Save My Soul (A Paranormal Romance: Preternaturals Book 2) Read online

  “A couple of weeks.”

  A sinister smile lit the other demon’s face. “So, either you’ve decided to try to convince her to help you break the curse, which I can tell you just from looking at her, won’t happen. Or . . . you’re already falling for her.”

  Luc remained silent.

  “Fine then. You work it out yourselves. Just don’t expect to see me again until you’ve sorted out your issues.”

  Cain dematerialized. Only his laughter remained, echoing off the walls of the kitchen. As soon as he was gone, the sexual possession left Anna, replaced by a feeling of revulsion. She couldn’t shut off the vivid pictures that continued to spin through her head. She’d felt mindless. The only thing she’d been able to think was how desperately she wanted Cain’s hands on her body and how she’d do anything to make it happen. Crawl, beg, plead, kill. Anything.

  “Oh God,” she said, sliding to the floor. She sat huddled, her hands wrapped tightly around her knees as the shame washed over her. How many hours had it been since she’d been eating peach cobbler and mocking clog dancers? That was her life. Not this.

  She was barely conscious of Luc crouching next to her, taking her hand in his. Anna thought at first he was there to comfort her. She didn’t have the presence of mind to push him away, though she resented him taking advantage of her moment of weakness.

  She looked up in time to see the knife and jerked her hand back, her eyes filling with tears. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m protecting you.” Luc cut a thin line down the center of his palm. “Expecting Cain to honor verbal tradition is like expecting the sun to set backwards. He thinks because he’s the boss, he’s above the law.” He took her hand gently, his thumb caressing her skin.

  “I’ll leave. I’ll leave the house,” Anna said, the panic seeping back into her voice. “Just don’t do any creepy blood rituals.”

  “It’s too late for that. Do you want him to get into your mind like that again? Do you want to feel what you just felt and have no control over it?”

  She shook her head. The idea made it feel like something dirty and slimy was slithering underneath her skin. She thought she might throw up. “Why do you care? This is what you are, too.”

  Luc avoided her eyes and made a matching cut down the center of her palm. She hissed as he clasped her hand in his, mingling their blood.

  “Are you stealing my soul?” She couldn’t believe that was her voice, that dead, hollow sound. Ten minutes ago she’d been feisty as Luc put it. Well, if he liked that in a girl, at least she was off the menu now.

  “Of course not. I can’t steal souls. That’s one thing we can’t coerce. This will bind you to me temporarily. Cain can’t feed from you or control your mind, and neither can any of his minions.”

  Luc stood, his wound already closing and forming a scar as he crossed the kitchen and took a hand towel from the drawer. He ran it under cool water and returned to wrap it around the injury he’d inflicted.

  “Anna?”

  “Yes?” She cradled her bandaged hand.

  “I have to feed.”

  She tensed and cringed away. “No.”

  Why was she saying no? It wasn’t like he couldn’t just do what Cain had done. He could make her want him. Somehow she knew if he got hungry and desperate enough, he might. Had this happened to Sara Johnson? Was that why she was rotting away in a padded cell right now?

  Why didn’t I leave when I had the chance? She’d been so cavalier about the whole thing. Scarlett and Rhett slipped into the room then, wrapping their small, warm bodies around her, offering silent support.

  “It’s not a yes or no proposition. I must feed.”

  “You guys are majorly weird. I’m just gonna go back to my dorm now.”

  Anna looked up to see the blonde wavering on wobbly legs as she tried to get herself re-oriented to her surroundings. Anna and Luc exchanged a look. They’d forgotten about her.

  “No,” Anna said, “I can’t let you do that. She’s drunk and . . . ”

  “I won’t harm her or do anything she doesn’t want to do. Of her own free will.”

  Anna shook her head.

  “And how exactly will you stop me? Do you really want to stand between a trapped demon and dinner? You can either stay or leave, but you have no power to prevent this. And further, I won’t let you. If I don’t feed, you won’t be safe.”

