Shadow Marked @page { margin-bottom: 5.000000pt; margin-top: 5.000000pt; } Table of Contents Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Acknowledgments CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN CHAPTER ELEVEN CHAPTER TWELVE CHAPTER THIRTEEN CHAPTER FOURTEEN CHAPTER FIFTEEN CHAPTER SIXTEEN CHAPTER SEVENTEEN CHAPTER EIGHTEEN CHAPTER NINETEEN CHAPTER TWENTY CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO EPILOGUE Teaser chapter Praise for the Novels of Anna J. Evans �śEvans pens a tale that is hot, scary, and sweet all at the same time. The protagonists �Ś will keep you turning the pages long into the night, and the happy ending is emotional enough to please any romance fan.” �"Romantic Times (4½ stars) � �śAnna J. Evans weaves a tale full of passion, intrigue, betrayal, and friendship that will leave readers in awe of the raw power behind the words.” �"Romance Junkies � �śEnough sexual heat to create an avalanche.” �"Fallen Angel Reviews � �śArousing, amorous �Ś pulled me right into their sexual encounters�Ś. Ms. Evans’s storytelling ability was amazing, without a single flaw.” �"The Romance Studio � �śA powerful story about the deep and undeniable connection between soul mates�Ś. The love scenes were so primal and raw that you’re going to want to keep a spare pair of dry panties, a bucket of ice, and extra batteries nearby.” �"TwoLips Reviews � �śExtraordinary�Ś. I didn’t put this down until it was read all the way through.” �"Romance Divas SIGNET ECLIPSE Published by New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Book Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 CommunityCentre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi -110017, India Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WCR2 0RL, England First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. First Printing, May 2010 Copyrights © Stacey Iglesias Fedele, 2010 Map by Cristina Gupta All rights reserved SIGNET ECLIPSE and logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Evans, Anna J. Shadow marked: a demon bound novel/Anna J. Evans. p. cm. �śA Signet Eclipse book.” eISBN : 978-1-101-42739-2 1. Blind women�"Fiction. 2. Psychics�"Fiction. 3. Demons�"Fiction. I. Title. PS3605.V363S53 2010 813′.6�"dc22 2009051310 Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. PUBLISHER’S NOTE This is a work of fiction. Namer, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidential. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their contents. The scanning uploading, and distribution of this book via the internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. http://us.penguingroup.com For Mike. Again. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Big thanks to Kerry Donovan and the production team at NAL. You all are a joy to work with! Thanks also to my agent, Caren Johnson, to my wonderful, supportive family, and to my amazing readers. I couldn’t do any of this writing stuff without you. CHAPTER ONE Samantha Quinn wasn’t afraid of the dark. Even when she was walking the edge of the ruins, where the demonic infestation had transformed New York City’s Greenwich Village into a maze of rubble inhabited by bloodthirsty predators, the darkness could be an unexpected ally. The scary things got cocky in the shadows. Careless. They made noise�"claws on the concrete, rough skin scraping along crumbling brick, eager breath rasping through thickly scaled lips�"things even a sighted person could hear if they were really listening. To a woman who’d been legally blind since the age of six, the sounds of an approaching demon were like gunshots�"impossible not to notice, and easy to avoid if you had practice ducking and covering. Which she did. A girl couldn’t grow up on the south end of the island without learning how to run and hide. Or when to pay attention to the feeling that something bad was going to happen. �śI’ll be there in ten, fifteen minutes, tops.” �śWonderful! We can’t wait to�"” �śGotta hang up. Bye.” Sam tapped the bud clipped to her ear, ending the phone call without waiting for Mrs. Choe to say her good-byes. Ellen and her husband, Chang-su, had lived in the neighborhood for forty years and raised four children in the wake of the infestation twenty years before�"when demons emerging from caves beneath the Atlantic Ocean had found the densely populated, burrowlike habitats they sought in the cities of New York and Boston. The Choes knew there were times when safety dictated the rude termination of a phone call. But they wouldn’t be worried. Demons were easy to avoid if you stuck to the main streets and made a run for it on the rare occasions when the creatures prowled too near to the edge of the ruins. The descendants of the ancient dinosaurs weren’t particularly quick. They had to rely on their prey being careless and letting them get close enough to employ the demons’ various deadly natural weapons. Sam wouldn’t let them get close. She had these streets memorized, and her ability to distinguish areas of light and dark kept her from running into any large obstacles. Sure, she had her share of spills, but she felt confident she could take care of herself, even on the city streets. It’s just dumb luck, Sam. Someday you’ll fall at the wrong time and something will get you. Ah, Stephen. Brother, friend, voice of doom. Why was it always his voice that got going in her head at night, when she was trying to pull off the �śbrave New Yorker” thing? Because I’m right. You know I’m right. You should move back in with me so you’ll have someone looking out for you, so you won’t�" Sam did her best to banish her brother’s voice, focusing on where she was going, not where she’d been, increasing her speed until her sandals made tiny scraping noises against the concrete as they chased the white cane tapping ahead. She was on her own now. She had her own place, her own life, and she didn’t need anyone taking care of her, no matter what her brother thought. The Choes hadn’t been surprised to hear she’d finally gotten her own apartment. But then, they’d never treated her like an invalid or an oddity. To them, she was just another girl from the neighborhood, and the only florist they wanted to handle their daughter’s wedding. Sam was gradually making a name for herself above the demon barricade, but Hand Picked was already the hottest thing going below Fourteenth Street. Arranging flowers based solely on smell and texture created some fairly fantastic-looking combinations. Obviously Sam had never seen any of her own arrangements, aside from the occasional silhouette when the sun shone brightly through her shop window, but she took her clients’ word for it that they were stunning. Old friends or not, the Choes wouldn’t hire less than the best for their daughter. They’d finally gotten Sin Moon hooked up with a nice Korean boy who owned a house in the suburbs, far from the dangerous community where they’d been trapped when property values plummeted in the wake of the infestation. They meant to stage a wedding celebration worthy of such an event. And they wanted to approve every last detail months in advance. Hence the centerpiece Sam was presently cradling with her left arm. She’d promised to bring the sample arrangement over as soon as she finished cleaning up the shop for the day, no matter what the hour. But as the pungent smell of fresh demon waste mingled with the scents of lavender and wild roses, she began to doubt the wisdom of journeying out alone after seven o’clock. Demonic attacks had been on the rise in recent months. Attacks always increased in the spring, when the warmer temperatures brought certain breeds out of their winter hibernation, but this year it was worse than usual. Just like her dreams�"worse than usual. She’d been tortured by nightmares since the night she lost her sight when she was six years old. At this point, she couldn’t remember what a good night’s sleep felt like. She was accustomed to bolting awake two or three times a night, soaked in sweat, screaming for the giant, shadowy fingers that crept through her dreams to stop hurting people. It would have been bad enough if the dreams were just dreams, but they weren’t. Once the shadow fingers touched someone, it was only a matter of time. Cancer, the loss of a family member, the loss of that person’s own life�"it was impossible to guess what tragedy would befall the touched, but Sam no longer doubted that tragedy would come. Knowing suffering was on the horizon was her �śgift.” Her best guess was that what she’d gone through as a child had somehow caused her ability, but she had no idea how to make it stop. Or how to help the people she dreamed about, even when she was able to guess their identity from the brief flashes she recalled upon waking. That had been awful when the dreams were filled with shadows and frightened voices crying out for help, but lately her nights had grown worse. She dreamed she was a man turned inside out by some kind of animal, a girl beaten in a dark corner, a woman with blood running down her face. Each dream was more vivid, more horrific than the last. She hadn’t been able to identify any of the people, but still �Ś Knowing those things might happen to someone made her crazy, but she didn’t know who to turn to for help. Stephen had never believed in his sister’s ability to predict the awfulness coming to people in the near future, no matter how much proof she presented. Still, Sam could tell when a bad dream was more than just a nightmare. She could smell it on the air. Taste it on her tongue, sharp and bitter. �śCrap,” she whispered under her breath as the wind shifted, carrying a hint of damp ocean mixed with garbage from the Chinese restaurant down the block, along with something cold and spicy and �Ś evil smelling. The last note wasn’t something she could define, but she’d smelled the scent before, two nights ago, while running through a nightmare that had left her shaking, drenched in sweat but too terrified to get up and change her nightgown. It was the smell of pure horror, a smell that reminded her of the time when her parents had plucked her from her warm bed and carried her out to the barn in the middle of the night. It had been a spring night like this one. She’d been sucking her thumb as she snuggled into her dad’s flannel shirt, even though she was supposed to be breaking the habit. She was six years old, and big girls didn’t suck their thumbs. Only babies like baby Emma, her new little sister, sucked their thumbs. Mom and Dad said so. Mom and Dad also said that the elders were just playing a game when they put her in the middle of a circle drawn in red, next to the wooden box her archaeologist father had brought home from his last dig. They were tying her hands and feet only to make sure she didn’t smear the markings, they said. No, it wouldn’t hurt, they said. �śYes, baby, you’ll be fine.” But it had hurt and she hadn’t been fine. Luckily, the police from the town nearby found out what the grown-ups were doing and came to take all the kids on the compound away. But not before it was too late, not before the cold, awful-smelling thing had invaded Sam’s body, wriggled inside her mind, and stolen her sight. The doctors she’d visited couldn’t explain how it had happened. Not a single one could explain why Sam couldn’t see. According to their fancy equipment and sophisticated tests, nothing necessary to sight had been damaged. One doctor had even suggested Sam’s blindness was psychosomatic. She’d kicked that guy in the shin, twice, before her brother pulled her away. She’d been nine years old and unsure what �śpsychosomatic” meant, but figured it wasn’t something good. She could read condescension loud and clear, even as a child, and had known the doctor was wrong. Her parents had been demon worshipers, members of one of many cults that believed the emergence of the animalistic demons heralded the coming of hell on earth. Ancient artifacts discovered near the various caves from which the demons had emerged foretold a world where invisible demons lived within human hosts, possessing them so completely that the human soul vanished. And she knew the invisible demons her parents had summoned were responsible for her blindness. Sam’s parents had believed in this terrifying new world. They’d been archaeologists themselves and sworn the little wooden box they’d pulled from the ground during their last dig in China left them no choice but to believe. And to fear. But they’d been sure the invisible demons were intelligent beings�"unlike the animal-like demons that had infested the major cities�"and that they would reward those who helped them become flesh with exemption from infestation and positions of power in the new world order. Sam hadn’t understood all that at the time, but her studies the past few years had helped her to make sense of her parents’ beliefs. Her parents’ madness, Stephen would say. But Sam wasn’t sure that her parents had been mad. Her memories told her something different from her brother’s. The last thing she remembered seeing with her six-year-old eyes was the rafters of the old barn wavering like pavement on a hot day. The air had been filled with alien screeching as she yelled for her mom and dad and then for her blankie, a part of her sensing her pale pink blanket with the faded hearts would offer more comfort than either of her parents. She’d heard Stephen yelling, too, begging for mercy for their baby sister, who howled as she was placed within the circle of blood. He’d pleaded for one of the grown-ups to do something, to�" Somewhere, deep in the ruins, a young girl screamed, startling Sam from her memories and nearly making her drop the flowers she’d worked on all afternoon. �śDamn it.” She stumbled to the side, regaining her grip on the basket, but clocking her shoulder on something big, hard, and foul smelling in the process. A Dumpster, but one that wasn’t used much. The stink wasn’t fresh, but more the lingering sourness of ancient vegetables mixed with rotted meat and coffee grounds. Gross, but it was probably the best hiding place she was going to find around here. After using her cane to check the area behind the Dumpster�"grateful for once for the smaller demons that had all but eliminated the city’s rat problem south of the barricade�"Sam set the centerpiece on the ground and turned back to the ruins. She’d never ventured inside by herself and had dared take the shortcut between her apartment and her brother’s bar only when accompanied by half a dozen of his biggest, burliest friends, but for some reason she had to follow to its source the cold, slippery energy oozing across her skin. The scream hadn’t come again, but the smell was stronger than ever, as was the certainty that something horrible was happening. A woman had screamed in her dream and there had been blood, so much blood. She’d felt it as if she were in the woman’s skin. It had oozed down her face, hot and wet, slipping between her lips before she could think to shut her mouth. She’d had her share of portentous dreams, but never anything so violent. She was positive that if she didn’t find the woman who’d screamed before whatever hunted her did, blood would be spilled and an innocent person would die. For once, she had a chance to do something to prevent the awful thing she’d seen from happening. There was no way she could live with herself if she didn’t at least try. Still, the rational part of her mind argued that she should call for one of the many demon-control patrols always a scream away in this part of Manhattan. It was their job to keep the streets safe, to make sure the thousands of tourists who came to New York to see the demonic urban habitat didn’t get themselves killed trying to get a picture of some of the more fantastic species. Even decades after the initial emergence, people were still fascinated by the dangerous, extraordinary-looking creatures. And as long as they stayed in their tour bus, demons weren’t usually a threat�"at least, no more so than lions observed from a jeep trundling through the African savanna. The barriers erected in the collapsed subway tunnels and the Fourteenth Street barricade kept the demons contained, and the demon-control patrols took down the rare beast that dared to leave the habitat they had created during the destruction of the initial infestation. Demon control also dealt with the homeless and the drunks, and looked into the reports of concerned citizens. They would take a report, get a police task force down here within a half hour, and�" The scream came again, higher and even more terrified. �śAnd they’ll be too late,” Sam said, setting a swift pace toward the sound. She tripped twice on the uneven pavement before she reached the first bend in the path, and the smell actually seemed to be growing fainter as she walked, but she didn’t think of turning back. She was the only one who could save this woman. Hell, she might be the only one who could even hear her. Whether it was simply that her ears functioned better than an average person’s because she was missing one of her other senses, or something more paranormal in nature, Sam had always heard things other people missed. Like the sound of something breathing nearby. Something big. Really big. Heart thudding in her throat, Sam edged closer to the crumbling buildings on her right, moving into the darkest shadows, where most people would never think to look. Her gut told her that, whatever she’d heard, it wasn’t human, but getting out of the middle of the path couldn’t hurt. There were human predators here as well. Several of the most violent city gangs called the ruins home. With crime in New York at an all-time high, everything below Fourteenth Street was low-priority to the metro police once typical tourist hours were over. They assumed the freaks who chose to live next door to demon nests deserved what they got, including a bunch of thugs for neighbors. No one seemed to remember that the prices the government had offered people for their homes in the wake of the infestation hadn’t been enough to pay for the moving trucks out of Manhattan. A lot of the families had been stuck where they were, figuring a home next to demons was better than no home at all. And, in the beginning, they’d all expected the government to do something about the infested wreckage. But demons were as ancient as cockroaches and just as hard to get rid of. Then there was the matter of demon tourism. In a global economy ravaged by the recession of the early part of the century, anything that brought money into the city was considered a good thing. Eventually, government officials had stopped trying to eradicate the demon habitat, settling for a half-assed kind of population control accomplished largely by freelance bounty hunters who flocked to the city to hunt amid the ruins. Bounty hunters who were often just as dangerous as the creatures they hunted. Whoever or whatever was watching her, its breath slowly getting swift and shallow with excitement, it wasn’t a good thing. It was a bad thing. A very bad thing, and that very bad thing was ready to pounce upon the prey it had spotted in the shadows. It was simply waiting for the right moment, enjoying the fear it could feel rolling from its victim. Sam tasted the mocha she’d made just before leaving the shop and swallowed hard. Now wasn’t the time to lose control of her stomach. She could do that later, bent over the cool bowl in her cozy apartment, worshiping the porcelain god the way she had on her eighteenth birthday, when her brother had finally allowed her to order anything she wanted from his bar. God, Stephen was going to go crazy when he found out she’d been wandering around here by herself, acting like some drunk tourist who wanted to dance with the devil in the pale moonlight. He’d warned her a thousand times not to go within fifty feet of the ruins. He was going to kill her for getting killed like this. The thought was almost enough to make Sam laugh, even though the giant, breathing thing was so close she could taste it. Fire and sulfur and the hint of some exotic fruit, mixed with the unmistakable smell of demon waste. It was definitely a demon, but not the one she’d smelled before. The scent from her dream was gone, vanished along with the sound of the woman’s screams. Whoever she’d heard, the woman was probably already dead. And now, because she was a stupid blind girl who thought she could play the hero, she was going to die, too. �śBut I’m going to hurt you first,” she whispered to the thing in front of her as she thumbed open the secret compartment on her cane, flicking the switch that turned the red-tipped end deadly. Switchblades were illegal in the city, so she assumed switch-canes weren’t something the police would approve of�"especially when the woman wielding the knife couldn’t see where she was aiming her deadly weapon�"but abiding by the letter of the law wasn’t a priority for most Southies. Sam wasn’t any different. Being blind didn’t automatically mean she was a law-abiding citizen or helpless or sweet. Or willing to wait for someone else to make the first move. �śCome and get me already,” she yelled, lifting her cane and lunging forward, aiming a few inches below where it seemed the breath was coming from. An outraged squeal echoed off the bricks, but there wasn’t time to celebrate her hit. Seconds later, her cane was ripped from her hands and the smell of fruit got even stronger as something whizzed by her face. Shit! She’d heard of demons that shot poison quills into their prey to immobilize them before they began to feed. They were alleged to be relatively small for demons, but size didn’t matter when you were passed out cold on the ground and the thing coming for you had sharp teeth and claws. Sam ducked and felt the air stir above her head. So far, she’d been lucky, but she could avoid a hit for only so long. She had to put some distance between her and the demon before it was too late. Whirling around with her hands held out in front of her, Sam started to run, praying she remembered the obstacles she’d encountered on the way in well enough to avoid them. Without her cane, she had no way of �śseeing” the ground in front of her before she stepped, no way of�" She cursed as she tripped over something round and hard and fell to the ground, the whizzing needles of the demon that hunted her pinging against the concrete near her scraped hands. On instinct, Sam curled into a fetal position, her body still trying to protect itself though her mind knew this was it. She was down, and the thing behind her was coming, and this time there would be no escape. All of a sudden she was six years old again, bound and tied and waiting for the invisible demons the cult had summoned to take what her parents had invited them to take, to steal what they needed to steal. But this time, it wouldn’t be just her eyes. This time, it would be her life. CHAPTER TWO If he were a different kind of man, Jace would have let the woman die. The hardened core of him might still have considered it, just for a second, if it had been anyone else. Anyone other than her. But watching Samantha Quinn fall to the ground, her long, silky black hair tangling around her frightened face, obscuring those big brown eyes, Jace couldn’t do anything but shoot the creature he’d been tracking for three days. Even though killing the Ju Du demon would mean forfeiting his bounty and facing a death threat or two if any of the other hunters found out he was the one who put the thing down. The city wanted demons taken alive or not taken at all. Once it had been decided demons weren’t any more dangerous than other earthly predators, scientists and conservation groups the world over had put pressure on the infested cities to �śhumanely” dispose of the surplus demon population. And royally fucked the bounty hunters in the process. Gone were the days when a dead body was all a hunter needed. Now there were licenses and quotas and different seasons for open hunting. Like deer season, but with animals that could kill you. It was dangerously absurd. But absurd or not, the city didn’t pay for dead meat, and his competition wouldn’t be pleased to hear he’d taken out one of the rarest and highest-bountied species to roam the Southie ruins. But he didn’t have a choice. Sam wasn’t just a friend’s kid sister or a girl he’d watched grow up in the neighborhood. Jace couldn’t say exactly what she was to him, just that something inside of him threatened to snap when he thought about a world without Sam Quinn. She didn’t deserve to die like this; she and her brother had been through enough. Who does, and ain’t everyone? She’s still screwing your capture, boy. You should charge her for being gracious enough to let her live. He could hear Uncle Francis’s old-school Brooklyn accent ringing in his ears as he exchanged his stun gun for the automatic at his hip�"the stun wasn’t guaranteed to immobilize prey with the first shot�"but it didn’t slow him down. He’d learned a long time ago that he wasn’t as mercenary as the man who’d raised him would have him be, but he was mercenary enough. The fact that he’d get only a couple of death threats for killing this demon spoke for itself. Ninety-nine percent of the men working the ruins wouldn’t dare cross Jace Lu, and it wasn’t just that his connections to the old Italian Mafia or New York’s Chinese Triad struck fear into the hearts of the competition. Jace was one scary motherfucker all on his own. He’d gotten his Chinese father’s coloring and stick-straight hair, but the rest of him was all Grandpa Joe. His petite mother’s dad had been a six-feet-four muscleman for the mob from the day he turned sixteen until the day he died of a heart attack at age sixty. He’d never missed a day at the gym or a dinner at the family restaurant. Jace would have hoped to make it a few more years, since he kept his manicotti consumption to Thursday meetings and the occasional Sunday brunch, but bounty hunting wasn’t a career known for its longevity. He’d be lucky to make it to forty, and usually that was fine with him. The struggle for survival was overrated at best, and damned torturous at its worst. Tonight, however, he figured he should do his best to stick around. If he weren’t here, Sam would be dead, which bothered him more than he’d like to admit. �śDon’t move,” Jace shouted as Sam curled into a ball on the ground, just barely avoiding another set of poison quills the Ju Du shot from its spiny underbelly. The quills wouldn’t kill her, but getting ripped open and eaten alive seconds later certainly would. There was no time for strategy. He was simply going to have to blow the demon away and hope Sam didn’t get hit by any poisoned flying debris. Sam didn’t scream when he fired. Jace had to give her credit for that. She lay perfectly still and quiet until the Ju Du was in pieces and the sharp reports of gunfire had faded, echoing away down the twisted corridors of the Southie ruins. But when he crossed to her, satisfied to see she hadn’t been hit by any quills, she was crying�"big, fat tears that streamed out of her haunting eyes. Damn crying women. The sight sickened him. He couldn’t help it. Seeing a woman cry made him nauseous. It made him want to slam his fist into a wall, or run until his lungs exploded, or kill something. Or maybe all three. Even knowing why he responded the way he did couldn’t help him get himself under control. In fact, it was all he could do not to turn and run from Sam and her tears. He’d been a bounty hunter since he was fifteen years old and could count the times he’d run from a demon on one hand and still have fingers left over. But facing down a demon never brought those memories to the surface, the ones he did his best to pretend didn’t belong to him. Tears brought them back, big-time. �śI’m sorry. Sorry,” Sam said, sucking in a deep breath and biting her bottom lip, as if she could tell how her tears affected him. �śThanks, Jace,” she said, tilting her chin until it seemed she was looking him straight in the face. It was hard to believe she was blind when you looked into those wide, melted-chocolate eyes. Sam’s eyes seemed to see everything. She looked all the way to a man’s core and took his measure. When it came to Jace, he could tell she’d never entirely approved of what she saw. He could understand the feeling. It was one of the reasons he avoided mirrors. �śWhat the fuck were you doing back here?” he asked, not bothering to ask how she’d known it was him. Sam always knew. �śI heard someone screaming.” Her fingers tightened around the hand he placed in hers. Jace hauled her to her feet, marveling at how light she felt, even for a thin woman. It felt like her bones were made of something more fragile than the average person’s, and Jace was suddenly possessed of the urge to go buy her a sandwich. Something big and sloppy, with lots of meat and cheese and mayo. Instead, he dropped her hand as quickly as possible. He didn’t buy women meals. He didn’t buy anyone meals, even something as innocent as a sandwich. Sharing food was an intimacy he reserved for the Italian side of his family and no one else, and there were times when he’d have preferred to skip Thursday dinners at the restaurant. Even with family, he liked to keep a bit of distance. It was safer that way. �śYou didn’t hear someone screaming. The Ju Du makes that sound when it’s hunting, to scare the Sqat demons out of their burrows.” �śNo, I’m sure I heard a person. A woman, or maybe a girl,” Sam said, her fingers twining anxiously in the gauzy fabric of her dress. It was loose, but transparent enough that Jace could see the outline of the bra she wore underneath, which made him angrier. Someone should have told Sam that her dress was almost see-through. She wasn’t the type who would want to draw attention to herself. It seemed like someone should give the blind girl a heads-up. Too bad it wouldn’t be him. If he wasn’t going to buy Sam a sandwich, he certainly wasn’t going to bring up the subject of her underwear. �śI didn’t think anyone else would be able to get to her in time. I guess I didn’t get to her in time, either. I can’t hear her anymore,” Sam continued, her voice trembling a bit, though her eyes remained dry. �śDon’t worry,” Jace said, strangely compelled to put her mind at ease. �śI didn’t see anyone in the ruins tonight. Except you. There aren’t any other women stupid enough to come in here alone.” �śThanks.” Her lips turned down at the corners. �śMaybe you’re right. I can’t hear her anymore. And I can’t smell it�Ś.” �śSmell it?” �śThere was this smell. It wasn’t just a demon smell. It was cold and �Ś evil. I know that sounds crazy, but�"” �śWhat’s crazy is that you decided you’d investigate the evil smell. By yourself. Without a weapon.” �śI had a weapon. My cane has a knife built into the end.” �śYeah, I saw that,” Jace said, glad his tone didn’t betray his admiration. He’d been impressed to see that Sam had rigged a weapon into her cane, but she didn’t need to know that. No reason to encourage this insane idea that she was equipped to protect herself, let alone anyone else. �śAnd how long did you keep a hold on that? Two seconds, maybe three?” �śI wounded the demon. I bought myself some time,” she said, her usually pale cheeks flushed with two bright spots of red he could see even in the dimness of the lights the community watch had installed on the outer edges of the ruins. �śIf I hadn’t tripped, there’s a good chance I could have made it�"” �śMade it a few more feet before the Ju Du ripped you open?” �śI did what I felt I had to do,” she said, tilting her stubborn little chin into the air. She looked like a bird when she cocked her head to the side like that, like one of those tiny brown sparrows that covered the statues in the park in winter. Except prettier. Why hadn’t he ever noticed how pretty Sam had become? It was probably the stupid see-through dress, making him look at her in a way no one should ever look at a friend’s little sister. �śWhat you did was make a dumb call that almost got you killed.” �śThanks,” she said, hurt and sarcasm warring in her tone. �śIf you’re done telling me how stupid I am, I’d like my cane, please.” �śI should tell your brother what happened here tonight,” Jace threatened as he fetched the cane from where it had fallen a few feet away. �śI’m sure Stephen would love to hear about his little sister wandering around in the ruins by herself.” �śI don’t care what you tell Stephen.” She snatched the cane from his hand with surprising accuracy. �śI’m a grown woman and I’ll wander wherever I damn well please.” �śWell, you might not want to wander much farther in that dress,” he said, before he could think better of it. �śIt’s almost see-through.” �śReally?” she asked. �śAlmost?” �śYeah. Almost. I can almost see �Ś things I shouldn’t see.” �śLike what? My bra?” Her smile was obvious now. It was a mocking smile, an amused smile, the smile of a woman who knew her goddamned dress was transparent. And liked it that way. �śTurn around,” he said, his words as hard as the bulge pressing against the fly of his jeans. He did not get a boner from girls like Samantha Quinn, even if they were deliberately wearing see-through clothing. The fact that his body was telling him otherwise pissed him off. �śI’ll walk you back to your place.” �śI’m not going back to my place.” She twisted her arm, pulling free from the hand he’d wrapped around her elbow. �śOh, yes, you are.” He reached for her, but she sidestepped, almost as if she could see him coming. �śNo, I’m not.” Up came the chin again as she half jogged toward the street, cane tapping quickly in front of her. �śI have an errand to run.” �śI don’t give a shit if you’ve got an�"” �śI have an appointment!” When Jace grabbed her she tried to twist away from him again, but this time he held firm. Still, even having at least six inches and fifty pounds on the woman, Sam wasn’t easy to hold on to. She probably would have given one of the smaller demons a run for its money with her deadly little cane. It was only bad luck that she’d crossed paths with a Ju Du. �śYou can reschedule.” �śI can’t! I’m late already. Jace, let go of me.” She twisted in his arms, nearly brushing against where he was in a most inappropriate state. Fucking hard-on. He obviously needed to make time to stop by Deanna’s for a quickie if a little mouse like Sam Quinn was making him respond like this. �śI have flowers hidden behind a Dumpster!” He laughed, a sharp bark of sound that surprised him. �śBehind a Dumpster?” �śI knew I had to have my hands free,” she said, spinning to face him when he released her arms. �śI’m not totally stupid.” �śJust mostly stupid,” he said, his voice harder than he intended. But the thought of her doing something like this again scared him, and he wasn’t a man who experienced fear often. He didn’t like it. He needed to be certain she was going to make smarter decisions in the future. �śI don’t want to see you anywhere near this area again.” �śWhat?” �śYou heard me. Stay clear of the streets near the ruins. Call Stephen to come get you, or call a car service if you need to�"” �śWhere do you get off?” she asked, stepping closer, until he could smell the light floral scent that clung to her hair. �śYou’re not my father or my brother or my boyfriend. Hell, I wouldn’t have even said we were friends, would you?” Jace stared down into those eerie eyes of hers, not knowing what to say, knowing only that the outraged look on Sam’s face made him want to show her exactly where he �śgot off.” And how he’d get her off, again and again, until she came so hard she screamed his name and clung to him, those strong, smooth legs wrapped around his hips as�" �śWould you?” Would he what? He couldn’t seem to remember the question. His thoughts were too shocking, too wrong. This was his friend’s sister, a sweet girl he’d watched grow up since she was fourteen. He’d been twenty when the Quinns moved into the neighborhood, and she’d been a kid he barely noticed, a shy little shadow who haunted the apartment above her brother’s bar. He realized she’d become a woman sometime between then and now, but not the kind of woman he took back to his place. Forget the fact that she wasn’t even close to being his type; Stephen would kill him if he found out Jace had gotten his dick within ten feet of his sister. �śHonestly, I’m curious. Would you say we’re friends? Is that why you feel entitled to order me around like a child? Or is it because of my brother?” she asked. �śSince he’s your friend, it gives you the right to play big brother when he’s not around?” She stepped even closer, her chocolate-and-coffee breath warm on his chin. If he tilted his head just the slightest bit, they’d be close enough for him to taste her. And, damn, did he want to taste her. Badly enough that he forced himself to take a small step back, putting a safer distance between them. �śOr is this just the way you are with all women?” �śI don’t know. I don’t associate with a lot of women in my line of work.” �śThat’s not true.” Sam’s tongue swept out across her lips, and her voice was breathier than it had been a second before. �śYou associate with lots of women, and you seem to like the ones who know how to take orders.” She couldn’t be saying what it seemed she was saying. No one knew what he preferred in the bedroom�"no one except the women he slept with, and they weren’t the types to talk. That was a big part of why he chose them. They knew when to keep their mouths shut, when to submit, when to �Ś take orders, just like Sam had said. He wasn’t an asshole�"pleasuring his partner was always his first priority�"but he wanted that pleasure to be on his terms. No, he needed it to be on his terms. He had to have control in the bedroom�"of himself, of his partner, of the entire encounter. It was the only way to make sure everything stayed safe, sane, and consensual. The few times he’d let himself go hadn’t been good scenes. There was too much bottled up inside him that needed to stay bottled. �śWell, I’m not so good at taking orders.” Sam eased slowly closer, eliminating the space he’d put between them. �śBut with the right man, in the right situation, I think I could enjoy the alpha-male thing.” Hell, no. This couldn’t happen. No matter what she thought she enjoyed, she wasn’t his type of woman. She was too soft, too sweet, too �Ś good. Especially for him. �śSam, I think you’d better�"” �śBut not when the man hasn’t earned my trust or my affection or even my friendship,” she said, moving even closer, until her slim body was pressed against his and the thick bulge of his arousal nudged the soft flesh of her belly. But surprisingly, she didn’t seem shocked by the fact that he had a hard-on for her that wouldn’t quit. In fact, she didn’t seem to notice his cock at all. Her attention was still completely on his face, her eyes boring into his own until he was positive she could see every secret he’d never told. �śSo, in the future, if you want to tell me what to do, you’ll need to earn the privilege.” �śIs that right?” He smiled. She frowned in response, making him wonder if she had heard the amusement in his voice. No matter how troubled he was by his own response to her, Sam’s assumption that she would be defining the terms of their relationship did amuse him. It also made him want to take her home and show her who was in control, to show her what an �śalpha male” could do for her in the bedroom. Jesus. He had to get away from Sammy Quinn. The sooner, the better. �śCome on. We’ve wasted enough time.” �śThen leave. I’m not asking you to stay,” she said, shifting her weight to her heels, putting just a breath between them, a breath he didn’t like. Smart or not, he liked feeling every inch of her pressed against every inch of him. �śI’m going to walk you home first. Let’s go.” She shifted forward again, pinning him against the wall. He could have pushed her away, of course�"she didn’t weigh much more than she had as a kid�"but he didn’t. �śYou need to quit assuming you’re the walking boss, Jace.” �śSo now you’re telling me what to do?” he asked, unable to resist the temptation to wrap his arms around her waist and pull her closer, even though his gut was screaming that this was a very bad idea. �śI thought you said I liked to be the one calling the shots.” �śWho said I cared what you like?” Her breath rushed out as his hands trailed down over the curve of her ass, molding her firm flesh in his hands. �śBesides, I don’t think you know what you like.” This just kept getting more damned interesting. �śI like telling women what to do, bossing them around like some bully over at PS 124, right? That’s what you think.” �śTaking control in the bedroom doesn’t mean you’re a bully. I know that,” she said, her voice soft, intimate, and the way she lingered on the word control nearly enough to make him explode. Jace was suddenly beset by images of Sam kneeling on the floor in front of him, naked and willing, her fingers sliding between her legs as he ordered her to pleasure herself. To bring herself to the edge of completion and then stop, waiting until he gave her permission to finish. Or, better yet, until he finished the job himself. What would Sammy taste like when he lowered his head between her legs? What would she scream when she came against his mouth? Would she be the type to fist the sheets in her fingers or would she reach her hands down and pull him closer, forcing his tongue even deeper into her salty heat? A groan escaped from the back of his throat that he did his best to swallow. �śBut wouldn’t it be interesting if things were a little more �Ś challenging?” Sam’s hips tilted forward ever so slightly, nudging where he was as hard as the bricks behind him. �śIf you gave a real woman a chance?” �śI’m a big boy, Sam,” he said, gritting his teeth, forcing himself to maintain control, not to let this go any further than it had already. �śI’ve had plenty of women.” �śI don’t think you’ve ever had a woman. I think you’re afraid of women.” �śIs that right?” His body went tense for a moment before he forced himself to relax. Sam had no idea how close she was to the truth, though not at all in the way she was implying. That was one secret he’d never told anyone. Not even his uncle Francis, who had flown to China to pick him up after his parents were killed, who had been a father to him since he was eight, knew why Jace avoided anything more meaningful than a casual screw. Of course, Francis did his share of casual screwing�"despite being married for nearly thirty years�"and he probably didn’t think twice about his nephew’s lack of attachment. �śThat’s why you sleep with girls too young to know what they want.” �śAs opposed to ancient women in their early twenties?” He smiled again. Sam couldn’t be more than twenty-three or twenty-four, and she still looked like a teenager. �śI’m old enough to know what I want.” �śAnd what is that?” he asked, the feeling that he was crossing some forbidden line making his heart beat faster than it had in years. Demon hunting was dangerous, but not as dangerous as Samantha Quinn. And it wasn’t the fact that her brother would try to kill him for touching his sister. It was Sam herself. He’d had no idea she was so �Ś irresistible. �śI think it might be you,” she said, standing on tiptoe, bringing her lips closer to his. �śYou think. You don’t know?” �śNot yet, but I will.” And then she kissed him. She kissed him. He let a woman make the first move for the first time in years and it felt inexplicably right. Everything about Sam felt right�"her ass in his hands, her fingers digging into the back of his neck, her mouth hot against his, her moan as he slid his tongue between her lips, tasting the unique flavor of this woman who had totally blindsided him. Blindsided by a blind girl. It should have been an amusing thought, but Jace didn’t feel like laughing. This wasn’t funny. This was a mistake, a huge mistake. But that didn’t stop him from spinning Sam in his arms and pressing her up against the wall. It didn’t slow his hands as he grabbed her behind the knees and spread her legs, hitching her up around his waist. It only made him feel like the very bad man he truly was. The last kind of man Sam should even think about getting involved with. If he were a better person, he would have cared enough to stop. But he wasn’t. So he didn’t. He just kissed her harder and let his fingers trail up the silky smooth skin of her inner thigh. CHAPTER THREE Near-death experiences were entirely underrated. Sure, nearly getting taken out by a demon had been terrifying�"her stomach still churned and her bones vibrated with adrenaline aftershocks�"but if she hadn’t almost died, she wouldn’t be living this moment. This moment she’d dreamed of for years, since she was way too young to be involved with any man, let alone a man like Jace. God, Jace. How many times had she imagined what she’d say to him if she had the chance? If he ever noticed her as anything other than Stephen’s sad, blind little sister? A hundred times. At least. But her imaginings had always ended with her own hand between her legs, her body struggling to believe it was Jace who touched her. Or who ordered her to touch herself. She’d guessed that Jace was the kind who liked more submissive women. Despite a healthy dose of women’s lib in college and a thirst for independence fueled by living with her overprotective brother, Sam still fantasized about being one of those women. She’d dreamed of being with Jace so many times, it was almost impossible to believe this was really happening. It was really Jace Lu’s tongue sliding between her lips, Jace Lu’s hands cupping her ass, Jace Lu’s cock pulsing between her legs. Even with the thick fabric of his jeans between them, she could feel how hot he was, could imagine how he’d burn every inch of her when he shoved inside where she ached. �śSpread your legs,” he ordered, and she obeyed without hesitation, her body thrilling to do as Jace commanded, just like she’d always imagined it would. �śWider.” She moaned as she forced her legs impossibly wider and the hard ridge of Jace’s cock ground against her clit. �śYou make me so�Ś” �śSo what? Tell me, Sammy.” �śSo �Ś wet.” She writhed against him, frantic for him to finish what he’d started. No, what she’d started. He was taking the lead, but she was the one who had started this. There was no turning back now, even if she’d wanted to. Which she didn’t, not for a split second. �śFuck, Sammy.” He groaned into her mouth, the need in his voice making her head spin. �śYes. That’s a great idea,” she said, the fear that still throbbed through her veins making her bolder than she’d ever been in her life. He laughed, a tight sound that made it clear how she affected him. She made him crazy. She, Samantha Quinn, the girl he’d always treated like a child to be pitied, was making him lose his infamous cool. It was an intoxicating realization, even more dizzying than the feel of his soft lips trailing down her neck. �śWe’re not ten feet from the main street. Someone could see. Is that okay with you? If someone sees me fucking you?” he asked, in a way that made it clear he didn’t give a good goddamn. Good. She didn’t either. �śI don’t care. I don’t care who sees.” And she didn’t. She didn’t care about anything except getting Jace inside her. Maybe it was the fact that she’d nearly died, or maybe it was just that she’d wanted this man for way too long to risk losing her chance. �śI want you. Can you feel how much I want you?” He muttered something in Chinese with that Brooklyn accent of his. The combination had always secretly amused her, but right now the foreign words whispering across her skin only made her hotter. As hot as his warm breath against her throat and his fingers smoothing up her thigh, cupping her mound through her underwear before pulling the crotch to one side and sliding his fingers inside of her. �śJace!” She threw her head back, banging it on the bricks, but she didn’t care about the pain. Even pain felt like pleasure when Jace was touching her like this. His thick fingers speared in and out of her, driving inside her, filling every aching inch. Even in her dreams, she’d never imagined it would be so perfect, that his touch would make her shatter apart even as another part of her was coming together for the first time. Kissing Jace, feeling Jace’s hands on her, made her feel safe in a way she’d never thought she could. It was like she’d been free-falling through some vast, terrifying blackness and suddenly had someone to hold on to. They were still falling�"that hadn’t changed�"but now they were falling together. �śI want to fuck this pussy, Sammy,” he mumbled against her lips, his words sending the knot of tension in her womb spiraling higher. �śAre you ready for me to fuck my pussy?” His pussy. His. The way he’d taken such casual ownership of her body should have made her angry, but it didn’t. It was what she wanted, what she’d always wanted. She wanted to belong to Jace, every last part of her, and her pussy was a fine place to start. �śYes, fuck your pussy,” she said, surprised how right the coarse words felt in her mouth. Sure, she’d read her share of erotic novels, but she’d never had the chance to play the wild, naughty girl in real life. Her few boyfriends had always insisted on keeping things soft and sweet in the bedroom. One had even told her that it wasn’t sexy to play rough with a blind woman, that it was like �śkicking a three-legged dog.” They’d been broken up before she’d gotten her panties back on. That asshole clearly hadn’t understood her or what she craved. But Jace did, as was evidenced by the way he ripped away her panties, without a word of apology for ruining her sensible black underwear. She knew it was black because all her underwear was black. All her clothes were black or brown, ensuring that she never picked out an outrageous color combination. It was one of the tricks she’d learned through the years, one of the ways she’d adapted. Not that she could quite remember what the colors black or brown really looked like anymore. Everything she’d seen before that night in the barn was a blur, a muddled collection of memories that her adult mind couldn’t seem to sort out, no matter how hard she tried. As if summoned by her thoughts, cold fire began to burn the backs of her eyes. It was like a brain freeze from drinking a chocolate malt too fast, but a hundred times less innocent. And a thousand times more terrifying. �śSammy.” She heard Jace whisper her name as if from a great distance and realized he’d unzipped his pants and was using the head of his cock to circle her clit. His pre-cum mingled with the wetness of her body, making the swollen tip slide back and forth across her with an unparalleled eroticism. Her breath hitched, and every nerve ending screamed out its approval. She was going to come, right now, before he’d even shoved inside her. But even as her nipples drew tight and things low in her body clenched with the force of her release, her mind experienced an explosion of an entirely different, entirely awful variety. It was like a bubble burst behind her eyes and suddenly she was somewhere else, someone else. She was someone who could see, but she couldn’t envy them their sight, not even for a second. What they were seeing was too awful. There was an evil presence with them in the room. Sam could smell the same noxious scent she’d smelled before she’d entered the ruins. It made her choke as she turned to reach out to the person next to her. The other person was small, but Sam sensed it was a man even though it was impossible to make out his face. There was too much blood. Blood pouring from his mouth and eyes, blood running through the hands he pressed frantically to his face, trying to hold back his death with feeble human fingers. Samantha screamed, but it wasn’t her voice, just like it wasn’t her arms that rose to block the attack when a hulking shadow ran toward her. The oddly large ring sitting on the woman’s left hand seemed familiar, but it wasn’t Sam’s. She didn’t own much jewelry, and nothing so chunky. Before she could place where she’d felt a ring like that before, a baseball bat swept past her raised arms to crash down on her head again and again, bludgeoning the life from her body. But still, Sam’s eyes couldn’t focus in on the hands holding the bat that struck her so hard she spun in a wild circle. All she could see was the knob of the front door looming too far ahead for her to reach it, and a basket of flowers crushed to bits on the pale wooden floorboards beneath her feet. The boards were almost white with age and seemed to glow even brighter as drops of red splattered across them, mixing with the lavender and pink of the flowers, a macabre painting created by the blows that continued to rain down upon her skull. So that’s bloodred, Sam thought, the part of her that was Sam realizing the woman she had momentarily shared a skin with was dead seconds before Sam was jerked back into the darkness, back into her own shaking, trembling body. �śNo!” she screamed, pushing against Jace’s chest, the feel of his cock ready to push between her legs, of the aftershocks of release that were making her body tingle and throb, suddenly making her ill. How could she be feeling pleasure when somewhere out there two innocent people were being murdered? When she’d seen the murder herself, through another person’s eyes? �śPlease. I have to go. I have to go!” Her voice cracked and a sob escaped her throat. The realization that her little �śgift” for predicting the future had taken a shocking new form nearly snapped what was left of her sanity. She wanted to curl up on the ground and cry, to beg the powers that be for mercy, to swear she would be happy never to see again if she was spared any more death. But begging wouldn’t accomplish anything, and Jace hated it when women cried. Really hated it. She could tell. �śHey, relax. You can go,” he said, setting her feet back down on the ground. He stayed close, however, close enough that it was impossible to pull her dress down without brushing against him as he tucked himselfback inside his jeans. �śBut you need to tell me what’s wrong. What happened? Are you okay?” She felt every muscle in his body tense and could practically hear his teeth grinding together. He was wondering if she was going to go hysterical female on him. There was little doubt she would, once the fact that two people were dead really sank in. �śNo, they’re not dead. They’re not dead yet,” Sam mumbled as she scrambled away from Jace, adjusting her dress with shaking hands. Something in her gut told her it wasn’t too late. The man and woman from her vision, whoever they were, weren’t dead yet, but they would be soon. She had to find them, had to get to them before their murderer did. If she could only remember where she’d felt that ring before. It had been on a woman’s hand, obviously, but which woman? She met so many people at her shop, and she always made a point to touch a woman’s ring and ask about her jewelry. It was a great way to break the ice, to put people at ease. But this ring was different�"very large, a lump of cool stone. She’d felt it more than once. On a cool, dry hand, thin fingers, almost fragile-feeling. It hadn’t been that long ago, maybe last week, when the woman had come in to talk about�" �śHer daughter’s wedding. Mrs. Choe!” Oh, God, the flowers on the floor in her vision �Ś they were the flowers she’d been taking to the Choes before she’d wandered into the ruins. She hadn’t known the exact colors of the flowers, but she’d recognize the basket anywhere. She’d chosen it especially for its large, coarse weave interspersed with woven half-moons in honor of Sin Moon’s name. She had to find those flowers, to make sure they never reached the Choe house. Terror made her hands shake as she squatted down and ran her fingers along the ground, looking for her cane. She’d dropped it sometime in those first few moments with Jace, those moments that might cost the Choes their lives. How could she have let herself indulge her sexual fantasies when she’d been so certain someone was going to get hurt that she’d risked walking into the demon ruins by herself? No matter what Jace had said about the Ju Du making the sounds she’d heard, a part of her hadn’t been convinced. She should have kept looking for the woman, or, at the very least, made a report to the police. Why had she given up? Assumed the woman was dead and so her earlier dream didn’t matter? Shit. The dream! It had been Mrs. Choe in the dream. The