Soul Thief (Dark Souls)

by Hope, Anne

  Cloaked or not, he had to track her down.

  Angie sat at the edge of Turtle Pond, gazing at her intangible reflection, trying to work up the nerve to head over to Reach. Fifteen minutes passed, then thirty, then an hour, and still she remained rooted to the bank.

  This was where Adrian had kissed her, where he’d stolen her memories. She’d recovered some of them, but she sensed that there were others. Others that continued to elude her. Others that would explain what had transpired last night.

  He’d been with her in her room—she was sure of it—not physically but in spirit. She couldn’t explain how he’d done it, but he’d somehow crept inside her soul and brought to the surface all the feelings she fought to deny. He’d invaded her mind and heart, and she’d been powerless to resist him.

  “What are you, Adrian?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” The words echoed through her head as though he’d actually spoken them. Maybe at some point, he had.

  Her fingers rose to caress the pendant she wore around her neck—the angel wings her mother had given her to keep her safe. She pictured Adrian stroking the gold while scrutinizing her with his hypnotic gaze.

  Awareness suddenly washed over her, sending a pleasant prickle skittering down her arms. “How long have you been standing there?”

  Adrian stepped from the shadows, his low-slung jeans hugging his lean hips. A black T-shirt stretched across his broad chest beneath the bomber jacket he always wore, despite the bullet hole marring the soft leather. The sight of him took her breath away. He resembled a bronze statue, carved in all the right places.

  “Only a minute or two.” He approached her in swift, confident strides. It should be illegal to have legs that long. “Why didn’t you come in today?”

  As if he really had to ask. If he denied what had happened between them last night, Angie swore she’d punch him.

  “I needed a little time alone to think.”

  His shoulders stiffened, and he looked every bit the statue she’d compared him to earlier. “About what?”

  She stood and boldly walked up to him, even as every instinct within her urged her to retreat. “You.”

  She wasn’t sure if the look she caught on his face was one of pleasure or guilt. Maybe it was a bit of both.

  Swallowing her discomfort, she decided to broach the subject she’d been avoiding. “Since you bulldozed your way into my life, you’ve completely dominated it. Dominated me. Now you’ve gone and invaded my mind, too.”

  His steely expression gave nothing away.

  “Go ahead,” she challenged. “Deny it.”

  “No. I won’t lie to you, Angie. Never again.” He raised his hand and cradled her face in his wide palm. “I know what I did to you last night was wrong, but I can’t bring myself to regret it. I showed you what it could be like between us, if you’d just let it.” His head swooped down until his nose grazed hers, but he stopped short of kissing her.

  Angie closed her eyes. She had to. Too many conflicting emotions ran rampant within her. She wanted to push him away, to grab him and pull him closer. The desire to flee assailed her, even as a secret ache bloomed in her heart. She raised her chin and forced her eyes open, fighting the burning need to bridge the small space that separated their mouths. He was so close, she could feel his sweet breath on her lips, but the distance that divided them might as well have been a chasm.

  A blade of light pierced through the trees, and light spilled over him, haloing his head. He looked ethereal, as insubstantial as a shadow backlit by the sun. Angie gripped the winged pendant she wore around her neck again, her fingers stroking the cool metal.

  A distant memory taunted her, flirted with her, dared her to open her mind to the impossible, and a question escaped her lips before she could stop it. “Are you an angel?”

  He jerked away, releasing her. Angie mourned the abrupt loss of physical contact. She could see his internal battle to come clean with her, even as common sense warned him to tread carefully. “How much do you remember?”

  “Not much. It’s just a feeling, an impression. For some reason, I keep coming back to angels.”

  He walked over to the shelf of rocks that bordered the pond and lowered his body onto it. “Fallen angels.” He spoke so softly she hardly heard him. “I’m one of their descendants.”