  She wouldn’t be able to listen to the moans again knowing what was causing them. She wondered how she could have ever thought it was a female ghost making those noises. Noises which now she couldn’t mistake as anything but a woman crying out in the throes of passion. The French called the moment of orgasm, la petite mort, the little death. Anna wondered if there was a large incubus population in France.

  Her eyes welled with unshed tears as she met his gaze. “Please don’t hurt her.”

  “Never.”

  She couldn’t stay there, couldn’t listen to him fucking someone else in her house. She needed to get out, get some air. Be somewhere that wasn’t here.

  Anna was afraid Cain might still be lurking nearby, but she was going to trust in whatever Luc had just done because she had to escape the way her universe had shifted sideways to become a place where magic and demons lived.

  Outside in the dark, the peach trees looked threatening, like they might break free of their roots and chase her down, dragging her kicking and screaming into some hell where Cain would have his way with her, and she’d writhe and moan in his arms while he did it.

  The moon lit the sidewalk as she ran the ten blocks to Tam’s house. She banged on the door, panting and trying to catch her breath.

  “Anna, what on earth . . . it’s 4 o’clock in the morn . . . ” Tam took a closer look at her. “I’ll make tea,” she said, stepping out of the way so Anna could get inside.

  She sat at a bar stool in Tam’s tiny kitchen filled with herbs, sipping the soothing Earl Grey brew. She told Tam everything, starting with Marshal, all the way to Luc and the blonde co-ed. “He could kill her, and I just left her there. I’m going to Hell.”

  “Hon, you don’t believe in Hell.” Tam stroked her fingers through Anna’s hair. Anna shot her a dirty look. “Sorry. Now probably isn’t the time for jokes. But from what you just told me, I’m not sure I believe he’d kill her.”

  “Really?” She looked hopeful. “Still . . . I can’t . . . What if she didn’t want to sleep with him and he . . . What if . . . ”

  She’d never forgive herself if that girl got hurt. The blonde might have been a stupid, drunk little twit, but Anna was pretty sure that wasn’t a reason to aid a demon.

  “Listen,” Tam said, “I know this probably isn’t the part to focus on, but I’m sorry I encouraged you to go out with Marshal. I had no idea he’d ever . . . ”

  Anna placed her hand over Tam’s and laughed. She wouldn’t have believed it a few hours ago, but in the grand scheme of things, Marshal Crust was barely factoring into her night.

  ***

  Luc stared out the front window long past the point he could see Anna. He’d been tempted to stop her. But what would he do? Chain her up? She was already scared to death of him.

  He needed her to break the curse on the house.

  You sure that’s why, buddy? his inner voice taunted.

  No, it wasn’t why. He’d spent the past two weeks working up the nerve to show himself and have a conversation with her. Somewhere during that time, an infatuation, perhaps even an obsession, had started to build.

  It was the little things about her. The way she twirled her long, chocolate brown hair while she read. The way she talked to characters on the television saying things like ‘Don’t go in that room!’ Her antics hiding from those crazy old biddies. The way she talked to her cats like they were people.

  And of course there were those delicious, soft curves she revealed far too often because she thought she was alone. He’d finally entered her dreams, promising himself he’d just take a little. Just eno
ugh to satisfy his curiosity.

  But it wasn’t just all of that. Her loneliness called out to him. He watched her when she looked in the mirror, brushing her hair at night. His chest tightened at the sad, wistful look in her eyes. He knew that look. The feeling that the emptiness could eat you away. He’d experienced the same thing for so long he felt a kinship with her.

  He should have just shown himself, talked to her. But every time he worked up to it, he lost the nerve and instead did some stupid, ghostly thing to see what she’d do with it. He might never have introduced himself at all if that dickhead hadn’t forced his hand.

  Luc had quietly seethed when he’d seen she’d brought a man home. He’d shut himself off in one of the upstairs bedrooms, pacing until he was sure he’d wear a hole in the carpet. He’d been angry over the fact that he was jealous of the man, that he hadn’t been able to bring himself to talk to her in all the time he’d lurked in the house. And now someone else had beat him to it.