sensations were the same, the feel of blood pouring down her face, her head exploding with agony. She simply hadn’t realized right away because she’d been seeing the violence as well as feeling it. Actually seeing�"the way a normal person would, without shadow fingers or other dream metaphors to mask the violence�"through Mrs. Choe’s eyes. �śAre you all right? Do I need to call someone?” Jace asked as he pressed her cane into her hand and helped her to her feet. �śMaybe your brother?” �śNo,” Sam said, tapping her way over to the Dumpster, where she’d left the flowers. �śWe don’t have to tell him that I found you in the ruins,” he said in a soft, patient tone. �śWe can just say I ran into you on the street and you needed some help.” Great. He thought she was crazy. So crazy he wasn’t even angry that she’d come on to him as if he were the last man on earth and then shoved him away. With a hard-on like he’d been sporting, he was going to be in pain if he didn’t get some relief, but he didn’t even care. Because she was insane, and he was glad he hadn’t ended up taking her to bed �Ś or to brick wall or whatever. Everyone knew crazy chicks got clingy, and Jace hated clingy. He was probably breathing a sigh of relief that he’d dodged the bullet that was Sammy Quinn. Damn it. He’d called her Sammy. No one ever called her Sammy. She was always sensible Samantha or friendly, likable Sam. Never Sammy. Sammy seemed like someone she’d like to be, someone wilder, sexier. But losing her chance at being Sammy with Jace would be worth it if she could just find those flowers, if that basket was behind the Dumpster and the Choes still had a chance at life. CHAPTER FOUR �śThank God.” Sam almost started crying again as her hand brushed against the flowers. They were still there, and there was no way in hell she was going to deliver the basket to the Choes. Not now, maybe not ever. They could find someone else to do the flowers for Sin Moon’s wedding, someone who didn’t have ties to malevolent entities that enjoyed killing people. A connection. A shiver swept across her skin that had nothing to do with the cool night breeze. She couldn’t deny that the presence she’d sensed just before she’d entered the ruins and in the apartment with her clients was eerily familiar. She knew that wicked energy, and would have recognized it the second she entered Mrs. Choe’s body if she hadn’t been so sickened by the blood and violence. She’d bet one of her other senses it was one, or more, of the invisible demons her parents had summoned when she was six years old. The smell, the �Ś feel was too similar to be ignored. Invisible demons couldn’t hold a bat, but they’d been in that room. After what she’d just experienced, there was no doubt about it. Her dreams had grown progressively violent in recent months, but no dream could compare to the vision she’d just had. She’d never experienced anything like that, never felt the evil that had taken her sight so close. Not since that night in the barn, when it had been her body the demons invaded. Sam shuddered, suddenly wishing for the symbolic black shadow fingers of her dreams. No matter how evil the energy seething from those fingers, it was much easier to watch a shadow pass over someone’s face than to see their life bludgeoned away with such merciless efficiency. �śSam, let me call you a car. At the very least. You shouldn’t be�"” �śI’m fine. Really, I am.” She had to pull it together. There would be time to figure out what to make of her vision once she made sure the Choes were safe and put some distance between her and Jace. Taking a deep breath, Sam chucked the flowers into the Dumpster. �śChoe,” she said loudly, signaling her earbud to dial the number. �śI don’t think you should�"” �śJust a second,” Sam said, holding up a hand. She could feel Jace’s irritation at being ignored, but couldn’t worry about that right now. She had to talk to Mrs. Choe. Now. Ten minutes ago, if possible. The phone rang, two, three times, while Sam’s heart did its best to crawl up her throat. She couldn’t be too late. The flowers were still here. Chang-su and Ellen had to be alive. Finally, Mrs. Choe answered on the fifth ring. �śHello? Sam? Where are you? We were getting worried.” �śOh, my God. Me too. Very worried.” Sam laughed, a slightly hysterical sound that ended in another sob. �śI’m so glad you’re there. Listen, I’m not going to be able to make it tonight.” �śBut we were counting on you,” Mrs. Choe said, her disapproving-mama voice making Sam nostalgic for the mother she’d never had. Well, the mother she’d had but couldn’t really remember. Probably for the best. Who wanted to remember a parent who was willing to sacrifice her children to demons? �śI already made tea, and Sin Moon is going to stop by after she gets off work to see what you’ve done. She’s very excited.” �śI’m so sorry, but I really can’t make it.” Sam nibbled at her lip, wondering how to warn Mrs. Choe without sounding like a complete nutcase. �śSomething came up, something serious.” �śAre you all right? Do you need one of the boys to come over?” Mrs. Choe had three sons, none of them much taller than Sam, but all as tough as any Southie kid. They were good boys, however, and hated men like Jace. They loathed the mercenaries who roamed the ruins even more than the demons they hunted. After all, demons were animals that killed because they were hungry, not for pleasure. Demons didn’t bully Southie residents for graft or have ties to various mobs either. Nope, the Choe boys wouldn’t be pleased to see her with a bounty hunter, despite the fact that Jace and Stephen had been friends for as long as Sam could remember. Call her crazy, but she really wasn’t in the mood for any more �śbig brothering” tonight. Besides, she hadn’t seen the Choe boys in her vision. If they stayed at home, the murder might be even less likely to come to pass. �śNo, keep the boys at home. In fact, I think it would be best if all of you stayed at home. Don’t answer the door and don’t invite anyone in who you don’t know.” The animalistic demons that infested the Village didn’t need an invitation to enter a home, but other demons did. Information on aura demons was scarce�"but the more �śout-there” experts in demon studies believed there were bodiless demons in existence. These demons were invisible to the human eye and needed an invitation to come inside a home�"or a body. In that case, the Choes would be safer if they remained safely behind closed doors. �śAnd why is this?” Mrs. Choe asked, her voice a little colder, more distant. Another person might not have noticed, but Samantha had become attuned to the slightest variation in tone and pitch. It was one of the ways she made up for not being able to see people’s facial expressions. She was going to have to come up with a real reason for Mrs. Choe to stay in tonight, something that would satisfy the shrewd woman. �śI know this is a little strange, but �Ś I’ve heard from a reliable source that one of the gangs plans to rob the pharmacy on the first floor of your building tonight.” She winced slightly, wondering if Mrs. Choe could hear the lie in her voice, the way Sam had heard suspicion in hers. �śI have no idea if they plan to hit the private residences, but I’m hesitant to come over alone, and I really wouldn’t want you or your family to get hurt, so�"” �śOf course. No, please. Don’t say another word. You can’t be too careful.” The other woman’s tone warmed again, even as a new note of tension entered her voice. �śWe’ll go to my sister’s in Midtown. We still have time to make it through the barricade before curfew. You go home and lock your doors. We’ll reschedule for early next week.” It wasn’t staying in, but surely they’d be safe if they went straight to her sister’s. Besides, Sam couldn’t think of another lie that would encourage them to stay put. This was why she usually told the truth. �śGreat. Thanks so much,” Sam said, deciding to hold off on backing out of the wedding. No need to complicate things tonight, and who knew? Maybe the link to the aura demons would fade. She’d gone nearly twenty years without feeling this connected to the creatures. Surely life would return to normal in a few weeks. Maybe it was just the identity of the demons’ intended victims that had caused her to have such a violent response, the fact that it was someone she knew that had given her the ability to psychically see the murder in time to put a stop to it. The thought made her feel calmer, and her hands had stopped shaking completely by the time she said her good-byes and ended the call. �śGangs targeting the Choes’ building. Where did you get this information?” �śI have my sources,” Sam said, turning back to Jace with what she hoped was a blank look. There was no way she could try to explain what had really happened. Anything she said would only make things worse. Jace was just like her brother: the kind of man who was never going to believe in a sixth sense or invisible demons, and would think a woman who said she had visions of the future was a freak. �śYou’re full of shit is what you are.” �śWhat?” The words hurt. She knew Jace had as filthy a mouth as any of the guys who hung out at the bar, but having him curse at her felt personal tonight. Hmmm, wonder why? �śYou were lying. You look to the left when you lie.” �śI do not.” Shit. She’d just looked to the left again. Sometimes she wished the world were a complete blank. Sometimes it seemed it would be easier to see nothing at all instead of the vague shadows her straining eyes could never make sense of. �śListen, I know this might seem strange, but I promise�"” �śYou don’t have to tell me what’s going on.” �śI don’t?” Well, that was a shocker. She was accustomed to everyone being in her business. It was part and parcel of being �śimpaired.” Everyone and their uncle felt it was their duty to tell her what to do. Knowing Jace wasn’t going to push her was �Ś nice. �śNope. I don’t care.” �śOh.” That �Ś wasn’t so nice. �śYou can lie to your clients and throw away your own flowers all night, but you’re not going to do it here.” So they were back to the alpha-male-without-a-cause bit. Her sassy seduction hadn’t accomplished a goddamned thing; Jace was too set in his ways. Either that, or she’d ruined the take-a-strong-woman-to-your-bed bit by going psycho on him ten minutes into their encounter. Guess she’d never know which was to blame. Or if there could have been anything between them besides some groping in a darkened alley. She sighed, suddenly exhausted. And sad. �śI didn’t plan on staying here. I’m going to�"” �śYou’re going to your brother’s bar,” he said, taking her by the elbow, his fingers wrapping all the way around the bone in a way that made her feel small, almost childlike. But not childlike enough to put up with his bustling her off to wherever he saw fit. Jace really needed to learn that jerking women around wasn’t okay, not even when the woman gave you permission, which she certainly had not. Well, not permission to do this, anyway. �śNo, I’m not.” She twisted easily from his grasp, using a self-defense move she’d learned in her classes down at the Y. �śI’m not going to the bar tonight. I’m going to go home.” �śNo, you’re not. You’re going to the bar.” �śNo. I’m not.” Sam sensed him reaching for her and jumped back, nearly tripping before she righted herself. Great. Way to show Jace she was fine on her own. �śI’m tired and I want to go home.” �śI don’t care what you want.” The sheer balls of the statement made her slow to react, giving Jace time to close the distance between them and grab her by the upper arms. He pulled her close, flattening her breasts against his chest, sending a frisson of awareness through her hardening nipples. �śWell, you’d better learn to care,” she said, anger clear in her voice, though her body seemed to like Jace’s manhandling. But then, her body just liked Jace’s hands on her, no matter what they were doing there. �śI’m serious. If you don’t want a lawsuit, then I suggest you�"” �śYou just spent five minutes mumbling about dead people,” Jace said, his breath warm against her cheek. Sam shivered, and fought the urge to turn her head and find his lips with her mouth. How could she still want to kiss this man? What was wrong with her? �śI don’t think you want to get the police involved in this. Now give me your cane. I need to make sure you’re safe.” �śNo, I won’t give,” she whispered, not trusting her own voice not to betray her desire. She’d already made a fool of herself; she wasn’t going to let Jace know how he still affected her, even when they were arguing. Just because he’d gotten that soft note in his voice when he’d talked about making sure she was safe was no reason to back down and follow him meekly down the street. She’d fantasized about his taking control in an erotic situation, yes, but she wanted him to take control because she was a woman he found irresistible, not a crazy person he thought incapable of taking care of herself. �śYou’re not going to make this easy, are you?” �śNo, I’m not going to�"” Her words ended in an outraged squeal as Jace inserted his shoulder in her gut and flipped her into a fireman’s carry. Her cane clattered to the ground as her hands instinctively braced themselves against his back. And ass. One hand had definitely strayed into ass territory. And what an ass it was. Firm and round and muscled and just �Ś perfect. Exactly the kind of ass she’d have loved to dig her fingernails into while Jace labored above her, fucking her the way she’d dreamed about. If he weren’t a complete asshole. But he’d taken this too far. He had no right to pick her up and haul her back to her brother like some kid who’d run away from home. It was ludicrous. �śPut me down,” she insisted, moving the hand full of ass to the small of his back. She did not want to feel Jace up. Or at least, she didn’t want to want to feel Jace up. That was nearly the same thing, wasn’t it? �śSorry. Can’t do that.” He grunted as he bent down and then stood again, presumably retrieving her cane. �śWouldn’t feel right about it.” �śPut me down, Jace, or I swear to God I’ll�"” �śIt’s not going to happen. You might as well save your breath,” he said, as he set a brisk pace down the street. �śI’m not letting you go home alone, not in your condition.” Ah. So this was because he thought she was crazy. He couldn’t let her go home. He felt obligated to deliver her into her brother’s keeping, no matter what she had to say about it, because she was a loon. �śAnd I’m sorry about what happened back there,” he continued, obviously uncomfortable. �śI shouldn’t have touched you. It won’t happen again.” Sam swallowed her response and the lump that rose in her throat. She wouldn’t let her feelings get hurt. She should have known better. This was how her relationships always panned out. No matter how competent she was, there always came a time when she became the helpless blind girl who couldn’t be taken seriously. After she’d spent two and a half years running a successful business, and lived on her own for nearly six months, Jace still saw her as something less than a sighted person. That was the only reason he thought he could get away with throwing her over his shoulder and toting her down the street. He wouldn’t dare treat anyone else like this, not even the shy, malleable girls he liked to take to his bed. Like he would know a real partner if she came up and bit him on his undeniably yummy ass. Jace was the quintessential loner, a man who made a living hunting dangerous creatures, did not play well with others, and wasn’t particularly well liked. He wasn’t an easy man to relate to, and most of the neighborhood preferred to leave him alone. She suddenly understood the sentiment. �śYou’re going to be sorry you did this,” she warned, knowing better than to ask Jace to put her down. He’d decided something in that pig head of his and there would be no debate. But there would be payback. Oh, yes, there would be, no doubt about that. �śGuess that’s a risk I’ll have to take,” he said, unconcerned with the threats of a helpless woman like her. Good. Let him underestimate her. She knew how to turn other people’s lack of expectation into a tool and, occasionally, a weapon. Sooner or later she would make Jace sorry he’d treated her like a child. Sorry he’d taken the hottest sexual experience of her life and ruined it with his apology. Yeah. If the moment hadn’t already been tainted by psychic visions of murder, you would have really been pissed. The inner voice. It could always be counted on for a smart-ass remark. The thought might have made her smile at some other time, but the horror of the vision was too fresh. It just wasn’t funny. It wouldn’t ever be funny, but hopefully she could at least put it behind her. After tonight, her awareness of the aura demons that still roamed the earth, looking for a way to complete the summoning spell her parents had begun, would go back to being the stuff of nightmares. CHAPTER FIVE She’d cost him thousands of dollars in demon bounty, given him a killer case of blue balls, and freaked him the hell out with her psychotic episode, but Jace still couldn’t take his eyes off her. His gaze kept sliding across the room, watching the way her dress rode up around her thighs when she bent over, imagining how those thighs would have felt wrapped around his waist while he slid inside that hot little pussy of hers, remembering the husky note in her voice when she’d told him to fuck her. He usually didn’t go in for dirty talk from a woman, but he couldn’t deny how hot it made him to hear naughty words coming out of Sam’s sweet little mouth. For a few minutes it had made him want to be the type of man who deserved a woman like her. And when she’d let him claim her pussy as his own �Ś Damn it, it was enough to give him a hard-on all over again, and keep him seated at the bar long after he should have headed for home. Crazy or not, Samantha Quinn could become a bad habit. After all, the crazier the woman, the more Jace craved her company. It was a side effect of having an addictive personality, and one of his personal downfalls. But in this case, it wasn’t himself he had to worry about. The last thing Sam needed was a man like him around. She had enough challenges in her life. She needed someone steady and dependable and �Ś saner than she was. Jace knew he didn’t fit the bill on any of those counts. �śSo you didn’t harvest the quills? Because of Sam?” Stephen asked under his breath. Sam was all the way across the room, somehow managing to play pool with a couple of regulars and their girlfriends, but it was clear her brother still worried she might hear. His little sister had no idea that her brother peddled anything other than alcohol, and Stephen preferred to keep it that way. Stephen’s demon narcotics business brought in thousands of dollars every week, money he’d once used to send Sam to the best private schools in the city and pay for her two years of business college. �śPartly,” Jace said with a shrug he figured the other man could interpret for himself. Stephen knew Jace had been well on his way to being a junkie at one point in time. There were several demons that possessed body parts that could alter human consciousness. The chemical emitted by an Inuago demon’s skin when it sweated or the powder made from grinding a Hamma demon’s claws could screw a man’s mind ten different ways, but Ju Du quills had been Jace’s weakness. At first he’d simply craved the oblivion of drifting away on that poison cloud, but eventually he’d become dependent. It had been harder and harder to keep those bad memories at bay without the quills. He’d started to lose control, all the rage inside of him looking for an outlet, any outlet. He’d ended up in lockup for beating the shit out of people who didn’t deserve a beating and was on his way to a prison just like every other Lu. His father and two uncles had both served time before getting paroled and fleeing the country. That was the reason Jace had lived in China as a child: His mother had followed his good-for-nothing father to a foreign country. And her death. When the worldwide earthquakes hit and the demons emerged from deep under the earth, the whole of China had been particularly hard hit. But Shanxi�"where the Chinese had been living in caves for centuries and still did in modern times�"had been devastated. Hundreds of people were torn apart before they even had the chance to run. Scientists theorized that the demons�"most of which were now reluctant to attack humans, especially in large numbers�"had simply reacted violently after being forced from their homes and thrust into a world vastly different from the one they were accustomed to. They’d smelled humanity and begun to feed, seeking out the largest concentrations of human blood by scent and killing and destroying, tearing down buildings as they went to get shelter from the sun and gain the dark, close habitat they craved. Knowing why the demons had done what they’d done, however, didn’t make a goddamned bit of difference to Jace. He doubted it made a difference to anyone who had survived the Shanxi attacks and lived to tell stories of watching the ones they loved be ripped to pieces before their eyes. �śGive me a whiskey shot. Some Dickel if you’ve got it.” Jace took a swig of his beer, shoving thoughts of his mother to the back of his mind, where they belonged. He could do that now �Ś most of the time. With the help of Stephen�"who had refused to sell to him and made sure every other Southie dealer did the same�"and the Italian side of his family, Jace had gotten clean. It had been nearly five years since he’d last pierced his skin with a Ju Du quill, but the temptation was still there. It had been even worse in the past few months. Something sour smelling in the air was making those cots down in the basement of Yang’s Curiosity Shop look better than they had in years. He’d been dying to get wasted and give in to the violence that pulsed beneath his skin. It was that temptation�"the driving need to get mindless and hostile�"more than Sam or any worries about getting caught trafficking in illegal substances that had made him leave the quills exactly where they were. �śThat’s a lot of money, man. A lot of money. I know you’ve got your reasons, but I could have sold those in a few days. I know some people who have been looking for Ju Du,” Stephen said, setting the whiskey shot down and topping off Jace’s beer. Alcohol had never been a problem for Jace. He could drink in moderation. In fact, drinking was one of the few things he could do in moderation. He certainly couldn’t do women in moderation. If he let himself get in too deep with a woman, he lost all perspective. It was one of the reasons he kept most of his encounters to one-night stands. Getting attached was dangerous. He’d learned that from experience. From the time his parents were killed in the demon emergence in China to his days outmaneuvering other demon hunters, his life had been one long lesson in trusting infrequently and letting your guard down never. Even with seemingly helpless blind girls. Maybe especially with them. It would be too easy to let a woman like Sam in. That mix of vulnerability, sass, and willingness to explore so fearlessly would have him hooked in no time. And if she was stupid enough to stick around, he’d end up hurting her the way he always hurt women. He’d left scars only once, but that was one time too many. Besides, he’d broken more than one spirit. He couldn’t seem to drop that last wall women always wanted him to drop, or figure out how to respond when she got that look in her eyes that said she wanted more than sex. Even the few times when he’d felt the urge for more, he’d failed to deliver anything but disappointment and pain. Something inside of him was broken; it was just the way he’d always been. Sam deserved better than a broken person who wanted to smash through walls every time he saw a woman cry �Ś even if she had set off something inside of him that few women had ever touched. She’d challenged him, surprised him�Ś. It was a unique experience. �śJace? Did you hear me?” Stephen asked, pulling Jace’s mind back where it should have stayed�"in reality. �śYou didn’t see anyone following Sam, did you? Anyone other than the Ju Du?” �śNo. Why?” The anxiety in Stephen’s voice was disturbing. Why would he think anyone would be following Sam? Had he gotten on the wrong side of one of his less savory customers and feared the client would take out his frustration on his sister? For the hundredth time, Jace wanted to tell Stephen to get the hell out of the demon narcotics business, but he kept his mouth shut. Without Stephen, he’d probably still be hooked on Ju Du quills. Or in prison. Or dead. Stephen was one of the few dealers who would sell only to recreational users, who refused to provide addicts with a fix and even made phone calls to their families to try to help them get clean. His intervention had saved Jace’s life, so he’d keep his mouth shut. For now. �śHas someone been threatening you? Or Sam? If so, I’ve got a couple connections in metro that I can�"” �śNo, no, it’s nothing like that. I just �Ś You know I worry about her. Especially when she goes out dressed like that.” Stephen cursed under his breath. �śI’ve asked her to throw that dress away a thousand times, but she won’t listen, acts like she thinks I’m lying about the damn thing being see-through on top.” Jace hid a smile behind his beer. If Stephen only knew that his kid sister knew exactly what she was wearing and what it did to the male population, he would probably lock her up in the apartment above the bar and throw away the key. Speaking of the Quinns’ apartment �Ś �śSo, are you going to make her move back in with you?” Jace asked, already planning to avoid the Demon’s Breath Pub if that were the case. He needed to get away from Sam until he forgot how soft her lips had felt against his, or how hard she’d made him. He might not be a good enough man to resist her when she was pressed against him in the dark, but he could at least make sure he steered clear of temptation. �śI can’t make her do anything. She’s stubborn, in case you hadn’t noticed.” Jace grunted, thinking about how pissed Sam had been when he’d thrown her over his shoulder. Normally he’d never have dared, but he hadn’t seen that he had a choice. If he’d left her and someone had hurt her �Ś It was something he didn’t want to think about. �śOh, I noticed. She told me I’d be sorry for hauling her back here. I think she was close to making death threats by the time we reached Avenue B.” �śYeah, she’s a pain in the ass,” Stephen said, a note of pride in his voice. �śShe refuses to listen to common sense, but I’m trying. I’ve been trying for months. No matter how smart she is, it’s not safe for her to be on her own.” �śEspecially on this side of the barricade,” Jace agreed. �śThe demons can smell weakness. They don’t go after people that often, but when they do, it’s always someone old or young. Or with a disability.” �śExactly. But she’s determined to stay in the neighborhood, even though I told her I’ve got enough saved to get her a room in that place uptown. That assisted-living place on Eighty-fourth with all the security is supposed to be real nice.” Stephen grabbed clean glasses from the washer beneath the bar and set them down with a little too much force. �śI swear, she’s just one step away from getting herself killed. Tonight’s probably not the first time, you know. It was just the first time she couldn’t keep me from finding out about it.” Sam had confessed to wandering into the ruins and told Stephen that Jace had saved her life, but she hadn’t sounded grateful, and she’d refused to listen to a word of Stephen’s forthcoming lecture. She’d told them both to go to hell�"albeit in softer language�"before stalking over to the pool table. They were both clearly on her shit list. Still, she hadn’t said a word to Stephen about nearly fucking Jace against a wall, so she must have had some gratitude left in her heart. If Stephen had known his friend had been close to naked with his sister, they certainly wouldn’t be all cozy at the bar. One or both of them would probably be on their way to the hospital. Jace was bigger and stronger and a trained fighter, but Stephen had a legendary temper that made people think twice before starting something in his place of business. The dark-haired, dark-eyed man might be on the small side, but he could seriously work a guy over when he was pissed. And nothing pissed him off more than people messing with his sister. �śI even called DHS the other day to see if there was anything legal I could do about Sam’s living on her own.” He sighed, his frustration clear. �śBut unless I can prove she’s a danger to herself or others or not in her right mind, they said they couldn’t do shit. She’s twenty-five years old.” �śIf you could at least get her to stay here tonight, I think it would be a good call.” Jace didn’t want to rat Sam out, but her behavior had been disturbing. She’d not only nearly gotten herself killed; she’d also had some sort of psychotic episode. There was nothing normal or sane about begging a guy to bang you one second and babbling on about blood and death the next. Maybe it had something to do with her childhood, with the violence she and her brother had suffered as kids before the state had locked up their parents. Or maybe she was just crazy. Or maybe she was a serial killer in her spare time�"damned if he knew. Whatever the cause of her odd behavior, Jace couldn’t stomach the thought of Sam being left alone tonight. She should be with her brother, so he could watch over her and make sure she was holding it together. �śShe’d be better off with you for at least one night. She was pretty shaken up and�"” �śNot shaken up enough,” Stephen interrupted, slamming his fist down on the bar. For a second, the anger in his eyes made Jace rethink his assumption that Sam would be better off here. Stephen looked ready to kill someone, and Jace could only guess that person was Sam. �śShe’s gone. She’s fucking gone.” Jace turned to scan the bar. Stephen was right. Sometime in the ten minutes the men had been talking, Sam had managed to sneak away. �śI can’t believe this shit!” Stephen pounded the bar again, making the women seated a few stools down flinch and scoot away. �śI’m going to have to have her committed. It’s the only way I’ll be able to keep her safe.” �śRelax. I’ll go find her.” Jace stood, the feeling that there was more to this than brotherly concern prickling the hairs at the back of his neck. Stephen’s response to finding Sam gone was too violent, even for a man who knew his sister’s life had been threatened. It was almost like he knew Sam was in danger, the kind of danger that came from something more intelligent and methodical than the average demon. Something like one of the thugs Stephen sold drugs to on a regular basis. Jace made a mental note to feel out his contact in the Death Ministry, one of Southie’s more violent gangs and one of Stephen’s biggest suppliers, to see if anyone had something against Stephen Quinn. He hated to think his friend would put himself or his sister in danger, but it was better to be safe than stupid and trusting. Trust no one, even your friends. The motto had kept him alive more times than he could count, and now it might keep Stephen and Sam alive, too. If Stephen had gotten in over his head, Jace would help him find his way out. He owed the other man that much. �śI’ll close down the bar and go with you,” Stephen said, pulling at the ties on his apron. �śI need to know she’s safe.” �śNo, man, it’s early. You’re going to lose a lot of cash if you close up now.” Jace shrugged his jacket on and, by habit, checked the location of all his weapons, making sure guns and knives were within easy reach. �śThis is what I do. Sam won’t be hard to find�"she’s probably just headed for home.” �śAll right.” Stephen didn’t seem thrilled with letting Jace handle the problem, but the mention of losing money had hit home. Even though Sam had been independent since she was nineteen, and Stephen’s bar, with its plethora of demon memorabilia covering every wall, was a tourist attraction in itself and earning a tidy sum, Stephen seemed desperate for more. He’d even taken a part-time job working for a refurbishing company, doing carpentry and painting in the afternoons before the bar opened. Jace would have suspected a gambling problem if he hadn’t known for a fact that Stephen didn’t gamble. He also didn’t drink or use the drugs he sold or sleep around. He ate red meat only a couple times a week and hit the gym religiously. Stephen was squeaky-clean. So why was Jace suddenly getting the feeling his friend had been up to something rotten? �śI’ll have her back here in an hour, maybe less,” Jace said, putting aside his suspicions. For now. There would be time to get to the bottom of what was going on with Stephen after he’d found Sam. CHAPTER SIX �śStephen’s going to kill you. And me.” Ginger sighed and took the final turn to Sam’s apartment a little too fast. Sam gritted her teeth and clung to the door handle, but didn’t say a word. Even when she hadn’t been drinking, Ginger wouldn’t have been her first choice of someone to ask for a ride�"she interpreted traffic laws way too liberally�"but beggars couldn’t be choosers. She’d needed out of the Demon’s Breath. Knowing Stephen and Jace were snuggled up at the bar talking about her like some annoying problem to be solved had been driving her crazy. Contrary to what Jace believed, she wasn’t out of her mind. Yet. Given a few more minutes in the bounty hunter’s company, however �Ś She’d been able to feel his eyes on her, burning across her skin, making her ache and itch and miss every single shot she lined up. She’d been playing her own slightly assisted version of pool for years and was pretty good at it. But tonight, every ball had gone wild. She couldn’t concentrate; all she had been able to think about was a certain man’s lips and what a damned shame it was that she’d never kiss them again. �śNo, probably just me,” Ginger said. �śHe’ll let you live.” �śOf course he’ll let me live.” Sam breathed a little sigh of relief as Ginger pulled to the side of the road and shifted the car into park. She’d survived another ride with a DDD�"designated drunk driver. This was one of the reasons she’d stopped hanging out at the bar. It wasn’t easy to get a safe ride home. Which Stephen just loved, of course. It was the perfect excuse to bustle her up to her old room for another night under his thumb. �śIf he didn’t let me live, he wouldn’t have anyone to boss around.” �śYeah, right.” Ginger snorted. �śHe doesn’t boss you around.” �śYou’ve had too much to drink. Your perception is impaired.” �śProbably, but not about that.” Ginger laughed. �śHe doesn’t boss you around. I mean, he tries, but you don’t let him call the shots. I’ve always admired that about you, Sam. You’re tough, girl.” Sam heard Ginger rummaging through her bag and then a click as she opened her compact. Ginger was always checking and double-checking her appearance. Stephen said it was because she wore red lipstick that smeared a lot. Sam suspected it was insecurity. Ginger did let herself get bossed around. A lot. There had been a time when she’d suspected Ginger had been with Jace. At least for a couple of nights. A few years ago she had left the bar every time Jace came in, as if it hurt to be in the same room with him. The memory suddenly made Sam feel awkward, despite the fact that she’d considered the slightly older woman a friend for years. �śThanks. I try.” Sam hit the release button on her seat belt and reached around to grab her cane from the backseat. It didn’t have the handy collapsible feature a lot of the newer models had. She hadn’t been able to figure out how to rig her knife into those, and she figured, where she lived, she needed a knife a lot more than the convenience of a cane that didn’t take up space. Speaking of where she lived �Ś �śHow’s the street look?” Sam asked before opening the door. �śAnyone hanging out near the door?” �śNope, it’s clear. It looks like there are still some kids playing at the end of the block, so you should be good.” Ginger snapped her compact closed and threw her purse into the backseat. �śEveryone’s been staying out later this week. The weather has been so nice. So much warmer.” �śYeah, it has,” Sam agreed, though, to be honest, she hadn’t noticed the warming temperatures. She’d felt cold all week, the chilling images from her dreams following her into the waking world and numbing her to the warmth of the sun. God, she didn’t want to think about those dreams. The vision foretelling the Choes’ murder was still too fresh. She needed time to let those sights�"the first she’d seen in years�"fade before she tried to sort out what had happened. Though she couldn’t wait too long. Ezra hadn’t been easy to get ahold of even when they were dating. Now that she was no longer the flavor of the month, it would probably be even harder to get the professor on the phone. But he was the only person she could think of who might believe she’d really seen a possible version of the future through someone else’s eyes. Even after fantastic creatures surged out of the ground and took up residence in major cities after the earthquakes, people were still reluctant to believe in the strange and unusual. Confessing you saw ghosts or believed in faeries or had dreams of shadow fingers that predicted misfortune was just as likely to get you labeled �ścrazy” as it had been fifty years ago. But Ezra was different. He’d been intrigued by Sam’s dreams and even helped her write them down when she woke up screaming. His willingness to give paranormal phenomena the benefit of the doubt was one of the reasons she’d stayed with him for as long as she had. That and the sex. It hadn’t been great, but it had been sex, which was saying something. Her brother had always acted as if she were too good-looking to be safe out of his sight, but sometimes it was hard to believe. If she was such a catch, why was it so damned hard to find a steady lover? Or any lover? Her disability didn’t slow her down, but it seemed to turn men off. Or at least the men she wanted. Men like Jace. Who are you kidding? Not men like Jace. Just Jace. You’re obsessed with the man. It’s pathetic. if he showed up here and threw you over his shoulder right now, you’d enjoy it. Wonder how tough Ginger would think you were then? �śYou okay?” Ginger asked, laying a soft hand on her arm, the concern in her voice clear. �śI’m fine.” Sam smiled, wondering what she’d done to give away her depressing thoughts. She had to quit thinking about Jace. He’d made it clear that touching her was a mistake he wouldn’t be making again. �śIt’s just been a weird night.” �śTell me about it.” Ginger’s fingers trembled slightly and, for a second, Sam thought she could feel the other woman’s unease before she pulled her hand away. �śEveryone was in such a lousy mood. Must be something in the air.” �śIt’s always like this in the spring,” Sam said, but she didn’t believe her own words. Ginger seemed to buy it, however, and made a sound of agreement. �śListen, drive safe, okay? I’ll see you later.” �śYeah, call me if you want. I’ve noticed you haven’t been hanging at the bar as much, but I’d love to see you. Maybe we could do brunch? Or go see that new exhibit at the History Project? They’ll let you cross the ropes to touch things over there, won’t they?” �śThey will,” Sam confirmed. �śThey’re supposed to have something cool about demonic artifacts unearthed after the emergence. You’re into that kind of stuff, right?” �śYep. That’s what my parents used to do. They were archaeologists.” �śYeah, that’s what I thought.” Most people who hung around the bar knew Sam wanted to learn more about demons and the cult her parents had belonged to. Her brother might collect the memorabilia, but she was the real enthusiast. �śKnow thy enemy” was her philosophy. Learning about things like aura demons and demon-worshiping practices might seem strange to people who knew her horrific history, but it made Sam feel more in control. �śSounds interesting. I’ll call you on Monday.” Sam smiled as she got out of the car and waved at the sound of the engine roaring down the block. It was nice to know she’d been missed. She usually thought of Ginger and the other girls who hung out at the Demon’s Breath as Stephen’s friends, or even friends of Stephen’s friends, since her brother had always been a man’s man. He didn’t have many female friends of the romantic or platonic varieties. In fact, since his last girlfriend had moved to Seattle to open a demon-themed bar of her own in the only infested city on the West Coast, he hadn’t been big on the fairer sex. �śAnd hasn’t been getting any sex,” Sam mumbled beneath her breath. �śProbably why he’s been such a jerk.” When Ginger’s car was out of hearing range, Sam turned and made her way up the steps to her building and fished out her key. Even south of the barricade, most apartments had gone to fingerprint entry systems, but she loved the fact that she still had to use something concrete to get inside her home. There was something satisfying about the feel of a key sliding into a lock. Good grief. Even her most banal thoughts had a sexual overtone. Keys sliding into locks might be satisfying, but not nearly as satisfying as the feel of Jace’s fingers slipping between her legs. She couldn’t even imagine how amazing it would feel to have him inside her, to feel his bare flesh crushed against hers as they moved. There was nothing in her sexual history that had prepared her for what she’d felt tonight. In those few minutes, she’d felt so alive and complete and �Ś connected. How was that possible? Sure, he’d been the star of her fantasies for longer than she’d like to admit, but she didn’t love Jace. She didn’t even like Jace half the time. Especially tonight. He’d made her feel like a complete fool. As she closed the front door behind her and started up the stairs, Sam’s cheeks grew hot again. How was she ever going to face him? The man who’d apologized for touching her? The apology was worse than if he hadn’t said anything at all. At least if he’d used her and thrown her away without a word, she would have felt normal. That was how Jace treated women. She’d known that going in. And what’s so great about normal? At least he cared enough to apologize. �śHe didn’t care. He just thought I was crazy. Was probably worried I’d �Ś” Sam bit her lip and took the stairs a little faster. Great, now she was talking to herself. Maybe Jace was right: Maybe she should have stayed with her brother tonight. She obviously wasn’t in top mental condition. Or paranormal condition. If she had been, there was no way the thing could have sneaked up on her. She was blind, but she had four other highly functioning senses that, before now, had done a pretty good job of warning her of danger. She’d always been able to feel when someone was close, to sense movement around her even when it was too dark for her to see anything in the shadows. But not tonight. The cold energy and horrible stench she’d come to associate with her own personal demons, the ones that had filled her dreams for years, enveloped her with such swiftness she could barely draw a breath deep enough to scream. �śHelp, Mr. Petrovich. I�"” Her call to her landlord ended in a strangled gasp as the stench of the creature streamed into her open mouth, cutting off her cry. On instinct, Sam’s free hand flew to her throat, as if she could force the demon out with her fingers, but it only dug in deeper, shoving down into her chest. Gagging, she fell to her hands and knees on the steps, her cane once again falling by the wayside. Not that it mattered. The blade at the tip wouldn’t do any good against an enemy that had no body, no flesh to cut or blood to bleed. But it would �Ś soon�Ś. The gleeful shriek inside her mind confirmed her worst suspicions: One of the demons that had taken her sight was back for more. And this time, it wanted it all: a human body to inhabit, so that it could finally be flesh, so that it could�" Suddenly a shout sounded from the bottom of the stairs. Sam spun, crying out, unable to form words, but praying whoever it was would see that she needed help. �śSamantha! Run!” It was a woman’s voice, but not one she recognized. Still, the woman sounded like she cared whether Sam lived or died, which was all the encouragement she needed. Sam tried to run, but the demon’s writhing made her dizzy. It wanted in, wanted an invitation, but damned if she was going to give it one. �śGet her out of here.” A man’s voice now, one that was strangely familiar. If he spoke a little louder, she’d be able to place him. �śPlease. You’ve got to�"” The woman’s voice cut off with a strangled sound as guttural singsong language filled the air. The echo in the stairwell made it impossible to guess who was speaking. Was it her landlord? He spoke Russian, but the words didn’t sound like Russian. She couldn’t guess what they were, not with the demon inside her, twisting and screaming, insisting it was time for it to have what it was promised, what�" The cold presence fled with the same swiftness as it had invaded, streaming out of her nose and mouth, for a second seeming it would take her tongue with it. Choking on a sudden lungful of clean air, Sam called out to the woman who had warned her to run: �śHello? Are you okay?” But the only sound was a man’s harsh whisper. She shivered, the hairs on her arms standing on end. Whoever was at the bottom of the stairs, he wasn’t a friend. Heart racing, Sam groped for her cane, but it was nowhere to be found. It must have rolled down the stairs. Wherever it was, she didn’t have time to look for it. She had to get out of the hall, into her apartment, where the demon hopefully couldn’t follow. It didn’t need an invitation to roam the halls of this public building, but her home would be a different story. She hoped. �śMr. Petrovich? Anyone? Is anyone home?” Sam called out, praying she’d scare the man at the bottom of the stairs away. She grabbed the railing and pulled herself to her feet. �śHello? I just need some help getting to my door. Mr. Petrovich?” More silence, almost as if the entire building had been evacuated while she’d been out. The woman and man she’d heard must have left. The old plaster walls absorbed her cries and returned nothing, not even an echo. The only sound was the rapid beating of her own pulse in her ears, reminding her she was still a hunted woman. The smell had faded when it had abandoned her body, but the aura demon was still there, lurking, close enough to pounce again when the time was right. She could sense it, the same way she could sense the approach of the shadow fingers in her dreams. �śHello? I’ve dropped my cane. Could someone help me to my apartment?” She tried one more time to call for help�"desperate not to be alone in the ominous silence�"but didn’t wait for an answer before starting up the steps. She could make it on her own without her cane, but she’d been hoping someone would hear her and come out of their apartment. But this was New York City ruin country. The demons might stay within the boundaries of their habitat most of the time, but the gangs and the criminals didn’t. It was other humans who ensured people didn’t come out of their homes when their neighbors screamed for help. They just ran inside, locked their doors, grabbed their weapons, and prayed whoever was out there dealing death and pain didn’t come for them next. The thought made her think of the way the woman’s voice she’d heard had cut off so abruptly. Almost as if she’d been strangled into silence. Maybe by the man at the bottom of the stairs, the man who might be coming for her next. It was time to quit playing it tough and call for real help. Sam shivered as she ordered her earbud to call 911, then bit her lip to hold back a sob as the familiar busy signal sounded in her ear. The emergency number was a joke. Perpetually understaffed and chronically overwhelmed. �śOkay,” Sam muttered to herself as she tapped her bud to end the call. She’d made it to the top of the landing. She was almost there. She reached out, feeling for the edge of the wall in front of her. The demon was close, but it wasn’t attacking. Yet. She had to move quickly, but that wouldn’t be a problem. She’d walked this route hundreds of times. She’d just feel her way along the wall to the third door and let herself into her apartment. Once inside, she’d be safe and she could try again to call for help. This thing doesn’t seem to have a physical body. It’s just a pocket of energy. What if the demon experts are wrong�"what if a door between you and it won’t make a difference? You have to call Stephen. No, she wasn’t going to call Stephen. He wouldn’t believe her anyway. Even after all they’d been through as kids, he still thought of demons as animals. He didn’t believe in demons that could think and reason, that had evil intentions and paranormal powers. He certainly didn’t believe they could do magical things science couldn’t explain, or that not all of them had a body people could see. �śInvisible.” The thing she hadn’t been able to see, the evil entity that had been present when the Choes were killed in her vision. Now there was no doubt in her mind that an aura demon�"one of her aura demons�"was responsible. One of them was here with her, but who knew how many of them were out there? She had no idea how many her parents’ cult had summoned into the earthly plane. There could be others out there right now, ripping Chang-su Choe’s eyes from his head while Ellen looked on and screamed. Her voice was shaking as she told her bud to call the Choes. She had to warn them again, let them know not to open their door or leave their apartment if they hadn’t left already. She had to convince them to stay inside even if they couldn’t see anything on the other side of their door. The phone was ringing when the demon hunting her struck again, as if it knew what she planned to do and wanted to make sure her warning didn’t get through. This time it surged into her ears, filling her head with the sound of ice freezing on a pond in winter, making her neck feel as if it would snap in two. She stumbled away from the wall as the world tilted unsteadily on its axis. It felt like the ground was literally rocking beneath her, but she knew it couldn’t be. The thing inside her was simply throwing off her balance, confusing her sense of equilibrium. Too bad that didn’t help her feel any steadier. Her head spun and her stomach lurched. It was only a matter of time before she was sick or took a nasty fall or both. �śHelp! Please help!” Sam screamed so loud her jawbones vibrated with the sound. She vaguely heard the man she’d heard before yelling something, but he didn’t come to help her. No one came. She was alone with the cold air inside her, the demon presence that churned and stretched, threatening to burst her ear-drums, to shatter her fragile flesh and surge into her brain. Sam cried out as she flung her arms out to the sides and spun in a wild circle, searching for something, anything, to hold on to. She needed to anchor herself, to find something solid to cling to while she�" Everything within her sent up a wail as she stumbled too close to the top of the stairs and the ground beneath her suddenly disappeared. Her stomach bottomed out and adrenaline dumped into her bloodstream as she plummeted down the way she’d come, falling through the thick, silent air. For a second she hoped the man who’d been watching the attack would have the decency to break her fall, but that hope vanished as she gained momentum. She tumbled for what seemed like forever before her shoulder and neck finally hit the stairs with a sharp thud. There wasn’t even time to cry out before she hit again and then again and again. Sharp corners bruised her spine and tormented her bones, hurts piling upon hurts until the back of her head hit at just the wrong angle. Agony exploded through her skull, and for a moment, just before her mind stumbled down a dark stairwell of its own, Sam could have sworn she saw Mrs. Choe’s hands once more. The other woman was wearing her ring and reaching for a brass handle, preparing to let death in through her front door. CHAPTER SEVEN Someone was holding her hand. No, scratch that. Someone was clutching her hand, his large fingers wrapped too tightly around her palm, making her bones rub together. But it was nice. More than nice. Despite the aching in her head and back, Sam felt safer than she had in years. Safer than she had felt since she was very small, before that night in the barn, before the foster families and the homeless shelter she and Stephen had lived in for a time, before she had flung herself out in the big, dark world in a desperate attempt to be something other than her brother’s little sister. Sam had always done her best to put up a brave front, but beneath the act, the fear was always there. Throbbing through her veins, tightening her chest, lurking like that demon on the stair. Her eyes flew open as she sucked in a swift breath. She couldn’t see much more with her eyes open than when they were closed, but instinct didn’t run on logic. Instinct ran on fear, and she was suddenly filled with plenty of that. The aura demon. Where was it? Where was she, for that matter? A quick scan revealed she was lying on a bed, but not her own. The mattress was too firm and the smells in the air weren’t the comforting scents of home. The air was sharp and astringent, with an underlying note of gravy and medicine. A hospital. She’d been inside a hospital only a handful of times in her life, but it was a smell she’d never forget. It was the smell of disappointment and pain, of learning there was nothing modern medicine could do for her�"the shadows were never going to go away. �śSammy? Can you hear me? Sammy?” She could tell by the tightness in his tone that it wasn’t the first time he’d asked. Jace. The sound of his voice roused a mixture of emotions almost as complicated as the smells of the hospital room. �śYes. I can hear you.” �śFuck. Thank God.” His breath rushed from between his lips and his hand tightened around hers for a second before he relaxed his grip. �śI’ll call the doctor. They had a couple of kids bleeding out down the hall and he got called out, but�"” �śWait; don’t go,” she said, her fingers clutching at his. She didn’t know how Jace had come to be by her side, but she really didn’t want him to leave. �śWhat happened? How did I�"” �śYou fell down the stairs in your apartment building. I followed you home after you left the bar, but I didn’t get there in time,” Jace said, anger banishing the relief she’d heard in his voice. �śThankfully someone called nine-one-one.” It must have been the man at the bottom of the stairs. At least he’d had the decency to call the paramedics. Though could she really blame him for refusing to answer her cries for help? In all likelihood, he hadn’t been able to see what was attacking her. He’d probably thought she was high on Inuago sweat and imagining the entire thing. But that didn’t explain what had happened to the woman she’d heard. �śWas there another woman hurt?” she asked. �śI thought I heard someone cry out before I fell.” �śIs this like the scream you heard before you wandered into the ruins?” Sam pressed her lips together. �śNo, it wasn’t a scream. It was a woman talking, and she knew my name. She �Ś she warned me that there was a slick spot on the stair.” There was no way she was going to tell Jace she’d been warned to run, not after he made it so clear he thought she was imagining things. �śDid you see her?” She could hear Jace’s shrug. �śI didn’t see anyone. I got there just as they were loading you into the ambulance. You were conscious for the first few minutes.” �śI don’t remember. I don’t remember anything after the �Ś after the fall.” She couldn’t tell Jace about the invisible demon any more than she could tell her brother. He’d never believe her. It would be like telling him she’d been gored by a unicorn. Impossible, fantastical �Ś crazy. �śYou were out cold for most of the ride to the hospital.” He still sounded angry, as if he blamed her for falling down the stairs. �śYou’ve got a huge bump on the back of your head and a shitload of bruises, and you’re lucky that’s all you’ve got.” �śI’m sorry.” She apologized before she could think better of it, before she could guess what she should be sorry for. It was another instinctual response, this time to the displeasure she could feel seething from the man sitting beside her bed. �śYou could have killed yourself.” �śI know. I said I was sorry.” The strong Sam she’d been trying to be for the past few years would have found something better to say, but she wasn’t feeling strong. She felt breakable and afraid and suddenly in need of more than Jace’s hand to make her feel safe. �śDon’t cry. It makes me crazy to see you cry.” His voice was tight, but he didn’t sound angry anymore, and his hand shook the tiniest bit as he leaned closer and pressed his lips to her forehead. The kiss was gentle, but Sam’s response to it was anything but. She would have assumed it was impossible to feel anything more complicated than fear at that moment, but the brush of Jace’s warm lips against her skin stirred things inside her she hadn’t even known were there. In seconds she was crying harder, sobbing even as she reached for Jace, cupping his jaw and pulling him closer, her tongue demanding entrance to his mouth. She needed to taste him, to tell him things with her kiss she couldn’t say out loud. Like how grateful she was that he was there beside her, how their brief encounter had blown her away, how much she wanted him to be the one she could turn to when she was lonely and scared and there was nothing solid-feeling left in the world. She’d been angry with him, but she didn’t want revenge. She just wanted him. It was a loaded kiss, one that could have killed a lesser man, but Jace didn’t pull away. He stayed and kissed her back. Really kissed her back. Sam moaned as Jace’s hands slipped softly around her neck and he leaned closer, his lips moving urgently against her own. For a moment, Sam believed Jace felt the same things she felt. She would have sworn she tasted need on his tongue, the kind of need that was more than physical, that came from one person’s soul crying out for another’s. But she should have remembered that Jace wasn’t the kind to cry out for anyone, from his soul or anywhere else. Their moment was only a moment, and was over as quickly as it had begun. �śWhat the hell is going on?” Stephen asked, outrage in his voice. Jace pulled away, flinching as if Sam’s lips had suddenly caught fire. �śSam’s awake.” �śI can see that.” Stephen surged into the room, his footsteps tapping out a warning to everything in his path. �śI also saw your tongue halfway down her throat.” Oh, God. This was going to escalate, quickly, unless she did something to defuse her brother. �śIt was my tongue down his throat. I kissed him, not the other way around.” Stephen’s shocked silence said more than words. Sam had never dared say something like that in his presence. She’d never even brought one of her boyfriends by the bar before. Except Ezra, of course, and that was before they’d started dating, when he’d simply been a demon studies professor she was pumping for information about the ritual her parents had worked all those years ago. She’d been trying to find out if there was any way to get rid of her dreams, if there was a rite to undo whatever the cult had done to her. Unfortunately, Ezra hadn’t known how to help, despite the fact that he had infiltrated various demon cults for his thesis work and lived in communes similar to the one where Stephen and Sam had grown up. He had seen some of the artifacts, like the box her archaeologist parents believed was key to summoning the aura demons. He’d even stolen a few to bring back to the university. Most of his colleagues didn’t approve of what he’d done, but Sam thought it was brave. She dimly remembered how her parents’ cult had all but deified the box her father had taken with him when he’d left his last dig in China. They would have killed anyone who dared try to take it away. That Ezra had risked his life to remove similarly dangerous tools from other cults and bring them to a place where they would be used only for academic study was one of his most admirable traits. And it wasn’t the only one. Ezra was, all in all, a very decent guy. Still, Stephen hadn’t liked him, even when he’d assumed she and the older man were just friends. But then, that was hardly surprising. Sam had learned at a young age that Stephen didn’t even like the idea of her dating. He wanted to keep her forever that runt of a fourteen-year-old she’d been when he’d finally had enough money to buy the bar and get them off the streets�"innocent and malleable and in awe of the much older brother who had swept in and saved her from the worst foster family she’d had yet. But she wasn’t a little girl anymore. And if she wanted to be treated like an adult, she was going to have to start showing Stephen she was grown-up in every way. Even the ways that made him uncomfortable. �śGet out,” Stephen finally said in a harsh whisper. �śI don’t want to see you here or anywhere near my sister again.” �śNo, I don’t want him to go.” The words made her heart race. Not just because she was finally standing up to her brother about something that mattered, but because of what she was saying to Jace. Her words were an offering of herself, one she’d been scared to make, but now was too scared not to. She wanted this man in her life. Nearly dying for the second time in one day had forced emotions to the surface that went way beyond desire. Whether it made sense or not, she just knew she and Jace could have something real. This wasn’t a crush. A crush didn’t make a person feel the way she’d felt when Jace kissed her. �śI should head out. I think you and your brother need to talk.” He was already walking away, but she would swear she heard the hint of hesitation in his voice. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to give her the guts to try one more time. �śWe can talk with you here,” she said. �śI don’t have anything to say to him that I can’t say in front of you.” �śYou need to rest.” �śI don’t need to rest.” �śSammy, I�"” �śPlease.” She stared in the direction of his voice, willing him to stay with everything in her. �śDon’t go.” There, she’d done it: made it pathetically obvious how much she wanted him. If he left now, she’d at least know she’d given this her best shot. �śI’ll �Ś be right outside the door,” he finally said. He didn’t sound really happy about it, but that was okay. It was a start, and that was something to hold on to. As she listened to Jace ease out of the room, and Stephen launched into a lecture worthy of the most betrayed parent, it felt like the only thing she had to hold on to. Jace paced the hall outside Sam’s room, trying not to listen to everything Stephen was saying on the other side of the door. But it was hard. It was even harder to resist slamming back in there and telling the other man to shut his mouth and leave Sammy alone. She wasn’t a child and she wasn’t a fool, and it was time he stopped treating her like both. Stephen was the one who needed to check his attitude and take a hard look at his life. Sam might be taking on more than she could handle, living alone, but at least she wasn’t earning her living peddling to people’s darker habits, and possibly putting herself and everyone close to her in danger. He was growing increasingly convinced that Stephen was up to something shady. The other man hadn’t sounded surprised to hear his sister was in the hospital, which bugged Jace. A lot. Stephen was just lucky this seemed like an accident, or Jace’s connection in the police department would be getting an anonymous call about the owner of the Demon’s Breath peddling more than liquor. Sometime in the past fifteen minutes, Jace’s loyalties had shifted. Seeing Samantha unconscious on that stretcher had done something to him, something he wasn’t sure he liked. He hadn’t enjoyed the things his heart had been doing in that room when she’d looked up at him with such need in her eyes and begged him not to go. Jace didn’t like being needed. He liked needing people even less. But he’d needed Sam to wake up and talk to him, needed it so badly it had felt as if his heart would explode when she finally opened her eyes. He’d never been so relieved to hear another person’s voice. He’d wanted to pull her into his arms and squeeze her tight, or crawl into bed with her and just �Ś hold her. Both urges were insane, and completely unlike him, as was this feeling that he had to protect Sam from her brother. Jace was the one who wrecked the life of every woman he touched, and he and Stephen had been friends for years. No man loved his family more than Stephen loved Sam. It would be better for everyone if Jace left them both alone. �śDamn it.” His hands bunched into fists as, in the room behind him, Stephen launched into a fresh tirade, underscored occasionally by soft murmurings from his sister. Fortunately, the man across the hall took that moment to turn up the volume on his television. Guess he was sick of hearing the domestic disturbance, too. Domestic disturbance. Made him think of a husband and wife, not a brother and sister. Stephen was way too involved in Sam’s business. Yes, she needed someone looking out for her�"the events of today had proven that�"but it shouldn’t be her big brother. It should be�" �śNot going there. Not even going to start going there,” Jace said, running his hand through his hair. He wasn’t Samantha’s lover or her friend or anything else. No matter what he’d felt when she’d kissed him tonight, there was no connection between them and there never would be. The sexual fascination he’d experienced after their interlude in the alley had been dangerous, but this new feeling was downright deadly. He felt so close to her. Connected, like he’d never been to anyone. When she’d cried, his entire body had begun to ache, and for a second, just a split second, he’d been afraid he’d start crying right along with her. He hadn’t cried since he was eight years old, not one fucking time. �śExcuse me. Are you working this floor?” Jace angled his body in front of a passing nurse, stopping the curvy redhead in her tracks. He had to get out of here. He didn’t have time to waste on the Quinn family. He had a Ju Du demon to scrape up off the pavement before any of the other bounty hunters in the area spotted the remains. He’d let it sit too long already. He’d used the Conti family’s weapon of choice�"the old-school automatic�"and Uncle Francis would shit if Jace was connected to the killing. Besides, cleaning up demon guts was exactly what he needed to cure him of whatever madness had possessed him in the past few hours. �śYes. Until the morning shift comes in at six, at least.” She smiled, and Jace read the interest clearly in her eyes. He’d meant to ask the nurse to deliver a message to Sam, to tell her he was sorry that he’d had to leave, but maybe this was an even better opportunity. And maybe that Ju Du could wait until morning. After all, what was a few more hours? He could take this woman home, fuck her ten different ways, and prove to himself this weirdness with Sam was just the product of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Watching a woman nearly die twice in the same night had thrown him, made him think he was having feelings he didn’t really have. After all, he hardly knew the girl�"at least, not the way his heart was trying to convince him he did. Jesus Christ. His heart. He was thinking about what his heart felt. He needed to do whatever it took to put this madness behind him, ASAP. �śSix o’clock?” he asked, leaning closer to the woman in front of him. �śWhy don’t you take off early? I know a bar that stays open until four. We can make it there for last call if we hurry. Get your things and I’ll meet you near the main entrance downstairs.” �śI can’t just take off,” she said, though her pale blue eyes told him she was going to do exactly that. Jace forced a flirtatious grin. �śI’ll see you in ten minutes.” He turned to go, feeling satisfied with himself. So a part of him was screaming that he was betraying Sam by leaving when he said he’d wait outside, that he was a lousy sack of shit for abandoning her when she obviously needed him. But the part of him that knew getting close to someone was dangerous, that feared being needed in the way some people feared walking into the Southie ruins, won out. It always did. Just another reason she would be better off without him. He was halfway down the hall and nearly home free when he heard her scream. Before he could think better of it, he had spun on his heel and was racing back down the white corridor, heart beating so fast he feared he might end up on one of the gurneys lining the hall. But the thought that Sam was in trouble, that Stephen or anyone else might have hurt her, made him frighteningly angry. Jace usually didn’t do extreme emotions. He preferred to keep an even keel and think his every move through with a clear head before he took action. But in one night, Samantha Quinn had managed to shoot that all to hell. Now, as he threw open the door to her room, he was ready to throw punches first and ask questions later, just like in the days when he’d been piercing with Ju Du quills on a daily basis. It didn’t matter that the man he would be punching was someone he considered a friend. If Stephen had hurt Sam, he wasn’t going to be a friend much longer. Fortunately, Stephen was across the room by the TV when Jace burst in, far enough from Sam that it was clear he’d done nothing to make her scream. In fact, she appeared fine. Though she still bore the bumps and bruises she’d sustained during her fall down the stairs, she didn’t have any fresh wounds. �śWhat happened? What’s wrong?” he asked, his voice harsher than he’d intended. But he was angry that she’d made him worry. Just like he’d been angry with her for falling down the stairs. And a part of him could already feel the satisfaction he’d get from smashing his fist into Stephen’s face. Who cared if he wasn’t the one who’d made Sam scream? It would feel good to hit something, more than good. There were times when completely losing his mind with rage was the best thing in the world, when spilling blood made him higher than any drug. Jace took a deep breath, forcing himself to relax the hands he’d fisted at his sides, spooked by how close he’d come to letting the beast inside him free. Damn. What a catch he was. He should turn around and walk away from this woman right now. Despite the fact that she seemed relieved to hear him, he wasn’t good for her, and she sure as hell wasn’t good for him. He hadn’t been this close to losing control since the darkest of his using days. �śThe Choes are dead. They’re dead,” Sam said, the terror in her voice making the hairs on his arms stand on end. �śThrowing away the flowers didn’t help.” The flowers? Was she having another episode? If so, he was going to have to tell someone she wasn’t in her right mind. Maybe a doctor or a nurse. He sure as hell wasn’t going to tell Stephen, however. Not when it seemed the other man was so eager to have his sister declared incompetent so he could take over the running of her life. �śI’m not crazy!” Sam’s hands fisted in the sheets at her side and her eyes narrowed, almost as if she could see the incredulous look on his and her brother’s faces. More likely, she could hear their doubt in the silence. There were times when silence spoke volumes. �śShe says she heard someone on the news reporting the Choes’ death,” Stephen said as he flipped on the set. �śBut we didn’t even have the TV on.” �śI heard it coming from outside,” Sam said. �śThe man across the hall is watching channel seven.” �śThere’s no way you could have heard�"” �śI heard it, Stephen. Turn on the damn news.” The strength in Sam’s voice shocked both the men in her room. Stephen’s eyes widened, but he turned to do as she’d asked. �śThey said they’d be going live to the scene after the�"” �śJesus.” Stephen backed away from the television, as if putting some distance between himself and the set would make what they were seeing easier to handle. For once, Jace was glad Sam couldn’t see. He wouldn’t have wanted her to watch the body bags being rolled into the ambulance. Body bags that�"according to the caption at the bottom of the screen�"contained the corpses of Ellen and Chang-su Choe. CHAPTER EIGHT �śNo sign of forced entry,” Sam muttered beneath her breath, repeating the newscaster’s words. That meant the Choes must have invited the demons in. Or that the demonologists’ theories were wrong and aura demons didn’t need an invitation to enter a home, which meant there was no safe place to hide. For anyone. �śLet me go, Stephen.” Sam flinched away from her brother’s hands on her shoulders and continued peeling away the tape securing her IV to the top of her hand. She had to get out of here. She didn’t have time to wait for nurses and official discharge procedure. She also didn’t have health insurance. So there was no good reason to stick around and give the hospital staff her full name and billing address. She was sure Jace hadn’t given her away. He’d been a Southie too long to hand out another person’s information without asking their permission first, and surely the hospital staff hadn’t had time to do a fingerprinting on her yet. She couldn’t have been out that long. She wasn’t even wearing a hospital gown, but was still sporting the gauzy dress she’d put on that morning. God, that felt like a zillion years ago. She’d like nothing more than to go home and burn the dress, change into some pajamas, and try to forget this entire day had happened. But she couldn’t. Like it or not, her premonitions had always made her feel responsible�"and that had been when she’d seen only the shadow fingers and had no way of figuring out what would happen to the people they touched. Until yesterday, her dreams had given her no real leads, nothing like the crystal-clear waking vision she’d had when she was with Jace. Now that she’d seen a murder�"the murder of friends�"she couldn’t rest until she knew exactly what had happened to Ellen and her husband. �śWhat are you doing? You’re going to hurt yourself,” Stephen said, grabbing her hands hard enough to make her wince. But Stephen didn’t make her feel safe. He just made her angry. She should never have told him that she hadn’t fallen down the stairs all on her own, that she’d had help from some serious paranormal distraction. She hadn’t said the words invisible or demon , but she might as well have. Stephen had still acted as if she were crazy. Either crazy or lying to cover up the fact that she was a fatal accident waiting to happen. Neither opinion brought out her warm and fuzzy feelings. �śPlease, I have to go,” Sam said, hoping he heard the warning in her tone. She didn’t have time to coddle her overbearing big brother, no matter how much he’d done for her. She had to get down to the murder scene and find out exactly what had happened to the Choes. If the murder had gone down the way she saw it in her vision �Ś �śIt doesn’t matter if it was the same. It happened and I saw it happen before it happened,” she muttered to herself, realizing she’d spoken out loud only when Stephen sighed and gripped her hands even tighter. �śSo this is about one of your dreams? Sam, we’ve talked about this a hundred times�"” �śAnd we’re not going to talk about it again.” She had to find out what had happened to the Choes, and whether she’d really seen Ellen’s last moments through the other woman’s eyes. She’d go crazy for real if she didn’t. She would figure out what to do about her vision after she’d talked to the police on the scene. Maybe they would already have someone in custody and she wouldn’t have to worry about invisible demons. Until the next time one helps you fall down a set of stairs. Right. First she’d head down to the Choes’ former residence and then straight over to Ezra’s apartment and wake him up with coffee and questions. She couldn’t wait for him to call her back. He had his doctorate in demonic anthropology with a minor in occult practices. He was the only person who might be able to help her find a way to protect herself from the thing shadowing her before it hurt someone else. Or came for her again. Because it would come. She had something it needed. She’d sensed that when the thing was pushing inside of her�"it was trying to find �Ś something. What had it been looking for? She felt as if she should know. There was a connection between her and the creatures. It made her wonder if Stephen had felt anything strange lately. The demons had invaded his body, as well, though the police had raided the commune before the creatures could take whatever they had intended to take from her brother. She knew that had always made him feel guilty. Their baby sister had been killed and Sam blinded, and he’d gotten away with nothing more serious than a few rope burns. It cut him up inside, because he was, despite his bullying nature, an extremely decent person. The thought made her voice softer when she spoke again. �śStephen. I’m fine. I promise you. I’m not even that sore.” A lie, but he didn’t have to know that her spine felt like some large, hoofed animal had been tap-dancing on her while she was asleep. �śJust let me go. I have to�"” �śI’ll let you go when you promise to get back in bed.” His fingers wrapped all the way around her wrists, making it clear he wasn’t going to back down. �śYou need to stay here.” �śLet me go, Stephen. Right now.” She fought the urge to knee her brother in the nuts as panic seeped into her bloodstream. No one enjoyed being physically restrained, but she’d always hated it more than the average person. It reminded her of large hands on her six-year-old ankles and wrists, binding her with rope. Still, she couldn’t lose what was left of her composure. If Stephen wanted to, he could use force to keep her in her hospital bed until he called a doctor or nurse to come do the job for him. South Methodist, the only hospital still open below Fourteenth, was notoriously understaffed, but Stephen would eventually find someone willing to come inject his sister with something to keep her quiet. She had to convince him to let her go of his own free will. �śPlease. I know this may seem strange, but I really need�"” �śYou need to lie down.” �śStop.” Sam fought him as he tried to push her back onto the bed, her voice rising as panic threatened to become full-fledged hysteria. �śStop it, Stephen. Stop, I�"” �śLet her go,” Jace said. The anger she heard in his voice surprised her. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was about to kick Stephen’s ass. But they’d been friends for years. He’d never take her side over her brother’s. Would he? �śI’ll take her wherever she wants to go. Just get your hands off of her. Now.” Maybe he would. The knowledge that Jace was standing up for her, even offering to help her, eased the tightness in her chest. Maybe she wouldn’t be doing this alone; maybe she’d have a friend with her. Maybe something more than a friend �Ś �śYou’re not taking her anywhere.” Stephen released her hands and she heard him turn to face Jace. �śI told you to get the hell out of here.” �śLook, it’s clear Sam doesn’t want�"” �śI don’t care what Sam wants. I want her back in bed and you out of here. Now.” It was the second time in one night that a man had told her he didn’t care what she wanted. For some reason, however, hearing it from her brother was even harder to handle. She was related to him by blood and affection, but he didn’t own her. She wasn’t a child or an animal, and she was sick of being treated like a piece of furniture to be moved wherever Stephen saw fit. The last of the tape was off her hand and the needle pulled from her vein in seconds. Now if she could just get hold of her cane, she could show Stephen exactly how much he should care about what she wanted. Her brother had no idea she’d rigged a knife into the end, but she was suddenly very eager to let him in on her little invention. �śGreat,” Stephen shouted. �śNow she’s bleeding.” �śDon’t talk about me like I’m not here, and don’t come any closer,” Sam warned as she swung her legs down on the opposite side of the bed, putting the mattress between her and Stephen. �śYou’re bleeding, Samantha!” �śIt will stop. I clot well.” She pulled her sleeve down over her bloodied hand and reached the other toward where Jace had been standing last time she’d heard him speak. In the glaring light of the hospital room, she could just make out a slightly darker blur in the shadows, but she couldn’t be sure it was him. He stood so completely still�"not like her brother, who constantly shifted and paced, as if his feet itched. She’d always found her brother’s restlessness rather endearing, but right now it was simply another reason she had to get away from him. She was upset enough, and Stephen’s obvious anxiety was only making everything worse. Hell, he sounded as if he was going to have a seizure when Jace pushed around him and leaned down to take something from the floor beside the bed. �śDon’t you dare, Lu. You owe me too much to�"” �śI don’t owe you shit, Stephen. I paid my debt a long time ago, and I’m beginning to think keeping my mouth shut has been a big mistake.” Stephen sucked in a breath, for once seemingly speechless. What debt? What had Jace and Stephen been hiding from her? Whatever it was, it had to be something Stephen really didn’t want her to know, because he still didn’t say a word when Jace crossed to where she stood by the bed. �śHere, I’ve got a towel for your hand, and your cane.” Jace pressed the cane into her right hand and took her left in his, wrapping what felt like a washcloth around the top and exerting gentle pressure to stop the bleeding. It probably would have been more effective if his touch didn’t make her heart race, but Sam couldn’t help herself. When his arm went around her shoulders to lead her toward the door, her pulse sped until she was dizzy. The feeling that something had shifted dramatically in their relationship was there again, underscored by the knowledge that no one had ever inspired this kind of reaction in her. It was more than a sexual response, more than an emotional need. It was something deeper, a connection even stronger than �Ś Connection. That word again. First the demons and now Jace, the demon hunter. One inspired terror, and the other, feelings so wonderful she could scarcely describe them, but there was an eerie similarity in the way both made her heart race and her skin prickle with an almost supernatural awareness. And they’d both burst onto the scene at the same time. She’d sensed something evil lurking in her dreams for years and obsessed about Jace Lu for nearly as long, but never felt this strange connection to either of them. Until tonight, when she’d had the vision of the Choes being murdered and then been attacked in the stairwell. Jace had been there for both. Or at least �Ś Jace had arrived on the scene soon after her attack. She could brush off the first meeting as chance, but why had he followed her back to her apartment? She’d like to believe it was because he’d been affected by the chemistry between them and decided to take her up on her offer to play with a woman who knew what she wanted, but she wasn’t a fool. He wouldn’t have brought her back to her brother’s bar if he’d planned to spend the night at her place. Call it Southie paranoia, but her mind was telling her it wasn’t wise to trust Jace, at least not completely. Too bad her gut, her heart, and just about every other body part had decided Mr. Lu was the only person she could trust. That kiss had done something to her, scrambled her insides into some kind of love mush. No, lust mush. No matter how overwhelming the feelings he inspired, she wasn’t in love with Jace Lu. The very idea was ridiculous. �śDon’t walk out of here with him, Sam. Please.” Stephen’s strained words stopped her at the door. He sounded so distraught it nearly made her think twice about leaving. But this tension between her and her brother wasn’t going to be eased in the next ten minutes. Especially not with Jace around. �śI’ll call you later, Stephen. Thank you for coming.” She turned to leave, even though she could feel Stephen’s anger prickling along her skin like a hundred tiny paper cuts. Jace didn’t say a word. Considering the situation, it was probably just as well. �śYou want to go to the Choes’, don’t you?” Jace asked under his breath as he guided her out into the hall. She easily matched his swift pace and was grateful that he wasn’t treating her as if she were made of glass. She was a little battered and bruised, but she was going to be fine. This time. Next time, she might not be so lucky. �śI have to. I have to see if�Ś I just have to go.” �śIf you know who did this, just tell me. I can take you up to Midtown and check you into a hotel under an assumed name and take care of this. The barricade opens in a few hours.” The way he said barricade made it clear Jace didn’t mind the ten-foot wall that ran along Fourteenth Street and cut their part of Manhattan off from the rest of the city. The wall and the heavily guarded tollbooth on Broadway were there to help the tourists and the rest of New York feel safe sleeping so close to a demon habitat. There wasn’t any danger of the demons leaving the ruins and trying to expand their territory into upper Manhattan as long as the bounty hunters kept their numbers under control, but the barricade put the average citizen’s mind at ease. Contrarily, it drove Sam crazy. She hated being forced to sit in a cab for an hour or more every time she needed to see a client above the barricade. But then, she would bet Jace had a special pass, one that would allow him to slip through without stopping to pay a toll or have his car checked for demon drugs. There were definite perks to having a big, bad mob boss for an uncle, and she was sure Jace made the most of it. The thought was almost enough to make her take him up on his offer. If only he could take care of this for her. It would be so nice to let someone else handle this particular situation. No matter how independent she tried to be, she’d never wanted to get involved in a murder investigation. �śThat won’t be necessary.” Sam stopped when Jace stopped, near the sound of elevator doors dinging. They were nearly off the floor. She’d feel better when they were out of the hospital completely, but just getting a little farther away from her brother would be a relief. She could feel his eyes boring into the back of her neck. The elevator doors couldn’t open fast enough. �śYou didn’t fall down the stairs, did you? Someone pushed you.” �śI �Ś Can we talk about this later?” Jace cursed under his breath. �śNo, we can’t. You’re going to tell me everything, and then you’re going to a hotel. You’ll be safe north of the barricade, and I can talk to my contact in metro.” Jace pulled her closer to his side, shielding her with his body as two official-sounding pairs of shoes clicked down the hall beside them. Despite the sobering reality of where they were headed, she couldn’t help the thrill that raced across her skin just from being so close to him, smelling his smell, feeling his heat warming the front of her body. �śTell me, who pushed you?” �śNo one pushed me.” It was technically the truth. An invisible demon didn’t count as an official �śsomeone,” and it hadn’t really pushed her so much as distracted her into falling. But even if it had, she wouldn’t tell Jace. Not right now. She had to get to the Choes’ apartment, and there was no way he’d let her stay in Southie if he thought she was in danger �Ś even from something he probably didn’t believe in. The knowledge made her flush with a combination of pleasure and anger. It was becoming a familiar mix of emotions when Jace was around. �śYou don’t have to protect anyone. If you know�"” �śI’m not protecting anyone, and I don’t know anything about the Choes’ murder. Not for certain,” Sam whispered as she followed him onto an elevator heading down to the ground floor. �śHopefully I’ll know more after I find out what �Ś or at least how�Ś” �śIt doesn’t matter how.” His voice was soft, but not a whisper, and she couldn’t hear anyone else breathing in the space. They must be alone. �śYou knew this was going to happen, and if the gang responsible knows that, then you’ll become the next target.” �śIt wasn’t a gang. At least, I don’t think it was.” The woman who’d called for her to run obviously hadn’t been part of a gang, but what about the male voice she’d heard? What if it had been a gang member? But that didn’t explain who the woman was, or how she’d known Sam’s name. If only Jace had been more receptive the first time she’d mentioned the woman’s voice or the screams in the ruins. It would be so nice to tell him the entire story and get a little help putting together the pieces of this puzzle. �śBut I heard you on the phone earlier. You said�"” �śI lied. I was just trying to think of something to say that Mrs. Choe would believe.” The elevator dinged. Sam took Jace’s arm and followed him toward the cool air coming from the entrance to the hospital. It had gotten too cold for the dress she was wearing, but she couldn’t get outside soon enough. She could use some fresh air. The smell of the hospital was starting to get to her. �śI needed a reasonable explanation for why she shouldn’t let anyone into her house tonight.” She smelled a cloud of strong perfume near the entrance, just as Jace mumbled something about a �śprevious engagement.” Outside, the shadows were still a jumble of black, not a silhouette in sight, so it couldn’t be anywhere close to sunrise. She was guessing it was near four in the morning, if her internal clock served her correctly. Ezra’s classes started at eight, so she’d have to find some way to ditch Jace after they stopped by the Choes’. Call her crazy, but she didn’t want her ex-boyfriend to meet her �Ś whatever Jace was. What was Jace? Why was he helping her? Was it pity or something more? Did he feel the same connection between them that she did? She was dying to ask, but now wasn’t the time to start a relationship discourse. Jace didn’t do relationships. He had a nearly pathological aversion to them, in fact. She was a fool to think he would change his ways for her, of all people. She was setting herself up for a very painful one- or two-night stand at best and complete rejection at worst. Or maybe the other way around. Right now, she couldn’t decide which option would be worse. She also couldn’t bring herself to tell Jace to get lost. She didn’t want to do this alone. �śSo you’re telling me that the real explanation is unreasonable.” �śVery.” Sam sighed and huddled a little closer to Jace’s warmth. He wasn’t going to let this go. She guessed they were destined to have this conversation sooner or later, but she really wished it could have waited. After the day she’d had, it would be nice to make it at least a few hours without someone telling her she was crazy. �śStephen said you had dreams. Sounded like he meant something more than the average nightmare.” To his credit, he kept the words neutral, but she knew him well enough to realize his neutrality would be out the window if she confessed to having a vision seconds before he’d nearly taken her against a wall. Sam felt her cheeks heat and hoped her blush wasn’t noticeable in the darkness. Stephen had always teased that she turned bright red when she was embarrassed. And she was embarrassed about what they’d nearly done and the fact that she’d been wandering around New York without any underwear�"thank God her dress was slightly transparent only on the top and not the bottom. For some reason, a quickie seemed wrong now. When she and Jace were together for the first time she wanted it to be someplace private and personal, not a frantic coupling on a public street. Geez, she was losing it. Jace wouldn’t want some romantic �śfirst” night with her. He wasn’t the type. But then �Ś she wouldn’t have said he was the type to kiss a woman as if her mouth held the answer to every question he’d been afraid to ask, either. Maybe Jace Lu wasn’t the man she’d thought he was. Maybe he would be open to hearing what she had to say. �śI have dreams that let me know when something bad is going to happen to someone. I’ve had them since the night Stephen and I were taken from our parents,” she said, pushing on before she could think better of it. �śBut all I’ve ever seen is these kind of dark, shadowy fingers. Once they touch someone in my dream, I know the person is going to be in trouble, but not what kind of trouble. There’s never been anything specific enough to allow me to help them, or to convince Stephen that I was anything but crazy. I used to try to tell him about them when I was younger, but �Ś” �śHe didn’t believe you.” �śNo, he didn’t. Even though I could always tell the difference between a dream that was going to come true and one that wasn’t, it took me a few years to figure out what the shadow fingers meant.” �śDream language is different,” he said, which surprised her. �śYeah. It is.” She still couldn’t tell if he believed her, but at least he was giving her the benefit of the doubt. It was a nice change. �śBy the time I figured out what was happening, Stephen had stopped listening, so I stopped pushing the issue. There wasn’t much I could do anyway. There was never anything so specific, nothing like �Ś the Choes.” �śA murder.” Sam fought off a shiver. �śNo, nothing like that. The dreams have been worse lately�"more violence, people in pain, but I still can’t see enough to get a clear idea of what’s happening, or to who. It was only �Ś um �Ś after �Ś” God, just spit it out already, Sam! This wasn’t the time to get flustered. �śThis was the first time I could see everything so clearly. It was different. It was more like a vision than a dream.” �śA vision? As in something you saw in your head?” �śMore like from inside Ellen’s head.” She felt his muscles tense, but she kept going. The Choes’ apartment building wasn’t that far from the hospital. They’d be there in a few minutes, and she’d like to have some sort of cover story ready for the police, some good reason for asking the questions she needed to ask. She suspected Jace would help her, but only if he knew the truth. �śI saw the murder happen from her perspective. Before it happened. There was a �Ś coldness inside my head, and then I was somewhere else.” He grunted. Not the most encouraging sound. Why had she started down this road? Didn’t she know better by now? Obviously she didn’t, because her lips kept flapping, spilling out everything even as her brain screamed for her to shut up. �śI think it may have something to do with the demons my parents summoned when I was a kid,” she said. �śThere’s some sort of connection between us.” He grunted again. �śYou think demons killed the Choes? But they almost never venture outside the�"” �śI know. But these aren’t normal demons. They’re �Ś invisible.” �śYou mean an aura demon. Like the demon cults talk about? You know they�"” �ś�"don’t exist. Right �Ś but I think they do.” She winced as she said the words. She was pushing her luck, but she had to tell someone about her theory. She supposed she could have waited until she tracked down her ex, but a part of her wanted to tell Jace. She had to know if there was any chance that he could believe in her in a way her brother never had. �śAnd I think there is a connection between me and these particular aura demons. I was there when they were summoned into the earthly plane. I was part of the ritual. I think that’s why I’ve always had these dreams. And why I was able to see the murder.” �śYou saw the murder, but not the demons?” �śNo, they’re invisible,” Sam repeated, her heart sinking at the doubt she heard creeping into Jace’s voice. �śI know that sounds crazy, a blind girl talking about invisible demons. But I saw the Choes being attacked. There was a big shadow there with them, but nothing I could see clearly. It could have been a person or not, but I’m positive there were demons there, too. I could smell them, feel them.” Jace was quiet for a moment. �śBut aura demons can’t interact with the material world. I mean, that’s what the demon cults believe, right? That’s why they do that crazy shit they do, the sacrifices and stuff. To try to give the demons a body?” She could tell he knew all about her parents. The word stuff had never been so loaded. �śThey believe aura demons have to have a human host to touch the physical world unless someone invites them in and gives them permission to possess them.” �śOkay �Ś and why would the Choes do that?” �śI don’t know. I don’t think they would, but �Ś” Sam chewed her lip. �śMaybe aura demons are different than the cults think they are. Maybe they can attack people without permission. I mean, I think these demons have been hurting people for years. Every time the shadow fingers in my dreams touch someone, they get really sick or someone close to them dies or they die or get cancer or�"” �śSo aura demons cause cancer?” He couldn’t sound more dubious if he were auditioning for the role of Dubious Man on an infomercial. Sam sighed. �śI don’t know. Maybe.” �śHmph.” She resisted the urge to keep babbling, to tell him about the pocket of evil energy that had attacked her on the stairs, of the way it had swept inside her just like the demons in the barn all those years ago, or about the thoughts she would have sworn she heard in her head. Jace was never going to believe her. He thought demons were just animals. That was why he hunted them. He didn’t say a word for a long moment, and the muscles in the arm around her shoulders bunched even tighter. Finally, he let out a long, slow breath. �śOkay.” �śOkay?” Surely she was hearing things. �śYou mean you believe me? You think I might have something? Just like that?” �śI didn’t say that.” Right. Of course he didn’t. That would have been too easy. Jace was many things, but easy sure as hell wasn’t one of them. �śSo you don’t believe me?” �śI didn’t say that either.” �śThen what are you saying?” �śI believe that you believe you saw this murder. And that you think aura demons are real and invisible and dangerous.” Ah. The talking-to-the-crazy-woman tone again. He still thought she was nuttier than your average pecan roll. �śI did see it. The murder, I mean, not the demons. I didn’t see them, but I felt them; I knew they were there,” she said, struggling to sound non-nutsy and failing miserably. She’d gone too far; she should have quit while he was still at least entertaining what she had to say. �śBut you believe I had a vision.” �śLike I said, I believe that you�"” �śWhat other explanation is there?” She tapped her cane even more rapidly back and forth in front of her in frustration. �śYou were with me when the vision happened. You saw it. One minute everything was �Ś fine.” If that was any way to describe being seconds away from sex in a public place. �śThen the next minute I was in her body, watching Chang-su’s eyes being gouged out.” Just saying the words out loud made Sam’s throat close up. When she spoke again her voice was husky and thin. �śBelieve me, it wasn’t what I would have chosen as my first entry back into the world of the sighted, but�"” �śSlow down,” he whispered as he pulled her closer, spinning her until her back was against a wall and his body was warming her entire front. �śWe’ve got people driving by who I’d rather didn’t see you.” �śWhat kind of people?” She answered her own question before Jace could speak. Gang-type people. He must still think she had insider gang knowledge and had shared it with Mrs. Choe. Sigh. This was why she usually made a practice of telling the truth. �śI swear, Jace. I don’t know any gang members well enough to know�"” �śI never said you did.” �śThen why are we�"” �śYou talk an awful lot. I don’t remember you being so chatty when you were a kid.” And then he kissed her. It wasn’t a sweet, aching kiss like they’d shared in the hospital, but neither was it a frenzied mating of their mouths like their first kiss. No, it was somewhere in between. There was heat in the way his tongue pushed past her lips, need clear in the way his large hands dug into her hips, fingers curling until her flesh hurt just the perfect, tiny bit. But there was also emotion there. She felt it when he let her take the lead, twining her arms around his neck and pulling him closer. Her fingers threaded through his hair, sliding through the soft prickle of the shorter strands at the bottom all the way to longer, spiked pieces on top. The feel of the crisp gel made her smile. She’d never guessed that Jace wore his hair this way, the same way the retro punks who came to the bar liked to wear theirs. The style had always reminded her of a giant hedgehog and seemed a little silly, but she had no doubt Jace could pull it off. The way women responded to him left no doubt he was well put together, and she still remembered the first time they’d met. Stephen had introduced them and asked Jace to let his little sister run her hands over his face. It was the only way for Sam to �śsee” what people looked like, and he’d wanted her to feel at home in their new neighborhood with his new friends. She was sure she’d blushed a million shades of red as her fourteen-year-old fingers smoothed across Jace’s handsome face, tracing the high cheekbones, gently feathering over his almond-shaped eyes and down his strong nose to the softest lips she’d ever felt on a man. Or a woman, for that matter. �śYou have the softest lips,” she mumbled against his cheek as he kissed his way down her throat, said lips sending shivers of excitement to every inch of her body. �śYou should feel the rest of me,” he said, the hands at her hips moving to cup her ass and pull her close to where he was as hard as stone. Her breath rushed out on a moan. �śDoesn’t feel soft to me.” He laughed, a deep chuckle that buzzed across her skin. �śIt isn’t, but I’ve been told the rest of me is. Soft as a baby’s ass.” This time she was the one who laughed, but laughter did nothing to banish the ache he inspired. If anything, it only made her want him even more. She’d always known Jace was a badass, with the kind of strength and confidence that made women swoon. She hadn’t known he was funny. �śA baby’s ass. That’s pretty soft.” �śI’m half Chinese. We’re a soft people.” One hand fisted in her dress and pulled it up while the other slid down over her bare ass, dipping between her legs. �śHope that doesn’t turn you off.” �śGod, no.” She sighed, shaking as his fingers teased at where she was wet and ready. �śSome women prefer their men to be a little rough around the edges.” �śYou’re plenty rough around the edges,” she said, struggling to keep her voice even as Jace’s fingers worked between her legs, building the erotic tension spiraling low in her body. �śBesides, we blind women appreciate tangible details.” �śThink you’ll enjoy soft against soft?” he asked, making her imagine what it would feel like to be naked with this man, her bare breasts pressed tight to his chest as he pumped between her thighs. Would she enjoy it? Enjoy was a pale, sad little word best reserved for things like hot chocolate and walks in the park. She wouldn’t just enjoy being with Jace. It was going to rock her to the core of her being. There was no doubt in her mind. If he could make her feel as if her head were about to spin off of her body with ninety percent of her clothing still in place, she knew the first time they had sex was going to redefine her perceptions of the experience. The realization was a little frightening, but that was okay, too. She’d never expected being with Jace would be anything but scary. �śJace, I�"” �śThey’re gone.” His fingers slid away from her eager body as he smoothed her dress back in place. If she didn’t know better, she’d say he sounded a little spooked, and not by whoever had been driving by. But there was no way Jace was afraid of her. She was the opposite of scary. Right? �śOh. Good,” Sam said, her addled mind not capable of anything more clever. How could she think clearly when her entire body vibrated with the need to finish what she and Jace had started? Her head spun, her chest ached, and the hungry place between her legs fairly howled with need. She suddenly wished she’d stopped by a drugstore to grab a pair of underwear. It sure would have made it easier to resist the urge to bang this man against a wall. �śWe shouldn’t make a habit of this,” he said, the teasing note in his voice helping clear her head. A little. �śNo. I think we can find someplace more accommodating than a �Ś” Oh. My. God. Samantha froze, mouth falling open, eyes slowly focusing in on the enormous man lurking in the shadows across the street. She was suddenly seeing, with her own eyes, for the first time in almost twenty years. CHAPTER NINE The darkness that had been her permanent companion drifted away, parting like sticky cobwebs, revealing a face and impossibly broad shoulders. The man was hidden in the shadows, but the red and blue lights of the nearby police cars flashed across his features. She couldn’t see the cars, but her eyes picked up every last detail of the man’s terrifying expression and his clothes, which were splattered with what looked like blood. His sweater and jeans were black, but somehow Sam could still see the splashes of red. They glowed with an otherworldly radiance, burning like fire in the swirling police lights. �śWhat’s wrong?” Jace asked, but with patience in his tone that hadn’t been there the half dozen other times he’d asked her that question tonight. It seemed he was getting used to her weirdness. Too bad she couldn’t say the same. Her tongue swept out across her dry lips as she darted a quick look up into Jace’s face. Still shadows, nothing but blackness where she knew he was standing. The darkness ruled, except in that one spot a dozen feet away. �śDo you see that man? The one across the street?” �śThe man �Ś” Jace trailed off as he turned to look. When he spoke again there was a coiled quality in his voice, as if his words were getting ready to pounce on a demon he’d been tracking through the ruins. �śYeah, I see him. Not well, but I see him.” He paused, sucking in a breath as the full import of what she’d said hit home. �śDo you see him?” �śI do.” God, it was crazy, but she did. She saw him. �śBig guy, scary face, lots of scars, and dark clothes,” she said, her voice trembling more than she would have liked. But then, it wasn’t every day that you saw something for the first time in almost twenty years. Twenty long, shadow-filled years. �śBut I thought you were completely blind, since you were a kid.” �śI am. I was.” Sam swallowed. Hard. �śI can’t see anything else. Just him �Ś his face.” This was even more mind-blowing than seeing through Ellen’s eyes. This was �Ś �śI think I’m going to �Ś” Her knees buckled, but Jace was right there to catch her, pulling her close, giving her strength she just didn’t have at the moment. She couldn’t believe this was happening. Her eyes were useless. No matter that nothing was technically wrong with them, she’d known in her heart that she’d never be able to see. So how could she be seeing this man? Watching him as he turned his head and caught her eyes across the abandoned street? Her breath hitched. �śHe sees me. He just�"” Before she could finish her sentence or pull herself together, the man in the shadows turned and ran. As soon as he disappeared, so did the flashing lights of the police cars, plunging Sam back into complete darkness. �śHe’s running. We have to follow him,” she said, lurching forward, her cane scraping across the concrete before Jace pulled her back into his arms. �śWe’re not going anywhere.” �śPlease, he’s the one who killed the Choes. I’m sure of it.” She wasn’t completely sure, but this man could have been the large shadow she saw. In any event, she had to know why she could see him and the blood glowing on his clothes. Besides, it seemed damned likely he had something to do with the Choes’ murder. Why else would he be lurking around the crime scene? And why would she be able to see him? If her paranormal abilities had allowed her to see the Choes as they were murdered, it made a weird kind of sense that they might enable her to see the person who had killed them as well. �śPlease. I have to know who that man is and why I can see him.” �śYou really could see him,” Jace said, sounding as shocked as she felt. �śYour eyes changed. I swear, they aren’t even the same color anymore.” �śPlease, Jace. Can we have this chat later? The guy’s getting away. We have to�"” �śWe’re not�"” �śFine, then I’ll follow him myself!” �śNo, I’ll go after him. You’re going to a hotel.” �śI’m not going to a hotel. I have to�"” �śIf you don’t let me put you in a cab, I’m not going to follow that man, and I won’t let you follow him either.” He pulled one arm away from her still-shaking hands and whistled. There must have been a taxi nearby. Sure enough, seconds later, a car pulled up beside them. Jace reached out to open the door and told the driver the name of a posh-sounding hotel on the other side of the barricade before turning back to her. �śHaving you with me will only slow me down and make me worry about you. It would be a great way for us both to get killed if that guy is half as dangerous as he looks.” He was the bossiest man in the entire world, but he was right. �śYou’ll call me as soon as you find out anything,” she said, letting him urge her into the car. She couldn’t waste any more time or Jace would have no chance of catching up with the potential killer. �śI will.” He closed the door behind her, but she could still feel the chill of the night air puffing against her face. The window was open. �śAnd be careful,” she called after him, a crazy part of her wishing he’d kissed her again before turning to run after their suspect. �śYou be careful. I don’t want to see you in a hospital again. Ever.” Well, it wasn’t a kiss �Ś but it was still enough to make her heart twist as she listened to his heavy footfalls fade away into the distance. It seemed like he cared. Really cared. And it seemed like he’d believed she’d seen someone, even though she had a hard time believing that herself. How could she have seen that man? How? In a crazy way, slipping into Ellen Choe’s body and seeing through her eyes made more sense than her own previously nonfunctioning tissue suddenly honing in on a man’s face. �śThe barricade is still closed for twenty minutes,” the cabdriver said, his exhausted voice making her suspect she was his last fare for the night. He must be at the end of his shift. �śYou want to wait here or drive up to Fourteenth and get in line?” �śWe won’t need to cross the barricade,” Sam said, then gave the driver directions to Ezra’s apartment near what was left of the old NYU campus. She’d call Jace later and tell him there had been a change of plans. She didn’t want to risk calling him now, while he was chasing after a could-be killer and�" Damn it! She didn’t even have his phone number. And wasn’t sure he had hers. A few hours ago, she could have called Stephen and had the information in minutes, but the last thing her brother would want to talk to her about would be Jace Lu. She’d have to find some other way of getting in touch with Jace. After she talked to Ezra. Suddenly, seeing her ex seemed more important than talking to the police investigating the Choe murder. She had to figure out what was going on with her new abilities, and Ezra was the only one who might be able to help her. Besides, she couldn’t think of a reasonable cover story to tell the police, and she was sure they wouldn’t be nearly as tolerant of the real story as Jace had been. Hopefully he’d be just as tolerant when he learned she’d disobeyed his orders and gone in the opposite direction of the hotel. Right, and maybe Stephen will call you and apologize for the way he acted at the hospital and then the three of you will go out for hot chocolate. Samantha let her eyes slide closed as the wind whipped in from the open window, getting stronger as the cabdriver picked up speed on the mostly deserted streets. Jace would be furious, and she’d be lucky if her brother didn’t try to have her committed, but there wasn’t anything she could do about that right now. She had to have answers�"before anyone else died because of her ignorance. She’d been on her way to see the Choes before they were killed, and that was too big a coincidence to ignore. There was a damned good chance her connection to the aura demons was the reason her friends and clients had died. �śCould you hurry, please?” �śBelieve me, I’m ready to go home,” the cabbie said. �śI’ll