it, and even as fast and strong as she was, an animal—a fucking wolf—could still hurt her, and one that was trapped or in pain would be more likely to lash out.

And if was hurt so badly it had to be put down, she shouldn’t have to do that, either.

He headed back inside, hauled on his clothes in the dark. Grabbing a flashlight and his rifle, he slung the weapon over his shoulder and picked up the snowmobile keys. Outside, he listened, searching for the direction again. All was quiet. Was it already done?

No movement in the tree line—though he didn’t know if she was coming back. Maybe he’d take the snowmobile out anyway, look for any recent tracks, make certain she was all right.

Halfway to the shed, he realized that the possibility she’d hurt the wolf had never even occurred to him.

Stunned to the core, he stopped, staring blankly into the night. It hadn’t occurred to him. And even now that he realized it hadn’t, not a single doubt existed within him. It was the perfect opportunity for a demon to torture an animal—isolated, with no one to hear and the evidence easily erased. But when he considered Ash, he rejected the idea as impossible.

Ash simply wouldn’t. Maybe every other demon on Earth and in Hell would, but Ash wouldn’t.

If he went out there looking for her, got lost in the snow, needed help, every other demon would ignore his shouts—or maybe even come in close enough to gloat while he froze to death. Ash wouldn’t. She’d simply come. Even tonight, when she couldn’t stand the sight of him, she’d come.

He’d been wrong, all this time. Not wrong to doubt at first, but to doubt for so long. He’d been waiting to get his head on straight, to figure out how to make sense of her, and now finally, finally, it did. She was an exception. He didn’t know how, but he’d help her find out.

For now, he just needed to find her. Tell her. And pray it wasn’t too late to matter.

Almost laughing at the lightness the realization left in him, he scanned the tree line again. And there she was. The soft red glow moving toward the cabin through the trees.

He went to meet her.

Up and down, up and down. Her emotions had gone through the most insane day of her life—that she could remember—and this was an up again. Her eyes glowed with it. She needed to learn how to control that, eventually. Right now, she didn’t care.

She glanced at the dog limping along beside her. His foot had been caught in an old, rusty trap—probably one that Nicholas’s survivalist grandfather had used, but hadn’t been pulled up after he died. Not the wolf she’d expected, but a black Labrador, and friendly enough after eating the chunk of meat she’d collected from the cabin’s icebox. Not a stray, either. Too well fed and wearing a collar, he’d obviously belonged to someone until recently, and had either gotten lost or had been dumped by his previous owners.

Too bad for them. He was hers now. She liked him—even if he had bitten her when she’d pressed the trap’s jaws open. But she’d understood that, all too well. Being hurt made her want to bite someone, too.

Not just someone. Nicholas.

Who was in the distance, trudging through the snow toward her, almost like a wild man. What in the world?

“Ash!”

She’d never heard him call her name like that, an almost desperate note to the deep tones. Did he need help? She glanced at the limping dog. He’d already resisted when she’d tried to carry him.

“I’ll be back for you. I’ll be right back.”

As if in reply, the dog chuffed. Her boomstick tucked beneath her arm, Ash gave a little laugh and took off through the snow. Slowing as she neared Nicholas, she searched his appearance for any sign of injury. No. His breathing was labored from plowing through the deep snow, but he moved with strength, speed. He just seemed . . . intent. Focused. On her. She reached him, stopped knee-deep in the snow, but he didn’t. For an instant she thought he’d plow right over her, but then he stopped, and his gloved hands came up to gently capture her face.

He kissed her.

Not like before. Not like ever before. His lips icy from the cold, but firm, and sweet, he kissed her as if it were the first time, the last, as if it were the only thing that mattered.

His mouth broke from hers. His breath was ragged. “I’m sorry, Ash. I was wrong. And I’m so damn sorry.”

She didn’t understand—or couldn’t believe it. “What?”

“You’re an exception. Maybe the exception, I don’t know.” His pale blue gaze held hers. Not icy at all, and hers washed his face in a red glow, but he wasn’t drawing away. “And I’m sorry.”

She couldn’t seem to catch her breath. This was a good feeling, the happiness bubbling through her. So why did it seem to crush her chest, sting her eyes, make her want to cry with it? She thought her smile wobbled a little, but it didn’t matter, because he kissed it away, and this time there was more beneath it—more strength, more heat, more need. Almost perfect.

Except she couldn’t lift her hands and hold him to her. Couldn’t push her fingers through his hair.

A soft whine broke them apart. Nicholas frowned, looking through the dark.

He couldn’t see the dog, she realized. She turned, and let her eyes provide the light he needed. “His leg was in a trap.”

Nicholas nodded before crouching, pulling off his glove and holding out his hand. The dog came over, sniffed, and then seemed to groan when Nicholas’s long fingers moved to scratch behind his ear.

“Is the leg broken?”

“I don’t think so, but he’s hurt enough that he lashed out at me, knocked me over onto my ass.” And apparently broke open some of her shotgun shells in the process. She could still smell the sweet hellhound venom. “I’ll look at his leg again in the cabin, see how bad it is.”

Nicholas’s eyes closed, almost as if in relief. His voice roughened. “So we are taking him in?”

“Yes.”

“All right, then.”

Nicholas stood, pulled on his glove. He gave her a hard kiss before pushing into the already furrowed trench he’d made through the snow. They made quick time back to the cabin, and Ash got the dog settled in with a blanket near the stove and a bowl of water while Nicholas changed out of his heavy clothes.