  Her scream of pain and terror had been all it had taken to unleash the demon.

  And then he’d had to show himself.

  He turned back to the blonde, peering at him with fascination and undisguised lust from the kitchen, like she’d won the sex lottery. Well, that made it easy at least.

  Cain really did know how to pick them. Luc wouldn’t have to convince her sleeping with him was a good idea. He could tell from the look in her eyes that she was already halfway to mentally undressing them both. And mental undressing came about thirty seconds before the actual undressing. In his experience.

  Chapter Five

  Anna traced a finger over the scar the next morning. Whatever Luc had done had caused her hand to warp-speed through the healing process, skipping the scabbing stage altogether to leave a long, reddish line. The remaining mark seemed ominous and permanent, as if it sealed some yet-to-be-revealed fate between her and the demon in her house.

  Tam walked in then, her cropped hair already gelled into little spikes that only she could make look feminine. She poured a cup of coffee, ruined it with cream and sugar, and perched on a stool beside Anna.

  “I just talked to Bitsy and Mimi. They were outside when I went to get the paper. Marshal’s in the hospital, in ICU. They don’t know how he made it there alive.” Off Anna’s expression she said, “News travels fast here. You’ve been away too long. Story is wild dogs attacked him.”

  Anna took a moment to process that, wondering if it was a random rumor or a lie Marshal had fed the orderlies in his last moments of consciousness. She glanced back at the scar. “Can you drive me home?”

  Tam’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea.”

  Anna wasn’t sure it was such a good idea either, but it was what she was doing, regardless. She was feeling much braver in daylight. “I’m getting him out of my house. I’m not giving up. He’ll have to kill me first, and you don’t think he will so . . . ”

  “Hey, I’m not a Magic Eight Ball.”

  “Just take me home.”

  Tam took one look at her and sighed.

  When they pulled into Anna’s driveway, her friend made one last attempt to dissuade her. “You don’t have to prove anything. Just put the house up for sale.”

  Anna shook her head, determined. “This is my house. I’ll get him out. And then I’ll throw a party. Remember to be here tomorrow at ten. We have to work on more candles if we’re gonna get something into Sally’s by the end of the week.”

  “I’m coming in with you,” Tam said.

  “No, you aren’t. This is my mess, and I’m cleaning it.”

  “But . . . ”

  “Just go. He’s had two weeks. If he hasn’t hurt me yet, he’s probably not going to. Okay?”

  Tam looked uncertain but finally backed out of the driveway. Anna turned toward the house. She’d be damned if some freaky sex demon was going to screw up her Barbie Dream House.

  The dream house loomed over her, dark and foreboding even in the morning sunlight. She took a deep breath and marched purposefully through the yard and up the front steps. The door banged against the interior wall as she shoved it open.

  “Honey, I’m home!” Anna sang out, not expecting a response.

  “In here, Sweet Pea,” a deep voice called back from the kitchen.

  She gritted her teeth and followed the sound of his voice. The scene that greeted her arrival was unexpected to say the least. Luc, wearing nothing but a pair of faded blue jeans, was padding around the kitchen. Cooking.

  “Have you had breakfast?” he asked, flipping an omelet like a pro. Anna was beginning to understand his whole cooking channel fixation. He seemed to fancy himself the Emeril of the demon world.

  She crossed her arms over her chest and was about to respond when Malibu Barbie decided to make her presence known.

  “I thought you broke up with her!” the blonde accused in a pouty whine that made Anna’s head hurt. The tart was fully alive and way too perky to have just spent the night having wild monkey sex with darkness personified.

  “You didn’t kill her,” Anna said, unsure why that irritated her. Some of his evil must have seeped into her through the blood exchange.

  “I didn’t think you would like it.” He turned to the blonde. “Be sure to drink your orange juice, Rachel. You need to keep your energy up.”

  Rachel kissed him on the cheek and went to the table with her plate.

  “What? You’re planning on going at it again after she eats?” Anna whispered.