go as fast as I can.” Sam sighed, worrying that wouldn’t be fast enough. Jace pulled his stun gun free as he raced through the narrow streets near the Choes’ apartment, choosing his path on instinct. There weren’t that many places the man he hunted could have turned, and years of tracking demons had given him a sixth sense when it came to knowing which way his prey had run. So you’ll trust your own sixth sense, but you won’t trust hers? And what about those �śshadow fingers”? You’re a liar if you say you’ve never thought you’ve seen something like that, reaching out of the darkness �Ś slipping over someone, seething under their skin�Ś. Jace ignored the voice in his head and pushed himself to run even faster. The man had a good head start and longer legs. There wasn’t time to give in to crazy imaginings or to figure out a reasonable explanation for how Sam could have seen the man in the first place. There’s a reasonable way to explain the way her eyes turned blue? If you can explain that, man, I’d love to hear it. The inner voice reminded him of his cousin Andre, the family smart-ass and the only person who might be awake at this ungodly hour. Andre worked nine to nine, like most of the Conti family lawyers, but he often hit the gym before work. The man took his womanizing seriously and liked to keep his temple in top worship-inducing condition. �śAndre,” Jace said, giving his earbud the signal to call Andre’s cell without slowing his pace. His cousin didn’t pick up, but Jace left a quick message anyway. If Andre checked his messages in the next half hour, he could still make it to the Waldon to meet Sam. He lived north of the barricade, and her cab would be stuck on the Southie side for a good twenty minutes before the roads opened at five o’clock. She’d be safe in the cab. He had to believe that or he’d go crazy. There was no such thing as invisible demons, but there was an abundance of human bad guys roaming the city south of the barricade. Men like the one he was chasing, who wore their gang scars proudly, flaunting the number of men and women they’d killed with deep slashes around their hairlines and across their cheeks. If one or more of them had Samantha Quinn on their hit list, they wouldn’t let something like a cabbie witness get in their way. They’d shoot him and then take out the blind woman in the backseat. The thought made him run faster. He couldn’t let anything happen to Sam, not when he suspected he might be the only one who could save her from her brother. Stephen must have been slipping demonic hallucinogens into her drinks for years. That was the only thing that would explain these prophetic dreams she insisted she had. The dreams induced by some of the more powerful powders and creams could make you certain you’d seen God, let alone some shadow fingers that hurt people. There was always something bad happening in Southie and the world at large; there were always people being hurt. It wouldn’t be hard for Sam to come to believe the dreams she was having were coming true. And it wouldn’t be hard for Stephen to get a doctor to sign off on Sam being crazy if she kept telling people about her dreams and visions and going on about invisible demons. But then, she’d really seemed to know that the Choes were going to be murdered before it happened. How could he explain that? He knew the two youngest Choe boys were clients of Stephen’s, but they’d never seemed the type to get involved with the gangs. Still, that would explain how two teenagers who worked as delivery boys for their dad’s pharmacy managed to afford Hamma demon claws. Maybe Sam had overheard Stephen talking to some of his gang connections about the Choes and her drug-addled mind had somehow twisted the information until it created a �śvision” of how Ellen and Chang-su’s murder would go down. The Death Ministry had been known to punish people in debt to them by taking out their loved ones. Maybe the Choe boys had gotten in too deep and earned themselves the worst possible warning that it was time to pay up. It was a stretch, but it made a hell of a lot more sense than psychic visions and invisible demons. And Jace had suspected Stephen was up to something. He’d never dreamed that he was drugging his own sister, but it made a horrible kind of sense. There was no way he could have kept Sam ignorant about his drug deals with her living in the same building where he met with his clients for all those years. He must have been using drugs to keep her sound asleep and out of her mind during the hours he conducted his illegal transactions. Learning the drugs he was giving Sam were making her a little crazy wouldn’t have stopped Stephen. It seemed like he wanted Sam to be crazy. It made it easier for him to control her, to force her to do what her big brother thought was best. Even if Stephen’s need to rule over Sam’s life came from a place of brotherly love, it was still twisted at best and psychotic at worst. The shit he and Sam had gone through when they were kids must have fucked Stephen up more than Jace had suspected. Now Sam needed someone to rescue her from the brother she’d always seemed to consider her savior. But what if you’re wrong? What if she’s telling the truth? Jace had no doubt Sam was telling the truth as she knew it, but what she’d told him just wasn’t possible. Demons were animals that humans hadn’t known existed until the emergence brought them streaming out of caves deep in the earth. They weren’t supernatural or even evil. They weren’t invisible godlike beings to be worshiped the way Sam and Stephen’s parents had worshiped them. It was human evil that had killed Sam and Stephen’s little sister, damaged Sam’s eyes, and messed with Stephen’s head, not some mythical aura demon. As if to prove Jace’s theory of human cruelty correct, a giant fist suddenly swept toward him from the shadows. Jace twisted and the blow intended for the center of his face grazed off his cheek, but the impact was still enough to knock him to the ground and the stun gun from his hand. He was on his feet seconds later, but there wasn’t time to go for his gun. The scarred man was already on him, fists flying with the precision of a person who killed for a living. �śWho’s your target?” Jace grunted as he dodged to the left and blocked another punch intended for his gut. The question slowed the man down just long enough for Jace to get in a quick uppercut to the jaw that snapped the man’s head backward, sending blood flying from his mouth. It was a simple trick of the trade that worked far too often. Men like this weren’t used to using their minds at the same time as they used their fists and were easily distracted. Throw a question at them, or even make a casual observation or two �Ś �śNice shirt. Smells like your favorite.” Another blow connected to the man’s middle, and then Jace’s knee caught his chin a second time as he bent over. �śDon’t you guys do laundry? Living with the demons doesn’t mean you have to smell like one.” �śFuck you,” the man growled, rallying with a speed not usually possessed by such an immense person. Jace just barely managed to jump back before one meaty fist connected with his groin. This guy was fighting dirty and was clearly one of his gang’s MVPs. It made Jace pray Samantha wasn’t the one he’d been told to kill. Hopefully he’d already completed his hit and had simply been lingering around the Choes’ house because he got off on watching the police clean up his dirty work. �śTell me, who’s your�"” Jace’s words ended in a groan as something cold and rank smelling surged into his head. It was like getting a brain freeze from chewing on frozen fish. The sensation left him blind for a few seconds, long enough for someone behind him to punch him in the kidneys�"both of them, with a speed and power that made a wave of sickness crash over him with the force of a tsunami. Pain, blunt and raw, pulsed from his waist to his neck and back again, and the putrid yellow taste of bile surged into his mouth. The coldness inside his mind vanished as his attacker struck again, leaving Jace no time to dwell on the odd sensation before a second series of punches had him on his knees. Fuck. Someone had sneaked up on him. It had never happened, not in his entire life, even when he was a teenager learning the bounty trade. Jace Lu was legendary for his sixth sense in a fight. He always knew where the next punch was coming from and could smell an ambush from fifty feet away. But he hadn’t been focused. Even knowing the Death Ministry members in the car that had driven by might have seen him and Sam, he hadn’t thought to watch his back as thoroughly as his front. He’d been too worried about keeping his woman safe. His woman. The thought was crazy. He was getting in way too deep way too fast with a girl who made his aunt Mary�"a woman who talked to her houseplants and was convinced they talked back�"seem sane. And now he was going to pay the price for letting his focus be divided. It just went to prove that getting too attached could be deadly. In some cases, literally. Jace braced himself for another blow from the man in front of him. They would take turns now, the one in front and the one behind, smashing their fists into him until he lost consciousness. Or maybe they’d pluck his automatic from its holster and do him with his own weapon. Nice and tidy, no evidence for the police to use to figure out who might have done the job. Not that they’d worry too much about the death of a bounty hunter. Hunters weren’t much better than gangsters in the minds of most cops. Jace tucked his head, hoping to at least protect his face and neck �Ś but the blow he anticipated never came. �śNo way. No fucking way. I gave you what you wanted,” the man in front of him whispered, fear obvious in his voice as he backed away, then turned and ran. Great. Even Mr. Big, Bad, and Ugly was afraid of whoever had joined their fight. Jace watched the giant feet disappear from his line of sight, but couldn’t lift his head high enough to see where the man had run. It was all he could do to stay on his hands and knees with his head hanging toward the ground, the pain throbbing up and down his spine was so intense. It took at least a full minute or two for him to stagger to his feet, but the man behind him waited for it. He must have wanted to finish this face-to-face, now that he’d made sure Jace was injured and the fight wouldn’t be fair. �śShit,” Jace cursed. The shadowed sidewalk was deserted. He knew he should be glad the other man had vanished, but he was still pissed that he hadn’t gotten a clear look at him. He needed to know who had followed him. If it was someone dangerous enough to frighten a gangster with nearly a dozen kill scars, this situation might be beyond Jace’s ability to handle on his own. He was going to need the family. He’d never gone to his uncle or any of the Contis for help with something so personal, but he didn’t see that he had a choice. He had to make sure Sam was protected, even if it meant taking heat from his relatives. Jace cursed again. Facing down death in an abandoned alley hadn’t made his stomach drop the way it did as he spoke his uncle’s name, signaling his earpiece to call Francis. But then, he’d seen his share of fights. He’d never cared enough about a woman to introduce her to his nosy, intrusive, and largely criminal family. CHAPTER TEN Sam’s first surprise was that Ezra was awake when she knocked at his door. It was barely five, and even for an early riser like her ex, it was too early. Her second surprise was that Ezra wasn’t alone. �śYou can’t stand having a woman sleep over,” she said, too tired to mince words, no matter how much she needed Ezra’s help. �śYou always kicked me out at midnight.” Sam could hear Ezra’s confusion in the strained silence. �śSam. How did you�"” �śMy fingerprint is still in the system, so I let myself in the front door. But I figured I should knock before I came in the apartment. Good thing, huh?” �śI don’t know what you’re talking about.” �śCome on, Ezra. I can smell her. Unless you started wearing vanilla body lotion and changed your shampoo,” Sam said, slipping inside the door even though Ezra hadn’t invited her in. �śGuess it’s pretty serious?” Ezra cleared his throat in that staccato way that had always reminded her of a constipated machine gun. It was one of the many irritating habits she hadn’t missed when they’d broken up a few months ago. His penchant for lying was another. �śListen, Sam, I’m glad you stopped by, but I really don’t have time to chat right now. I’ve got an early class. But I’d love to have coffee later.” His arm slipped around her shoulders as he tried to turn her back toward the door. She couldn’t help but notice how slight and weak Ezra’s arm felt when compared to Jace’s. Jace. She hoped he was okay. She was going to have to find a way to contact him as soon as possible. Which meant she had to cut to the chase here. �śThis is important, Ezra.” Sam slipped out from beneath his arm, tapping her way over to the kitchen. �śI have to talk to you. Now.” �śI think we should talk, too. I’ve missed you and�"” �śNot about anything personal. I know you’ve got someone else here and I don’t care,” she said, shocked to realize the words were true. Her and Ezra’s breakup had been her decision, but there was a time when finding out he’d moved on so quickly would have upset her. �śI’m here for some professional advice.” �śSam, there’s no�"” �śEzra? Who is it?” The high, lilting voice from the bedroom sounded like it belonged to a twelve-year-old, but Sam knew better. Ezra would have made sure his latest conquest was at least eighteen. He was a bit of a lech, but he wasn’t stupid. �śA student? Isn’t that against school policy?” she asked, not bothering to hide her smile. She couldn’t see him, obviously, but she could practically feel Ezra squirming. Finally he sighed, then called out in what Sam had always thought of as his teacher voice, �śIt’s just my friend Sam, Sunshine. Go back to sleep; I’ll be there in a minute.” �śSunshine?” She laughed, just a little bit. She couldn’t help herself. Ezra had finally taken his hippie fetish too far. Ezra ignored her. �śSo you’re here for professional advice? Still take sugar and cream?” She heard ceramics clang together as he pulled two cups down from the cabinet. He didn’t sound terribly happy about it, but at least he was offering her coffee. Maybe he hadn’t been lying when he’d said he hoped they could stay friends. �śYeah. It’s about my dreams; they’re not just dreams anymore,” she said, gratefully accepting the mug he set down in front of her with enough of a thud to let her know exactly where to reach for it. She needed caffeine in a major way. She was going on twenty-four hours without sleep, if she didn’t count however long she’d been unconscious. �śYesterday I had a vision. While I was awake. No shadow fingers, no metaphors, just �Ś bad stuff.” �śReally?” He sounded intrigued. Ezra was one of the few people she’d ever told about her dreams who hadn’t thought she was crazy. She shouldn’t have been surprised that he seemed willing to go with her on this, but she was. And relieved. It was nice to know not everyone was a skeptic. �śYeah. There wasn’t any symbolism this time. It was just �Ś” She swallowed the bile that rose in her throat, then chased it back with a big gulp of coffee, welcoming the burn as the hot liquid raced down her throat. There was something comforting about a little bit of pain right now. A little bit of pain. It reminded her of Jace’s fingers digging into the soft flesh at her hips. Damn. She wouldn’t have thought arousal possible after the day and night she’d had, let alone while hanging out in her ex-boyfriend’s kitchen with his new lover in the next room. Just went to show she shouldn’t underestimate the new man in her life. Jace was the new man in her life. It seemed impossible, but there was little doubt he was interested in playing the role. At least for the moment. �śThat bad, huh?” Ezra asked, a note of compassion in his voice. �śI saw two people I know murdered.” �śWow. Did you�"” �śI called them and warned them to be careful,” Sam said. Her sensual excitementwas thoroughly banished as Chang-su’s bloodied face flashed on her mental screen. �śGood, you should have,” Ezra said, taking a loud sip of his coffee. �śMore people should take their dreams seriously. The collective unconscious�"” �śIt didn’t help,” Sam said, interrupting Ezra before he could get started on one of his speeches about the power of the collective unconscious. �śThey were killed a few hours later.” �śGod �Ś you’re kidding.” �śI’m not. I heard it on the news while I was in the hospital.” �śWhat?” The concern was clear in his voice, making her wonder again if she hadn’t been too hasty in assuming Ezra was lying about wanting a friendship. �śI noticed the bruises, but I didn’t think it�"” �śI’m fine. For now.” She gave him the bare bones of what had happened in the past twenty-four hours�"the vivid dream, the scream and the strange demon smell that had lured her into the ruins, the vision, and the attack on the stairs, then paused to let all of that sink in. �śSo was it a neighbor who called nine-one-one? Or one of the people you heard?” �śI don’t know. It might have been the man. The woman sounded like she was hurt.” �śReally?” �śI’m not sure. She told me to run, but when she tried to talk again, something cut her off. I tried to call the police, but I couldn’t get through, and by the time I woke up in the hospital �Ś” Sam let her words trail off, knowing Ezra would understand the futility of her calling to report a suspicious situation when she couldn’t describe either of the people involved or recognize their voices. �śAnd you’re positive it was an aura demon on the stairs?” �śPositive.” �śThen why would the woman tell you to run? If she couldn’t see what was attacking you?” �śI �Ś don’t know.” Sam pondered the question for a moment. �śMaybe the man with her was dangerous and she was trying to warn me? Maybe she could see something, a shadow maybe? I can’t say for certain, but I know it was one of the aura demons. I’m sure of it.” She knew Ezra believed in invisible demons�"he insisted they were fairly common in many parts of the world, in regions where demon cults had summoned them and then been unable to complete the ritual to make them flesh. �śI think it was one of the demons my parents and their cult summoned when I was a kid. And I think they’re responsible for my dreams.” �śReally?” Uh-oh, here came the skepticism. Still, she might as well finish what she’d started. �śReally. I think I’ve been seeing the people they plan to hurt, and I think they killed the Choes.” �śHow? Aura demons can’t interact within our world without inhabiting a human�"” �śI’m thinking that maybe that’s not true. I swear I saw the Choes being beaten, and there’s a chance it was a man who did it, but I could feel the demons there in the room with them. And they were inside Ellen’s head, hurting her. I just know it was aura demons. I think that maybe there’s some kind of connection between me and them.” �śLike a psychic connection.” �śYes! Exactly,” she said, not bothering to hide her excitement. �śBut why would something like that stay dormant for so many years? If you had�"” �śI don’t think it was dormant. I told you, I think the connection manifested in my dreams, with the shadow fingers. This is just a �Ś mutation of that. And I don’t know why it’s happening now; I was hoping that was something you could help me with,” Sam said, cutting Ezra off before he could ask the question. �śHas there been an increase in cult activity lately?” �śNot that I know of. At least, not on the East Coast.” �śSome of the members of my parents’ cult got out of prison last year,” Sam said, wondering why she hadn’t thought of the phone call she’d gotten from the prison officials sooner. They’d had to notify all surviving children of the cult that six of the lesser offenders were being released. �śYou don’t think they could have decided to finish what they started when Stephen and I were kids, do you?” Ezra grunted, then sniffed. �śI doubt it. According to cult beliefs, they’d need the same artifact your father used, and that would be impossible. It was added to a museum collection a long time ago, right?” �śAs far as I know. I guess I could try to check again with the police who took it into evidence, but�"” �śI can do a search for you of museums that exhibit demon relics. I have the connections to find out where most of the artifacts originated.” �śThanks,” Sam said with a sigh of relief. She was feeling overwhelmed enough as it was. �śTell me more about this psychic connection.” Sam took a deep breath. �śI think I’m seeing what the demons plan to do, and I swear I heard one of them in my head before it pushed me down the stairs.” �śYou did? What did it say?” �śI �Ś can’t remember.” Shit, she couldn’t remember. It had been pleased with itself, and it had wanted something. From her? Or from the Choes? �śDamn it! I can’t remember exactly. I think it had something to do with wanting a body to inhabit, but�"” �śBut you said you didn’t think they needed bodies to hurt people.” Sam squeezed her eyes closed as her head threatened to explode. �śI don’t know, Ezra. Maybe hurting people isn’t the final goal. I’m doing my best to figure this out, but I was knocked unconscious, so�"” �śGod, Sam. What the hell are you doing walking around? You should be in the hospital.” �śI couldn’t stay in the hospital. What if the Choes aren’t the end of this? What if more people are going to get hurt or killed and it’s my fault?” she asked, wishing for the zillionth time that she could see the face of the person she was talking to. �śPlease, you are the only person I know who can help me understand what’s happening. Do you think this kind of connection is even possible?” Ezra sniffed and took another sip of his coffee. �śI’m not sure. There are stories of partnerships between humans and aura demons, but they usually require ritual sacrifice.” �śWouldn’t my eyes be considered a ritual sacrifice?” �śMaybe,” he said, but he didn’t sound convinced. �śBut the sacrifice was made without your consent and took place a long time ago. If it was enough to create a psychic bond between you and this demon, wouldn’t you have realized it before now?” �śBut I’ve always had the dreams, ever since the night my brother and I were taken away from our parents. I thought that what I’d gone through had created a kind of sixth sense, but maybe I was seeing what these demons were planning to do?” Sam asked, trying to keep her voice calm and failing miserably. �śWhat if the demons my parents summoned have been out there all along, doing horrible things, and I was seeing them in my dreams? Maybe I could have stopped them, if I could have�"” �śYou can’t think like that. And we don’t know anything for certain.” Ezra sniffed some more. His allergies seemed to grow even worse when he was thinking. Another annoying habit, but one that didn’t bother her now. She was so grateful to have someone take her seriously that she could have leaped over the island between them and kissed him �Ś if he didn’t have a girl in the other room and she wasn’t falling for Jace with a swiftness that wasn’t wise. �śOkay, so let’s say you’ve always had this connection,” Ezra continued. �śThat you’ve been privy to all the nasty business the aura demons have been up to in the years since the ritual, but didn’t know it. You still need to figure out why the connection is growing stronger. Why now? Why are you suddenly having waking visions?” �śAnd actually seeing people with my own eyes,” she said, dropping the final bomb. �śJust a few hours ago, I saw a man watching me from across the street. I couldn’t see anything else, but his face was crystal clear.” �śYou’re kidding me,” Ezra said, sounding justifiably shocked. �śBut you’ve been examined by doctors. Isn’t regaining your sight impossible?” �śI always believed so. But I did see him. I had a friend with me and he saw him, too.” �śA friend, huh?” Ezra sniffed again, a longer, more agitated sniff. �śGuess I’m not the only one moving on. I should have known you wouldn’t be wearing that dress for a night out with your brother.” �śSpeaking of clothes, do you have any of my stuff still here? I’m dying to change.” �śYes, your drawer is still full. I haven’t gotten around to cleaning it out yet,” he said, pausing for a thoughtful slurp of coffee. When he spoke again, his voice was much softer. �śYou know, I may have kicked you out at midnight, but you had a drawer. Did you ever stop to consider that might have been a big step for me? Letting a woman have a drawer?” Now it was her turn to squirm. She really hadn’t thought much about the significance of �śher” drawer. She’d assumed it was just more convenient for both of them if she occasionally showered and changed at his place after work instead of going home first. �śUm, I�"” �śDon’t worry about it,” Ezra said, saving her from what would have no doubt been a very awkward response. �śI’ll go tell Sunny you’re coming in to shower and change.” �śBet she’ll love that.” �śI’ve told her about you. She’s open-minded.” Open-minded? What the hell did that mean? If she weren’t dying to get clean and back into a pair of underpants, Sam would have told him not to bother. She couldn’t imagine being open-minded about another woman coming into her lover’s bedroom to shower while she was still in the bed. �śTell her it will be the fastest shower ever. I’ve got to meet someone uptown.” She might as well head up to the Waldon and hope Jace had left her a message at the desk. It was the only way she could think of connecting with him without going through Stephen. Jace definitely wasn’t the type to have his number listed in the public database. �śSo you’re not going to stay for breakfast, I take it?” Ezra asked, amusement in his tone. �śProbably for the best. I stopped buying real bacon after we broke up. I’m back on the veggie stuff.” �śGross.” Sam wrinkled her nose. �śSo I’ll look through a few of my books this morning and get back to you as soon as I find anything interesting about aura demons and psychic connections,” he said, dropping his mug off in the sink on his way by her. �śI’ll see if there’s any astrological reason this could be happening and do a check on cult activity and make sure no artifacts have gone missing. In the meantime, you should do some thinking about anything unusual that’s happened in the past day or so. Try to think whether you’ve done anything differently that might have triggered this new ability.” �śRight,” Sam said with a sigh. �śI’ll try, but I can’t really think of anything off the top of my head.” �śProbably because you’ve got a concussion. You should consider going somewhere safe and getting some sleep.” He paused at the door to the bedroom. �śYou’re welcome to stay here. I know Sunny wouldn’t mind.” �śNo, I don’t mind at all!” Sunny yelled from the other room, sounding positively eager to have another woman join her in Ezra’s bed. What was with this girl? And Ezra? It seemed like he’d finally taken his �śfree love” philosophy too far. Too far for her tastes, at least. �śThanks!” Sam called out. �śBut I really have to go. I just need to grab a quick shower.” �śSure! Whatever you need,” Sunny said. �śI’ll come have breakfast with Ez and give you some privacy. Unless you don’t mind if we stay in bed a little longer?” �śUm �Ś privacy would be good. Thanks.” �śThe look on your face is absolutely priceless,” Ezra said with a smug laugh. Sam bit her lip. Let him keep thinking she was a prude. That was fine. She knew she was anything but repressed. She’d nearly had sex with a man on a public street. Twice. In the past twenty-four hours. She was practically �Ś Wait �Ś twice �Ś in the past twenty-four hours �Ś �śYou know what? I’ll take a rain check on the shower,” she said, setting down her coffee. �śI’ll just grab clothes and run.” �śWait. We were just kidding, Sam,” Ezra said, hovering as she tapped her way over to the chest of drawers and dug around in the bottom drawer for clean underwear, jeans, and a light sweater. �śYou don’t have to�"” �śNo, really, I just don’t have time.” Sam shuffled to the bathroom near the front door, nearly tripping twice in her excitement. She had to hurry. She finally had an idea what might have caused her surge in paranormal power, but there was no way she was going to mention it to Ezra. Not until she knew for sure. Hopefully she would still be able to catch up with Jace at the Waldon and put her theory to the test. The thought made her shiver as she pulled her sweater over her head, and her hands were actually trembling as she pitched her ruined dress into Ezra’s trash. �śYou don’t have to go, you know,” Ezra said when she emerged from the bathroom. �śI know,” Sam said, pausing at the front door. �śThank you so much for your help. It really means a lot.” �śYou’re welcome. Hope I find something that will help. I’ll call you.” �śThanks.” Sam hurried out the door to the elevator at the end of the hall. If all went well, she would be naked with Jace Lu in less than half an hour. Even after the nightmarish day and a half she’d had, the prospect was still enough to send a shiver of excitement skittering across her skin. Jace wiped the blood off his cheek as best he could, wincing as the rough fabric of his shirt made contact with the swollen skin and bruised bone. He felt like he’d run into a brick wall. Repeatedly. And apparently he looked as great as he felt. �śYou look like shit.” His cousin Andre waved at him from one of the bright yellow couches littering the lobby of the Waldon. He looked completely at home in the upscale surroundings, his custom-fitted suit, ten-thousand-dollar watch, and blindingly white teeth screaming wealth as surely as the weapons Jace had checked with the bellman screamed bounty hunter. But it was Andre’s job to look respectable. He’d quit the family bounty business in his late teens to help manage the Contis’ legal issues. Not that the breed of lawyering he practiced was much more respectable than bounty hunting, but the clothes, at least, had to look the part. �śThanks.” Jace nodded in his cousin’s direction, ignoring the stares of the other people milling through the lobby. You didn’t get many of his kind north of the barricade. There was no reason for him to leave Southie. The ruins were where he earned his money, and the company was much better on the other side of the tracks. �śYou should see the other guy.” �śPretty roughed up, huh?” �śPretty dead.” Just thinking about the body he’d all but tripped over on his way back to the main street made the hairs on Jace’s arms prickle and stand on end. The man Sam had seen wouldn’t be hurting Sam or anyone else ever again. Andre’s voice dropped to a whisper, but his smile didn’t waver for a second. �śI got your message about the girl, but is this the real reason you contacted me? If so, I need to give Uncle Francis a call. I don’t do criminal work anymore. I’m real estate and tax�"” �śI didn’t kill him,” Jace said, sinking onto a couch a good distance from the nearest tourists. �śHe was dead when I found him.” �śDid you report it?” �śNo one else saw the body. Or me. I figured it was best to leave him for someone else to find,” Jace said, not bothering to tell Andre that at least one other person knew he’d been tracking the dead man. He trusted Sam, probably more than he trusted anyone, as scary as that was. Besides, no one was going to believe a woman who’d been blind for nearly twenty years had suddenly �śseen” Jace tracking a murder victim minutes before he was killed. �śGood thinking,” Andre said, relief clear in the way he relaxed onto the couch beside Jace. �śWe can put in an anonymous tip from the central computer. No one will be able to track where it came from.” �śThere won’t be anything to find by the time the police get down there. I was attacked by someone else not long before I found the body, someone who scared the shit out of the dead guy.” Andre nodded. �śSome Death Ministry type who will be sending in his own cleanup crew?” �śI’m guessing.” �śYou couldn’t tell from looking at him?” Jace sighed. �śHe got me from behind and ran off before I could get a good look at him.” �śReally?” Andre laughed. �śYou’re going to catch some shit for that. Of course, could be worse. You could be dead.” �śI thought of that. Kind of makes me wonder why I’m not. Whoever killed the man I found was sicker than your average Southie. The guy’s eyes had been ripped out.” �śGruesome. But sounds personal. Probably why you’re still among the living. The other guy must not have had anything against you.” �śMaybe,” Jace said, still unable to shake the image of the man’s body from his head. �śI put in a couple of calls to Uncle Francis. He’s going to see what he can find out about the dead guy and the local murders.” �śThe Korean couple your girlfriend knew?” �śFriend,” Jace corrected. Seemed Uncle Francis had made a few phone calls himself. �śRight. I’ve got some people running background checks on the entire family and your girlfriend’s brother,” Andre said, ignoring Jace’s scowl. �śBut I’m thinking she’ll be fine. No matter what she heard, it would be pretty difficult getting a conviction on a blind girl’s testimony.” It was along the lines of what he’d been thinking, and he knew the Death Ministry thug wouldn’t be getting anywhere near Sam, but for some reason Jace was sure she was still in danger. There had to be some rational explanation for these demons she assumed were after her, and he was guessing it had something to do with her brother pissing off the very human men who’d jumped him. He felt that truth in his gut. Unfortunately, his gut needed some rest before it was going to get much further. He was starting to feel his long night and every blow the two guys he’d fought had landed. He’d go up to Sam’s room and check to make sure she had everything she needed, then snag a room for himself and grab a few hours of sleep. Or you could shack up in her room. She probably wouldn’t mind. Even after the night he’d had, the thought of sliding into bed with Sam was still enough to make his filthy jeans feel a little too tight. She’d gotten under his skin and into his head, and there wasn’t much chance he’d get her out. At least, not until he made sure she was safe. And then you could spend a few days in bed with her, fucking her until neither of you cares who’s sane and who’s crazy. �śSo you got Sam checked in, right? There wasn’t any problem comping the room?” Jace asked. The Contis were major stock-holders in the Waldon, and the staff knew to make nice when a Conti called in a favor. Even if that Conti was technically a Lu. �śNo problem with the room. I went ahead and got you two the honeymoon suite in honor of this girl being the love of your life and all that.” Andre smirked. He was only getting warmed up. The teasing would no doubt continue for months, long after Jace and Sam had gone their separate ways. But he’d known this was going to happen. You couldn’t go your whole life without introducing a single girl to your family and expect them not to make a big deal out of the first woman to have the dubious honor. �śRight. Cute, but we’ll be staying in separate rooms,” Jace said, his tone making it clear there would be no further discussion of the matter. He and Sam both needed rest and some time to think before they took whatever it was between them any further. If they took things any further. Even a few hours ago he would have said there wasn’t any question that he and Sam would keep things purely friendly, but now �Ś he wasn’t sure. No matter how crazy her stories or how explosive the chemistry between them, touching Sam didn’t rouse his inner demons. She actually made him smile and laugh. There hadn’t been a whisper of those dark memories in his mind when he’d held her in his arms. In fact, feeling her lips against his, imagining her soft skin bare beneath his fingers, seemed to banish some of his darkness, to bring out a softer side of himself he hadn’t been sure he possessed. �śCool. Then go ahead and get a room.” Andre settled deeper into the couch with a sigh. �śI don’t have any meetings until ten. I’ll get the girl settled when she gets here.” �śWhat?” Jace asked, the hint of a smile on his face transforming to a scowl. �śShe’s blind, with long dark hair, and wearing a black, kind of see-through dress,” Andre said, parroting the information Jace had given him in his message. �śShe shouldn’t be hard to spot.” �śWhat do you mean, hard to spot?” Jace asked, a sinkhole developing in his stomach. Sam wasn’t here. She wasn’t safe. The knowledge made his heart race and every last bit of darkness he possessed surge to the surface. This was why Samantha should be avoided at all costs. She might bring out his softer side when he held her, but realizing she was in danger made him crazy. And the girl attracted danger like it was going out of style. �śShe should have been here over an hour ago.” �śI got here fifteen minutes after your call, man, and I kept my eyes open.” Andre shrugged. �śNo one matching your description came into the hotel.” �śShit.” Jace surged to his feet, ready to head back toward the barricade on foot and comb every last inch of Southie until he found Sam, when the woman herself suddenly appeared at his elbow, making him jump. Great, he’d had two people sneak up on him in less than a few hours, and one of them was a girl who couldn’t even see him. Clearly, he needed some rest. Now. �śI thought I heard your voice,” she said, smiling like she hadn’t just scared the shit out of him. Jace’s eyes did a quick sweep up and down her body, noticing the change of clothing. What the hell �Ś ? �śI’m so glad you’re okay. I was worried.” Her smile faded when he didn’t respond. When she spoke again she didn’t sound nearly as sure of herself. �śSo what happened? Did you find out who that man was or�"” �śNot yet, but I’m working on it.” �śSo he got away? You didn’t get a chance to question him?” �śI wouldn’t say that.” He wasn’t going to tell her about the murder. Not yet, at least. Especially not when he was this pissed off. �śWhat do you mean?” �śNice jeans,” he said, the words slipping out before he could stop himself. He sounded passive-aggressive and about ten years old, but he didn’t care. He was too furious to keep acting like what she’d done was okay. She’d gone home to change her clothes. She’d disobeyed his order, put herself in danger, and all for a change of clothes. Jace’s plans for separate rooms evaporated in the heat of anger. �śYou said the honeymoon suite?” Jace asked, holding out one hand toward Andre. �śYep.” Andre chuckled as he handed over the envelope. �śTwo keys, take the elevator to the thirty-ninth floor. Are you going to introduce me to your�"” �śNo,” Jace said, with more volume than he’d intended, drawing the attention of a clutch of older women seated nearby. They turned to stare. They were probably in New York City to take in the theater, but damned if he was going to provide them with a free show. �śCome with me. Now.” Sam sighed. �śJace, I can tell you’re�"” Jace took Sam by the hand and pulled her away from his smirking cousin and the curious eyes of the blue-haired crowd. �śThe elevators are this way.” �śOkay, but I promise I�"” �śWe’ll talk when we get to the room.” Or not. Suddenly Jace wasn’t much in the mood to talk. He was in the mood to show Samantha Quinn who was calling the shots in their relationship. You don’t have a relationship. She doesn’t have to listen to you�" Jace shut the voice in his head off with a growl. She didn’t have to listen to him, but then, neither did he have to listen to common sense. CHAPTER ELEVEN This was what she’d wanted. She’d planned on inviting Jace up to her room to test her theory about her visions, but the way he gripped her hand with such obvious anger gave her second thoughts. And third thoughts. The man was pissed. She’d suspected he might be, so the tension-filled silence as they waited for the elevator to reach their floor shouldn’t have affected her so strongly. But it did. Her skin practically itched with apprehension. She could get Jace into bed; there was no doubt in her mind�"attraction still buzzed between them beneath everything else�"but she didn’t want their first time to be tainted with anger. She wanted them to be the people they’d been earlier this morning. People who could laugh together, who were obviously sharing something more than their bodies. Even if it was foolish to want something more than sex with Jace Lu, she didn’t care. Even if being with him was actually in some way responsible for bringing on her horrific visions. She couldn’t imagine how such a thing could be possible, but she couldn’t ignore the evidence. No visions until she and Jace had kissed for the first time, and then�"bam�"two incidents right in a row, both times right after she’d been in a deep lip-lock with Jace. The timing should have been enough to bring back her suspicions that he couldn’t be trusted, but it didn’t. She trusted Jace, and, as unexpected as it was, she could tell he cared about her and wanted to help. All the more reason to make sure she was honest with him from here on out. Which meant she should tell him about her plan before she put it in motion. A heads-up that she might go mental on him midnooky would probably be appreciated. �śJace, can we talk now?” �śAre we in the room?” His chilly tone invited no further comment. Good thing she’d never needed an invitation to speak her mind. At least, not with him. No matter how brusque he could be, she felt comfortable with Jace. He could never intimidate her the way even her big brother could. �śI can tell you’re upset,” she said in her most mollifying tone, �śbut I need to tell�"” �śUpset doesn’t cover it,” he snapped. �śYou disobeyed a direct order.” �śI didn’t realize I’d signed up for the military,” she snapped back, her clear-the-air intentions fading fast. Where did he get off? Hadn’t she made it obvious she wasn’t going to put up with this kind of crap? �śAnd you put yourself in danger by going back to your apartment,” Jace said, ignoring her. �śThe place where you were pushed down the stairs less than twenty-four hours ago.” �śI didn’t�"” �śDon’t lie to me. I’ve seen you when you know the layout of a place. Half the time no one can tell you’re blind,” he said. �śThere’s no way you fell down the stairs of your own apartment building. You�"” �śFine, I might have been pushed. By the invisible demon you don’t believe in. I also heard a woman telling me to run, just like I heard a woman screaming in the ruins. So I’m still feeling invisible demons and hearing imaginary women. Are you happy now?” �śNo, I’m not happy. I think it’s pretty clear I’m not happy.” He pulled her out into the hall when the elevator doors dinged open. The smell of freshly cut flowers filled the air, reminding Sam of the arrangement she’d been taking to the Choes. She wondered if those flowers had really been on the floor of the murder scene, the way she’d seen them in her vision, and if so, how they’d made it from the Dumpster to their apartment. Jace was the only one she knew of who’d seen her throw them away. It was just another little fact that should have made her wary, should have made her run the other way when Jace let go of her hand to slide the key to their room into the card reader. But she didn’t. Jace wasn’t capable of killing someone in cold blood, just like he wasn’t capable of hurting her, no matter how angry he was. �śPutting yourself in danger for a change of clothes was a dumb call.” Jace’s lecture began in earnest as soon as the door slammed closed behind them. �śAnd dumb calls are a good way to end up dead. I don’t know what�"” �śI didn’t go back to my apartment,” she said. �śI went to my ex-boyfriend’s house to talk to him about the demons.” �śWhat?” He somehow managed to make that single word sound as ominous as a death threat. Great. Well, no time like the present to put that Jace-would-never-hurt-me theory to the test. �śHe still had some of my clothes at his place, so I changed there. He’s a doctor of demonic anthropology with a minor in occult practices,” she said, standing her ground as she heard Jace move closer. �śI thought he could help.” �śAnd did he? Did he help you?” His hands landed possessively on her hips, making her breath hitch. He still sounded mad as hell, but the way he touched her �Ś Damn. Electricity practically radiated from his fingertips. Maybe she’d been wrong about the anger thing. The jealousy was nice, too. He was obviously jealous that she’d had clothes at another man’s house. She’d always thought envy a ridiculous emotion, but she couldn’t deny Jace’s possessiveness turned her on. A lot. �śHe’s trying,” Sam said, her voice trembling a bit as his body heat warmed her face. Jace was bending down, which meant his lips were probably only a few inches away from her own. �śHe’s going to look into a few of his books and see if there could really be some sort of psychic connection between me and the aura demons my parents summoned when I was a kid.” �śThere’s no such thing as an aura demon.” His hands slid up to her waist and under her sweater, until they rested on the bare skin of her back. They were warm, but they still made her shiver. She wanted to arch under his fingers like a cat, to let him know how even such a simple touch drove her crazy. �śA hundred years ago people would have said there was no such thing as demons. Period.” Sam leaned closer, bringing her hands to Jace’s chest, loving the way his muscles bunched beneath her fingertips. He smelled just slightly of sweat and general New York City street grime, but that did nothing to dampen her excitement. Arguing with Jace was fast becoming one of her favorite forms of foreplay. �śNow we know better.” �śI don’t think so.” He pulled her even closer, letting her feel that disagreement had a similar effect on him. �śDemon is just a name.” �śWhat do you mean?” Sam tilted her hips, a thrill running through her as she nudged where Jace was already as hard as he’d been that first time on the street. God, she couldn’t wait to get his clothes off, to finally have the chance to live out some of the fantasies she’d had about this man. No. Not about this man. The Jace Lu she’d fantasized about was a bad boy without a cause. He hadn’t had a sense of humor or cared about her. And he certainly wouldn’t have trembled when she touched him. She liked this man even better than her dream Jace�"maybe she even loved him. �śThe things I hunt aren’t demons�"at least, not in the original sense of the word,” he said, his breath hot against her forehead and his hands sliding farther up her back, teasing at the close of her bra. �śThey’re reptile-mammal hybrids, descended from dinosaurs. They’re animals without�"” �śAnimals who can think and plan way better than people give them credit for. After thousands of years living in caves, they adapted to a radically new environment and then manipulated that environment to make themselves at home, all within the space of a few days.” The close of her bra snapped open with a practiced little flip of Jace’s fingers. Sam’s nails dug into Jace’s shirt as her nipples pebbled tight inside the loosening cups of her bra. Why were they still talking? She had no idea, but for some reason their conversation about demons was really doing it for her. Maybe it was just the deliberate delay of pleasure that made her skin itch and her sex throb. Or maybe it was just being this close to Jace. They could probably be discussing the weather and she’d get hot, wet. �śSo they’re smarter than your average lizard.” He shrugged. �śThat doesn’t prove there are invisible demons.” His lips pressed soft kisses to her temple, then her cheek. �śIt doesn’t prove that there aren’t, either. What if aura demons are to the demons what we are to dogs and cats? Smarter? More dangerous?” Sam met Jace’s lips for a not-so-sweet kiss before he tugged at the bottom of her sweater, pulling it up and over her head. He pulled her deeper into the room. She followed eagerly, kicking off her shoes as she went. �śMore dangerous than a demon that can shoot poisonous quills out of its stomach?” he asked, his voice muffled as he pulled off his own shirt. Seconds later, Sam heard metal jingling and the hushed slide of leather through loopholes. Jace was taking off his belt. Her body threw a celebration, complete with bells and whistles and nervous thrills shooting across every inch of her skin. �śThink about it, survival of the fittest. It’s a basic law of nature.” Sam’s mouth went strangely dry. This was it. They were getting naked. He was getting naked. �śExactly.” �śWhat?” she asked, struggling to follow the conversation. �śSurvival of the fittest. I’m agreeing with you.” Oh. Right. �śRight. So what could be more fit than a predator you can’t even see?” she asked. �śThat you couldn’t fight with teeth or claws or human weapons even if you could see it?” Jace was silent for a long moment. �śI see your point.” �śBut you still don’t believe in aura demons.” �śI don’t know what I believe,” he said, a weary, vulnerable note in his voice that touched something inside of her, and made her want to hold him for reasons that had nothing to do with sating their mutual hunger. She heard the little boy Jace might have been in that voice, a scared, confused little boy who didn’t have much in the world to hold on to. It made her wonder about his childhood, if maybe it had been even less cheery than her own. At least she remembered a time of happiness before that night in the barn, and after she came to live with her brother. �śI do know that I’m exhausted, I’m dirty, and I’m worried about your safety,” he said. �śThere are probably a dozen things I should be doing instead of what I’m about to do, but I don’t care.” �śYou don’t?” �śNo, I don’t. I need to know if you taste as sweet as you look.” Oh, my. Her skin felt three sizes too small as she imagined where he would taste her, how he’d put those full, soft lips and teasing tongue to use on every place where she ached. �śNow, take off your bra.” There was a note of the won’t-take-no-for-an-answer Jace in his tone, but this time it didn’t bother Sam. A part of her thought it should, but it didn’t. The feeling that he wouldn’t be taking no for an answer only made her throb. �śNow, Sam. Take off your bra and your pants.” Sam’s lips buzzed as she let her bra slide down her arms, then tugged at her jeans, popping open buttons and shoving the rough denim down to her ankles before stepping free. This was exactly what she wanted, what she needed. So why was she so nervous? �śCome here,” Jace said, the husky note in his voice letting her know he appreciated seeing her in nothing but a pair of black panties. Seeing her. Shit, she hadn’t said anything about her theory on where her visions were coming from. �śJace, I�"” �śCome here. I want your tits in my mouth.” Damn. How could she argue with a sentiment like that? Or waste any more time with potentially useless explanations? Either she’d have a vision while she and Jace were rolling around in bed, or she wouldn’t. Talking to him about the possibility would only convince him she was even crazier than he thought she was already. �śEven though you think I’m kind of crazy?” she asked, realizing what was causing her hesitation. How could Jace want her when he thought she was nuts? She was allegedly the crazy one, but she didn’t find head cases particularly sexy. �śOnly kind of?” The teasing note in his voice made her feel a little better. �śJace, I’m serious. I�"” �śI don’t think you’re crazy.” His hands closed gently around her wrists and pulled her against him. �śI think you’re beautiful.” Oh. God. He was naked. Totally naked. She could feel every delicious inch of his skin. �śYou really are soft all over,” she said, running her fingertips down his chest and then lower, skimming over his hips, down to where his body showed her just how desirable he found her. Tentatively she ran her fingers up and down his length, amazed at the petal softness of the skin covering the seven or eight inches of hot, hard male flesh. �śYou feel like a flower,” she breathed, blushing before the words were even completely out of her mouth. Jace made a noise, half laugh, half snort, that made her smile. �śA flower?” The kisses he feathered across her shoulder were gentle, undemanding, as if he sensed she needed to move into this slowly. �śA manly flower,” she said, breath hissing out as his hand slid up her wrists, past her elbows. His thumbs brushed lightly across her nipples, making them pebble even tighter as frissons of excitement flowed down between her legs. �śThat may be the strangest compliment I’ve ever received.” His thumbs brushed across her again, drawing a moan from low in her throat. �śThanks,” Sam said, finally starting to grow tired of conversation. There were better things she could be doing with her mouth. Slowly she stroked Jace up and down, once, twice, until his breath hitched. �śBut you know I love flowers. They’re one of my favorite things in the world,” she continued, sinking down to her knees, until her lips were level with Jace’s erection. �śI love the way they smell.” She inhaled the musky scent of male arousal and slightly salty skin and sighed. Way better than roses. �śI love the way they feel.” She leaned closer, teasing her lips across Jace’s tip until his cock twitched against her mouth. �śI even love the way they taste.” Her lips parted as she took just the tip of him into her mouth and suckled, drawing the head of his cock in and out, in and out, with a gentle suction until she tasted the most intimate flavor of the man she loved. Love. The emotion kept sneaking into her heart no matter how many times she told herself there was no future for her and Jace Lu, and she was tired of fighting it. It was insane to fall so hard for a man�"even a man she’d known and fantasized about for years�"in less than a day, but it was hardly the craziest thing that had ever happened to her. The unexpected and unlikely happened far more often than most people realized. Which made a foolish part of her hope that Jace might feel the same way. It was unexpected and unlikely. But that didn’t mean it couldn’t happen. �śYou have to stop,” he said softly, as his fingers threaded through her hair. �śDo I?” She pulled him even deeper, relaxing her throat until she took as much of him as she could into her mouth. He groaned, a tortured sound that made her breath come faster and her sex ache. Giving pleasure was almost as good as receiving it. Almost. �śYes, you do.” One hand fisted in the hair at the base of her neck and pulled her away from his cock with a force-fulness that made her gasp in surprise. And pleasure. No matter what she preferred in �śreal life,” in the bedroom she couldn’t deny that she liked a man who wasn’t afraid to take control. Who wouldn’t think twice about scooping her up and throwing her on the bed. Who didn’t ask permission to do what he wanted to her body, simply gave her orders he expected her to obey. �śSpread your legs,” Jace said as he climbed onto the bed after her. His hands were already behind her knees, but he didn’t make a move. He was waiting for her to do as she was told. �śYes, sir.” Her voice was light, teasing, but the feelings rocketing through her body were anything but. Her nipples pulled so tight they stung in the cool air of the hotel room, her hands fisted in the quilt beneath her, and every muscle in her body tensed and trembled. It had been so long since she felt this way, so exposed, so vulnerable to a man. Hell, she’d never felt like this. Never been on the verge of tears because of the way a man pressed soft, adoring kisses up and down her thighs, drawing closer and closer to where her body wept with need. She was dying for Jace to be inside her, to fill her where she ached, wanted him so badly that her thighs began to churn on either side of him, as if somehow her writhing limbs could force him to move something more useful than his mouth between her legs. Sure, oral sex was nice and all, but�" Her breath whooshed in with equal parts surprise and excitement. Holy. God. What the hell was he doing down there? With his tongue, moving in and out and up and down and around and around her clit until her body sang with pure joy. Pure passion. She’d never felt anything like this, never known having a man taste her could be so completely transporting. Obviously she’d never had someone do this properly. But Jace did. God, he did. Again and again he played through her folds until she was certain he’d tormented every needy inch of her flesh. But then he’d find previously unexplored territory, teaching her that there was more to pleasuring a woman than mindlessly circling her clit. Every place his tongue licked and teased had its own little pleasures, sweet torments that built the pressure within her until she could barely breathe. �śPlease.” Sam’s head thrashed back and forth on the blankets, her hands fisted into the sheets until she swore she could feel her nails digging into her palms even through the thick fabric. Her heels dug into the mattress beneath her as she shamelessly strained to get closer to Jace’s mouth, Jace’s tongue. �śSammy, God, Sammy,” Jace murmured, his words humming against her sex before he drove his tongue deep inside her, moaning as if he’d never tasted anything better than her pussy. Then his hands were on her thighs, spreading her even wider, pinning her to the bed as he moved from her clit to her entrance, from teasing flicks of his tongue to forceful plunges into where she ached like she’d never ached before. She would have sworn it was impossible to be this aroused without reaching climax, but somehow Jace just kept taking her higher. And higher. Until she cried out wordlessly for him to let her fall, for him to push her off the edge. She wasn’t afraid of falling anymore, but this relentless climb was too beautiful and horrible to bear much longer. She was going to lose her mind. She needed to come, needed Jace to make her come, like she’d never needed anything. �śCome for me, Sammy. Come,” Jace demanded. And that was all it took. She exploded, her body clamping down on where Jace’s tongue still worked in and out, in and out, wickedly awakening fresh desire even as she spiraled out of control, her body writhing on the bed like a woman possessed. Which she was not. No demonic possession or connection. No visions, nothing dancing before her eyes�"open or closed. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. But then, it was hard to be anything except mind-numbingly aroused when Jace captured her mouth with his, driving his tongue between her lips, letting her taste her own sweet-salty heat before he positioned himself at her entrance and shoved slowly, achingly slowly, inside her. Inch by inch, velvety soft flesh, bare and hot, moving deeper and deeper, until he filled her completely and then just a little bit more. �śSammy.” It was only her name, nothing special, but when combined with one of those kisses�"the kind he’d given her at the hospital, the kind that made her certain she didn’t ever want to live without this man�"it was enough to send her over the edge again, sobbing his name. CHAPTER TWELVE She was so beautiful, so perfect. Kissing her was like nothing he could name. It wasn’t just a physical sensation�"lips against lips, tongue sliding over tongue. Kissing Sammy was like having a conversation�"a slow, lingering, passionate conversation where no secrets were concealed, where there was no place to hide from her �Ś or himself. He felt exposed and vulnerable in a way he hadn’t even when he’d been facedown on the filthy ground, waiting for the men he fought to finish him off. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling or one he’d experienced in �Ś ever. It made his heart race, his lips buzz, his body tremble, and spilled tendrils of fear into his blood. Fear for Sam and of Sam. She made him feel both, had since the second he saw her in the ruins last night. Fear for her, he could manage. But this other feeling, this sensation that he was spilling over into her, the very heart of him merging with the heart of her as their bodies strained together toward some goal bigger than orgasm�"he wasn’t sure he knew what to do with that. He still didn’t feel that familiar darkness sneaking up on him, but what if he was wrong? What if he lost it, the way he had when he was younger? Mind-blowing sex wasn’t safe when you had skeletons in your closet, personal demons eager for the chance to come out and play rough. �śTurn over,” Jace said, pulling away from Sam’s lips and forcing himself to slide away from the clutching heat of her pussy. God, her pussy. He’d never tasted anything so sweet. So damned addictive. �śNo,” she said, and arched beneath him, the aftershocks of her second orgasm still making the soft flesh of her stomach tremble beneath his palms as he gripped her hips. �śNow, turn over.” He made sure his touch was gentle as he guided Sam over, onto her stomach. It would be better if he couldn’t see her face, if he couldn’t be tempted by those lips. He’d thought pleasuring Sam would help him keep the upper hand, that making sure she came once or twice before he allowed himself to push inside her would ensure he didn’t get to this point. But he should have known better. He’d realized Samantha was trouble from the first time they’d kissed. She was a fire he shouldn’t be playing with, but he couldn’t help himself. He’d never wanted anyone, anything, as badly as he wanted this woman. It was a sobering realization, one that steadied his hands as he gripped Sam’s hips and drove slowly into her from behind. Damn. just �Ś damn. Sam moaned and arched her back, sending strands of glossy black hair spilling over the pale skin of her back. A part of Jace wanted to fist his hand in that hair, to force her head back even farther as he plowed into her, fucking her until they both lost what was left of their minds. Luckily, his cautious side won out. His hands stayed on her hips, fingers digging into the soft flesh as he pumped in and out, in and out, keeping his rhythm slow and even until Sam wiggled her hips. �śPlease, harder,” she said, her voice husky, thick with satisfaction. She sounded like a well-pleasured woman. Hiswell-pleasured woman. Smart or not, the thought of Sam being his made his cock even thicker, made his entire body ache with the need to give her exactly what she was asking for. Too bad he didn’t trust himself. �śHarder,” she demanded again, shoving back into his next thrust, surprising him, showing him he could get even deeper into her slick heat. �śFuck me.” �śI am,” Jace said, driving quickly in and out, once, twice, making her moan. �śMore.” She reached back, digging her nails into the top of his hand. He winced at the slight sting of pain and gripped her even harder, until she cried out. Shit. He couldn’t do this. �śSam�"” �śNo, I like it. Hurt me a little, just a little. Please, I�"” �śNo. I can’t.” He pulled away from her and stumbled off the bed. His cock immediately sprang up to his navel, voicing a silent, aching protest at leaving Sam’s welcoming body. But that was fine. His cock could protest all it wanted. The cold sweat between his shoulder blades and the tight clench of his jaw encouraged him to keep backing away until he put a healthy distance between him and Sam. He couldn’t do this, not when something vicious inside him had been so savagely excited to hear her plea for him to hurt her. He could practically feel the way his hand would sting from punishing her ass. It wouldn’t just burn; it would throb, because he wouldn’t be able to give her just a little pain. That dark thing inside of him, whatever it was or wherever it came from�"anger, childhood trauma, inborn kink�"wanted to hurt her. Truly hurt her, until her skin bore the marks of his use, until she was completely bent to his will. �śWhere are you going?” she asked, spinning around, wide eyes searching the room. For the first time she looked as helpless as her brother was always insisting she was. �śJace?” �śAre you crying?” he asked, trying to keep the question neutral, not to let on that the telltale shine in her eyes made the angry thing inside of him want to slam a fist through the wall. It didn’t matter how old he was, or how much time had passed; women’s tears always reminded him of her tears. His mother had hidden him under the sink, but there had been a hole big enough to see through, big enough for him to watch while the demons tortured her. They’d fed on her for days, playing with their food, eating her alive piece by piece, until she’d begged them to kill her, until her rational mind broke and she started screaming every time they left her alone for a second. And Jace had watched, forcing himself not to cry, knowing they would find him if he did. He’d greedily drunk the water that leaked from the pipes and watched while his mother died. He’d never forgiven himself for that, no matter how many people told him there was nothing an eight-year-old boy could have done against a houseful of demons. He’d been so traumatized by what had happened that he couldn’t even remember what kind of demons they were, or recall much about the event except the sight of his mother’s blood and the sound of her tears, so obviously there was nothing he could have done. Still, he couldn’t keep from blaming himself. Just like he couldn’t keep from turning his anger outward, unleashing his self-hatred on the world at large. �śJace. Are you listening to me?” She’d been talking. He hadn’t been listening. Not that it mattered. He didn’t need to make nice or make up; he just needed to get out of here. �śSorry. I’ve got to go.” She sniffed. �śWhat’s wrong? I thought�"” �śNothing’s wrong. I’ve just got to go.” �śJace, stop,” she said. �śTalk to me.” Talk to her. They were at that point already. It usually took him at least a few months to get to this place with a woman. It took them that long to sense that he was pulling away. Or, more accurately, that he’d never been with them to begin with. But Sam had felt it right from the start, felt that he was holding back, and wanted what he was too afraid to give. For the first time, a part of him actually wanted to talk, to tell a woman what he was afraid of, to see if Sam might be able to understand. To �Ś help him somehow. Jesus. Help. He was hoping for help from a woman who couldn’t even help herself. �śI’ll call you later.” He reached for his pants and shoved them on, his dreams of a shower and a good long nap entwined with Samantha Quinn forgotten. He needed to go talk to Francis, to make sure Sam was on her way to being safe. Then he needed to get the hell out of her life, before the nastier parts of him overwhelmed the nicer ones. It was already almost impossible to resist the urge to go to her, to force her back onto the bed and fuck her with every last ounce of rage and frustration simmering beneath his skin. �śYou can’t call me,” she said, crossing her arms at her chest, concealing the flushed breasts he’d been dying to get his mouth on a few minutes earlier. �śYou don’t have my number.” Damn it. She was right. But he couldn’t stay here, couldn’t look at her for another second, or he would lose the last of his control. He pulled on his shirt and grabbed his jacket from the floor. �śGive it to someone at the front desk. I’ll call back later.” He charged toward the door, pausing long enough to shove his feet into his boots, but not bothering to tie them. �śShit, Jace,” she said, her breath drawing in on a gasp and her pale hands fluttering to her throat. Was it really that much of a shock? Hadn’t she guessed that there was a reason he never brought the same girl to the Demon’s Breath two times in a row? �śDon’t move.” He turned away. �śI’m serious. Don’t take another fucking step.” �śRight,” he said, muttering the word beneath his breath. They’d already moved on to the hurling-expletives-at-his-retreating-back phase. His Sammy did move fast. No, not his Sammy. She could never be his. He wanted her too much for it to ever work between them. He needed a woman who didn’t drive him crazy, who didn’t keep him on his toes in and out of the bedroom, who didn’t bring out the best or the worst in him. He needed the female equivalent of dry white toast: flavorless, but safe for even the most volatile stomachs. At another time the comparison would have brought a smile to his face, but not this morning. The thought of making do with toast when he really wanted the four-course meal of the woman behind him made his stomach cramp. �śPlease! You have to stay.” She scrambled off the bed. �śIf you leave, you could die.” He turned around slowly, trying not to notice the way the morning sun lit Sam from behind, making her look like an angel sent down to warn him to change his wicked ways. �śWhat do you know? If this is gang related, you have to tell me�"” �śNo, it’s �Ś That man we saw, that man on the street.” She licked her lips and her eyes once again zeroed in on his in that eerie way she had. �śYou never told me what happened to him.” �śI’m not going to tell you. I’m not going to tell you anything until�"” �śHe’s dead. Isn’t he?” she asked, her voice not much more than a whisper. How the hell had she guessed? He hadn’t said anything to lead her to that conclusion. Jace did his best to think of some evasive comment that would enable him to put this conversation off until later, but Sam read the truth in his silence. �śOh, God, he is dead.” She sat down hard on the side of the bed, hands flying to her mouth as if to hold back a wave of sickness. Shit. This was exactly what he’d wanted to avoid, but it was too late for a denial now. �śYeah. He’s dead.” �śBut you �Ś you didn’t kill him.” It wasn’t a question; it was a statement, but one he felt obliged to confirm. �śNo, I didn’t,” he said, pleased to see a bit of the tension ease from her face. She believed him. No matter what a jerk he’d just been, she still trusted him. And cared about him. It was all the excuse he needed to tell the story he had been planning to spare her. He wasn’t worthy of her trust or her affection, and it was past time for her to get the memo. �śBut someone else did. I found him in a back alley. His eyes had been ripped out�"while he was still alive, judging from the expression on his face.” �śJust like the Choes �Ś” Sam swallowed and paled visibly. �śSo he wasn’t the one who killed them.” �śWe don’t know that. He could have been,” Jace said, figuring now was as good a time as any to grill her on what she’d been hiding from him. Maybe it would distract him, keep him from dwelling on how beautiful she looked sitting there on the bed, the dark chocolate of the quilt beneath her contrasting with her white skin, making her look like something straight out of a museum. �śSomeone higher up in the Death Ministry could have given him the order, then decided to take him out to keep him from telling anyone about the hit.” �śThat’s the gang that distributes demon drugs, right?” �śThey’re famous for screwing each other over, especially if taking out one of their own means a bigger cut of whatever they’re running at the moment.” Sam shook her head. �śBut that doesn’t make sense. Why would they pull out his eyes?” �śTo make it look like there was a serial killer on the loose. To deflect attention from themselves. It’s not a bad idea, even though�"” �śNo.” She sounded sure of herself, too sure. �śThat isn’t it. A gang isn’t responsible for this.” �śThen who is? Tell me. Who is your brother in with who would�"” �śMy brother? What does this have to do with Stephen?” She seemed genuinely shocked, which blew a huge hole in Jace’s theory that she’d somehow overheard Stephen talking with one of his drug connections about murdering the Choes. �śWhat are you two hiding?” �śI was going to ask you the same thing.” �śI’m not hiding anything.” No, she wasn’t, not a damn thing. She sat there chatting with him, completely in the nude, oblivious to the fact that he couldn’t keep his eyes from drifting down to her breasts, and to the soft tuft of black hair between her legs. Damn. Just thinking about the way she’d responded when he’d tasted her was enough to make the ache in his balls edge closer to full-blown pain. He cleared his throat and forced his gaze higher. God, what had they been talking about again? Hiding things. Right. �śYou didn’t tell me you felt one of those invisible demons at your apartment. Or that the woman told you to run, not�"” �śThere was also a man there, but he was speaking in some other language. Except when he told someone to get the woman or catch the woman or something like that. I can’t remember exactly.” �śWhat? What the hell, Samantha. I’ve been trying to help you; don’t you think�"” �śI’m sorry! I couldn’t find a good time to tell you.” �śBullshit.” �śFine, I didn’t think you’d believe me, so I didn’t tell you the whole story.” She licked her lips and reached for her sweater, as if she could sense that he’d been distracted by her nakedness. She pulled it over her head without bothering with her bra and then picked her panties off the floor, stepping into them as she spoke. �śBut I’m not going to hide anything from you. Not anymore. I want you to know that you can trust me as much as I trust you.” Great. Just what he’d been doing his best to avoid. �śListen, Sam, I’m not this nice guy you seem to think I am.” �śYes, you are.” �śI’m not,” he said, making his voice as hard and hateful as possible. �śI’m not your friend. I’m not even nice to women�"” �śI know you’re not.” �śDid you know I spent a couple nights in lockup for breaking a woman’s arm?” he asked, his tongue cramping as he spoke, as if it could physically keep him from saying the words. Sam was silent for a moment. �śOn purpose?” He shrugged and forced his clenched jaw to relax. Might as well let Sammy know the truth, let her understand what she’d be getting into if she spent much more time with him. �śNo. It was during sex. We were �Ś And I lost it. I didn’t mean to, but that didn’t make a lot of difference. Her arm was still broken. In two places.” �śThat was the only time that happened?” �śIt was the only time I let it happen. You wanted to know why I like a certain kind of woman.” He cleared his throat, shocked at how emotional he was getting. �śI like women who don’t get me too close to the edge.” �śI want you to come to the edge with me,” Sam said, emotion in her eyes that made a crazy part of Jace want to lay his head in her lap and cry like a baby. �śI know you won’t hurt me.” �śI will hurt you. It’s only a matter of when.” �śThen why have you been helping me?” �śMen do what they have to do.” �śDon’t try it, Jace. It’s not going to work.” She smiled a little. The expression made him scowl. �śYou could have had me up against the wall last night and we both know it. You didn’t need to pretend to care to get in my pants.” He scowled some more, angry with himself. He couldn’t remember ever feeling like such a fool. It only intensified the urge to flee, but he held his ground. He would hurt Sam a lot more if he left and allowed her to keep assuming he was one of the good guys than if he stayed and saw this through. �śYou’re right. I do care, but I don’t want to,” he said, the words foreign in his mouth. He’d never said anything like this to a woman. To anyone. It brought that terrifying, vulnerable feeling to the surface again, followed swiftly by a fresh flush of anger. �śI’m not a good man, Sammy. I’m really not.” �śI think you’re wrong, but I can see I’m not going to change your mind.” The hands he’d unconsciously fisted at his sides loosened a bit. Maybe this wouldn’t be as hard as he’d thought. He’d reassure her that he had his family working on keeping her safe and then remove himself from the situation. It wouldn’t be easy�"he already felt oddly responsible for Sam�"but it would be the best thing for both of them. �śListen, I’ve got my uncle looking into�"” �śI can also see that your shirt’s on backward,” she said, crossing her arms and twining her bare legs around each other, the self-conscious movement distracting him for a second from realizing the full import of her words. �śThe tag is sticking up by your neck.” His hand flew to his neck. He flinched when he touched the scrap of fabric. This couldn’t be happening. �śYou can �Ś you can see me?” She let out a shaky breath and nodded. �śJust you, nothing else. Just like I saw that man on the street, and how I’m betting I would have seen the Choes if I’d made it to their apartment last night.” She took a step closer, her blue eyes honing in on his own. Shit. They were blue again, just like they’d been last night. He’d been so distracted by the rest of her, he hadn’t noticed the change in color, but he knew damn well she hadn’t had the chance to take out a pair of contacts or anything that would provide a reasonable explanation for the phenomenon. �śI think I can see the people these things are going to kill.” �śThe aura demons?” Jace asked, disbelief warring with caution. What if she was right? What if there was such a thing and she did somehow have some sort of connection with the creatures? There was clearly something extraordinary going on with Sam, something that couldn’t be explained away by drugs or confusion or even madness. �śThey’re real, Jace,” she said, closing the last of the distance between them and taking his hand in hers. �śAnd they’re going to try to kill you.” CHAPTER THIRTEEN Jace didn’t completely believe her; she could see uncertainty in his eyes. Eyes she could have spent at least an hour or two staring into without saying a word. She’d had no idea eyes could be so beautiful, or so many different colors. Gold, brown, and amber swirled together in Jace’s, framed by lashes so long and dark they would have seemed feminine if it weren’t for the rest of his face. Though his Chinese heritage was dominant in some ways, the rest of him definitely bore the mark of his Italian family, the side she knew he was closest to. His full lips and strong jaw were the work of the Conti genes, as were the enormous shoulders stretching the seams of his shirt and the hand that curled around her own. He’d been determined to run away a few minutes ago, but now he threaded his fingers through hers, evidently too stunned to remember that he was a �śvery bad man” who she needed to stay away from. Sam couldn’t believe Jace was bolting because he thought she was too good for him. She’d assumed he considered her beneath his interest or boring or pathetic or high maintenance �Ś never that he’d avoided her because he thought she deserved better. If that was the only thing standing between them, then there was no reason for them not to be together. It was simply a matter of convincing Jace that he was more than good enough, and the only man she wanted. The realization would have captured her attention completely if there hadn’t been so many other things buzzing around in her head. Like the terrifying certainty that Jace was going to be attacked by the demons that had killed the Choes and the man they’d seen lurking near the murder scene. And the fact that she could see Jace. Really see him, not with her fingertips, not because someone had described him so well that she could paint a mental image, but because her eyes had suddenly honed in on his face. He’d drifted into focus, though everything else remained as shadow-filled as before. No matter how thrilling it was to be able to see the man she was falling for, to know firsthand that he was as gorgeous as she’d always assumed him to be, the fact that she could see the stubborn set of his jaw and the bruise swelling one side of his face terrified her. �śYou’ve got to come with me to see someone,” she said, squeezing his hand. �śHe’s the only person I can think of who could help us figure out�"” �śIs this the ex-boyfriend?” Jace said, pulling away with a frustrated sigh. �śYes, but�"” �śNo, thanks.” He dropped his jacket and tugged his shirt over his head and turned it right-side out. Sam did her best not to stare at the golden skin he uncovered, not to notice the way his hip muscles dipped sharply inward just before they disappeared into his jeans, as if inviting her to look lower, to reach out and unzip his fly and take a good, long look at the cock she’d had in her mouth a few minutes past. She’d never actually seen a penis before, and she was suddenly very curious. Would the skin be the same color as the rest of his body? Or would it be flushed pink and blue, the way a couple of her girlfriends in college had insisted was the case when a man was aroused? Jace’s head emerged from the top of his shirt, and Sam pulled her eyes away from his crotch, but not quite quickly enough, if the twitching at the edges of his lips was anything to judge by. For a second, she thought it would be worth getting caught ogling if it could bring a smile to his face, but the hint of a grin faded as quickly as it had arrived. �śI’ll take my chances with my connections,” he said. �śWhy? You’d rather die than meet a man I used to have sex with?” �śI don’t give a fuck who you have sex with,” he said, but his scowl belied his harsh words. He did care, no matter what he said, no matter how tough he tried to play it. There was something real between them, something she had to make sure they both lived long enough to make the most of. �śHe had another woman in his bed when I was there this morning,” she said. �śIf that makes you feel any better.” �śIt doesn’t.” But it did, at least a little bit. She could tell. �śEzra knows more about this kind of stuff than anyone in New York,” she said, ignoring the throbbing getting started at the base of her neck. She was getting a killer headache. No big surprise, really. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone this long without sleep. Or food. God, she was starving all of a sudden, flat-out dizzy with hunger. Too bad there wasn’t time to eat, not when Jace might be the demon’s next victim. �śHe contacted me a few years ago, and wanted to do an interview. He tracked me down through the state’s database on cult victims. He’s very professional, and I know�"” �śProfessional? Screwing a victim he found on the Internet is professional?” �śI wanted to talk to him. I was trying to figure out more about my parents. And I’m a lot more than a victim, Jace.” Sam sighed and pressed her fingers to her temples. Damn. The headache was going migraine, fast. She consciously tried to relax her shoulders, to release the tension knotting the base of her neck. �śCan we fight about this later? After we do our best to make sure you’re safe? I really �Ś I don’t know �Ś” �śHey,” Jace said, steadying her with gentle hands on her shoulders when she swayed on her feet. �śAre you okay?” �śI think I’m just �Ś hungry. And exhausted. I haven’t eaten or slept in �Ś a while.” But it was more than that. She could feel it now, that pressure at the backs of her eyes, pushing, shoving, until it felt like they would explode. It was the same way she’d felt seconds before the vision of the Choes had taken her over. Sam sucked in a terrified breath, but there wasn’t a hint of the demon’s smell nearby, not a trace of evil energy. It wasn’t in the room with them. Jace was safe, for now. It was the last thought to race through her mind before she left her body, bursting through into someone else’s head with a popping sound that made her ears ache. No, his ears ached. She was a man this time. The blood-smeared hands that reached underneath the iron-framed bed were masculine, though his bones were more delicate than average. Still, he was a man who worked for a living. His skin was chafed and scratched in places, and his chapped knuckles filled with drying blood, forming obscene little smiley faces on each finger. He’d done something horrible, Sam guessed, though she wasn’t privy to his thoughts. But judging from the way his hands shook as he worked the combination on the lockbox he’d pulled from beneath the bed, he hadn’t earned those bloody hands butchering meat. Any doubt that this man was about some very nasty work vanished when he lifted the lid of the lockbox and pulled out another, smaller box of intricately carved wood. If she’d been judging with her eyes�"or his eyes, rather�"she would have assumed she was looking at something intended to hold jewelry or keepsakes. It wasn’t a scary thing to look at, as far as objects went, its dark wood warm and inviting, the twisting vines covering every side painstakingly crafted. No, it was the way the thing felt that made the man’s skin crawl, made bile rise in his throat as he fumbled with the intricate latch holding the box closed. Evil energy, even colder and viler than what Sam had felt from the aura demons, flowed over the man’s skin. She sensed that this box had been around for a long time, had held wicked secrets, had soaked in the murderous power of thousands of bloodstained hands. It was an ancient predator lurking in the shadows, a thing of such immense power it didn’t feel the need to hunt. It was content to wait until its prey sought it out, willingly serving themselves up to its icy, passionless mouth. It didn’t crave the kill, didn’t relish the blood of its victims. It was too old for such frenzied emotion. It simply waited and consumed, all the more evil for its utter emptiness. No �Ś scratch that. The box wasn’t empty. Not literally. It was nearly full, in fact, crowded with its own diseased brand of keepsake. Eyes. Human eyes. Four of them. The two on top of the small pile were the same color, and looked remarkably lifelike for tissue that had been removed from its host. They still retained the deep brown color they’d had in life, and actually�" If Sam had been in her own body, she would have screamed when the eye twitched and the pupil at the center contracted violently in response to the sudden influx of light. Even the man flinched, and he knew exactly what he was going to find. He knew the eyes were still alive, kept vital through whatever nasty power lived in the box. He had to have known. He was the one who had put the eyes inside, maybe even the one who had ripped them from their owners in the first place. How else would he have come into possession of this box? The last bit of Sam’s uncertainty faded when the man reached into his coat pocket and pulled out another pair of eyes. They were slightly larger than the rest, and clouded over, milky-looking �Ś at least until the man’s bloody hands placed them in their new home. As soon as the killer’s trophies rolled to a stop, the cloud covering departed and the blue eyes snapped to life. Sam would have assumed it was impossible for disembodied organs to express emotion, but these did. They were confused, then betrayed, then terrified, the full horror of the situation in which they found themselves dawning just before the man snapped the box closed. He shoved his macabre treasure chest back into the lockbox, slammed the iron lid, and spun the numbers until the combination was concealed. By the time he slipped the entire thing back underneath the bed, the man’s hands were steady. He felt calmer, his heart rate dipping back down into the mostly normal range. Oddly, Sam could feel his physical responses, but still wasn’t privy to his thoughts. She was guessing, however, that he felt relieved to have finished the worst of his business. Surely whatever he was going to do next had to be better than this. Maybe he’d go to the bathroom to wash his hands, taking a good long look in the mirror while he did. If she could stay with him, she’d get a glimpse of his face. Then she and Jace would know who they were looking for. He stood, inching away from the bed as if he were hesitant to turn his back on what lay beneath. Sam took in the luxurious surroundings, surprised to see lush carpet beneath the bed and heavy drapes surrounding it. The rest of the furniture in the room looked old and expensive and was littered with delicate carved marble statues and intricate pieces of glass. But for all its decoration, the room had the feel of a place that hadn’t been lived in, and the man wasn’t comfortable here. He was ready to get out, spinning on his heels so fast, the other side of the room spun before his eyes and�" The smell hit with the force of a physical blow, snapping Sam’s head back. The aura demons! They’d found her. She could feel them swarming around in her head, surging deep into the pit of her stomach, so many of them she couldn’t guess how many fought for space within her skin. For a second she panicked, certain Jace was in danger, but before she could form the words needed to warn him, she was kicked back into her body. The demons cast her out with a high-pitched screech. The creatures weren’t pleased to find her lurking inside their partner in crime. Partner in crime. The demons had a human working with them! She should have known. Sam cried out as her soul reconnected with her tissue, her back arching as painful little shocks of electricity skittered up and down her spine. It took several seconds for her to realize that she was on the floor of the hotel room, draped across Jace’s lap as he held her head and shoulders off the carpet. As comforting as it was to look up and see him still in sharp focus, it was also terrifying. She had to make sure those mesmerizing golden brown eyes weren’t added to Mr. Sicko’s collection. �śThe murderer is a man. I saw his bloody hands. He’s collecting the victims’ eyes in a little wooden box. I think it’s one of the artifacts the demon cults use to summon the aura demons into the earthly plane, but I’m not sure. My dad had something similar, a box, but I can’t remember what it looked like,” Sam said, her mouth dry and her tongue thick and awkward in her mouth. It felt as if she’d been away from her body far longer than a few minutes. �śI wasn’t allowed to see or get near it. None of the kids were.” She shivered. It made sense that she hadn’t been allowed near it if it was half as wicked as the thing she’d seen in her vision. It seemed crazy to think an inanimate object could be evil, but in the long run it probably wasn’t any crazier than believing in invisible demons who entered the world through some sort of ritual involving said inanimate object. �śBut the box and the man, they are connected to the aura demon.” �śHow do you know?” �śIt was like last night, when I was inside Mrs. Choe. This time I felt the demons inside the man I was �Ś” How to describe seeing through another person’s eyes, feeling the physical sensations he felt? �śInhabiting?” Jace asked. �śYes! And if I could inhabit that man without his permission, it makes sense that the demons can inhabit people without permission, too, right? Or at least hurt them without permission.” �śI have no idea what makes sense anymore.” �śBut you believe me, believe that I was inside someone else?” she asked, frightened by how much she wanted Jace to believe her. She knew these things were really happening to her; she didn’t doubt that. But, man, would it be nice to know she wasn’t alone in that belief. �śYou certainly weren’t here,” Jace said, sounding spooked. �śIt was worse than last night. You weren’t moving. I wasn’t even sure you were breathing.” �śWas I?” �śYeah, but �Ś touching you was like �Ś” �śLike what?” Sam asked, staring up into Jace’s eyes, doing her best not to imagine what they’d look like ripped from his body. The demons and the human monster it worked with and that nasty box wouldn’t get Jace. She wouldn’t let them. �śLike holding an empty container of cereal,” he said, pulling her a little closer. �śIt looks the same as a full one, but you don’t have to open it up to know there’s nothing left inside.” Sam shivered. �śCreepy.” Jace nodded. �śThat pretty much covers it.” But not as creepy as what she’d seen. Sam pulled away from Jace, but stayed on the ground, tucking her legs beneath her. She wasn’t ready to try to stand up yet. As briefly as possible, she described what she’d seen and the evil she’d felt coming from the box. �śI was hoping the guy would wash his hands or something and I’d be able to see his reflection in the mirror, but then I smelled that smell I told you about in the ruins. It was the same one that I noticed in my apartment later, just before I was pushed down the stairs.” �śThe aura demons smell?” he asked, but without the incredulity she would have expected. Sam nodded. �śAt least, I can smell them, but there are a lot of times when I smell things that other people can’t. I even smell things in my dreams,” she said. �śBut this man could smell the demons, too. He�"or I guess we�"smelled them, and then the demons were there with me, inside the man’s body.” Jace narrowed his eyes. �śYou’re sure it’s not the man who smells?” �śNo, it’s not a man smell.” Sam sighed. �śIt’s a demon smell, but not a normal demon smell. Not just demon waste or sweat, more�"” �śI smelled something earlier,” Jace said, hesitating only slightly before he went on. �śThe man who jumped me from behind in the alley smelled pretty rank.” �śMaybe it was an aura demon!” �śThis was a man, Sam,” Jace said, though she could tell he was starting to buy her theory. �śHe punched me in the kidneys. Demons without bodies don’t�"” �śBut the man the demons are working with could have punched you. If he had the demons with him, that would explain the smell. It would also explain how he came into possession of another pair of eyes,” she said, piecing together the time line in her mind. �śBut it took him a while to get to his box, if what I was seeing was happening right now, which I’m going to assume it was. Since you already saw the �Ś body.” Jace nodded. �śAnd the demons sensed me inside the man, which they couldn’t have if this was going to happen in the future, right?” �śUm�Ś” �śSo, it’s been at least a couple of hours,” Sam said, not waiting for another comment on the far-reaching fingers of her logic. They were dealing with a lot of unknowns, and far-reaching logic was the only kind available. �śA couple hours walking around with bloody hands. Not smart.” Sam nibbled at her lip. �śNo, but he’s �Ś He wasn’t afraid. At least, not of getting caught. He was anxious when he opened the box, but I think that was just because of the box itself. It’s �Ś evil.” �śSo maybe he works some kind of job where it would be normal for him to have bloody hands. Isn’t there a meatpacking plant not too far from the Choes’ old place?” The Choes’ old place. God, it was still so hard to believe they were dead. �śI need to find out if there were flowers on the floor of the Choes’ apartment when they were �Ś found. In my vision I saw flowers on the ground, my flowers.” �śI can call my uncle. He has ways of finding out what went down at a crime scene.” �śGreat. So if he confirms my flowers were really there �Ś” �śThen that means someone must have taken them out of the Dumpster.” Sam smacked her forehead. �śWhat if the man used the flowers to get inside? What if he hid behind the flowers and tricked the Choes into letting him and the demons in?” Jace sat up a little straighter, and she could tell he thought she was on to something. �śWhich means someone was watching us last night. Some sick freak who likes to collect eyeballs.” Jace scowled and ran a frustrated hand through his wildly spiked hair. It was truly out of control now. He was in need of a long shower and about half a bottle of hair gel in order to repair his hedgehog. Hell, so was she. In need of a shower. She could do without the hair gel. Food would be good, too. They weren’t going to be worth shooting if they didn’t at least get some food in their stomachs. �śWe should eat something. And maybe try to get some sleep.” �śI’ll order room service,” Jace said with a sigh as he pushed to his feet. �śBut I don’t think I’m going to be sleeping until I figure out why you can see my face. Considering the last guy to have the pleasure lost his eyeballs a few hours later �Ś” Sam shivered, appetite destroyed once more. She almost told Jace to forget about ordering anything, but he already had room service on the phone. She smiled when he ordered veggie burgers. A veggie burger sounded perfect. She would usually have shunned anything soy masquerading as real food, but the events of the past twenty-four hours had killed all her cravings for red meat. �śDo you think the demons could be controlling the man?” Jace asked after he’d hung up. �śMaking him commit these murders?” Sam chewed her lip for a moment. Her lips were as dry as the rest of her mouth. The raspberry-lime soda Jace had ordered couldn’t get to the room soon enough. �śMaybe �Ś but I don’t think so. I think the man’s doing it of his own free will. Ezra said something this morning about pacts with aura demons. That they usually require a sacrifice made from free will.” �śThe ex-boyfriend Ezra?” Jace crossed the room until he stood right next to her, forcing Sam to crane her head all the way back to keep him in sight. The movement gave her a brief moment of vertigo. This �śseeing” stuff wasn’t as easy as the rest of humanity made it out to be. �śYeah, the ex-boyfriend.” �śGuess we should go see him after we eat.” Sam smiled, more relieved than she could say that Jace was being reasonable �Ś at least about the Ezra business. �śI think that would be wise. Unless you have a better idea.” �śI don’t.” �śWell, I do,” Sam said, nervously licking her dry lips. �śNot for finding the man I saw in my vision, but I can think of a few better ways to spend the next fifteen minutes than sitting on the floor.” He took the hand she held toward him and helped her to her feet. It was so strange not being able to see her own hand, but being able to see his so clearly. If she’d had any doubt that her ability to see was paranormal in nature, it would have vanished in that moment. �śThey said the food would be about twenty minutes, right?” He nodded. �śGood. Just enough time for a bath.” �śYou want to take a bath?” He made it sound like she’d said she wanted to run over old ladies while they were crossing the street. �śI’d like to be clean. Wouldn’t you?” she asked, pulling the sweater she’d just put on over her head. She was glad she hadn’t bothered putting her bra back on before. Jace’s eyes dropped to her chest for a split second, just long enough for her to read the desire in his heated gaze. He wanted her. Badly. No matter what he thought was best for her. �śI don’t have any clean clothes,” he said, stepping back, as if he feared what he’d do if he stayed so close to her. �śI bet they have something in your size in the shop downstairs. And I’m betting they’d send it up. Seems like you have some pull around here.” �śThe Contis have pull�"which reminds me: I should call my uncle and see what�"” �śIt can wait thirty minutes until we get clean and a little food in our stomachs.” She took his hand and pulled him back toward the door, hoping she remembered the layout of the room well enough to find the bathroom. �śHow do you know? I could be dead by then,” he said, though he didn’t sound particularly disturbed by the thought. �śIf these demons have a connection with you, they could find us here.” Sam paused for a second, considering his words. �śThey could, I guess, but I don’t think they will. They weren’t happy to find me hanging around their human friend. They’re not looking for me right now.” �śWhy? Why did one or more of them try to kill you, push you down the stairs, and then suddenly decide to leave you alone?” �śGood question,” Sam said. �śAnd maybe Ezra will have some answers. In the meantime, our bath time has been cut down to ten minutes.” �śI don’t want to take a bath.” He dug his feet in, stopping her from taking another step. �śDo you want to die dirty and hungry and with a killer case of blue balls?” Jace’s eyes widened, and then the most amazing thing happened. He smiled. And laughed. �śNo, I don’t.” Then he pulled her into the bathroom and shut the door. CHAPTER FOURTEEN �śYou’re sure you’re okay?” Sam asked no more than an hour later as Jace helped her from the back of the cab and hooked her arm through his. The apartment where her ex lived was only a few hundred yards from the outer rim of the ruins. Normally, no big deal, but today �Ś it made his skin crawl. Sam’s madness was catching. Calling his uncle and having him confirm that there had been flowers on the floor of the Choes’ apartment and that Stephen Quinn had nothing to do with any gang activity going down in Southie had killed his theory that Stephen was responsible for putting his sister in danger. It was looking more and more like invisible demons were really out to get Sam �Ś and a few other people while they were at it. Maybe even him. No matter how many times he told himself Sam seeing him didn’t necessarily mean he was next on her demons’ hit list, he wasn’t quite buying it. He felt hunted �Ś watched �Ś and not only by the woman who couldn’t seem to take her eyes off of him for a second. But then, could he blame her? He was one of the first things she’d seen in two decades, and she’d nearly had to give him mouth-to-mouth�"the kind that had nothing to do with her tongue down his throat�"not forty minutes ago. �śJace, are you�"” �śI’m fine,” he said, his voice rough with embarrassment. �śI’m fine now. I was just hungry.” And nearly sexed out of his own skin. He’d never felt like that. Ever. He’d never felt as if his soul were leaving his body, never come so hard he stopped breathing, stopped thinking, stopped feeling anything but a pleasure so intense he wasn’t sure he could physically contain it. For about twenty seconds he’d seriously considered the fact that sex with Sam might be what was going to kill him, and foul play would have nothing to do with it. �śAre you sure?” Her fingers plucked softly at the clean sweater he’d ordered from the shop downstairs. It was blue, a color he never wore. Sam had requested it. She wanted to see as many colors as she could before he faded from sight again. And she was sure he would fade away. She was certain his impending death was the reason she was seeing him, and that she would stop as soon as they took action to keep him safe. Hence their presence at her ex-boyfriend’s apartment. Ezra had said he’d found something interesting, something he and Sam should talk about in person. He hadn’t seemed to mind that Sam was bringing Jace along, but that didn’t make Jace feel any better about walking into an apartment where another man used to fuck Sam. He didn’t want to think about anyone else fucking Sam. Ever. Not now, not yesterday, and surely not anytime in the near or distant future. �śI mean, I told Ezra and Sunny we’d be here as soon as possible,” Sam said. �śBut if you need to get some sleep, I can�"” �śI’m fine, Sammy,” he said, as she placed her finger on the print reader and let them into the front door of the building. So she was still in the print reader. He tried not to let that bother him. But it did. He suddenly wished he hadn’t been on the phone to Francis earlier when she went into the hall to call her ex. He would have liked to hear her voice when she talked to this Ezra character, to hear if it got all soft around the edges, the way it did when she was speaking to the people she cared about. �śRight, sorry. I just wanted to�"” She tripped on an uneven place in the tile in the lobby and would have gone sprawling if Jace hadn’t grabbed her around the waist. His heart pounded in his chest as she thanked him and tapped her way over to the elevator. Just the thought of Sam getting hurt made him jumpy. He was the one who had nearly passed out and drowned in the bathtub�"orgasms with Sam were best reserved for beds and other places where breathing when you lost control of your body could be taken for granted�"but it had made him even more anxious for Sam. What would happen to her if he died? Would the killer and his demons come after her next? Those worries were enough to keep his mind off his other concerns. Like how could he ever sleep with Sam again if he lost control so completely when they were together? Sure, this time he’d been the one to suffer, but what about next time? What if he blacked out and did something more dangerous than swallow a few mouthfuls of tub water? What if he did something to hurt Sam? It just went to prove that he should never have let down his guard in the first place. But he hadn’t been able to resist. When she’d stripped off her sweater and stood naked before him, smiling that crooked little grin, he’d lost the will to fight. Hell, remembering the moment was enough to make him hard, to make his cock strain the close of his new jeans, to make him lose focus on what he should be doing�Ś. Fortunately, this time he caught the �śoff” feeling before it was too late, before someone or something caught him and Sam unawares. �śHold up,” he whispered, his hands on Sam’s elbows, pulling her back behind him as soon as they got off the elevator. �śI smell something. Do you?” Sam sniffed the air, growing pale as she did so. �śYes. But it’s not the demon�Ś. It’s something else. Something �Ś bad.” Something bad, indeed, something like the scent of freshly spilled blood. Jace could tell from the look on Sam’s face that she recognized the smell, but didn’t want to name it. Stephen had told him once that his other sister had been killed the night that Sam was blinded, that her blood had been all over the place. After something like that, he imagined it would be impossible to ever forget the bright, sweet, and salty smell. Just like it was impossible for him to forget the smell of his mother’s blood. He and Sam were a pair, all right. It was amazing that neither one of them was more messed up than they were. �śIt’s coming from that way,” Sam whispered, pointing to the left. �śEzra’s apartment is at the end of the hall down there, number four hundred and eight.” �śThat last door at the end?” Jace asked, stomach sinking as he saw the light seeping into the darkness of the hall. The door at the end was cracked open. �śYes. Can you see anything? What’s�"” �śThe door’s open.” �śOh, no.” They both knew that couldn’t be anything but bad news. People who lived close to the ruins didn’t leave their doors open, not even on a beautiful spring day like this one. �śStay here, and run when I tell you to,” Jace said, pulling his stun gun from its holster. �śNo, I’m coming with you.” �śYou’re staying here,” Jace hissed. �śYou can’t see anything except me. How are you�"” �śExactly, so I’ll be able to see you react if anyone gets close enough to attack you.” She flipped a switch on her cane, turning the end deadly. �śAnd I’ll be able to help.” �śYou ever killed someone with that knife?” �śNot yet, but I wouldn’t mind starting,” she said, chin in the air, making that stubborn face he was coming to love as much as the woman herself. Love. He was falling in love. It probably would have made a normal man insist the woman he cared for stay behind, but then, he wasn’t normal. He’d known that for years, and he also knew Sam needed someone in her life to treat her with respect, like she was the force to be reckoned with that she truly was. �śOkay, but stay near the door and out of the way unless there’s no other choice,” Jace said. �śIf you get in my way, you could do a lot more harm than good.” �śFine.” Sam nodded, falling in behind him as he crept down the hall. The closer they got to the end, the stronger the smell: sharp and metallic, with an undercurrent of horrible sweetness. He heard Sam swallow and wondered if she was fighting the same urge to gag that clutched at his throat. He’d been a death dealer to demons and humans alike at different times in his past, but the smell of blood never got any easier to stomach. Sam’s fingers reached out to tangle in his sleeve. �śWait. I think �Ś I think I �Ś There’s something coming. I can feel it. I�"” Her words were cut off by a woman’s scream. Seconds later the door at the end of the hall flew fully open and a living nightmare rushed out. Jace couldn’t even guess exactly what he was looking at. God knew it wasn’t a man�"though it was shaped like one�"but it wasn’t an animal or a demon either. It was something �Ś unlike anything he’d ever seen, a monster with glowing red eyes set in a featureless humanoid face whose entire body was covered in some kind of yellow mucus. It smelled like death and sounded like a banshee come to collect a soul, emitting a shriek so high-pitched it made him fall to his knees before he could aim his stun gun. Sam fell beside him, clutching at her head, crying out in agony. With her sensitive hearing, the sound had to be even harder to bear. Not that she would have to hear it for long. The creature�"whatever it was�"was nearly upon them, wielding a thin knife as long as Jace’s forearm. �śRun, Sam! Back to the elevator, and don’t come out,” Jace yelled as he threw himself into the monster’s path, knocking it to the ground. He was on his knees a second later, leveling his gun at the thing, but it was already up and running, moving with preternatural speed down the hallway. Jace fired once, twice, and was sure at least one of his shots hit his target, but a stun gun set on its highest setting didn’t faze the creature. It just kept running, then leaped at the window at the end of the hall without pausing to throw it open first. The sound of shattering glass and breaking wood filled the air as the monster crashed through the window and began the free fall toward the ground four stories below. After a quick look back toward the door to make sure nothing else was coming out to play, Jace pushed to his feet and ran after the creature. It seemed to take an eternity for him to close the fifty feet when compared to the speed of whatever it was he’d just seen. The bastard was fast, deadly fast. And apparently pretty damned invincible as well. The stun gun hadn’t done jack shit to slow it down, and neither had a fall from a five-story building. Jace reached the window just in time to see it racing toward the ruins a few blocks away, leaving a trail of mucus as it went. In another life, Jace would have hurried to the elevator and down to the ground and done his best to follow the creature�"a previously undiscovered demon-human hybrid of some sort would fetch a hell of a bounty�"but now he just ran back to where he’d last seen Sammy, heart racing when he found she’d continued on to her ex’s apartment without him. Quickly he exchanged his stun gun for his automatic, glad he’d taken the risk of wearing it out in the open without his jacket to cover the illegal firearm. But then, cops patrolling the ruins tended to turn a blind eye when a bounty hunter was packing forbidden heat. Police didn’t like the hunters, but they performed a vital service for New York, a service that sometimes required something a little more serious than a stun gun. Hopefully, real bullets would do some damage if he encountered another one of those creatures. If not �Ś Jace burst through the open door at the end of the hall, lifting his gun and scanning the room. �śSam, where are you? Sam�"” �śI’m in here, in the bedroom,” she said. A sob followed her words, but it wasn’t hers. There was someone in the room with her. �śWhatever that thing was, there aren’t any more of them. I could see it, but I can’t see�"” She broke off, talking softly to someone else. �śSam?” �śJace, we’re going to need an ambulance.” �śAre you hurt?” �śNo, not me.” Thank God. The relief that washed through him made his knees weak for a second. �śBut it’s bad.” Another sob, followed by the muffled sound of Sam whispering some sort of meaningless comfort before she raised her voice to call out to him again. �śI’ve already contacted the paramedics. They should be on their way.” Jace hurried toward the sound of her voice, keeping his gun in hand, checking a small bathroom and the rest of the apartment as he went. It wasn’t a large space, and there weren’t many places to hide. If there was anything lying in wait, it would have to be in the bedroom. Fortunately, he was pretty sure that area was secure. Not that Sam wouldn’t have rushed into a danger zone if she thought someone needed help, but if she said nothing was there, he believed her. She might be blind, but her other four senses and whatever sixth sense she had kept her pretty damned informed. After all, she’d known something bad was coming before he had. He’d never dreamed of having a partner, and if he had, he would have thought Sam was the least likely candidate for the job, but he couldn’t deny she had the makings of a good bounty hunter. She was brave, levelheaded in a crisis, and had amazing instincts. And he trusted her. Completely. So completely that he didn’t question her when she met him at the door to the bedroom with a certifiably crazy request. �śThat thing was what I heard screaming in the ruins the other day.” �śYou’re sure?” �śI’m sure. We have to find out where it went. You have to kiss me. Really kiss me,” she said, pulling his lips down to hers. Jace had time to take in the man lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood and the pretty blond girl in tears kneeling next to him, but then Sam’s lips were on his. His eyes closed, a part of him thrilling to feel her tongue slipping into his mouth, to hear her moan of pleasure as he slid his free hand around her waist and tugged her closer, lifting her feet off the ground as he strove to give her exactly what she’d asked him for. The other part of him said this was absolutely fucking nuts. �śMore,” Sam murmured, rubbing against him, as if sensing he was about to pull away. She wrapped her leg around his hips and ground shamelessly against the thigh he slid between her legs. Jace hesitated again, highly conscious of the two strangers a few feet away, but didn’t break off the kiss. There had to be a good reason Sam was doing this, though for the life of him he couldn’t imagine what it was. �śNow relax the back of your neck,” the woman across the room said, not sounding shocked to see two people making out while her boyfriend bled out on the floor. It was insane. Unless �Ś Sam had said she’d never had these visions before, not until last night, after the first time they’d nearly �Ś If she’d given her ex and his new girlfriend that information, then maybe�" The suspicion wasn’t fully formed before Sam’s back arched and she cried out, tearing her lips away from his. Jace caught her before she fell, guiding her to the ground the way he had in the hotel room when the vision had taken her over. Shit. Crazy as it sounded, it seemed like the heat between them was somehow triggering her visions. And she knew that was what was happening, but she hadn’t told him. Maybe that was the only reason she’d agreed to go up to that hotel room with him: She was hoping for another psychic event. It might not have bothered him if she’d told him up front, but now�Ś He hadn’t trusted many people in his life, and this was a damned fine example of why. Trusting inevitably led to playing the fool. It made him angry enough that he was tempted to leave Sam and her friends to figure this out on their own. But he couldn’t, not when she’d turned so pale that even her lips had lost all color. She was gone again, vacant in that haunting way that made his mouth run dry and his tongue feel too big for his throat. It was as if she were dead. Breathing, even blinking occasionally, but completely empty on the inside, her soul absent from the Sam shell it normally inhabited. �śSam? Where �Ś are �Ś” The man on the ground�"Ezra, he was assuming�"took a liquid breath. Good thing Sam had called an ambulance. The man was going to need it if he hoped to survive. �śWhere are you?” the blond woman asked, taking up where her boyfriend had left off. �śLook around. See if you can�"” Sam jolted back into her body, her soul animating her eyes the way fingers did a glove. �śHe’s somewhere in the ruins, but he’s changed. It’s the same man I saw with the box�"the hands are the same. I’m sure of it. He was that monster. Somehow he and that thing in the hall, they’re the same.” �śHe’s �Ś working with the aura demons,” Ezra wheezed. �śIt’s affected his appearance. He’s�"” �śEzra found a mention in one of his books about aura demons who enter the world through an ancient box,” the blonde said, interrupting Ezra when it became difficult for him to speak. �śThe demons are so strong that they’re capable of hurting humans once they’ve been summoned into the earthly plane. They can feed on that pain and grow stronger, but not strong enough to take over a human body and take the physical form they crave.” �śThen what the hell was that thing we just saw?” Jace asked. �śTo take over a human body completely they need someone they’ve possessed to fill the box with the proper offering,” the woman said, ignoring Jace’s question. Sam gasped. �śSunny, is it the same box that my father�"” �śEzra said the box the authorities took from your father went missing from its museum collection a couple of months ago.” �śSomeone’s trying to make the demons flesh.” Sam shivered. �śIt looks like it,” Sunny said. �śAnd it looks like whoever it was did their homework. Ezra said your parents’ cult translated the symbols on the box incorrectly. They thought the ritual required three children to be sacrificed. The words for child and eye are almost the same in the demons’ lexicon.” The eyes. And whoever had killed the Choes and that thug in the alley already had three pairs. �śBut how did it find you? I didn’t tell anyone I was coming here, Sunshine, except Jace,” Sam said. Apparently the girlfriend’s full name was Sunshine. Great. They were getting advice from some wannabe hippie. The resurgence of the free-love movement was great and all, but Jace didn’t trust people who took flower-child names as far as he could throw them. And something was off about this chick �Ś something he couldn’t quite put his finger on, but that left him cold and wary. Maybe it was just the fact that she’d known Sam was using the sexual heat between them to facilitate her visions when he hadn’t. Or maybe it was something more. Either way, he was going to take everything the woman said with a large grain of salt. �śAfter we hung up,” Sam continued, �śJace and I came straight over.” �śYou didn’t tell anyone where you were going?” Sunshine asked, nailing him with an accusing look. �śHe called his uncle, but�"” �śI didn’t tell anyone where we were going, and I certainly didn’t mention any names,” Jace said, trying not to take the accusing look personally or let it fuel his instant dislike of the woman. The girl’s boyfriend had just been stabbed, and she couldn’t know that Jace had been raised to choose every word carefully and assume he was being overheard at all times. Hackers could eavesdrop on just about any earbud in the city and had always taken a special interest in his uncle’s activities. �śThen I don’t know how the demons found out Ezra was helping you, but�"” �śThe box, Sunny �Ś �śEzra, please, don’t try to�"” �śI spoke the words �Ś on the box�Ś. I�"” �śEzra, please, you’ll hurt yourself.” Sunny’s voice rose hysterically as more blood gushed from the wound at the center of Ezra’s chest. �śDon’t speak �Ś the words �Ś don’t �Ś” �śDon’t speak the words on the box,” Sunny said, as understanding lit up her face. �śHe was looking at some pictures of the box in one of the books and read the words out loud maybe half an hour ago. He was working on the translation. Maybe that’s how�"” Sirens sounded outside, growing louder as the police cars made their way down the block. �śGo �Ś find�"” �śDon’t say another word. I mean it,” Sunny said, bringing a shaking finger to Ezra’s lips before turning to look at Jace and Sam. �śYou need to find that thing before it kills again or, God forbid, completes that ritual. Those demons are nasty enough without physical forms. Take the books on the table and go. I’ll call you as soon as we get to the hospital.” �śBut shouldn’t we�"” �śGo. If you’re here when the police arrive, you’ll never catch up with it in time.” So they were going hunting after all. Though for what kind of creature, he had no idea. But he would find out. Before he and Sam took a step closer to the ruins, they were going to have a little talk about everything she’d seen and how she’d seen it. �śCome on. Let’s go.” �śShould we head down the stairs?” Sam asked as he pulled her to her feet. �śDo you think the paramedics will be in the elevator or�"” �śCome on. Follow me,” Jace said, tugging Sam along behind him as he strode through the apartment, grabbing the two open books on the coffee table, then hurrying out into the hall, where the rank smell of the creature still lingered. They ducked into the stairwell just as the elevator dinged open. Good. Jace didn’t want anyone to see them and start asking questions. Considering that a man was bleeding in the apartment behind him, it didn’t seem like a good idea to get caught with an automatic still clenched in his fist. The fact that Ezra was suffering from stab wounds, not bullet holes, probably wouldn’t matter to anyone. Jace would still be a person of interest. The kind of interest that ended in a night spent answering questions down at the Southie precinct. �śJace, where are we going?” Sam whispered behind him. �śThis isn’t the way down to the street. We’re�"” �śWe’re not going down. We’re going up.” �śWhat? But the man went�"” �śI saw exactly where it went, and how fast it went there,” Jace said, still unwilling to call what they’d seen a man. It had looked demon and smelled demon, no matter that it wasn’t a species he was familiar with. �śIt’s so far ahead, a few more minutes isn’t going to make a difference.” �śBut�"” �śAnd we’re going to need backup.” �śBut�"” �śAnd I’m going to need you to answer a few questions. If you can be straight with me, then we’ll continue to work together. If not �Ś” �śYou’ll throw me off the roof?” Sam asked. Jace didn’t say a word, just gritted his teeth and pulled her along a little faster. If Sam knew about the angry thing that lurked inside of him, she wouldn’t give him any ideas. CHAPTER FIFTEEN Jace was angrier than she’d ever seen him, and she could guess why. He’d figured out she was using the heat between them to induce her visions. She knew she should have told him her theory earlier. Now he was furious. He must feel deceived and �Ś hurt, if the look in his eyes as they emerged onto the roof of Ezra’s building was any indication. She’d hurt him, which shouldn’t have pleased her. But it did. Just a little. If she’d hurt him, that meant he had to be feeling what she was feeling. Jace was falling in love with her, too. That she could be happy about that when a man she cared about had been severely injured just showed she wasn’t as good a person as she’d assumed�"once upon a time, before Jace and all the intense emotions he inspired came into her life. Maybe he was right and he was bad for her, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. She just had to make him see that she hadn’t intended to deceive him, and that they had to do whatever it took to stop the man-thing that had streaked by them in the hall before it claimed its next victim. A victim she was terrified would be the man she loved. When he’d chased after that creature, she’d felt as though her heart were going to leap out of her chest. It had smelled a little bit like the aura demon, but looked almost like a man. And in the vision she’d had in Ezra’s apartment, she’d watched those sticky, yellowed hands transform into a man’s hands�"the man collecting human eyes for the demon. She’d never even heard of something like that, and couldn’t wait to learn what the books Jace had tucked under his arm had to say about these particular aura demons and that evil box. But she would have to wait. There was no way the books were written in Braille, and Jace clearly wasn’t going to read anything until he got a few things off his chest. And arranged for some backup of the big, mean, and heavily armed variety. �śWe’ll meet you at the southern edge of the ruins,” he said, finishing up another call to his uncle Francis, one of the most notorious mob bosses in New York City. Francis Conti had started a bounty-hunting business twenty years ago and ended up owning half the property in Southie. He also had his hands in a good number of high-profile businesses uptown. As far as mobsters went, he was rumored to be a fairly stand-up guy, but she still would have been scared to meet him �Ś if she and Jace weren’t already facing down far scarier things. �śDown near the docks would be easiest. I think that’s the best place to start looking.” �śI didn’t see any water in my vision. It looked more like�"” �śRight, see you in twenty minutes,” Jace said, ignoring her and ending the call with an irritated tap on the bud in his ear. �śListen, I understand that you’re upset, but it’s stupid to ignore what I’ve seen.” �śHow long have you known?” Sam didn’t insult him by asking what he was talking about. �śI started to suspect our �Ś um �Ś” God, she was suddenly at a loss for words, more nervous than she had been around Jace since their first interaction on the street. Seeing the hard look in his eyes, realizing he might not forgive her, banished any shred of satisfaction she’d received from realizing he cared. It didn’t matter whether he’d cared, only whether he trusted her enough to keep caring. �śSuspect that fucking me made you jump into other people’s bodies?” �śNo,” she said, wincing at the anger in his voice. �śI started to think maybe the energy between us had something to do with the visions and seeing that man on the street this morning.” �śBefore we went up to the hotel room?” His jaw clenched and the look in his eyes grew even colder. This wasn’t going to a good place. She had to make him understand that she hadn’t kept him in the dark on purpose. She’d been blind for years, for God’s sake. She knew what it felt like to be the person who never got the joke, who was left out of countless conversations because she just couldn’t relate to the average person’s experience. She’d never do that to him. �śYes, but I swear I meant to�"” �śYour ex-boyfriend and his girlfriend put you up to it? They look like the types.” �śI just wanted to ask them if it was possible, and why it seemed like I was starting to see the present instead of the future. When I talked to Sunny on the phone this afternoon, she seemed to think it was because I was consciously attempting to contact the demon instead of subconsciously�"” �śSunshine’s just full of information. Ezra, too.” �śJace, please.” �śWhy didn’t you just jump in bed with the two of them?” he pushed on before she could get a word in. �śOr does fucking old men not do it for you?” �śNo, it doesn’t do it for me,” she said. �śNo one has ever made me feel the way you�"” �śSave it.” �śNo, I won’t save it. I love you. I didn’t mean to keep anything from you. I tried to tell you, but then I �Ś I don’t know.” Shit �Ś She’d said it, that she loved him. It had popped out of her mouth before she could think better of it. Now her heart was racing. �śI just �Ś I was going to tell you, but I�"” �śIs there anything else you’re keeping from me?” he asked, not interested in her confession of love. He hadn’t batted an eye when she dropped the L-word. Which meant he didn’t love her back, that all the you’re-too-good-for-me crap was a line he used to keep women from getting too clingy. That the mind-blowing sex between them wasn’t making love at all. It was just�" �śTell me, or I’ll drop you off at the hospital and head down to the docks alone.” �śI don’t need to go to the hospital.” �śYou’ll be safe there.” �śNo one is safe anywhere, and you’re not going to find him at the docks,” she said, not bothering to hide her frustration. �śThe docks are the best place to start a search. We can fan out from there. Are you going to answer my question?” �śBut in my vision, the man was already coming out of the ruins when he transformed. He was close to some kind of garden �Ś and a building I didn’t recognize,” she said, knowing they shouldn’t be wasting time. This was Jace’s life on the line. Whether he believed that or not, she did, and there was no way she was going to let him put himself at risk. �śEven if I was seeing the future, that means he’s going to�"” �śFine, I’ll go alone.” �śNo! I’m not keeping anything else from you! I told you, I wouldn’t have�"” Her bud pulsed weakly in her ear. She hadn’t charged it in nearly two days and it would lose power soon, but it still had enough juice left to weakly announce Stephen’s name. It was her brother. Great. Perfect timing. Still, she felt obliged to answer. To let him know that she was alive, if nothing else. She sighed. �śThat’s Stephen. Should I tell him�"” �śDon’t tell him shit. Your brother’s a drug dealer.” �śWhat?” She’d suspected Jace and Stephen had some sort of secret, but drugs? It just didn’t make sense. �śStephen doesn’t use drugs. He barely even drinks.” �śHe deals. Demon highs, all of it illegal. I used to buy from him six years ago, before I got clean.” The look on his face left no room for doubt. He was telling her the truth. She didn’t know which was more shocking: that the always-in-control Jace had once been into drugs or that her straitlaced brother sold them. Both ideas made her sick to her stomach, and made her wonder how well she knew the men in her life. Maybe she was as stupid and naive as Stephen had always assumed. �śI was sure drug business gone wrong was the reason you were in danger,” Jace said. �śBut even though it seems like Stephen has nothing to do with this, I don’t think you should trust him.” �śStephen would never hurt me.” �śNo, but he might cause you to be hurt.” �śNo, he wouldn’t. I don’t care what he’s into. He’s too careful. He would never�"” �śHe asked me if I’d noticed anyone following you,” Jace said, his words sending a shiver of doubt down her spine. She’d been about to tap on her bud, but she let the call go to voice mail. She knew her brother would call back. Probably in less than two minutes. �śLast night at the bar, he was worried you might have been in danger from something other than that Ju Du demon.” �śStephen always worries about men following me. Since I was sixteen, he’s been convinced half the male population is hot for his blind sister. He’s crazy like that, but�"” �śHe’s not crazy. Half the male population probably is hot for you. You’re a beautiful woman,” Jace said, though he managed to make the words sound like an insult. �śBut it wasn’t just normal worry. I think there’s something going on, and that he has reasons for wanting you locked up that have nothing to do with brotherly love.” �śStephen doesn’t want me locked up,” she said with a strained laugh. �śHe called the Department of Human Services to see what kind of evidence he would need to have you declared mentally incompetent.” Sam sighed and swallowed the sour taste that rose in her mouth. She hated to admit it �Ś but that sounded like Stephen. He would do something like that. He’d never had a problem restricting her freedom in the name of doing what was best for her, no matter how many times she’d told him she didn’t want him controlling her life anymore. And he had been mental since she’d moved out, acting like he’d do anything to get her back in the same apartment, where he could be sure she was safe. Safe. In the same house with a man who ran demon drugs. How could he? After all those years telling her how important it was for her to walk the straight and narrow, to do well in school, to not drink too much, not wear provocative clothing, not date older guys, and on and on and on until she would have chewed her own arm off to get some distance from him and his rules. She’d always thought he was acting out of love for her�"she still did�"but the double standard made the news that he was trying to have her declared officially crazy a very bitter pill to swallow. �śWell�Ś thanks for the heads-up. Looks like I wasn’t the only one with secrets,” she said, trying to keep the hurt from her voice. �śI’ll have to watch myself more closely. Stop talking about invisible demons and prophetic dreams, I guess.” Jace winced, as if he could feel the same hurt and betrayal that pulsed through her and regretted being the cause of it, even indirectly. His eyes softened, and, for a second, Sam thought he was going to apologize for keeping Stephen’s secret and tell her that he forgave her for neglecting to tell him the entire truth about her visions. But when he spoke, his voice was as cool and in control as ever. �śNo more secrets between us, and you listen to any orders you get from me or from any of the people we’re headed to meet,” he said, stalking toward the edge of the roof as the sound of sirens once again filled the air. Ezra must be on his way to the hospital. Sam sent up a quick prayer for his swift recovery. �śUncle Francis won’t go for this invisible-demon shit. That’s why I didn’t bother telling him about your �Ś” �śMy crazy visions,” Sam said, realizing that a part of Jace still didn’t believe she’d seen what she’d seen, no matter that he’d been with her every time the visions had overtaken her. And if he couldn’t believe in something he’d witnessed, there was no way he was going to be prepared to deal with the aura demons. �śI don’t think you’re crazy, Sam. I really don’t. But I�"” �śRight. I get it. Don’t mention anything in front of your uncle Francis.” This was completely ridiculous. How was she supposed to help keep Jace safe if she couldn’t even be honest about what she’d seen, or use her newfound power to get a bead on the box or the man working with the demons? She didn’t even have to ask if Jace would be willing to lip-lock for the cause again. He was freaked-out by the paranormal side of their little investigation and determined to take this back to a place where he felt comfortable�"even if it got him killed. Shit. And shit again. What the hell was she going to do? She couldn’t let Jace put himself at risk like this, but she had no idea how to stop him. �śYou can mention what we saw downstairs. He’s plenty interested in that. The bounty on whatever we just saw could be in the millions. New species are pretty fucking rare and�"” �śIt’s not a new species of demon. It’s the man I saw,” Sam said, giving Jace one last chance to listen to her. �śSomehow he shifted into the form we saw in the hall and then shifted back again. I saw it. It’s probably because of the ritual he’s trying to work with the demons, like Ezra said. I remember a couple of the grown-ups in my parents’ cult got sick right before they summoned the demons. I’d never thought about it, but maybe the same thing happened to them.” �śThey turned into snot monsters?” �śI don’t know, maybe. I never saw them. They were locked in the infirmary and�"” �śWe should get going.” �śNo. We should look at the books and see�"” �śI’ll drop you at the hospital and you can read the books there.” He reached for her and turned back toward the door to the roof. �śThey’re not in Braille. I can’t read them,” she said, pulling away from the hand he’d wrapped around her elbow. They weren’t going to start this bullying crap again. Not now. Not after all they’d been through in the past twenty-four hours. �śAnd I’m not going to the hospital. If you’d just look at the books and tell me what they�"” Jace cast a swift look down at the volumes in his hand. �śIt’s just an old history book, stuff about artifacts unearthed after the emergence.” Artifacts unearthed after the emergence �Ś why was that ringing a bell? God! If she’d just had the chance to get a little bit of sleep sometime in the past day and a half, she knew her brain would be working far better. �śCan you read it to me? I think�"” �śI’ll read it to you later,” he said. But Sam didn’t get a chance to enjoy the insinuation that they were going to have a �ślater.” �śWe don’t have time to waste doing homework.” �śThat may be the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you say.” She sighed and barely resisted the urge to stamp her foot as her earbud pulsed again. It didn’t have the juice to speak his name, but she would bet a few grand it was Stephen calling back, just as she’d known he would. She ignored him a second time. He could leave another voice mail. �śHow can we not take the time to understand what we’re facing?” �śSam, the pages turned down here are about some kind of Pandora’s box.” �śThe box that unleashed evil upon the world?” She couldn’t remember her dad ever referring to Pandora’s box, but it made a bone-chilling kind of sense. The box she’d seen had been more terrifying than any demon. �śI bet that’s why the demons can interact with people, because they come from Pandora’s�"” �śPandora’s box isn’t real. It’s legend, purely mythical�"” �śYou thought aura demons were mythical, too,” she said, her voice rising despite her attempts to remain calm. With every moment they wasted, the man they needed to find got farther away �Ś which �Ś might not be a bad idea, now that she thought about it. Just like it might not be a bad idea for Jace to head in the opposite direction of where she suspected they’d find the killer. If only she could see something other than Jace’s face! Not that she’d be able to read print even if she could see the books, of course. She’d learned to read in Braille, and Braille was all she knew. �śJust tell me what the book says about the box.” And then she’d find a way to ditch him and take care of this herself�Ś somehow. The thought of facing either the demon-man or the man and the demons as separate entities was terrifying, but she would do it. The demons hadn’t hurt her, and the man-thing had run right past her in the hall. Either they couldn’t hurt her or they didn’t want to for some reason. A shiver of apprehension whispered across her skin. Why wouldn’t the demons want to hurt her? The more she thought about it, the more she suspected the fall down the stairs hadn’t been part of the plan. The demons didn’t want to kill her or take her eyes. They wanted something else�Ś. �śI’ll read it on the way if we have time,” Jace said, interrupting her thoughts before she could grasp the ribbon of understanding teasing at the edge of her brain. �śWe need to make time. Now,” Sam said. �śIt seems like the aura demons are turning the man they’re working with into some kind of monster, but why�"” �śI’m not going to spend any more time fighting with you about this fucking fairy-tale bullshit!” Jace turned away, storming toward the door leading off the roof, forcing her to follow him. �śFairy-tale bull�"You know I’m telling the truth about the demons, so why won’t you�"” �śI don’t know anything.” This was ridiculous! �śHow much evidence is it going to take to�"” �śI’m willing to give the aura-demons theory the benefit of the doubt, and I admit that there’s something weird going on with you that I can’t begin to explain,” he said, turning back to her with his hand on the door handle. �śBut I can’t even read whatever language the first book is in, and the second one is just about human eyes being the ultimate demon sacrifice because they’re the window to the soul or some shit.” �śExactly! So we should�"” �śWe already know the freak likes to collect eyeballs. Now we need to catch the motherfucker before he collects any more,” he said, his mind clearly made up. �śCatching demons�"all kinds of demons�"is what my family has been doing for twenty years. It’s the way I make my living. I’ll find a way to take down these demons and whoever or whatever we saw in the hall.” Sam sighed. There was no way she was going to change his mind or get him to listen to her. She was going to have to do this on her own �Ś or maybe not. It was a long shot, but there was one person she had left to turn to. �śFine, you go take care of this your way. I’ll go have a talk with my brother,” she said, the tiny lie pricking at her conscience. She was going to have a talk with her brother, but not the talk Jace would assume. �śDo you think that’s a good idea? He seemed pretty pissed off at the hospital.” �śStephen has never hurt me. Never.” She tried to keep the anger from her voice, but it was hard. Stephen was the one who had untied her and pulled her out of that circle of blood in the confusion after guns started firing that night at the commune. He’d carried her into the woods to hide and probably saved her life. The elders had killed several of the other children who were in the barn while the police were still busy in the main farmhouse. They had thought that the demons they worshiped would protect them from the police if they added a few extra sacrifices to the altar where Stephen and Sam’s baby sister had been slaughtered only a few minutes before. Without Stephen, Sam would have joined her sister in the afterlife. But Jace couldn’t know that, just like he couldn’t know that Stephen had dedicated his life to getting her out of foster care as soon as he was old enough to be named her guardian. As soon as he’d had enough money, he’d�" �śThe demon drugs.” She should have realized the truth immediately. �śThey were for me, to help him earn money faster so he could finalize the paperwork to get custody,” Sam muttered, not caring that Jace overheard her. He should know that Stephen wasn’t the type to take a risk like trafficking illegal substances for no reason. He’d no doubt done it for her, to get her out of that final foster home. �śYou’re probably right, but that doesn’t explain why he’s still selling,” Jace said. �śJust �Ś be careful, okay?” Sam nodded. �śI will. You be careful, too. Please.” Jace’s eyes met hers, and for a second she thought he was going to kiss her, but he didn’t. He just reached out to cup her face in his hand. �śI’m glad you’re not coming. I don’t handle myself well when I think you’re in danger. I get �Ś distracted.” �śYou distract me, too,” she said, knowing it was the closest she would get to telling Jace what he meant to her right now. She wasn’t ready to say the L-word again, and he certainly didn’t seem ready to hear it. But as they hurried down the stairs and out to the street below, Sam prayed she would have the chance to tell Jace all that was in her heart. CHAPTER SIXTEEN Sam turned and watched out the window until Jace was just a tiny shape in the surrounding darkness. It was sunny out today, a bright, crisp spring afternoon, so there were other shapes in the shadows, but he was the only point of light. It made her heart ache when he finally disappeared as the cabbie took a sharp right, cutting through the park toward her brother’s bar. Still, she was determined that the next time she saw Jace, she wouldn’t be able to �śsee” him at all. Turning to face the front, Sam told her earbud to retrieve her voice mail. It would be a good idea to know Stephen’s frame of mind before she burst into the bar and demanded he come help her fight demons. It was going to be hell convincing him as it was, but she hoped the books in her lap would help. She could at least prove to him that some sick person out there was collecting people’s eyes and trying to work a spell using this Pandora’s box, which was probably the same artifact their father had pulled from the ground more than twenty years ago. Hopefully the combination of guilt and knowing lives were in danger would work to her advantage. �śYou a student at NYU?” the cabbie asked, not seeming to notice that she was trying to listen to her earbud. �śNo.” She smiled in case he was looking at her in the rearview mirror and cupped her bud pointedly. The first message was just a terse order for Sam to call Stephen at the bar. �śOh. I just saw the books,” the cabbie said, not getting the hint. �śI’m a student there. Part-time. I studied the demon stuff last semester. Pretty cool.” �śHmmm �Ś” A noncommittal sound if she’d ever made one. Hopefully that would be the end of their conversation. She needed to concentrate. Stephen’s second message was far stranger than the first. He sounded really upset, almost frantic. Now he told her not to call him, and not to come by the bar until he called her back to tell her it was safe. He was breathing heavily, so it was hard to understand�" �śI mean, I’m not sure I buy some of the stuff,” the cabdriver said, his voice loud enough that Sam couldn’t hear what her brother had been trying to say. Argh! �śBut it’s certainly interesting. Enough to make me check out the History Project every time they change exhibits. It’s good to know about�"” �śPlease, I’m trying to listen to a message. If that’s okay?” Sam asked, ordering the bud aloud to repeat the last message. �śRepeat.” �śOh, sure. Sorry. I never know when to shut up.” The guy laughed, not troubled by her request at all. �śGot a mouth on me.” Sam smiled again, though she really wanted to reach into the front seat and cover the man’s mouth with her hand. Too bad there were bars between the front seat and the back to protect the drivers from the unsavory types prowling around Southie. Those bars had probably saved this dude’s life numerous times. If he’d gotten her this pissed, she could only imagine how he interacted with the real tough guys and girls on this side of the barricade. She listened to Stephen’s warning again, but the second half of the message was still hard to understand. Something about him being sorry for not telling her the truth, but then the message cut off. Even if her earbud had enough power to play the message a third time, Sam doubted she would be able to catch anything new. Shit. It must be something about the demon drugs, just as Jace had thought. It was the only explanation for why she shouldn’t come by the bar until it was �śsafe.” Stephen probably expected that Jace had told her the truth about his secret side business and was apologizing for keeping her in the dark. Ha. In the dark. The thought would have made her smile, but not even smart-ass blind jokes were doing it for her right now. She was too scared, too alone. What a perfect time for Stephen to morph from the solid, dependable brother she’d always known into an unreliable criminal engaged in shady, dangerous business dealings. What the hell was she going to do now? She couldn’t even think of anyone she could call except maybe Ginger. She’d been pretty friendly yesterday, and she’d wanted to �Ś get something to eat and �Ś Oh, my God �Ś That was it! �śDid you say something about the History Project? The museum that’s having the exhibit of demon artifacts recovered after the emergence?” �śNot sure what they’ve got there now, but�"” �śHave you been there?” Sam asked, heart beating fast in her throat as she leaned forward, suddenly very eager to chat it up with her driver. �śDo you know what it looks like?” �śYeah. You been there? It’s pretty�"” �śI’ve been there, but I’ve never seen what it looks like from the outside. I’m blind.” A moment of stunned silence. �śOh, yeah. The cane and everything. You don’t look blind, though, if you don’t mind me saying. Your eyes move around a lot. Real pretty color blue, too.” Blue. Her eyes were still blue, not the chocolate brown she’d always received compliments on in the past. That meant she was still �śseeing” more than she should, that the connection between her and the demons was still going strong, and that she had to figure out a way to stop the demons and their human partner before they made the man she loved their next target. �śThank you, but I was wondering if you could tell me what the museum looked like. Is it a brick building?” �śYeah, red brick,” he said, falling silent for a second, as if he were pulling up a mental image. �śWith white columns down the front and then all those vines that grow on old buildings on one side. And a big garden with those big kinds of trees with the �Ś” Sam tuned out the rest of the man’s babble. It was exactly what she’d seen in her last vision. The man had been hiding in the garden, waiting until he looked human again. That must be where the box was located! It made sense now why the room he’d been in seemed unlived in. Because it wasn’t lived in. It was a museum exhibit, the one Ginger had suggested they take in this week. Sam had assumed the artifact had been stolen from its collection, but maybe it hadn’t. Maybe it was still inside the History Project, hidden under some antique bed in one of the re-created rooms. �śTake me there, to the History Project.” �śAll right! Love a woman who isn’t afraid to be impulsive.” �śThanks,” Sam said, even as she told her phone to call Ginger. The other woman answered on the third set of pulses. �śHey! What’s up, Sam?” Ginger sounded a little sleepy, but genuinely glad to hear from her, which made Sam feel guilty for her ulterior motives. She needed someone with her who could see the exhibits, someone who would be able to recognize the bed from her vision. Even if she was allowed to touch the artifacts, it would be difficult to distinguish which bed she’d seen until she felt for the box underneath, which she really didn’t want to do. She didn’t want to add her fingerprints to the killer’s, just in case she and Jace ended up getting the real authorities involved in this. Ginger would be able to help her find the bed and peek to see whether there was a lockbox underneath without disturbing the crime scene. �śHey, my bud is about out of juice, but I wanted to call real quick to let you know I’m headed to the History Project and was hoping you’d meet me,” she said. �śWe could do the exhibit and then go out for a late lunch after?” �śSounds great! I went back out after I dropped you off and stayed out super late, so I was just planning to stay in bed, but that sounds like a lot more fun.” They made arrangements to meet outside near the ticketing office in twenty minutes and signed off just as Sam’s bud began the weak throbbing in her ear that meant it was toast. Fortunately, Ginger wasn’t one of those women who couldn’t get off the phone, and she lived close by. They would be into the museum and hopefully learning more about the threat facing the people of Southie within half an hour. Sam hated to bring someone else into this, but she needed help and surely she and Ginger wouldn’t be in any danger in the museum during normal operating hours. There was no way this freak was ambling in during the daytime and depositing his eyeballs in that evil box. But then why did the mango there straight from Ezra’s house? And why was he at Ezra’s in the first place? �śOr what if he’s not there yet? What if I’m seeing the future again?” Sam chewed her bottom lip, wondering if she should try to borrow the cabbie’s bud and call Ginger back and tell her not to come. Ezra had said he’d spoken the words on the side of the box and warned her not to do the same, so she was assuming that was why the man working with the demons had been summoned to his house. But she had no clue why the man had headed back to the museum when he was covered in Ezra’s blood. His hands had been caked with the stuff, even after he made the transformation from man to demon. There was no way he could get away with wandering around in public looking like that. But that doesn’t mean he couldn’t still be in the garden, watching, waiting for the museum to close. He could see me walk in with Ginger, and she might become his next target. �śCould I borrow your bud?” Sam asked, her voice sweetening as she leaned forward. �śMine’s out of charge and I need to call my friend back.” �śSorry. I can’t. I’ve got the implant, not the removable kind. It’s company policy for drivers working this side of the barricade,” he said, obviously not pleased with the policy, though he seemed thrilled to have the chance to have another good ramble. �śThey used to have drivers getting killed for their buds, like, ten years ago. Now everybody’s got one, so I don’t think it really matters, but I need this job, and they say no implant, no job, so�"” Crap. And she didn’t have Ginger’s number memorized�"she’d had it programmed into her bud for too long�"so she couldn’t ask the cabbie to call Ginger for her. �śThen could you hurry? I really need to get there before my friend. I’ll try to call her from the ticketing booth.” And tell her not to come or she might end up without eyes before the day is through. How could she have been so careless? The Choes, the man she’d seen near their apartment, and Ezra had all had some kind of contact with her before they were attacked. And Jace was next on the list if the pattern of her seeing people before they encountered the aura demons held. Which meant this freak in league with the demons had been following her, watching her �Ś and might very well be pleased to see her show up at the museum if he was still lurking in the garden, waiting for the chance to go play with his eyeball collection. The thought made a sour taste rise in her mouth and her head spin. Or maybe that was just exhaustion. She couldn’t ever remember being this tired. She’d been awake for far, far too long. Her mind wasn’t working at top speed anymore. Later, she assumed that was the reason she didn’t realize the flaw in her staying-safe-in-a-crowd-of-museum-patrons plan until she’d already paid her cabbie and he’d driven away, until she’d tapped her way over to the ticket booth and felt the closed window. Then she suddenly realized three things all at once: 1. The museum was closed on Sundays. 2. The museum was being painted. The smell of paint fumes hung thick in the air, red paint, if her guess was correct. The driver had said the building was red brick. She’d assumed he meant naturally occurring red brick, but he could have meant bricks painted red �Ś which would explain the smell, and the reason the man didn’t fear getting caught with bloodstained hands. They weren’t stained with blood; they were stained with paint. He was here doing a job, which gave him the perfect excuse to come and go as he pleased. 3. The demons and their partner had nothing to bring to their box. Ezra’s eyes hadn’t been taken or he would have been dead, and she assumed she would have been able to see him when they’d met up earlier in the day, or at least when he was hurt. But she hadn’t. She’d seen the Choes and the gang member on the street and Jace �Ś but not Ezra. That must mean the man had another victim in mind �Ś most likely Jace, but maybe not�Ś. Maybe his choice to go to the docks would keep him safe�Ś. A part of Sam wasn’t surprised when her vision slowly began to clear, shadows parting until she saw the face of a frail young woman reflected in the glass of the ticket window. She was a petite person with tiny bones and big blue eyes framed by a tangle of silky black hair. She was beautiful, in kind of a tragic way. The perfect victim. People would be upset to learn that a helpless little thing like this had had her eyes ripped from her head. Sam turned to look over her shoulder, determined to warn the woman, to make her believe that her life was in danger and she should run as far away from here as she could. Unfortunately, when she turned, so did the reflection. And when she turned back, the shocked looked she felt on her face was mirrored on the features of the woman in the glass. Sam had time to be surprised�"and to think maybe she ought to give her brother a break for spending so many years worried about his helpless little sister�"before a large hand swept around her face from behind, covering her mouth, muting her scream as the man dragged her around the side of the deserted museum. Jace hurried toward the boat landing at the edge of the ruins, near what had once been East River Park. Even from a distance, he could see the shells of rusting cars that still lurked in the shallow water, jutting up from amid the waves like demon fangs. The mayor at the time of the attacks had made noise about cleaning up the area where a group of amphibious demons had dragged hundreds of commuter cars into the water when they first hit the city, but those plans had been forgotten in the following years. Now most people just avoided this part of New York�"everyone except the demon hunters brave enough to hunt water-dwelling demons with teeth far sharper than the average shark, and the gangs ballsy enough to run their drugs through the dangerous waters. The rest of New York’s waterways were well guarded, however, so the risk was worth it to some men. The payment for sneaking a load of Ju Du quills or Hamma demon claws out to international waters, where demon drugs weren’t illegal, was a pretty penny. Man-made islands created expressly to cater to the demon-high fetishes of the rich and famous floated only a few miles out to sea, and the hosts there were always grateful to take on quality merchandise. So Jace wasn’t surprised to see a small clutch of Death Ministry members loitering near the dock, speaking in hushed voices. He was, however, very surprised to see Stephen Quinn emerge from the shadowy ruins. He hurried toward where Jace’s uncle and the men he’d brought with him�"most of Conti Bounty’s best, from the looks of it�"waited at the edge of the dock. Uncle Francis pulled his automatic and aimed it at the wiry man without a break in the welcoming smile that had stretched his face when he saw Jace jogging down the narrow path from East Houston. �śWait!” Jace said, lifting a hand and hurrying to get to his uncle before Stephen did. Shit. Sam must have told Stephen where they were meeting despite his warnings. Hopefully she hadn’t said anything about the aura demon, or he was going to have to do some fast talking. Uncle Francis didn’t believe in invisible things, including God and germs�"the man had never had a religious experience or been sick a day in his life�"so there was no way he was going to entertain the possibility of an invisible demon. �śThat’s my friend Sam’s brother, Stephen.” �śOh, yeah.” Francis’s eyes narrowed, but his gun didn’t shift position until Stephen slowed down, coming to a full stop about five feet away from the Conti family. Only then did he tip the gun down slightly. �śYou’re the guy who helped Jace with the demon shit.” �śYeah, that’s me,” Stephen said, his eyes wide and his breath coming fast. He looked like hell. His clothes were rumpled and damp and his dark hair hung in matted chunks. �śJace, I have to talk to you. I tried to�"” �śI remember talking to you on the phone,” Uncle Francis said, interrupting without a second thought. Francis had been king for so long, he’d forgotten his manners �Ś if he’d ever had any in the first place. �śNice of you to care about my nephew.” �śTh-thanks, but I�"” �śBut you’re the one who got him hooked on the stuff, too. Didn’t you?” Francis’s gun tipped up a bit, aiming somewhere around Stephen’s knees. �śUncle Frank, don’t start,” Jace said, though he kept his tone respectful. No one spoke disrespectfully to Francis and got away with it, not even his favorite nephew. �śIt takes two to tango, Jacey.” Francis shrugged, but his gun didn’t waver a centimeter. �śThat’s all I’m saying. That’s all I ever said. I don’t make my opinions a secret.” �śThat shit’s in the past. We’ve got bigger things to worry about,” Jace said, hoping to turn everyone’s attention back where it belonged. �śThis thing Sam and I saw, it’s definitely a new species, at least for North America. I’ve never seen anything like�"” �śJace, I have to talk to you. Now.” �śDon’t interrupt my nephew.” Francis punctuated his order with a sharp movement of his gun. Surprisingly, Stephen didn’t even seem to notice the automatic weapon now pointed at his groin. His eyes were all for Jace, and the fear in those dark brown depths�"so like Sam’s until hers had changed colors a few hours before�"was enough to get a nasty feeling going in Jace’s gut. �śIt’s okay, Frank.” Jace crossed his arms at his chest as he turned to face Stephen. �śWhat’s up? Did Sam tell you we were going to be here?” �śNo, she didn’t. I found you myself. I hid at the edge of the ruins and followed you,” Stephen said, his hands trembling as he raked them through his hair. Clumps of something too thick to be gel stuck to his fingers, making him shudder before he flung the goo to the ground. What the hell had he been up to? Looked like he’d taken a roll in a bunch of Narcon demon larva. �śWhy were you in the ruins? On that side of town?” Jace asked, his suspicions about Stephen resurging with a vengeance. No matter what Sam thought, his gut still told him Stephen had something to do with the trouble in which Sam presently found herself. �śI w-wasn’t there. I r-ran away.” Stephen swallowed hard, visibly trying to control his stammer. �śBut then I heard the sirens and I had to come back. I had to know if I’d killed him. I didn’t mean to kill him. I just�"” His words ended in a sob as he covered his face with his hands. All four of the Conti family hunters raised their guns of one accord, as if they shared a brain. Which they did, in a way. They’d all been trained by Francis, and Uncle Frank warned his people not to trust a man in tears. By the time a normal guy got around to crying in front of another penis-owning member of the population, he was a dangerous person, too near the edge to be trusted. �śWhat the fuck, Stephen? Does this have something to do with the drugs?” Jace asked, lowering his voice and cutting a swift glance over to where the Death Ministry guys were still chatting a few dozen feet away. Usually the Contis and the gangs kept things peaceful, but if they were here for Stephen, this could get real ugly, real fast. �śYou’ve got about three Death Ministry over there, so if they’re the people you’re in�"” �śThis has nothing to do with gangs or drugs!” Stephen yelled, tears running down the face he lifted from his hands. �śDon’t you get it? Can’t you see?” �śWe’re going to need you to get rid of this guy, Jacey. Now.” Uncle Francis had clearly noticed the Death Ministry contingent and had the same concerns that Jace did. He didn’t want to get in the middle of something drug related. He didn’t traffic that breed of contraband and wouldn’t want the Contis dragged into some kind of drug war. �śI’ll take care of it.” Jace crossed to Stephen and took him by the arm, guiding the shorter man to the end of the dock, a safer distance from his trigger-happy family. �śPull it together, Stephen. Go home and take a shower, and I’ll call you later.” �śYou can’t call me later. I’m not going to be here. I’m leaving. Forever,” Stephen said, his breath hitching as he tried to pull himself together long enough to get out the words. �śBut you’ve got to protect Sam. I tried to call her and warn her not to come back to the bar, but I couldn’t get hold of her.” �śWhy shouldn’t she go back to the bar?” Jace asked, a sinking feeling in his stomach. �śThat’s the first place he’ll look for her. He didn’t stay in that ambulance for long. I’m sure of it. He wasn’t hurt that bad, and he’s crazy to get the ritual done. Sam is his last chance. He needs her for the last part. Either her or me or �Ś someone who’s been touched by the demons. One of us has to close the box and invite them inside our body to stay.” Stephen shivered and his eyes focused on something in the distance that Jace was certain only he could see. �śThat’s why I have to go. I can’t let him make me finish it, no matter what kind of threats he makes. I told him I’d kill myself first, but�"” �śTold who?” Jace asked, though a part of him already knew exactly who Stephen was talking about. He just didn’t want to admit that he’d been so distracted by Sam and her visions and everything else that he hadn’t checked the guy out the way he should have. �śEzra,” Stephen said. �śHe’s going to use Sam in a ritual to make the aura demons flesh.” CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Fuck. Jace had known there hadn’t been enough blood on the floor, and Sunshine had tripped every one of his bullshit sensors. �śThe girl he’s with, she’s helping him, isn’t she?” Stephen nodded. �śThey’ve been looking for someone touched by an aura demon for years. They think they’ll become immortal if they help these demons. They were fucking thrilled to find me and Sam. There aren’t many people who survive what that demon does to you. If the ritual my parents and their cult were working hadn’t been interrupted, I don’t�"” �śSam’s known this guy for a while,” Jace said, his thoughts racing too quickly for him to wait for Stephen to tell his and Sam’s life story. �śWhy didn’t he�"” �śHe had someone else, but she wouldn’t help him. And now she’s gone.” Stephen sucked in a shaking breath. �śAt least, I hope she is. She’s not in the basement anymore. I went to Ezra’s to try to break her out, but she wasn’t there.” �śEzra’s been keeping a woman locked in the basement of his building?” All Jace could think about was that it could have been Sam locked away down there, and it made his fists itch to smash her ex-boyfriend’s face in. Stephen nodded. �śHe found her through the same database that helped him find Sam, but this girl didn’t have anyone looking out for her, no one who really noticed when she disappeared. Ezra told me she was my little sister Emma, the one Sam and I thought died, but I don’t know if that’s true.” �śBut they needed someone from your family to make the spell work?” �śYeah, if he’s using the same box our parents used. The box and the demons work together. All aura demons have an artifact they’re connected to. Sometimes it’s a statue or a bowl or something. For these demons, it’s a box. Ezra tracked it down about a year ago and found out the collection it was part of was due to come to New York this spring. He has clearance into most of the museums and knew he’d be able to get his hands on it.” �śSo he’s had a woman locked in his basement for almost a year? While he waited for this box to come into town?” �śI know it sounds crazy,” Stephen said, obviously hearing the doubt in Jace’s voice loud and clear. �śBut that’s exactly what he did. It’s also why he started something with Sam. He wanted to keep her close and try to get her on board in case he couldn’t convince Emma to do what he wanted. When Sam broke up with him, he came to me.” �śAnd you decided to help him?” �śHe was blackmailing me.” Stephen scowled, a dark expression that made him look far scarier than the man he feared. But then, Ezra probably used his glasses-wearing academic look to his advantage. No one ever suspected the short, aging intellectual. �śBelieve me, I didn’t want any fucking part of it.” �śWhat did he do, threaten to expose your side business?” �śNo, he threatened to kill the woman he told me was Emma, and to hurt Sam. I felt like I had to do what he asked �Ś until I saw the box today �Ś until it was full�Ś.” Stephen shuddered. �śI knew then that I couldn’t finish the ritual, even if it meant risking Ezra hurting my family.” Jace grunted, not bothering to hide his doubt as he ordered his bud to call Sam. Thank God he’d programmed her number into his earpiece on the way to Ezra’s from the hotel. �śYou can’t call her,” Stephen said, pulling Jace’s hand away from his ear in a movement that made the Contis behind them twitch. �śHer bud’s dead or she’s not answering or �Ś” �śOr what?” Jace asked, raising a hand to let Frank know he didn’t need backup. �śOr he’s already got her,” Stephen said, the pain in his voice leaving no doubt how horrifying he found the possibility. Messed up or not, the man loved his sister, probably more than anything in the world. �śHe was so happy when she stopped by his place this morning. You can’t imagine. If I hadn’t been there, in the bedroom with Sunshine, getting the new access codes to the museum, I don’t think they would have let her leave.” Shit! A part of Jace wanted to make a run for the bar without wasting another second, but something in Stephen’s story didn’t add up. Jace didn’t know jack about demonic rituals, but he did know a thing or two about the criminal mind. �śIf Ezra needed Sam, he could have taken her long before now. She’s half your size and�"” �śIt has to be a willing sacrifice. The person has to choose to engage in the ritual of their own free will,” Stephen said. �śEmma refused, no matter what Ezra did to her, and I think he knew Sam wouldn’t do it either, no matter what that box promised her or what kind of threats Ezra made. Sam’s a good person, and she doesn’t love anyone enough to put hundreds of other people in danger. Even me. Or at least, she didn’t. Ezra seems to think that might have changed�Ś.” Sam had said she loved him. Jace could still hear the word echoing in his ears, remember the way his tongue had cramped from the effort it took to keep from saying it right back to her. Now he might not get the chance to tell her how she made him happier than any man had a right to be after the day and a half he’d had. �śHow would hundreds of people be hurt?” he asked, forcing himself to concentrate on understanding what they were up against. Whether or not this demonic ritual was going to work, he needed to know what Ezra and Sunshine thought was going to happen and what they were going to do to Sam. �śWhen the demons are made flesh, they’ll be faster and stronger than anything human, and we’re nothing but food to them. Some of the people they attack will die, but some of them will become hosts themselves.” �śBut I thought you just said it needs the person to be willing, and that it has to be someone who’s been touched by the�"” Stephen shook his head impatiently. �śNo, once a touched person�"like me or Sam�"is fully taken over and becomes demon, that demon �Ś person �Ś thing can possess other people without consent. They’ll have to. There are over a dozen of those aura demons connected to the box. They won’t be able to share one body for long, and�"” �śWhat will they do to Sam to make this happen?” Jace asked. What Stephen was describing was too wild to believe, but a part of him couldn’t keep from imagining