  “Of course not. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t. Not for a couple of days. I might drain too much. I don’t do that anymore, remember?”

  Anna latched onto the even if I wanted to part, not sure why she cared one way or the other. “So, you don’t want to . . . um sleep with her again?” Could I sound more like a desperate twit? It must be some kind of demon mojo.

  He raised an eyebrow and grinned. “God, no. She’s a simpering moron. They must just be letting anyone into university now. I’m sorely disappointed in this thing you call higher learning.”

  Anna turned away to hide a smile. Luc handed her a plate of food along with a small glass of juice. “You should drink your orange juice, too,” he said.

  Was that innuendo? Her eyes slid over his stomach, her gaze lingering at his waistband until he cleared his throat. She snapped out of it and went to the table, trying not to think about how awkward it was sitting across from Rachel. Not that it should be awkward.

  “So, if you guys are broken up, what are you doing here?” Rachel had decided not to bother with pleasantries like ‘good morning, did you sleep well?’

  Anna speared the other girl with a glare. “Well, see, this is my house. Luc just doesn’t know when he’s overstayed his welcome.”

  Rachel’s eyes went to the demon. “I thought you said the house belonged to you.” She seemed annoyed she wasn’t getting a nice big house with her newly-acquired sex god.

  Luc smiled at Anna. “I’ve been here a bit longer than you, dear. And possession is nine tenths.”

  “You’d know all about possession, wouldn’t you?” Anna shot back. She tried not to be affected by his warm smile. “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “You really are remarkable. I’ve never met a woman faced with what you were faced with last night who could be so together the next day.” He seemed embarrassed suddenly and turned away to load the dishwasher.

  “Excuse me!” Rachel said. “It looks to me like you two are still very much together. I don’t have to take this.” She pushed herself up from the table and flounced toward the door.

  Luc grabbed her faster than Anna could track. He placed one hand on either side of her face and stared deeply into her eyes. Anna thought for one sick moment he was going to kiss the blonde, who, judging from her look of breathless abandon, thought the same thing.

  “Sleep,” he said.

  “But I’m not sleepy . . . ” Rachel slumped unconscious to the
floor.

  He turned to Anna. “You’ve got thirty minutes before she wakes. I suggest you get her into the car and far away from here before then. She’ll be disoriented and have the barest recollection of me. Anything she remembers, she’ll believe to be a dream.”

  “What? Are you kidding me? Clean up your own mess. I’m not your minion or your pimp.” She almost backtracked and apologized when she saw the hurt look on his face.

  “Fine. Leave her. We’ll have a house guest. I can start building a harem. Rachel can be my number-one harem girl.”

  Anna glared at his retreating back and pulled the blonde up by her arms. Jesus. People weren’t kidding when they talked about dead weight.

  She flung Rachel into the car, slammed the passenger door, and went to retrieve her keys. Half an hour later found her driving aimlessly on the outskirts of town.

  Rachel stirred beside her. “It must have been some party, huh? I’m sorry, you look familiar, but I can’t place you.”

  “Anna.”

  “Right. Anna. So, um, thanks for driving me home. Where did we end up, anyhow?”

  “Some cabin out by the lake,” Anna lied.

  Rachel scrunched her nose. “I don’t remember.” The visor of the passenger side flipped down to reveal a small mirror. She pulled a tube of lip gloss from her pocket and swiped the wand over her lower lip.

  “Yes, well, you were drunk,” Anna said, not hiding her disgust.

  “Did I do something to piss you off?”

  “No, I’m sorry.” She didn’t know why she was being so hostile. If anything, Rachel had been a victim. One Anna had aided the demon in attaining, she reminded herself. She had no right to be so mean.

  Rachel rolled down the window and looked out at the passing blur of trees. She seemed all right. There were no marks on her, and she was happily oblivious. She’d been fully in control of her senses during breakfast and had seemed possessive of the man she’d spent the night with. Then again, what sane woman wouldn’t be possessive of a man that looked like Luc?