and fearing the world he described. �śI told you, they need her to take up the box, and willingly invite the demons inside her. She’ll host them in her body while Ezra does his chanting shit and the box firms up the connection between the demons and the flesh they are inhabiting.” �śAnd why the hell would she do that?” �śEzra will promise her immunity for the people she loves,” he said, the flat look in his eyes giving Jace the creeps. �śBut he’s lying. The demons are pure evil. There will be no immunity. We’ll all be turned into monsters sooner or later, no matter what Ezra says.” �śHow will we be turned into�"” �śWhere do you think the demons in the ruins came from?” Stephen asked, his voice rising hysterically, drawing the attention of both the Contis and the Death Ministry members nearby. �śThousands of years ago, they were human.” �śYou’re insane.” �śI wish I were. The box showed it to me. I don’t know if it meant to, but I saw it. I saw how the world was before.” Stephen picked at his chapped lips, his hands shaking with genuine fear. �śAncient people found a way to bind the aura demons to objects and banish the posessed people into caves beneath the earth, but that’s not going to happen this time. Ezra is one of the only people who’s studied this stuff, and he doesn’t want to stop the demons. He wants to make them offerings and�"” �śOfferings.” A sour taste rose in Jace’s mouth as he realized what Stephen had to be talking about. God, how could he have called this monster a friend for so long? �śYou helped him kill them, didn’t you? You killed the Choes and�"” �śNo! I swear I didn’t!” Stephen looked genuinely horrified. �śI wouldn’t. Ezra hired someone to do it and sent the demons along with him. He chose the Choes to scare me. The man he hired even took some of Sam’s flowers over there and left them on the ground, to send a message.” �śBut you killed the man he hired,” Jace said, knowing it was the truth even before Stephen’s eyes dropped guiltily to the ground. �śI should have known. You followed me and Sam when we left the hospital.” �śI had to. I�"” �śYou had to sneak up behind me and sucker punch me? And rip a man’s eyes out?” It was hard to believe that Stephen could have done such a thing. He wasn’t a big man, certainly not big enough to scare a Death Ministry thug just by looking at him�"but he’d basically just confessed to the murder. Still �Ś how had he managed it? And so fast? It had been less than ten minutes from the time Jace had been knocked off his feet to when he discovered the body. There was something off here, something he still wasn’t getting. �śI’m sorry. I just had to make sure you didn’t get in the way,” Stephen said. �śI didn’t want to hurt you, but I had to get that man’s eyes. I didn’t think I had a choice �Ś but once I’d done it�Ś” Stephen shivered, clearly traumatized by what he’d done, but that wasn’t enough to make Jace feel an ounce of pity. Jace blinked against the bright sun. He was getting a killer headache, and none of this was making as much sense as he’d like, but there wasn’t time to waste standing around interrogating Stephen. He had to find Sam and make sure she was safe. He turned back to the docks, prepared to tell his uncle that the plan had changed, but was stopped by Stephen’s hand on his arm. �śWhere are you going? We have to find her.” �śI will find her,” Jace said, his skin crawling as some of the glop from Stephen’s hair fell on the sleeve of his new sweater. It was thick and yellow, and, now that he was closer, Jace could smell the slight odor rising off the stuff, the smell that was eerily similar to�Ś �śHoly fuck.” He ripped his arm away and drew his weapon, going straight for his automatic without bothering with the stun gun. Stephen was the snot-covered monster he and Sam had seen in the hall. He was the one who’d wounded Ezra; that had been who he was coming back to see if he killed, not some drug lord or gangland thug. Stephen was the creature who’d survived a leap out of a four-story window. And if he was half as strong and fast in his human form as he had been when he’d been that �Ś thing, then Jace was going to need all the firepower he could get. �śGet down on the ground!” His uncle and the rest of the Conti hunters were beside him in seconds, forcing Stephen to the ground and pulling his hands behind his back. �śI didn’t hurt you. Or her!” Stephen protested. �śPlease, I can’t help it. The demons did something to me when I was a kid, the same thing they’ll do to all of us if we don’t�"” �śShut the hell up and tell me where that box is.” Jace aimed his gun at Stephen’s face as his ex-best friend began to get shinier, stickier. Stephen’s story of humans turned into monsters suddenly didn’t seem nearly as fantastic. �śIt’s gotten worse,” he said, his voice rising hysterically. �śJu Du quills used to keep it under control, keep me from changing, but they don’t anymore.” Well, shit. That cleared up a few dozen questions about Stephen’s involvement in the demon drug industry. �śBut now I can’t control it. I can’t�"” �śWhere’s the box?” Jace demanded, his voice loud enough to make Stephen flinch and fall silent for a moment. Stephen blinked as if he were awakening from a dream, and the slime covering his face began to fade away once more. �śIt’s hidden under a bed at the museum. Ezra couldn’t risk removing it from the building because there’s a tracking device embedded in the wood,” Stephen said, taking a long, deep breath, obviously trying to calm himself down, �śbut Sam doesn’t know about�"” �śYes, she does.” Jace cursed. �śShe saw the box in one of her visions.” Stephen made a sound somewhere between a growl and a sigh. �śHer dreams aren’t real. Can’t you�"” �śWhat is wrong with you?” Jace crouched down, bringing his face closer to where Stephen’s was pressed into the pavement. �śYou know that your connection to these demons turns you into some kind of slime monster, but you can’t admit the possibility that it might be making Sam have dreams and visions of things that are going to happen?” �śI �Ś I �Ś Sam isn’t like that,” he said, though Jace could see the doubt in his eyes. �śShe isn’t like me. She’s good inside. She�"” �śI don’t think �Śgood’ has anything to do with it,” Jace said, feeling a moment of pity for Stephen. He’d obviously assumed the side effects of what the demons had done to him were his fault, and it had screwed him up accordingly. �śThis sounds like some sort of infection or possession or something.” �śSome infection. Let’s just hope it ain’t catching.” Uncle Francis stared dispassionately down at Stephen’s face, his nose wrinkling slightly as the yellow ooze swam across the other man’s skin. �śThat shit’s �Ś gross. A demon’s causing that?” �śAn aura demon, allegedly,” Jace said, ignoring the grunts of disbelief that sounded from several of the other hunters. At least Uncle Francis didn’t look nearly as skeptical as Jace would have expected. But then, it wasn’t every day you saw a man turning into some kind of freak of nature right in front of your eyes. �śBut I don’t think the demons can hurt Sam�"at least, not without a human’s help. We’ve got to find this Ezra guy before he finds her.” Jace filled his uncle in on what Stephen had told him, then motioned for the other men to let Stephen up off the ground. �śJust tell us which museum this box is at.” �śIt’s at the History Project, but why would Sam go there?” Stephen asked as he stood up, his entire body shaking from the effort. The man didn’t look good, not good at all. �śShe’ll probably go to her house or back to the bar. She wouldn’t�"” �śEzra gave Sam and me some books about the box.” Jace’s stomach clenched. �śHe acted like he didn’t know much about it, but seems like that’s pretty far from the truth.” �śHe was trying to lure you two to the museum,” Stephen said, going pale. �śWe’ve got to get there. Sam’s smart. She’ll figure out where to look for the box. It’s not on the list of the museum exhibits�"Ezra made sure of that�"but the entire building’s filled with demonic artifacts discovered after the emergence.” �śLet’s just hope she hasn’t found anyone to read the damn books to her,” Jace said, for once congratulating himself on being a jackass. He’d refused to read Sam the books mostly on principle, a perverse part of him wanting to punish her for withholding information from him and making him feel like a fool. But now, his asshole tendencies might just have saved her life. �śMarcus and Michael can go check out the bar,” Uncle Francis said, taking control of the situation without wasting another second. �śWe’ll send Tommy over to the girl’s house, and then the rest of us will take the museum. Sound good?” Jace nodded, then turned to give Tommy directions to Sam’s while Uncle Francis motioned for Marcus and Michael to escort Stephen to one of the vans. �śYou’re locking me up?” Stephen asked, sounding as thrilled about that prospect as Jace had thought he’d be. �śYou can’t lock me up! I have to go help my sister. If Ezra’s got her, I�"” �śWe can’t have a murderer running free on the streets,” Uncle Francis said. �śI’m not a�"” �śI’ve got excellent hearing, freak.” Francis glared at Stephen as Michael and Marcus dragged him toward the van. �śI heard everything you said to my nephew. Just knowing you were the one who fucked with him this morning is enough to get you on my bad side, which ain’t a good place to be.” �śBut I�"” �śBut if those guys standing over there figure out you killed one of theirs �Ś” Francis’s voice dipped to a whisper as he jerked his head toward where the Death Ministry members still lingered close by. �śWell, then you’ll be on their bad side, too. Call me crazy, but I’m thinking that would be even worse for you.” Stephen paled and the slime swam over his face once more. �śThings can’t get any worse for me.” The next few seconds were a blur. One moment Stephen was standing between Marcus and Michael; the next, the two huge men were on the ground bleeding from twin wounds to the forehead, and Stephen was nowhere in sight. �śHoly shit! Did you see that shit?” Uncle Francis shouted. �śGet in the vans. We’ve got to beat him to the museum,” Jace said, grateful to see his uncle already motioning for the rest of the team to obey Jace’s command. There was no time to debate or strategize. They had to get to Sam before someone�"or something�"else did. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Sam started screaming as soon as the man took his hand off of her mouth, praying someone would hear her before he pulled her inside the closed museum. �śHelp me! Someone, I�"” �śThere’s no one here. I wouldn’t risk it. You know that. You’re a smart girl,” Ezra said. �śDon’t waste your energy. You’re going to need it for better things. Things I think you’ll like if you’ll give them a chance.” Sam had recognized his smell even before he spoke. Ezra. He always smelled like a mix of incense and fresh coffee and books. She’d once thought it was a nice scent�"sexy intellectual with a dash of hippie thrown into the mix. Now it made her stomach heave and pitch as he pulled her down a hallway lit with fluorescent lights. She could hear them buzzing, like some ominous swarm coming to feed. �śLet me go,” Sam said, struggling to get free of the arms wrapped around her chest, pinning her own arms to her side. �śYou don’t want to hurt me. I know you�"” �śOf course I don’t.” He had the balls to sound offended even as he pushed her face-first into a wall and wrenched her arms behind her. Sam smelled vanilla a split second before another set of hands began winding coarse rope around her wrists. �śHere, hold her still.” It was Sunshine. Shit. She should have known better than to trust her ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend. Or her ex-boyfriend, for that matter. There were reasons he was her ex, and being a lying bastard was a big one. �śI thought you were hurt, on your way to the hospital?” Sam asked, wincing as Sunny pulled the rope tighter and tighter. This girl meant business, but then, Sam should have suspected something was off when she’d been so eager to help Sam with her new �śgift.” Sunny hadn’t questioned the idea that altered states of consciousness could enhance psychic ability for a second, and had been positively giddy when she heard that the heat between Sam and Jace seemed to be responsible for Sam’s visions. Sam had chalked up her discomfort with Ezra’s new squeeze to awkwardness of the you’re-the-new-woman-in-my-ex-man’s-life-and-I’m-talking-about-sex-with-you variety, but now she knew better. Her gut had been trying to send out a warning, one she’d been stupid to ignore. �śHe is hurt,” Sunny said. �śHe’s probably going to need stitches.” �śIt’s fine. The bleeding has almost stopped.” �śYou’re just lucky he doesn’t know what he’s doing with a knife.” Who were they talking about? The demon-monster she and Jace had seen in the hall? They knew the man who was working with the demons? Sam cursed inwardly, but knew better than to ask any questions. She’d learn more by keeping her mouth shut and her ears open. Years of being the blind girl no one noticed had taught her how much you could learn when you didn’t attract too much attention. �śHe knew what he was doing,” Ezra argued. �śHe just didn’t want to hurt me, not really. He’s a good guy. He was just afraid, and doubting that the people he loved would be granted immortality, as promised. It’s understandable. He hasn’t spent the years in study that we have.” Ezra gave Sam an awkward pat on the shoulder before urging her to turn and keep walking down the seemingly endless hall. They turned right once and then left almost immediately thereafter, but most of their movement was in a straight line. Sam tried to count the steps they took, so she would know where to run when the time came. �śHe would have killed you if he hadn’t heard his sister coming,” Sunny said, her frustration with Ezra clear. �śDon’t kid yourself. You need to be prepared.” They couldn’t be talking about Stephen. Stephen didn’t even know Ezra, at least not well. They’d been introduced only once. And Stephen would never, could never�" �śHe’s dangerous,” Sunny continued, the genuine fear in her voice making Sam’s thoughts race. There was no way her brother could be that monster. It wasn’t physically possible. But then �Ś most people would say it wasn’t physically possible for her to have prophetic dreams, or visions, or for her damaged eyes to change colors and suddenly be able to see�Ś. �śWe’ve got to hurry before he realizes we’ve got her�"” �śHe’s not dangerous. He’s just protective, but he’ll relax when he realizes we’d never hurt Sam.” Ezra petted Sam on the shoulder again, while she did her best not to shudder with revulsion. �śYou threatened to hurt�"” �śWe’re not talking about her anymore,” Ezra said, his voice sharp. Sam could tell he didn’t mean her, but couldn’t guess who he was talking about. She hadn’t really known many of the other women in Ezra’s life. �śI don’t want to talk about her. I’m just reminding you of the facts. You threatened to hurt one of them, so why wouldn’t he think you’d�"” �śBut Sam is different. We’ve had a relationship.” Ezra sniffed. �śI’ve always planned for her to be among the saved and kept the demons away from her until there was no other choice.” �śAfter one of them lured her into the ruins and nearly got her killed and another made her fall down the stairs,” Sunny said. Sam bit her lip, barely repressing a sound of triumph. She’d been right. It was a hollow victory now, but it was good to finally know she wasn’t crazy. �śThey were simply overeager. I called them off. I showed them who was in control.” �śNot soon enough.” Sunshine’s tone left no doubt she wasn’t thrilled with Ezra’s �ścontrol” of the demons. �śSam could have been killed, and then what would we have�"” �śWe would have been lost, considering you let her get away while I was trying to protect Sam.” Ezra cleared his throat awkwardly, seeming to remember Sam was actually capable of hearing everything he was saying. �śYou know I’d never let anything hurt you, don’t you, Samantha?” Give me a break. Exactly how stupid does he think I am? Sam thought, but did her best to be a little more cordial when she spoke. Cordiality seemed like a good idea in a situation like this. �śThat’s what I always thought, but the whole tying-me-up thing is a little misleading. If you’re not going to hurt me, then why are you�"” �śIt’s a precaution. Just in case you turn out to be like your brother,” Ezra said, his voice as polite as her own. �śIf you undergo the same transformation, you could be dangerous to us.” God, no. It just couldn’t be possible, but Ezra had all but confirmed that her brother was that �Ś thing. And he thought she might turn into a thing like that, too. �śI never knew Stephen �Ś that he could change�"” �śThat he could change into a demon?” Sunny chuckled softly. �śHe can’t. What he has is more like an infection, one that gets more virulent when he’s in close proximity to the demons who possessed him in the first place. Just like your visions became stronger, his condition became more severe when we used Pandora’s box to summon the demons fully into the earthly plane. You’re reacting because your parents didn’t do the ritual correctly.” Sunny’s voice held that pleased-to-be-sharing-my-knowledge-with-the-less-educated tone that it’d had when she was explaining the history of mystics’ using sexual energy to facilitate their quest for enlightenment to Sam on the phone earlier. Great. It looked like they were going to keep this nice and friendly. Except for the rope, of course. Maybe they’d all sit down and have some tea before Ezra and Sunshine did whatever horrible thing they were going to do to her. And it would be horrible. If they were working with the demons, summoning them onto the earthly plane just as her parents had done, then there was no way it could be anything else. After all, the people who were supposed to love her more than anything else in the world had agreed to let their children be sacrificed to the demons. She wasn’t stupid enough to believe a man she used to sleep with and his new gal pal cared more for her safety than the two people who had given her life. She had to get away from them, had to find help before it was too late. Thank God Ginger hadn’t been sucked into all this. She must have arrived after Sam, seen the museum was closed, and left. She was probably trying to call right now, but couldn’t get through because Sam’s bud was dead. God, if she’d only charged her bud! Better yet, if only she’d stayed with Jace �Ś but then he would be in danger, too. Even now, the thought of him being hurt scared her more than anything else. She had it bad. Really bad. She was totally, completely in love with him. Now she just prayed she’d live long enough to convince Jace he had to love her back. �śI told Ezra we didn’t need to tie you up, but he’s Mr. Safety. You probably know all about that, right?” Sunny giggled again. Sam barely resisted the urge to trip her. That she could be making jokes about Ezra’s borderline-psycho obsession with doubling up on birth control was just �Ś wrong. On so very many levels. �śThe demons didn’t get as deeply inside of you, Sam, so you won’t shift forms.” Now Sunny was getting in on the shoulder patting. What the hell did these two think she was? Some sort of pet? �śIt seems like they only affected your eyes.” �śHer eyes have changed, Sunshine,” Ezra warned. �śThey’re usually brown, not blue, so I’m�"” �śYou’re worrying too much. If she was going to shift, she would have already. Stephen can’t control the change when he’s in a heightened emotional state. She’s obviously been experiencing quite the physical and emotional highs with that guy she’s�"” �śI don’t want to talk about Sam’s new lover,” Ezra said. Sunny sighed, and Sam could practically hear the eye roll that followed. �śYou’re not jealous?” �śNo, I’m not jealous.” �śI mean, after what you said, what I agreed to �Ś And now you’re acting all jealous?” Sunny’s hands left Sam’s wrists. She let out a soft huffing sound, and seconds later cool, climate-controlled air and the smell of the museum�"dust and cinnamon and the sweet scent of rotting wood and paper�"filled Sam’s nose. They were going into the museum itself, which gave her a small spark of hope. There had to be someone around, a janitor or someone who would be able to hear her when she screamed, or maybe a security program linked to the museum’s cameras that would alert the police. She just had to bide her time, wait for the perfect moment to break free from Ezra and Sunny, and make a run for it. Even if she made it far enough to ram into a few of the museum exhibit cases, that could be her ticket to freedom. The pricier objects were rigged with alarms that would alert the authorities in case one of them was stolen. She knew that from the times she’d visited before. The tour guide had a special code to disarm the alarms so the visually impaired group she was leading could �śsee” the artifacts that could hold up to being fondled by human fingers. So if Sam could tip over an ancient artifact or two�" �śDon’t be ridiculous.” Ezra sniffed his annoying sniff and led Sam through the door. �śI’m not being ridiculous. You wanted me to sleep with her, and now�"” What? Sam’s mind short-circuited for a second, all thoughts of escape temporarily halted. Ezra had wanted Sunny to�" �śI thought it might be necessary. I never said that I would enjoy seeing you with someone else.” Again with the sniff and the throat clearing. Sam vowed to make Jace use his cop connections to get Ezra held in the darkest, dankest, moldiest cell in the entire city while he awaited trial. Torment by his own allergies wasn’t great revenge, but it was a start. �śI simply thought perhaps Sam preferred women. She’s very timid and cool, not particularly enthusiastic about the art of lovemaking, and�"” �śWhat?” Sam couldn’t keep the word from bursting through her lips, even though she knew she should stay quiet, hopefully encouraging them to let down their guard. �śI’m sorry,” Ezra said. �śYou’re right. This isn’t an appropriate thing to discuss in the present company. My apologies.” �śFine,” Sam said through gritted teeth, though she wanted to say several other, more colorful things. Ezra was the one who had about as much enthusiasm in bed as a sack of potatoes. Moldy potatoes with a receding hairline and persistent sinus infections that made him sniff like a�" Oh, no. Speaking of sniffing �Ś Sam could smell it now �Ś the pure evil of the aura demons. They were close. Too close. It was time to run first and figure out appropriate ways to make sure Ezra never used his cock for anything but peeing ever again later. Luckily, she caught a flash of light out of the corner of her eye a second later. Sam shifted her gaze, sliding it from the shadows to the immense gilt mirror hanging on the wall to her left. There she saw not only her own frightened face�"blue eyes glowing faintly in the dim light�"but also the face of a beautiful blond girl four or five inches taller than she was. Sunshine. Sam’s eyes darted to the mirror again, the sheer size of the thing allowing her to track Sunny’s movements as she trailed behind Sam and the man who held her gently by the shoulders�"a dignified-looking man in glasses with a gray beard and a faded brown sweater-vest that fit in with the museum perfectly. She could see Ezra now, which didn’t bode well for the professor, though it did satisfy her curiosity. He reminded her of the archaeologist from the Indiana Jones films. Her girlfriends in college had dragged her along to a marathon showing of the series at the Antique Film Preservation Institute years ago. Even without being able to see the movie, Sam had enjoyed it, especially the first film �Ś the one that had featured an ark filled with angry spirits that had devoured the lead character’s enemies. Sam shivered, wondering what would happen when Ezra and Sunny completed the ritual to make the aura demons flesh. Hopefully, no one would ever have to find out. Sam hadn’t thought to look behind her before now, but it made horrible sense that she could see both Ezra and his new friend. Making a pact with demons was an excellent way to get killed. If she was truly seeing people marked for death, then her captors were in as much danger as she herself. But they would never believe her. Whatever the demons and the writing on the box had promised them, it had already convinced them both to get blood on their hands. They would never be persuaded to abandon their work because the girl they were getting ready to sacrifice saw them in a mirror. Sacrifice. The word made Sam’s mouth fill with the horrible sour taste of fear. She couldn’t wait any longer. Her sanity had barely survived her first pass as a sacrificial offering to the aura demons and would never survive another turn at the center of a circle etched in blood. �śWell, I don’t think�"” Sunny’s words ended in a grunt as Sam spun free of Ezra’s hands and rammed her head into the other woman’s stomach. Sunny’s blue eyes widened in shock as she fell, her tailbone slamming hard into the marble floor, but Sam didn’t wait to see how much real damage had been done. �śHelp! Someone help me!” Sam screamed as she turned and ran in the opposite direction of the mirror, heart racing as she hurled herself into the void. It was too dark in the museum for her eyes to see any patches of dark or light. She was truly running blind, and every instinct within her screamed for her to slow down, to wait until she could get her hands free and at least feel the air in front of her. But she couldn’t wait. There was no time, and her life might depend on slamming into�" �śHelp! Help me!” Sam kept screaming as she collided with something housed in a glass case and hit the ground�"hard. Her chest grew tight and what air she’d had in her lungs felt as if it were trapped midbreath. Still, she managed to scream for a few seconds more before Ezra’s hand clamped down on her mouth. �śShut up!” Ezra’s eyes were wide, but with fear, not the anger she had anticipated. �śYou’re going to ruin your chance. It won’t believe you’re committed to the cause if�"” �śCalm her down. I can feel it, Ezra. It’s waking up!” Sunny sounded terrified, though Sam couldn’t see her. From the direction of her voice, it seemed like she was still on the ground behind her. Good. Sam hoped she’d broken the woman’s tailbone. Sam screamed again around Ezra’s hand, making him add his other palm to her face, cutting off her air supply until she had nothing left to scream with. Sam bucked and writhed beneath him as the need to draw breath quickly became the focus of her world. But his hands didn’t budge. He just pushed down even harder, until spots swam in front of her eyes, blocking out the face of the second man she’d seen in twenty years. Or third, if she counted Chang-su. Her mind flashed on the image of the poor man with his palms pressed to his bleeding eyes, and once again she heard his screams as he tried to hold back the life pouring from his body. Ezra and Sunny were responsible for that, for the horrific murders of two innocent people. They’d killed to get the sacrifice for the aura demons. They’d supplied the box with its deadly contents, and�" Sam moaned low in her throat and felt tears build behind her eyes as she realized why the thought of Stephen being involved in this had chilled her to the core of her being. It wasn’t just the knowledge that he could transform into some kind of monster. As her skull softened and her mind sank into the darkness of her own unconscious for the second time in twenty-four hours, Sam realized why a part of her felt that her brother had died. It had been Stephen’s hands that had placed the last set of eyes in the box. Her brother had started working part-time for a refurbishment company a couple of months ago, and came to the bar smelling of paint more than once. He was the man with blood on his hands, who had been using his job as a painter to get into the museum. God, she should have realized. But how could she have guessed that her brother would kill someone to feed an artifact of such potent evil? No matter what part Sunny and Ezra had played in this, Stephen was the one working with the aura demons, the one who had willingly let them into his body, into his mind, to the point that they were so at home there, they could sense Sam’s intrusion. So there was no surge of relief when she heard Stephen’s voice floating through the cotton that filled her ears. Stephen might be here, but she couldn’t understand what he was saying, and it wouldn’t matter if she could. Her brother was no longer someone she could trust. He was a monster�"and not because of the demonlike creature he could become, but because of the very human evil he had committed. CHAPTER NINETEEN Ezra and his smothering hands were knocked away by a mass of sticky, foul-smelling demon. No, not a demon. Even before she’d fully recovered her breath, Sam realized exactly what�"or who�"had tackled Ezra to the ground. It was Stephen in his other form. She could see the strange resemblance now. Even when he was covered in oozing yellow slime, she recognized her brother. Those were the hands that had held hers when she was first learning her way around Southie. That was the mouth she’d felt a hundred times when she’d reached out to see if the too-quiet man next to her on the couch found what they were watching as funny as she did. She’d had to feel his upturned lips to know if he was enjoying the scathing satires she’d been addicted to for most of her teen years. He never laughed out loud. Not once. But then, she hadn’t been laughing either. They’d always been quiet. Both of them. Holding in their thoughts, keeping their secrets, hiding from each other. But at least Sam had tried to let Stephen know who she was and had been honest about what their horrific past had done to her. Stephen couldn’t say the same. He’d lied to her, deceived her, and now she knew he’d done things she would never be able to forgive, no matter what the reasons. Stephen was as good as dead to her. As much of a liar and betrayer as the man he fought. Sam didn’t wait to see who was going to win out in the end, whether Stephen would subdue Ezra and Sunshine�"who had leaped upon his back and was striking him with a statue she’d seized from a nearby exhibit�"or if Sunny and her ex would beat Stephen into submission. She just struggled to her feet and staggered away, moving more slowly this time, reaching her toes out in front of her before she stepped. She had a little more time now that her captors were otherwise engaged. If she could put some distance between them without leaving a trail of destruction in her wake, maybe she could find a place to hide. Maybe she could�" The now-familiar chill of the demons swept inside her before she could finish her thought, banishing her hopes of flight, assuring her there was nowhere to hide. They must have realized that she might actually be able to escape. Their energy was stronger now, a fierce, clutching wave that fisted around her mind and sucked her under, promising pain if she didn’t submit. They swirled through her body�"their actions an assurance that they would find her no matter where she went. They were connected, intimately bound by what her parents had offered them all those years ago. Now Sam could feel the linking of their energies in a way she never had before, the connection magnified by the closeness of the box. She could hear their strange, feral thoughts and sense the even stranger pulsing energy of the box nearby. Her parents had given her to that box and the creatures it housed and protected. They believed that gave them certain rights. Rights the demons meant to claim. Sam stumbled as the demons surged deeper and deeper, filling every ounce of available space, chilling the backs of her eyes until she feared they would freeze and crack, shattering like glass. It hurt�Ś. God, it hurt more than anything she had felt in a long time, and the demons enjoyed her pain. They wanted to hurt her, to frighten her, but they �Ś couldn’t �Ś they couldn’t�Ś. They couldn’t kill her. They needed her alive. Sam felt that truth deep in her gut even as the demons pushed and shoved inside her, making her ears ache and her temples throb. The fall down the stairs had been a mistake. They didn’t want to truly do damage. They had been trying to scare her, to show her what life would be like for those not under their protection �Ś so they could convince her to do what the other woman had refused to do �Ś what her brother was too afraid to do�Ś. To take up the box and invite them inside �Ś and then she wouldn’t feel any more pain, any more fear. She’d finally be able to see, and see more than any other human on earth. She’d be strong, powerful, indestructible, immortal�Ś. Wouldn’t she like that? Not to fear even death itself? The creatures squirming around inside her mind couldn’t communicate with words�"they didn’t possess human language�" but Sam felt the message just the same. The demons wanted her to ceremonially lay hands on the box and invite them to possess her. If she did, they would reward her. If she would help them, the demons would make every dream she’d ever had come true. They would take away the pain and the fear forever, if only she would relax and let them take what they needed. �śGet out! Get out!” Sam screamed, fists balled tightly at her sides. She wanted to claw through her own scalp, reach inside her ears, and rip the voices out of her mind, but she couldn’t. She didn’t believe it would do any good. There was nothing she could do to stop the demons from invading her. The pathway had been laid when she was just a little girl, and now they could wiggle around in all those places they had visited before, tormenting her with their cold evil, taunting her with glimpses of what she would be seeing if the ritual hadn’t stolen psychic energy from her eyes years ago. Sam tried to run, but her eyes suddenly flashed on her reflection in a glass case with pottery inside. She spun away just in time to avoid a collision. As she turned, the tangle of people on the ground came into view. They were still fighting, but it looked like Stephen was winning. There was blood again, but it wasn’t clear who it belonged to. Good. She didn’t want to know who was bleeding. She didn’t care. She just wanted out of here. No, she wanted them out. If she could just get outside, get away from the box, hopefully the demons would lose some of their power. The box was making the demons stronger. She could feel the artifact’s energy throbbing in the air. We need you and will reward you. Come, take up the box, take it and finish what you�" Sam growled low in her throat, panic and frustration nearly overwhelming her as the temptation slithered into her mind like a snake hunting in water�"swift, passionless, merciless, adrift in a world where gravity was no longer the rule. She was the mouse that had fallen into the shallows, whose tiny feet were unsuited for swimming. It was all over. Her death was assured. Only the mercy of the snake could save her. We will be merciful. Simply deliver yourself unto us. Come and�" �śNo, no,” Sam chanted, her words a desperate plea to every god she’d ever studied in her World Religions class. Feeling the demons so deep inside her was terrifying, more awful than anything she’d ever imagined. It incited a despair that was strangely seductive. No matter how the rational part of her mind screamed for her to run away, something else within her wondered if it might not be best to lie down with the evil and let its cold tongue slip into her ear. The world tilted on its axis as she spun again, back the way she’d come, but veering just far enough to the right to steer clear of the case she’d nearly hit the first time. She’d taken half a dozen steps before the demons lifted the veil behind her eyes again, this time only seconds before she plowed into a wall. Sam gasped and lunged for an open doorway a few feet away, trying to memorize the layout of the room she’d just entered before her sight was stolen once again. She was certain she’d seen daylight coming from the left, so she hurried in that direction even when the darkness fell. It was brighter in the next room over, bright enough that she could see the dark, hulking shapes of a large statue and the smaller shadows of display cylinders. The world retained its customary darkness as she raced into the next room, but that was fine. She could smell freedom. There was a door to the outside somewhere close by. The smell of old rain and dirty streets and the faint, musky scent of the ruins that always lingered in Southie drifted through the air. Sam sniffed deeply and hurried in the direction she guessed the smell was coming from, heart racing as her walk turned into a run. She knew she should slow down and be careful�"her hands were still tied behind her back, and if she hit something, it was going to be a full-frontal assault�"but she was too desperate to be away from this place. The demons’ presence had grown less intrusive as she fled, convincing her that she was headed in the right direction, away from the box and the�" Sam tripped and went sprawling, hitting the ground with her right shoulder hard enough to make her scream. She’d run into some kind of platform, stumbled over the step leading up to one of the larger exhibits. It was bound to happen, but still she cursed herself and the demons and the museum and half a dozen other things as she tried to regain her feet. It wasn’t easy with her arms tied behind her. She flopped on the ground for several seconds, something wet on the floor making her slip and slide�"each movement triggering a fresh wave of agony in her bruised shoulder�"before she finally managed to get to her knees. But there wasn’t time for a celebration of her small victory. The full power of the demons slammed down all around her, pinning her in place, making her mouth drop open in pure shock. She’d never felt anything like this. Never. She’d never known fear could hit so hard that it made you numb, calm, ready to accept death with a peaceful smile�"just like the Ju Du quills she’d barely avoided less than a day and a half ago would have done. Had it really been less than a day and a half? It seemed like forever since she’d slept, an eternity of painful, futile minutes spent struggling against a fate she could see now was inescapable. She was meant to fulfill her destiny here in this room, kneeling at the foot of the bed where the box had waited patiently. Her eyes cleared, revealing the ornate bed and lushly decorated room she’d seen in her vision. This was where Stephen had delivered his bloody donation. Sam dimly realized that the demons had led her here, driving her like some mindless herd animal into exactly the position they required. The circle of blood was already drawn on the floor. She’d smeared it a bit as she’d struggled to sit up earlier, but not enough to damage the ritual space Ezra and Sunshine had prepared. She knew she should feel like a fool, but she didn’t. She was simply �Ś relieved. It would end now, all the pain and the fear and suffering. She would finally be able to sleep without dreaming of dangerous shadowed fingers, to see without being forced to watch an endless display of horror. It would be a blessing to give herself over to the box and the demons. The urge to reach under the bed and pull the artifact from its hiding place was overwhelming. Sam strained against her bonds, twisting her wrists this way and that, tearing her skin and drawing blood before she abandoned her attempts to free herself with a sob. She’d just have to get to the box another way. She couldn’t give up, not now, not when she was so close to the peace she’d craved for longer than she could remember. Breath coming fast and tears pooling in her eyes, Sam spun around and pulled her knees out from beneath her. Then she scooted backward toward the bed, every second that she was forced to be without the box in her hands driving her desperation higher. She was frantic by the time her questing fingertips finally felt the cool, carved wood. Thank God. Ezra and Sunny must have removed it from the lockbox! Every inch of her body shook with the need to hurry, to get the artifact in hand before it was too late, before�" �śSammy! Sam!” It wasn’t the first time he’d called to her; she could tell from the strain in his voice, but that was okay. He wasn’t too late. Jace’s shout snapped the thread connecting her to the evil pulsing in the air. He was here. He wasn’t going to let her be taken without a fight and�"now that her thoughts were her own once more�"neither was she. Sam sucked in a breath as if emerging from too long underwater, lifting her head and searching the room for Jace with her newfound sight, only to have the world fall into darkness once more when the demons realized she’d slipped from their control. �śJace!” she screamed, flinching away from the wicked thing she touched as if it had burned her and scooting away from the bed. She had to put some distance between her and the box before the demons pulled her in again. She wasn’t strong enough to fight them, not on her own. �śHelp me. I have to�"” �śHold on. I’ll be right back.” Jace’s cry was followed by a grunt and a crash and the shouting of men whose voices she didn’t recognize. They were calling to one another in some kind of code, commands it seemed they used often, but with an undercurrent of fear she instinctively knew was unfamiliar. A woman screamed, and Sam heard Ezra yell for someone to let go of Sunshine, and then, suddenly, from beneath all the noise came an unearthly howl, the cry of a wounded animal ripped from the vocal cords of a man. It was Stephen, and he was hurt. No matter what he’d done, she had to make sure Jace and the others knew Stephen was the monster in the other room, and do her best to ensure he was captured peaceably. �śJace!” Sam screamed again. �śStephen is the thing we saw in the hall, and Ezra and Sunshine are�"” �śI know!” �śNo, you don’t!” There was no way he could know what he was up against, and his stubborn refusal to listen to her could allow Ezra and Sunny to get away. Or worse, allow them to hurt Jace while his guard was down. Sam’s heart raced at the thought. �śThey’re the ones who summoned the demons. You can’t trust them!” �śI know!” He did? How did he�" Ezra yelled something in a language she didn’t recognize, leaving no doubt that he was the man who had watched her fall down the stairs. Sunshine called back to him, and then the sharp report of gunfire echoed through the marble halls. �śSam, get down! Get down!” Jace cried out. Sam hurled herself to the ground as guns fired again�"real bullets, not stun lasers. The reports were too loud to be lasers, but they weren’t close enough to hurt her ears. Jace was being overly cautious. She was safe in this room, but she knew he couldn’t say the same. More shouts came from the men, someone called Sam’s name, and several bursts of rapid gunfire and the sound of breaking glass shattered the stillness of the museum. Shit! What were they doing? Who was shooting who? She had to get into the other room and see what was happening for herself. She should still be able to see her brother, Jace, Ezra, and Sunny, which would give her an idea of how she could help, even if she couldn’t see any of the people Jace had brought with him. But thank God he’d brought backup, Sam thought, as she struggled to sit upright. There was no way he’d be able to handle Stephen by himself, let alone Sunny and Ezra and�" �śNo! Move, Sam, hurry!” It was her brother’s voice, but the words sounded like they were being spoken around a mouthful of water. Still, no matter what he’d done or what he’d become, a part of her trusted him enough not to question the urgency in his command. She wiggled faster, contracting her abs and rocking into a seated position before scooting as fast as she could toward the edge of the platform. It would be easier for her to get to her feet there than�" �śSam!” Stephen screamed. �śNo, Stephen, don’t touch it! Not alone!” She recognized the woman’s voice calling out the warning, but she didn’t have time to place it before something warm and wet and repulsive crashed down around her. Sam gasped, then immediately realized it was the wrong thing to do. She shut her lips, but it was too late. Her mouth was filled and she couldn’t breathe. Panic descended and she thrashed inside a bubble, desperate for air, but her struggles only spun her in a tight circle, like a baby trapped in an inhospitable womb. All around her the wetness popped and crackled, scalding her skin. It was like she’d dived into a boiling-hot ocean. No, not the ocean. The ocean was salty, but it didn’t taste like this, didn’t stick and cling and invade with such a ruthless possession. Whatever this was, it was far worse than water. Not that it really mattered. Whatever this bubble was made of�"salt water or blood or worse�"it was going to kill her, while the only two people who had ever really loved her were forced to watch. CHAPTER TWENTY Jace raced after Stephen. He knew he should stay and help his men, but he couldn’t stop thinking about Sam. Had she been hit by a stray bullet? Had Ezra and Sunshine done something to her�"something that he hadn’t noticed in the few seconds he’d been able to spare before all hell had broken loose in the room behind him? Would Stephen hurt her now that he was in his monster form? He didn’t know, and so he had to go, leaving his men to fend for themselves. It wasn’t as if he knew how to fight whatever it was that attacked them anyway. How did you fight something you couldn’t see? He’d be no better off than the rest of his men, many of whom had already fallen to their knees, clutching at their throats, the victims of some sort of assault, though the enemies they had come here to capture were clear across the room. Ezra and Sunshine huddled in a corner, wounded and covered in their own blood, but still chanting and holding hands, as intent as churchgoers at a prayer meeting even as guns fired around them. Jace was tempted to turn his own weapon in their direction, but he couldn’t waste a second. So far, he was one of the few bounty hunters still standing, but�" Shit! He should have known better than to even think such a jinx-worthy thought. Jace stumbled as he was engulfed by the rancid smell he’d noticed in the street earlier this morning. This time, however, the smell was on its own, without a human to do its dirty work. Still, the bodiless attack was even worse than a punch in the kidneys. Something foreign and awful surged into his mind, making his temples ache and throb and that all-too-familiar anger surge inside him until the world was swimming in red. The need to kill, to destroy, to rip apart something, anything, was stronger than it had ever been, so powerful his bones felt as if they would melt in the heat of the rage coursing through his veins. He nearly went down to his knees with the rest of his men, but forced himself to keep moving forward, toward Sam, to where he knew the woman he loved was in danger. Because he did love her. Even as the adrenaline he associated with the loss of control dumped into his bloodstream, Jace’s concern for Sam kept him grounded. He loved her�"more than he’d realized until he’d thought he’d never see her again, never smell the scent of flowers in her hair, never slide his bare skin against hers. The thought alone was enough to force back the rage pulsing inside of him. He had to get to her, had to make sure she knew how much she meant to him. He just had to keep moving, one foot in front of the other, no matter how difficult each step had become. As he half fell into the next room, the aura demons inside his head squirmed and shifted, but the pain didn’t get any worse. In fact, as he became accustomed to the messed-up feeling of something foreign moving inside of him, Jace felt a little steadier and his anger faded to background noise. It seemed pain was the worst the stench could dish out. Without a human body to possess, the demons had no fists to throw, no way to hold a deadly weapon. �śGet out,” Jace growled as the creatures slithered into his ears and streamed out through his nose like a swarm of insects. The sensation was one of the most disturbing he could remember, but not nearly as disturbing as hearing Stephen scream out a warning to Sam, then hearing Sam’s own scream cut off abruptly, as if someone had caught her throat in a stranglehold. Jace broke into a run, ignoring the invisible things that did their best to slow him down. He had to get to Sam and destroy whatever it was that had dared hurt her, whether it was a man or demon or �Ś Or something straight out of a horror movie. He stopped dead in the doorway, unable to move for a few seconds as his mind struggled to understand what it was seeing. It was Sam inside the thing; he knew that for certain, but he couldn’t even place a name on the �Ś whatever it was that held her. It was like a giant bubble made of jelly had risen from the box. Ropes of blue ran beneath the surface, spiraling into the center, where Sam kicked and thrashed, her movements slowly growing sluggish as she drowned right before his eyes. �śNo!” Jace thought he was the one who had shouted until he saw Stephen, in his monstrous form, leap on top of the thing. His clawed fingers dug into the jellylike substance, but the bubble wasn’t without its defenses. White light shot across the red surface. Stephen screamed as electricity coursed through him, arching his back. He fell to the ground and stayed there, limp and boneless, easy prey for the black fingers that reached from inside the small brown box. The shadow fingers Sam had seen in her dreams�"and he would have sworn he’d seen himself a time or two�"were reaching out from the darkness. They appeared insubstantial, but were solid enough to latch around Stephen’s ankles and pull a full-grown man across the floor. �śYou have to stop it!” Jace’s eyes snapped to the far wall, where a young woman with dark blond hair and strangely familiar brown eyes struggled against an invisible assailant�"another aura demon, most likely. She cringed, then doubled over, clutching her stomach as if something had punched her in the gut. �śHurry. You’ve got to stop it!” �śHow?” Jace asked, gritting his teeth and shaking his head as the demons in his mind churned and thrashed with renewed vigor, igniting rage inside him once more. They didn’t seem to want him to listen to the blonde�"who he was guessing was the sister, Emma, the one Stephen had mentioned�"and that was all the convincing Jace needed. He had no idea what was going on or how to help Sam. If this woman did, she might be his last hope. �śTwo people. If two of us �Ś instead of one �Ś the demon grimoire, the spell book �Ś It said �Ś” Emma sobbed and clawed at her own stomach, clearly in a hell of a lot more pain than he was. �śI can feel you’re one of us �Ś you know �Ś” Spell book? One of them? What the hell? Not much help there. He was going to have to figure this out on his own, and quickly. Sam was barely moving, and the bubble was growing bigger, stronger, feeding on the woman inside it. �śYou can’t have her,” he muttered out loud, whether to himself or the blob or the things inside his head, he really couldn’t say. But it helped to talk, helped steady his hands as he drew his gun and aimed it in the general direction of the mayhem. He was taking a risk that he would hit Sam, but he couldn’t see any other way to get to her. She needed to breathe, and Stephen had shown just how effective fists were against this thing. It was either shoot at it or risk death by electrocution. Stephen still wasn’t moving, and his neck snapped back and forth at unnatural angles as the shadow fingers drew him up and over a ledge into the museum’s re-creation of an old bedroom. Faster and faster they tugged him, toward where the box lay on its side beneath the bubble, peeking out from beneath the crimson blankets covering the antique bed. The eyes it had once held spilled across the carpet, throbbing on the floor, their power helping give birth to �Ś To the bubble that held Sam! At the last moment, Jace shifted his aim from the red monstrosity itself to the floor, his gut telling him the box and the eyes were the power source he needed to destroy. Gunfire echoed through the room, loud and angry in the small, confined space. Luckily, the floor beneath the carpet was wooden, so there was no need to worry about ricocheting bullets, but that looked like the only piece of luck he was going to get. As the area near the box exploded�"several of the eyes obliterated entirely�"the pulsing of the giant orb grew faster. For a moment, Jace felt despair tighten his chest, but then Sam kicked again. She was definitely moving more than she had been a second ago. Maybe, if he tried again, if he destroyed the rest of the offerings that had spilled from the box, if he could destroy the box itself, then�" As if sensing his thoughts, the shadow fingers dropped Stephen’s legs and surged across the room, headed straight for Jace. The demons within Jace’s mind fled, abandoning the doomed ship he had become and taking the mind-muddying rage with them. But his relief at having his head clear was short-lived. Jace had been a hunter long enough to know how it felt to be the hunted. To those fingers he was prey, pure and simple. �śRun! Get to Sam!” Emma shouted. As if he needed to be told. Jace was already scanning the room, searching for the best route to Sam’s side. �śHurry!” The blonde screamed and fell to the floor with a moan of pure anguish. But still, she managed to shout her next words just loud enough for Jace to hear. �śThe two of you �Ś try to shut it together. The spell book said if two of us closed it, the demons will be banished back beneath the earth ” Jace didn’t have time to second-guess the order. The giant fingers were only a few feet away. Ignoring the voice inside him that screamed for him not to abandon his weapon, Jace waited until his shadow hunter was inches away, then threw the automatic to his left and dove right. Luckily, the action seemed to confuse the fingers. They paused in indecision, giving Jace time to roll back to his feet and then lunge forward, hurling himself at the bottom of the giant eye. That was what it was. He could see it clearly now. The orb was an eye filled with blood, with a pupil formed by the tiny woman curled in the fetal position at its center. Sam wasn’t moving now, and he couldn’t see her face. It was tucked between her legs, covered by the arms she’d wrapped protectively around her ears. She looked absolutely lifeless. For all he knew she was already dead and what he was about to do wouldn’t make a bit of difference, but Jace didn’t care. If Sam was dead, he might as well join her. He’d finally found a woman worth living for�"really living, not the half-assed excuse for life he’d been making do with for longer than he could remember�"and there was no way in hell he was going to give up on her. Not if there was the ghost of a chance that he could save her. And himself while he was at it. He shoved his arm up, fast and hard, using every last bit of his strength, punching through the orb and up into its center. Hot, sticky liquid clung to his skin, seeming to pull him farther and farther inside the thing�"but not far enough. Sam was still beyond his reach, trapped there, her thigh just inches above his outstretched hand. Jace cursed, straining even farther, only to cause a ripple in the fluid that pushed Sam farther away. But luckily, he didn’t feel a hint of electrical charge. Maybe the eye had used up all its juice on Stephen, or�" �śWatch out! It’s coming,” Emma screamed, making Jace risk a swift glance over his shoulder. She was right. The shadow fingers had regrouped and were pulling back toward their source�"and Jace. He had to get to Sam before those fingers reached him. The giant eye itself didn’t seem to have the ability to run or fight back�"aside from the burst of electricity that had leveled Stephen�"but those fingers were a lot more solid than they looked. Jace plunged his other hand up into the sticky mess, an action that�"goddamn him�"seemed to complete some kind of circuit and trigger the white light. He watched it flickering across the surface of the orb in slow motion, but braced himself and reached for Sam anyway, for a foolish second hoping he might escape Stephen’s fate. But then the world exploded in flashes of yellow and red. Suddenly, the room was plunged into blackness, and that blackness spread, crushing into his chest, stealing the last of the air from his lungs, making his skin ache as if it would burst open and spill his insides onto the floor. It was by far the worst pain he’d ever felt, a consciousness-wiping agony that threatened to overwhelm him, to destroy every thought but the awareness of the horror his existence had become. But it didn’t. It couldn’t. There was still Sam. She was still there�"just out of reach, covered in goo and probably unconscious herself, but there. He couldn’t give up. He had to�" The wave of agony came again, skittering across his skin like a rock across the surface of the water, leaving ripples of pain and fear. It was worse this time. If he’d been asked a second ago if there was such a thing as �śworse,” he would have said no, but this was worse, so much worse. Jace opened his mouth but didn’t have breath left to form a scream. He felt his hair go up in flames that he knew would spread to his skin, but he couldn’t seem to care. All he could think about was getting to Sam, somehow managing to pull her free before he passed out and took her last hope of salvation with him. He dimly heard someone screaming as he jumped into the orb hovering above the box�"slamming his head through the membrane and into the same sticky mess his arms were already shoulder-deep in�"but his pain-ravaged brain couldn’t put a name with the voice. His mind was beyond language, beyond focusing on anything but the last mission Jace had given it, its last purpose here on earth. Get Sam. Get her out. Get. Her. Out. Hot liquid rushed into his nose and mouth as he reached, his fingers straining for Sam with the same passion with which their bodies had strained toward ecstasy a few hours before. As soon as he touched her, he knew he was going to get her out. He wasn’t too late. She was still inside her body. A different kind of electricity leaped between them, a connection that was primal and undeniable and real. Sam was fighting for life�"holding her breath, refusing to give in�"with every last bit of strength that she had. Which was a hell of a lot. She was strong, his Sam, probably the strongest, best person he’d ever met. And she loved him. Which made everything worth it. Everything. Even the horrible things, even knowing he was dying as he pulled her close. I love you, jace. I really do. It was like he could hear her thoughts inside his head, as if Sam had invaded his mind in the same way the demons had a few minutes before. Energy pulsed between them, connecting them to each other and to the evil that lived inside the box. One connection was hideous, but this intimate bond between him and Sam was painfully sweet. He welcomed the feel of her spirit sliding against his own as he shifted his grip and shoved her away, straight down, toward the ground and freedom. He hoped she would know what to do when she reached the outside. She was tougher than anyone gave her credit for, and smart, and had knowledge of the supernatural world. She’d be able to fight this thing and win. Her sister would help her. She seemed to be on their side. And maybe Stephen would wake up �Ś or some of the other bounty hunters would fight off their own aura demons and make it into the room in time. God, he just hoped she’d be okay now that she was out of this thing that clung and stuck and stole. It was a shitty way to die. Except that he had died saving her, his Sammy. That made it a little less horrible, Jace thought. And then the blackness came again, sucking him inside and shutting him down. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Sam gasped as she hit the floor, sucking life-giving air until her chest ached. The horror clung to her mouth and nose, but she could breathe. It still stuck to her eyes, gluing her eyelashes together, but she didn’t need to see. She’d been blind for most of her life. She’d probably do better without using her eyes. The sighted world was confusing, distracting, and right now she wouldn’t be able to deal with what she saw. Stephen was dead. She didn’t know how she knew, but she did. The second it had happened, a light went off in a room somewhere deep inside her. The place in her heart that had always been Stephen’s was empty. No, not empty �Ś altered. It was no longer a place of activity and life. It was a museum exhibit, a memorial to the past, something that would never change and grow to be anything more than it had been. The brother she’d loved like a father and a best friend was gone. Forever. And Jace was �Ś hurt, very badly hurt. He wasn’t dead. She couldn’t even allow the possibility to enter her mind. Not only had he risked his life to save hers�"bursting inside the monstrous thing that held her and pulling her free�"but he’d given her a piece of himself. His touch had sent a jolt of electricity washing through her tired cells, awakening the spark of life that had been so close to blowing out, connecting her to Jace with a psychic bond as strong as her bond to the demons and their host. Maybe stronger. He’d given her what she needed to fight her way back toward consciousness, and she wasn’t going to let his sacrifice be in vain. She was going to destroy the box and its demons, smash it to bits with her bare hands if she had to. Her hands would be free in a moment or two. The slickness of the blood she’d been drowning in coated the ropes, making it relatively easy to twist her wrists free and fling the restraints away. Sam fumbled along the ground on her hands and knees, struggling to discern where she was. In the other room, guns still fired and men screamed, and beneath it all Ezra and Sunshine chanted something wicked into the world, but Sam didn’t pay attention to the sounds floating to her through clogged ears. She needed to hear only one thing: the demons screaming as they died the way they should have died a long time ago. �śSamantha! Hurry. You and the man, you’ve got to close the box together. It will banish the demons.” It was the woman’s voice she’d heard just before the hot, sticky mess had pulled her under. Now Sam knew where she’d heard it before. It was the woman who had warned her to run, the one who Sunny had allowed to get away, if Ezra was to be believed. Was she another victim? Or someone they’d been working with who had betrayed them? Sam couldn’t know for sure, but she had no one else to trust, and they were all out of time. �śWhere is it? Tell me, which direction should I�"” �śTo your right! But don’t close it alone, and it’s�"” The woman’s words ended in a scream, but Sam didn’t waste time asking her what had happened or if she was okay. She clearly was in pain and none of them was okay. None of them was ever going to be okay unless she reached that damn box. Sam scrambled along on her hands and knees, patting the floor in front of her as she went, every nerve ending sending up its own little prayer that she would feel it. That her fingers would touch cool, dry wood any second. Then she�" �śOh, God.” She cried out as her fingers found something round and firm and wet, like a grape that had been skinned and dipped in water. Ice water. The thing was so cold, chilled to its core. It was an eye, one of the victims’ eyes. But there wasn’t time to let the horror of the realization slow her down. The box had to be nearby. If it had fallen open and the eyes rolled out, they couldn’t have gone too far. She resumed her search, frantically patting the carpet, trying not flinch as she found another eye and then another and then, finally, her fingertips brushed across the box. The wretchedness she’d felt when she’d touched it the first time returned with a vengeance, but none of the despair or weakness came along with it. She was no longer tempted by the demons’ unique brand of evil. �śSamantha! Hurry!” The woman’s voice was closer now, but still not close enough. Even if she was a friend and ally, as Sam suspected, there was nothing she could do to help other than shout advice. The woman was as much a victim of the aura demons as Sam herself. It was Emma across the room, the sister she hadn’t dared believe still lived. No �Ś it couldn’t be �Ś Sam thought, doubting the knowledge that had somehow surged into her brain. Her sister had died when she wasn’t more than a few weeks old. No infant could have survived the kind of blood loss that Emma had suffered at the hands of the elders of the cult. But it was her sister. She could sense it. Somehow Emma was alive and well and �Ś here�Ś. The distraction of learning that her sister was still alive slowed her down, made her hands linger on the edges of the box. Which was exactly what the demons had intended, Sam realized seconds later as Emma screamed and Sam felt something firm and muscled latch around her ankles. Her scream joined her sister’s as she was lifted into the air, and the box flew out of her hand. Whatever it was that had grabbed her shook her, making her teeth rattle and her neck crack at the end of her spine. Sam tightened every muscle in her body and then just as quickly tried to relax, unsure which action would be more likely to keep her from being paralyzed. She had to stay in one piece and gain her freedom. Jace’s life depended on it. She’d been so stupid to let down her guard for a second, to think the box and its demons had only one trick up their sleeve. She was fighting ancient evil, demons who had been manipulating humans for centuries. They wouldn’t be conquered so easily. Hell, they wouldn’t be conquered at all, especially not by a tiny scrap of a person who couldn’t see, who couldn’t keep her thoughts focused for�" Sam muttered aloud to herself, not even sure what she was saying, knowing only that making noise helped block the influence of the demons. It also helped her feel stronger, to reconnect with that surge of power she’d felt when Jace had touched her. Jace. He was still alive. She could feel it. �śReach out your arms when I tell you! Trust me, please!” Em-ma’s voice was so earnest, so desperate, that Sam knew she had to listen. If she was a fool to trust her sister, then she would die a fool. Better a fool than a cynic �Ś or so she’d always thought. Now that belief might be put to the final test. �śNow! Reach out and grab him!” Emma shouted. Sam reached, straining her arms out, blindly searching for Jace. That was the �śhim” Emma was referring to, she knew without having to ask. She and Jace couldn’t beat this thing apart�"their combined failures made that abundantly clear�"but maybe Emma was right and together they would have a chance. That suspicion grew stronger when her fingers burst through what felt like the firm plastic exterior of a water balloon and into the ooze she’d escaped from only a few minutes before. As soon as her hands touched the hard planes of Jace’s back, Sam grabbed hold and clung for dear life. That sense of connection and the rightness of being with Jace engulfed her once more. She’d made the right choice. Even if her actions ended with her being stuck inside with him, she wouldn’t let him go. She loved him more than she’d ever loved anything. She’d lost a lot of things in her life, and she’d just lost Stephen, the only family she’d ever known�"she wasn’t going to lose Jace, too. It just. Wasn’t. Going. To happen. Sam dug her fingers into Jace’s arms as the thing at her feet tugged her backward. Her muscles protested, and her arms felt like they were about to pop from their sockets, but still she held on, until her spine was stretched tight and her ankles throbbed and sharp pain shot from her feet to her knees. Finally the tugging of the monster holding her succeeded in popping both her and Jace free. As gravity engaged, Jace’s weight became too much. She was a woman who spent her time arranging flowers, not lifting weights. She just couldn’t hold on to two hundred pounds of man, and Jace eventually fell from her arms. Luckily, however, she held on to him long enough for their combined weight to overpower the thing that held her. She crashed onto the ground, half on top of Jace, more relieved than she could express when he grunted as her elbow gouged into his stomach. He was alive! And breathing and grunting that annoyed grunt that was becoming one of her favorite sounds in the world. �śYou’re okay. You’re okay.” Her hands feathered over his body, up to his face, and then farther up, only to jerk away as she touched the sticky remains of his hair. It was gone, or mostly gone. He’d been burned, badly. She wanted to reach out and feel the true extent of the damage, but she didn’t dare. They didn’t have time, and she didn’t want to risk infecting his wounds. She’d let a doctor handle them properly when they got out of here. Because they were getting out of here. Now. Right after they took care of one last little detail. �śJace. Can you see the�"” �śSammy? God, what �Ś” Jace’s voice was thick and heavy, revealing just how exhausted and hurt he was. No matter what Emma had said about the pair of them being able to banish the demons if they stayed together, his voice frightened her. Jace, one of the strongest men she’d ever met, sounded so beaten. He didn’t sound capable of stopping one of the tricycle-riding toddlers who played near her apartment. How in the world would he stop something so powerful and ancient with the kind of power that�" �śFight them, Sammy.” Jace whispered the words, but Sam heard them loud and clear. �śDon’t listen.” The box and the demons. They were working on her mind again, trying to make sure she stayed hopeless. They were afraid that she and Jace would find a way to put them out of commission. �śCome on. We have to find the box,” Sam said, swiping at her eyes with one hand and fumbling for Jace’s hand with the other. Seeing suddenly seemed like a good idea. If she could look into Jace’s eyes and see his faith in her there, she knew she’d feel a thousand times better. Finally, after pulling a few dozen eyelashes out by the root, she was able to peek through one matted lid and turn to Jace and see �Ś nothing. Absolutely nothing, not even a darker place in the shadows. �śJace?” she asked, even though she knew it was him, even though she felt his hand in hers. �śWe’ve got to shut that box,” he said, squeezing her hand. �śRight,” Sam said, grateful that he sounded a little stronger. �śDo you see it? If we can close it together, then�"” �śWe’ll close it,” Jace said, gripping her hand even harder. He was okay. He wasn’t as weak as she’d thought. �śSounds good, but we have to find it first. I had it in my hands, but I dropped it when the, um �Ś whatever that is picked me up.” �śThey looked like �Ś fingers, made of shadows. Like the things you said you saw in your dreams. But they’re gone now. I think we did some damage.” So much for dream metaphors. Seemed like all the horror in her life was absolutely real. Sam shivered. �śDo you see the box?” she asked, turning her head to look around the room. She still couldn’t see a damn thing except �Ś the body a half dozen feet away. Her brother’s body. He was still covered in that strange yellow goo, still had clawlike projections where his fingers should have been, but it was Stephen. He’d died trying to fight the thing she was assuming she’d take down so easily. He’d been bigger, stronger, meaner, and he’d fallen in an instant, as easily killed as an insect beneath a man’s shoe. And while she’d been chatting it up with her boyfriend, the evil had taken her sister over as well. Emma was as good as dead, and Sam would be next. Then there would be no more Quinns, unless Sam came to her senses and�" �śFight them. Don’t let them get in,” Jace said, shaking the hand he held, making her arm flop bonelessly at her side. Emma. She hadn’t said a word since Sam and Jace had spilled onto the carpet. �śIs there another woman in the room?” Sam asked, a knot in her throat. �śThe blonde?” �śI don’t know. I never saw her. I just�"” �śYeah, she’s still here. But she’s down on the floor across the room. I think she’s still alive, but I can’t be sure.” �śShe’s still alive,” Sam said, relief making her stronger. �śI’d be able to see her if she weren’t.” �śYou mean�"” �śStephen’s dead,” Sam confirmed. �śI’m not sure about me. I saw myself in a mirror earlier, but I can’t see my arms or body now, so I’m not sure if I’m going to die or not.” She sounded crazy, even to herself. �śWe’re going to get this thing and get the hell out of here.” Jace’s tone left no doubt he thought she was losing it, but that was okay. She suspected she was losing it �Ś a little bit. She was absurdly calm, considering her brother was dead, her long-lost sister was alive but in danger, she’d nearly drowned, the man she loved had been severely burned, and the demons that had caused all that were still in the same room with her. She was probably going into shock, but there was no time to worry about that. There wasn’t even time to mention the possibility to Jace before he was pulling her across the room. �śI see the box. We’re almost there.” �śDon’t let go of me,” Sam warned as she tripped and nearly fell, but was pulled upright by the hand Jace still held. �śEmma said we could shut it together and banish the demons. I don’t think it can hurt us as long as we’re touching. I know that sounds stupid, but�"” �śNo, it doesn’t,” Jace said, but didn’t elaborate further. Probably smart. This wasn’t the time. �śKeep walking straight. We’re almost there.” The last few feet of their adventure were strangely calm. No shadow fingers, no screaming from long-lost sisters, no immersion in wombs filled with blood. In fact, the entire museum was as still and quiet as if it were a normal business day, as if there were nothing more dramatic occurring than a few dozen people taking in the latest exhibits. The sudden silence was unnerving, as terrifying as anything that had come before. It felt �Ś wrong, dangerous. What had happened to the screams from the other room? To Ezra’s and Sunshine’s chanting? To the shouts and gunfire of Jace’s men? By the time Jace knelt on the ground, pulling her with him, Sam was shaking all over. �śJace, I meant what I said earlier,” she said, needing to make sure he knew �Ś just in case. �śI love you.” �śI love you, too.” The emotion in his voice left no doubt that he meant every word, making her heart race even faster. He loved her. He really did. �śAnd you’re moving in with me tomorrow.” �śOkay.” She smiled, even though the hair on her arms stood up, the animal part of her still skittish at being so close to the evil thing in front of them. �śNo arguments?” �śNope. I told you, I can let a man take the lead if he knows what he’s doing.” �śGood.” She heard his smile. �śNow, let’s do this. We’ll use these.” He gave the hand he held a gentle shake. �śDon’t touch it with your other hand, just in case it’s like the other thing.” In case it could kill, he meant, but he was being careful not to freak her out any more than she was already. Sam appreciated it. Reaching forward until her and Jace’s joined hands touched the cool, dry wood was scary enough as it was. But not quite scary enough. If she’d been properly frightened, she would have run from the room. But she didn’t. They didn’t. It was the last mistake either of them would ever make. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO This time, the world didn’t explode. It imploded as the connection between them and the box and the demons grew so strong it smashed them together, scrambling their souls like eggs in a pan. One second, Jace was kneeling by Sam, his heart racing with relief to be holding her hand. The next he was turned inside out. The moment they touched the box, he and Sam slammed into each other. Not physically. Physically, neither of them moved a muscle, but there was no other way to describe what happened. It was as if their skin collided and then evaporated, clearing the way for their souls to slide together. Suddenly he was overlapping Sam, living her memories and his own, remembering every trauma-inspired nightmare, awakening the most deeply suppressed terrors. He was looking out through her eyes as her mother pulled her from her father’s arms. She was crying, begging to go back to bed. But her mother’s fingers dug into her skin, squeezing until she screamed in pain and dropped her blanket on the ground. Jace felt her despair at leaving the blanket behind, her longing to press her face into the pink softness as her arms were tied behind her back and two men in robes placed her in the center of a circle made of blood. Her little sister was already nearby, wailing the piercing cry of an infant in pain. There was no worse sound in the world than that, little Sam thought. It was so raw and fresh, a wound that would never stop bleeding �Ś would never stop �Ś Jace’s mother was never going to stop bleeding. The thing that had her kept inflicting more and more wounds until the world swam in a sea of blood, until he worried that it would fill the house and drown him in his hiding place. Eight-year-old Jace cowered under the sink, peeing himself with fear, wondering if the horrible thing outside would smell it and come for him next. But this time, he wasn’t alone. There was someone else there, someone who watched and wept for him and his mother, for the pain they’d both endured. She was there. Sam. He wanted to draw comfort from that, but he couldn’t. It was all too real. Jace had never had a memory take him over so completely. It was as if he were living it all over again, feeling the fear, tasting the shame as he hid and watched instead of trying to protect the only person in the world who had ever made him feel loved. Instead, he hid and listened to her cry and cry and cry�Ś. It seemed like the baby would never quit crying. The wailing went on and on until Sam felt like she’d do anything to make it stop, to put an end to the hysterical tears that made her even more afraid. But then the crying stopped, and Sam hated herself for craving the silence. Baby Emma’s wails faded to little snuffles, broken only by the screeching of the demons that got louder and louder and louder as they emerged from the box, seeking the bodies they’d been promised�Ś. The demonlike thing screeched in excitement as it lapped at his mother’s blood. The monstrous creature his father had become after he’d accepted the box and said the sacred, foreign words was feeding on his mother. And he wasn’t alone. There were other monsters, invisible but no less terrifying than his father. Jace couldn’t see them, but he could hear them. They were wild with delight, prolonging his mother’s death so they could dance in the spray of her blood again and again. They thrived on the torture they inflicted, feeding on her misery and pain as much as her blood. It had been so long since they were free to play, since the box had been opened by someone who knew what to place inside. But Jace’s father had known. Only days after the emergence in China, when Jace and his mother had been hiding in their apartment on the edge of Shanxi, too terrified to leave his parents’ bedroom, Jace’s father had come home with something horrible in a bag and placed it into the box he’d found near his brother’s destroyed cave home. He’d said the box had talked to him, and that what he was doing would be a new beginning for all of them. Not only would the Lus survive the demon infestation; they’d emerge as kings and queens of the new world. They’d finally have enough to eat and never have to be afraid again. Instead, the things he’d set free had transformed him into a monster that ate his own wife. He would have killed Jace if he hadn’t hidden so well and been so quiet, shoving his fist into his mouth to smother his screams as he watched the monster feed�Ś. The demons had gotten a taste and wanted more. Sam, blind and petrified, clung to her brother’s hand as he pulled her deeper into the forest. �śKeep running, Sam, keep running,” he said, the fear in his voice terrifying six-year-old Sam as much as anything else that had happened. Stephen was never afraid. Stephen was a teenager and rode his bike as far as he wanted without having to tell anyone where he was going. If he was afraid, then they were probably going to die. The demons would find them. They could sense where they ran. The residents of the box were connected to them both now, and they wouldn’t rest until they had the bodies they’d been promised when the ritual began. �śUnder here, Sam. Get under here and stay quiet.” Stephen shoved her under a fallen tree, pushing her inside until her knees were covered in mud and rough bark scratched at her bare neck. She’d been wearing her sleeveless nightgown because it was always hot in the farmhouse, but now she shivered. Uncontrollably. Until her teeth knocked together so loudly she was certain the demons would hear. They didn’t. They heard Stephen, heard him screaming for them to come and find him, crashing away through the leaves. For a moment something drew close to where she hid, close enough that Sam could smell the wretched scent of it, but then �Ś Gunshots, so loud they made Jace scream, filled the room, shattering glass, bursting through the paper-thin walls. The military was out hunting the demons that had emerged from the Shanxi caves, and Jace’s father was too close to the window. One minute he was dancing in his wife’s blood; the next he was dead on the floor beside Jace’s mother. As soon as the shots faded, Jace crawled from his hiding place, trembling and weak from too many days without food. It was hunger that had driven him out so soon after the demons seemed to have left. If he weren’t so hungry, he wouldn’t have crept from beneath the counter and hurried past the fallen bodies to the tiny refrigerator across the room. If he weren’t so hungry, he would have realized that he still wasn’t alone. The demons that lingered inside what remained of his father’s body rose from him like a swarm of flies and headed straight for Jace, overwhelming him before he could slam the refrigerator door shut and run. They surged in through his ears and pushed into his brain, eager to feed on something fresh. Jace’s father had summoned the demons and given them permission to feed on all that was his. The demons didn’t need Jace’s consent. Jace was just a weak little coward who deserved pain, who deserved to be food. But they were wrong. Jace had kicked the box on the floor open, spilling its precious contents. Then he’d run so far and so fast that he’d been in Xi’an by the time his uncle’s plane had touched down. Of course, he could have done more. If he had been brave enough, he would have destroyed the box that housed the demons, made sure it never fell into the hands of a certain archaeologist sifting through the Shanxi rubble a few years later. If only he’d been a bit braver �Ś Sam finally got up the courage to raise her voice and respond to the men calling out into the woods. They said they were policemen, and policemen were supposed to be good. But then �Ś parents were supposed to be good, too, and they’d been bad. So bad. Still, it was Sam’s fault. If she hadn’t been such a horrible child, if she hadn’t been so innately unlovable, her parents would never have dared to do what they did. They would have cherished her if she’d been good. They would have protected her. But she didn’t deserve protection. She deserved everything she’d been through and more. She deserved the terror of feeling the ground disappear just as she dared to crawl from her hiding place. She was a waste who no one would miss, whose destiny was a pit so deep and dark that she would fall through it forever, never reaching the end, the anticipation and absolute terror of knowing she was about to die drawn out for eternity�Ś. The bitch deserved it, but he didn’t. She deserved to die, but he could still live. They weren’t children anymore, and they weren’t inside each other. Now they were falling through the void together, two distinct individuals who didn’t need to share the same destiny. All he had to do was let go of her hand. If he let her go, she would fall, but he would rise. Rise and rise until there was no more pain and fear, until there was�" �śNo,” Jace grunted, squeezing Sam’s hand even tighter, praying for the first time in God Himself only knew how long that she wouldn’t give in to the thing that pushed at his mind, filling his entire being with so much terror that a part of him would do anything to make the torment end. Anything but let go of Sam. He couldn’t do that. Wouldn’t do that. Ever. Me either. Not ever. Jace sighed with relief. He couldn’t see Sam’s face in the darkness, but he could still hear her thoughts. He hoped she could hear his, too, that she knew he loved her completely, every part of her, inside and out. So let’s do it. Jace didn’t have to ask what she meant. He simply flexed the hand that was still wrapped around hers, and knew that somewhere, in the real world, he and Sam were closing the lid on the evil that would have possessed them if they had tried to do this alone. The shriek that followed was truly deafening, so loud Jace could hear it for only a handful of seconds and then it was gone, replaced by a ringing that filled the darkness through which they fell. The sound was so big, so strong, that Jace could feel it vibrating in his chest, altering the beating of his heart, slowing everything down until the darkness crept inside him. In a way it was a relief, that blackness. It was peaceful there, and he knew he’d be all right inside it. Because Sam was there, right there beside him. She knew every shameful secret and fear that had plagued him for years. She’d even seen the things he’d forgotten, knew that he’d been the one who allowed her father to find the artifact that had ruined her life, and she still wasn’t going to leave him. Not ever. He heard her say the words again and then he was gone, floating in an oblivion deeper than sleep, deeper than anything he’d ever known except his love for the woman whose hand he still held in his own. EPILOGUE Five months later�Ś �śLet me do it,” Sam whispered, curling her hand at the back of Jace’s jeans and tugging him into the shadows. �śYou promised you would let me do it.” �śThat’s when I thought we were hunting Sqat demons,” Jace hissed. �śThis is a Ju Du.” �śI know! It’s perfect. Just like the first night we kissed.” Sam stood on tiptoe to place a quick kiss on Jace’s cheek, loving the feel of his soft skin against her lips. It was only one of the things that more than made up for the fact that she couldn’t see him anymore. Sam had been dead on arrival at South Methodist last March, but the emergency room staff had managed to get her heart beating again. She’d stayed in a coma for several days, drifting in the darkness. Still, she hadn’t been afraid. Jace had been there, too. When she’d awoken she’d known instantly that he was across the hall. Since then, the connection between them had deepened every day. Sometimes Sam would swear she could still read his mind, though the ability to hear Jace’s thoughts had vanished when they’d shut Pandora’s box. Emma had been right about it taking two people who had been touched by the aura demons to banish them from the earthly plane. The years Sam’s little sister had spent in a halfway house for demon-marked kids might have left her with scars inside and out, but she’d learned a thing or two about the evil that her parents had summoned into the world. While there, she’d gained access to a demon grimoire�"a spell book�"that had taught her ways to beat the beasts that had touched her and her siblings. Unfortunately, Emma had also learned about guilt and suffering. While Stephen had spent time as a monster and Sam had endured horrific dreams, Emma had been left with an aura demon’s hunger. She needed to psychically feed on the pain and misery of other human beings in order to survive. She’d learned to feed on the kind of people who didn’t deserve better than the shortened life span she caused when she stole their vital energy away, but it wasn’t easy. It made her keep to herself. Even though she’d risked her life to try to save the brother and sister Ezra had told her about, Emma still kept her distance from Sam. She managed the Demon’s Breath, attended the Conti family dinners, and seemed to be getting along well with Ginger, her new roommate, but Emma was still a mystery to Sam in a lot of ways. Sam had a feeling she always would be, which made her sad. And angry. Hence her new appreciation for shooting things. �śIt’s fate, Jace. This was meant to be my first capture. It’ll be romantic.” �śGetting killed, really fucking romantic,” Jace grumbled, but he turned and claimed her lips for a slow, sultry kiss. Damn, but the man could still take her breath away, even when he was getting on her last nerve. �śI’m not going to get killed,” she whispered, frustrated that he seemed to be going back on his promise to let her take point tonight. �śI’m almost as good with the stun gun as you are, and you know it.” �śYou can’t see the demon, Sam. What if�"” �śSo what? You can. It’ll be just like shooting pool.” She’d taught Jace to help her play pool by giving cues based on the three hundred and sixty degrees of a circle. He’d used the same trick to teach her to shoot his stun gun so she could protect herself when she joined him on his bounty-hunting missions. Thus far, however, he’d only let her shoot in the simulator at his uncle Francis’s training building. Which was no fun at all, and did nothing to help banish the nervous energy that had plagued her since the night at the museum. Sam sensed that her thrill for the hunt had something to do with anger over losing Stephen, who had been declared a missing person after his �śdisappearance” last spring. His body, along with the bodies of Sunshine, Ezra, and Marcus�"the one bounty hunter who had been killed by friendly fire in the museum�"had been disposed of by the Conti family while Jace and Sam were still in the hospital. Uncle Francis said her ex and his lover had been melted into yellow goo by the time the bounty hunters got Jace and Sam to the hospital and made it back to the museum to clean up the mess. Sam chose to accept that story. Whether their connection to the box and its demons had killed them or Francis had done them in with something a lot less paranormal in nature, it didn’t much matter. She was glad Ezra and Sunshine were dead. The fact that she could feel satisfaction over the loss of two lives would have shocked her even a few months earlier, but that was before she’d absorbed a bit of the darkness that had tormented Jace his entire life. His father hadn’t given Jace’s blood to the demons the way her parents had, but Jace had still felt some of the effects of being offered as a sacrifice. He’d battled with anger and a lust for violence inspired by the demons for years. The good news was that his bursts of rage had been a lot easier to control since the aura demons were banished from the earthly plane and the damned box sunk somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean. So maybe she hadn’t absorbed his anger, after all. Maybe her anger was all her own. Maybe she’d always liked to hunt things and hadn’t known it. She was discovering a lot of new things about herself now that she could sleep the night through without visions of shadow fingers and evil demons dancing through her head. Her paranormal power still remained with her�"enabling her to literally see people who would soon be experiencing a major shift in the course of their lives�"but it was no longer something she considered a curse. Sometimes the people she saw died or were diagnosed with cancer, but sometimes they had a near-death experience that changed their life for the better. And sometimes they met the love of their life or learned they were pregnant with a much-wanted child. She’d learned to look each person in the eye and silently pray for the best for each of them. It wasn’t her job to meddle with fate. Most of the time she doubted there was much she could do to help the people she saw anyway. Some things were beyond the influence of mere mortals. Of course, that would change if she ever saw Jace’s face. She would quite happily spend the rest of her life never looking into his eyes again. Just the thought of it made her anxious, edgy, ready to do something already. �śYou give me the signals and I’ll get the ball in the corner pocket,” Sam said. �śThis is nothing like playing pool.” �śIt’s exactly like�"” Jace turned to her, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her back a few steps. When he spoke again, his voice was even softer. Sam assumed that meant the Ju Du was close. �śThis isn’t a game, Sam. The Ju Du can change the texture and color of its flesh to blend in with almost anything. What if I lose sight of it?” �śThe Ju Du only attack things smaller and weaker than they are. It won’t come after me with you here,” Sam said. �śCome on. Trust me. You have to trust me sometime.” �śI’ll trust you when we’re after Sqat demons. Now, stay here. I’m going�"” Sam fisted her hand more tightly in his jeans. �śI’m not staying here. Let me do this. I’m ready.” �śNo, and that’s my last word.” �śSince when do I give a shit about your last word? Screw your last word,” she hissed beneath her breath, wishing she could light into Jace at full volume. �śI’d rather screw you,” he said, his hand sliding down to squeeze her ass through her own tight-fitting jeans. They were gray, to match the demon habitat. Jace called them her demon-hunting jeans and had picked them out himself. The fact that they were tight enough to show every little curve gave testimony to the fact that her husband was a sex fiend as well as a practical man. �śYou won’t be screwing me for a long time if you don’t let me�"” �śThe Ju Du is gone,” he said at full volume. �śYou scared it away.” �śI scared it away?” �śYes, you did. And I don’t appreciate it. We could have paid for this entire trip with that bounty. And threatening me with sex deprivation less than two days into the marriage is not giving me warm fuzzies, Sammy.” �śI promised to love and honor you,” she said, smiling in spite of herself as Jace wrapped an arm around her waist. �śNot give you warm fuzzies.” Jace grunted. �śI knew this marriage crap was a bad idea.” �śAnd I knew honeymooning in a city with a demon habitat would be too much for you to resist.” She let her lips play over his neck, interspersing kisses with nibbles of her teeth, until she felt things stir inside Jace’s jeans. She wiggled a little closer, nudging his swelling length with her hip. �śWe could have gone to San Francisco instead of Seattle.” �śBut then we wouldn’t have been able to see the Space Needle.” He cupped her breast, teasing her nipple through her thin T-shirt, making her moan. �śYeah, I really enjoyed seeing the Space Needle,” she said, voice ripe with sarcasm. �śOh, cry me a river, blind girl.” Sam laughed, a full-throated laugh that echoed off the ruins that surrounded them. �śYou are such a fucking asshole.” �śDid I ever tell you that nearly fucking you in the street that first night was one of the hottest sexual experiences of my life?” Jace asked, abandoning her breast for twin handfuls of her ass. �śNo, I don’t think you did.” �śWell, it was.” He pulled her closer and claimed her lips for a long, slow kiss. Her entire body lit up, just like it did every time Jace kissed her. He truly was her other half, everything she’d dreamed of in a man and more. �śYou are the hottest woman I’ve ever met.” �śYou’re not so bad yourself,” she whispered against the soft skin of his neck as he grabbed her behind the knees and hitched her up around his waist. Her breath rushed out as her clit pressed tight against where he was hard and hot and ready. �śI want you more than I’ve ever wanted anything.” �śEnough to let me shoot something next time?” �śEnough to take you back to our hotel and make you forget about every gun but this one,” he said, grinding against her, drawing a sound from her throat that was half moan, half giggle. �śDid you just call your cock a gun?” �śI did. And this bad boy is ready to fire, baby.” He was smiling so widely that their teeth bumped together with their next kiss, making them both laugh. �śYou’re a mess.” She swatted his ass as he set her down, then took the hand he placed in hers. �śGood thing I love you.” �śAnd I love you. More than anything in the world.” And she knew he did. And it was better than any dream, any fantasy, better than anything the evil demons inside that box could have promised, strong enough to withstand any fear, any darkness, any demon bond. Read on for a sneak peek of the next book in the Demon Bound series by Anna J. Evans, DEMON MARKED Coming from Signet Eclipse in January 2011 Emma Quinn took a pull on her beer as she scanned the crowded bar�"Death Ministry gang members, some frat boys from Columbia looking for danger they couldn’t handle, and a couple of prostitutes trying to masquerade as party girls and failing. The real party girls never wore dresses or heels. Even in the soupy humidity of August in New York, they stuck with jeans and boots. When you lived on the wrong side of the barricade, you never knew when you might need to run for your life. Heels were a bad life choice, even if they made fashion sense. No, the real party girls had left hours ago, the frat boys were on their way to being too drunk to stand�"let alone make their way to one of the few all-night diners to sober up while waiting for the barricade to open at five a.m.�"and the gang members �Ś well, they just stank of trouble. The Death Ministry thugs had never come into the bar before. They were usually too busy plotting their drug runs, planning who to kill, and taking care of whatever other assorted business Very Bad Guys had on their nightly to-do lists. But tonight they were here, shooting tequila and interested looks in the prostitutes’ direction. It was midnight at the Demon’s Breath Pub and all was not well. But then, it never was at this time of night. Emma had learned that much in her first few weeks on the job. At least no one was dead yet. That was something. Always looking on the bright side, Quinn. Emma grimaced and downed the rest of her beer. She did look on the bright side, in her own jaded fashion. Growing up where she had, the way she had, she’d been forced to create her own happiness. If she hadn’t, no one else would have bothered. Even Father Paul had had only so much time, so much energy, and most of it was used up by the time he got back to the halfway house at the end of the day. He’d saved her life, but Father Paul was too busy to worry about her contentment. �śDude, do you think we should call demon patrol? Or �Ś somebody?” Ginger, the bartender on duty, poured a shot of whiskey as she closed out a tab. She cast a pointed look to the corner of the room, where several Death Ministry members�"easily identified by the scars marking their faces, one long slash for each life they’d taken in the name of gang business�"sat sharing a bottle of tequila. �śNope.” Emma finished her beer, then placed her empty glass into the dishwasher under the bar with the rest. �śDemon patrol doesn’t deal with gang stuff.” �śWhat about the police?” �śThey haven’t done anything illegal.” She shrugged and started up the machine, holding it closed as the initial rush of hot water blasted the glasses. It wasn’t staying shut on its own anymore. The dishwasher was just one of the many things that were falling apart in the pub since her brother’s �śdisappearance” five months before. �śThey’re just drinking.” �śSo far. But who knows what they’ll do after they’ve had a few?” Ginger slammed back the whiskey shot and took a deep breath. �śWhy couldn’t they come in when Jace was here?” �śDon’t worry. We’ll be fine.” Emma watched Ginger pour herself another shot without saying a word. According to the rules, Ginger wasn’t supposed to be drinking while she was bartending, but Emma wasn’t going to tell. Hell, she wasn’t supposed to be drinking either�"on the job or any other time. She was still a year away from the legal drinking age of twenty-one, but no one questioned her right to imbibe. Emma didn’t look underage. Despite her shoulder-length blond bob and soft brown eyes, she looked hard, edgy, and far older than her years. Sam, her older sister, said it was because she was too skinny for someone who was five feet eight. Emma knew it was because she was too messed up for someone who was barely more than a teenager. But then, when one spends the first couple years of her life in a hospital recovering from nearly being killed by her own parents, she sort of gets a head start on the whole �śmessed up” thing. �śI’m going to have another shot. You want one?” Ginger asked. Emma’s stomach cramped. A shot wasn’t a good idea. It was time for her to get something real to eat, something more than beer and stale pretzels. �śNo, I’m good. But you go ahead.” She couldn’t have cared less whether Ginger was trashed on the job. In fact, it worked in her favor if her roommate and coworker was too smashed to pay much attention to Emma as she prepped for closing at two a.m. It would make it easier to sneak away and find something to sustain her. Or maybe �Ś she wouldn’t have to go out to find food�Ś. Maybe she had something suitable right here in the bar�Ś. Emma’s eyes drifted back to the Death Ministry thugs. There were five of them, each one scarier than the last. But still, they were paying customers, customers who looked as if they were running low on tequila. �śCheck on the frat boys again, will you? I think they need another pitcher,” Emma said, waiting until Ginger turned before grabbing a bottle of Jose Cuervo and slipping out from behind the bar. She deliberately let a little wiggle creep into her walk as she crossed to the darkened corner. Her low-heeled biker boots thumped on the bare floorboards, catching the rhythm of whatever angsty techno-pop tune the frat boys had selected from the jukebox. She’d never been dancing at a club, but she imagined this was the kind of crap they played at the places where young men and women went to grind against complete strangers for a few hours every Friday and Saturday night. It was painful listening to it, and for the hundredth time, Emma was glad she had no urge to grind against another person, at least not in a public place�"and not for the reasons the average twenty-year-old girl would press her body up against someone else’s in the dark. �śLooked like you guys were running low.” Emma plunked the fresh tequila bottle in the middle of the Death Ministry table. A shiver raced along her skin as five pairs of flat, cruel eyes tracked up her body, taking in her tight black jeans and black tank top on the way up to her face, but it wasn’t fear that made the hairs on her arms stand on end. It was excitement. Anticipation. Oh, yeah, these men were bad. More than bad enough for her purposes. She’d bet one of their lives on it. �śWe didn’t order another bottle.” The man who spoke had bright blue eyes and seemed a little younger than the rest, but his face was still heavily lined with kill scars. He’d taken the lives of at least a dozen people if those ruined cheeks were anything to judge by. Surely not all of those people had deserved a grisly death. Odds were that at least a few of them had been innocents. �śYeah, I know,” Emma said. �śConsider it a gesture of good faith. This bottle is on the house, providing you guys don’t make trouble while you’re here tonight.” �śMake trouble? What kind of trouble would we make, blondie?” guy number one asked. �śVanish, chica. Leave the bottle.” The speaker was a brown-skinned man with a Mohawk and a low opinion of women. He didn’t even bother to look at her when he spoke, instead keeping his dark eyes trained on the tiny dance floor where one of the prostitutes writhed to the pounding beat. Most of the other men had shifted their eyes elsewhere, as well, apparently unimpressed with the skinny blonde with the crooked nose and mud brown eyes�"except for the young guy. The blue-eyed dude with the crew cut and sprinkling of acne across his wide forehead was still looking �Ś and he would do just fine. More than fine. God, Emma could already feel how good it would be, how much stronger she’d be afterward. Her heart raced as if she’d downed a triple shot of espresso instead of a couple of beers, pounding so hard her ribs ached and her head spun. Her hands shook and her pulse thudded unhealthily in her ears. It had been too long. She should have taken care of this sooner, before she needed it so badly. But she always tried to put it off, to find a way to keep from committing the same necessary sin. But that was the thing about necessary sin�"it was just so �Ś necessary. �śExactly,” Emma said, staring at her victim through lowered lashes. �śI’m sure you boys aren’t anything for me to worry about. I’m just going to take the trash out back. Be good while I’m gone. Or �Ś not.” Emma turned slowly, maintaining eye contact with Blue Eyes until the last second, then sauntered away. On her way back across the room, she did one last sweep of the bar, making sure Ginger was occupied and none of the other patrons were paying attention as she slipped through the thick plastic strips that separated the pub from the storage room. All eyes were elsewhere. She was clear. No one would notice the thug slipping out behind her and think about playing hero. Hurrying across the cracked brown tile, Emma headed for the silver door and the back alley beyond, certain the man would follow her. He didn’t seem to be the sharpest knife in the case, but he was smart enough to read the interest in a woman’s eyes and horny enough to go for a chick who barely filled out an A cup. Or maybe he was simply frugal�"preferring to get his pussy for free instead of paying for it like his buddies were intending to do. Not everyone cared to spend their hard-earned money on prostitutes. Emma could sympathize with frugality. Money had always been tight around the halfway house growing up. Father Paul worked as a poorly paid chaplain for a hospital, and collecting weird kids was an expensive habit. There were nights when everyone went hungry for traditional sorts of food. No one ever had their supernatural needs unmet, however; Father made sure of that. He considered it a holy calling to provide for the children who had come to be in his care, to teach them how to manage their inhuman powers, to control their baser cravings, to feed their unnatural hungers with the appropriate sort of food. Food. God, she was so hungry. The dark craving that had been her constant companion since the day her parents offered her as a sacrifice to the aura demons surged to the surface of her skin, making her fingertips itch and burn. �śCome on�"follow me,” Emma whispered under her breath as she eased into the shadows behind the bar. The alley was wide and clear except for two small Dumpsters and an oversized ashtray�"the city made sure the streets surrounding the ruins were kept tidy in order to prevent infestation by demons who made their nests in tight, crowded places�"but it was still dark. It wasn’t a place where a woman should walk alone. There were predators in Southie who didn’t need teeth or claws, who used fists and knives and guns to dominate, steal, and kill. She wondered what kind of weapon Blue Eyes was packing�"the trademark DM knife or something with a little more firepower. Either way, it probably wouldn’t matter, not as long as she got him close enough to touch before he whipped anything out. Anything other than his dick, of course. Emma didn’t mind when men whipped out that particular weapon. A man with his dick in his hand was a man with his head in the clouds. Or maybe someplace less wholesome than the clouds, someplace darker, more dangerous. The door creaked open and Blue Eyes stepped out of the bar, his movements confident but careful. He was a man used to watching his back, accustomed to keeping one eye peeled for possible threats. But she was one �śthreat” he would never see coming. They never did, not one single person in the eighteen years she’d been stealing from the wicked. �śOver here,” she said, her voice trembling a bit. The man turned toward her, looking even scarier in the shadows. �śWhat’s up?” �śYou said you were taking out the trash. Figured I had something that needed to be thrown away.” He held up the nearly empty tequila bottle and his features twisted into something Emma supposed was meant to be a smile. �śThat was thoughtful of you.” �śThat’s me�"thoughtful.” He closed the distance between them in four long steps and reached out, cupping her small breast in his hand and squeezing, making his intentions abundantly clear. Guess he wasn’t much for verbal foreplay. Good. Neither was she. �śSo, you want to do this here?” she asked, running one hand up into his greasy hair as he pulled her close, willing her fingertips to find the pressure points on the skull that made her job so much easier. She had to make sure he was one of the bad guys. It was what Father Paul had insisted upon, and she’d never gone against his teachings. She’d never wanted to. She might be a killer, but she wasn’t a monster. �śFuck, yeah. Here’s good.” He laughed and tipped the tequila bottle back, emptying it before throwing it against the bricks behind them. �śGood, I�"” Emma groaned as his mouth slammed down on hers, his tongue probing between her lips, sending secondhand tequila rushing into her throat. It was swallow or gag, but Emma regretted her decision to drink as soon as the tequila hit her stomach. Her belly clenched and cramped, while the dark craving grew even stronger, sizzling along her nerve endings, making her fingers feel as if they would catch fire at any moment. The telltale blue light erupted from her hands before she could even attempt to control it. She’d waited too long. She couldn’t remember feeling this weak, this needy, even in the months she’d been Ezra’s captive. He’d known what she was and had helped her survive, bringing her suitable �śsnacks” every few days. Fortunately the thug’s eyes were closed, but he would notice the pale blue glow sooner or later. She had to hurry. Forcing her attention away from the thick tongue that moved sluggishly in her mouth and the meaty hands squeezing first her breasts and then her ass, Emma concentrated on where her hands pressed against Blue Eyes’s greasy head, sending her intention out through her fingertips. Almost immediately, images began to flash on her mental screen�"Blue Eyes’s rat hole of an apartment near the ruins, the interior of a nearly empty fridge, the pile of dirty laundry he’d dug through to find his shirt for the evening. The mundane flooded in first, as it always did, but Emma swam deeper, sending her mind further into the man she touched, the dark need in her searching for what it craved. She found it seconds later�"the pale face of a little girl with her split lip bleeding from where one of Blue Eyes’s meaty fists had connected with her face, the corpse of a thin man the gang member had shoved out of a boat into demon-infested waters, the mascara-stained cheeks of a woman who screamed as his hand fisted in her hair. Emma had seen enough. More than enough. Silently she reversed the flow of her energy, no longer diving into her victim, but swimming to the surface, pulling his evil along with her. The horrible memories flowed into her fingers, up her hands, surging through her arms and into her chest, where they made her heart slam against her ribs as her body worked to disperse the energy to her demon-altered cells. The aura demons fed on the pain and suffering of humans; Emma fed on evil. It was a slight difference, but an important one. When her parents had given her blood to the demons, the very essence of her had been altered. In many ways, she was like the monsters that had nearly claimed her life. She craved human life force and stole the vitality of others in order to survive. But she stole only from those who deserved what she did to them, whose karmic balance was firmly tipped into the realm of evil. The choice allowed her to sleep at night, and as an added bonus �Ś Evil was damned tasty. Table of Contents Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Acknowledgments CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN CHAPTER ELEVEN CHAPTER TWELVE CHAPTER THIRTEEN CHAPTER FOURTEEN CHAPTER FIFTEEN CHAPTER SIXTEEN CHAPTER SEVENTEEN CHAPTER EIGHTEEN CHAPTER NINETEEN CHAPTER TWENTY CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO EPILOGUE Teaser chapter