  A flood of memories buffeted her. “That freakish army in the subway, the man with the icy blue eyes…”

  He nodded. “He’s my uncle and a Kleptopsych. That means he was born soulless. As for me, I’m what they call a Hybrid. I actually got to have a soul for a short time.” He raised his gaze to hers, and the ground shook beneath her feet, right before he yanked it out from under her completely. “Then I died.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Adrian watched Angie for a reaction, unsure if he’d made a mistake confiding in her again. There was just something about her that pierced all his defenses and made him long to confess everything to her. He wanted her to know him, truly know him. Only then could she belong to him.

  “Hybrids are born human,” he explained. “Dual forces sustain us—a soul and the dark energy that fuels the Kleptopsychs, like my uncle, Kyros. Quite often, we don’t realize what we are until we die and our souls leave our bodies. When this happens, we are reborn. Our entire body chemistry alters. We become invulnerable to injury and disease. We uncover hidden powers, like the ability to manipulate human thoughts and emotions.”

  She came to sit beside him. “What happens to a Hybrid’s soul?”

  “It’s recycled, reborn. Rarely do we have the good fortune of finding it again. If we do, an instant connection is forged, and it takes an inhuman amount of strength to walk away from it.”

  Understanding came into her eyes, made them glitter like the gold necklace she wore. “Am I the one?” She brought her hand to her chest, as though she could actually touch the chain of energy that linked them to one another. “Do I have your old soul?”

  He’d promised her he would never lie to her again. “Yes.”

  “Do you want it back?”

  Her question rattled him. “No. I’d never harm you. You have to know that.” He reached for her hand, blanketing it in his. “I just want to be with you. I need to be with you.” Never before had he been this honest with anyone.

  Pain slashed across her features, and something inside Adrian curled into a tight ball, then withered to ash. He hadn’t considered the possibility that she might reject him till now.

  “Is there any chance—” She hesitated.

  “Is there any chance of what?”

  “That I’m a Hybrid.” Her voice quivered with reluctant hope.

  “No. You’re one hundred percent human.” As far as he could tell, there was no trace of darkness in her.

  The disappointment he caught in her eyes perplexed him. She was quiet for an exceptionally long time, probably busy processing everything he’d told her. Then she flung another question at him. “Exactly how old are you, Adrian?”

  “A hundred and sixty-eight years old.”

  “So you’re immortal?”

  “Yes.”

  Silence swelled to envelop them again. Angie yanked her hand away, fisting it in her lap. Her posture grew stiff and guarded.

  “I’ve upset you.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?” Last time he’d confided in her, she’d taken the news surprisingly well. It was obvious that something had changed between them since then. Something that suddenly made his invincibility painful for her to bear.

  “Because you’re immortal, and I’m not.”

  He reached for her, pulled her close and wrapped her in his arms. “One lifetime is all I can ask for.” He knew he was condemned to lose her one day, but every moment he spent with her was a blessing well worth the inevitable pain that awaited him at some distant point in the future.

  He lowered his head, intending to kiss her, but she stopped him by placing her palm on his chest. “I don
’t even have one lifetime.” A single tear trickled down her cheek, its soft glide across her pale skin as graceful as it was bitter. “I’m dying, Adrian.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Boiling clouds abruptly rolled in from the north to choke the sun. The wind picked up speed, sending leaves spiraling through the air and making the water ripple. Angie extricated herself from Adrian’s embrace and looked around her. “Are you doing this?”

  His features were sharp, his expression murderous. Right there and then, she had no trouble believing he was a fallen angel. All that was missing was a pair of wings and a lethal sword, like the one often depicted in the hand of the Archangel Michael.

  Adrian didn’t answer her question. His chest heaved as he stood and walked closer to the bank, whether in pain or rage, she couldn’t say. The trees shook their green-capped heads in silent reprimand.

  “Please say something.” She was an honest-to-God idiot. How could she have blurted out the truth that way?

  Great going, Ange. Smooth, real smooth.

  The shock of seeing Mother Nature go on a rampage had effectively dried her tears, but the skin on her cheeks still felt tight and tender.

  He stood on the rocky ledge, staring at the pond, his back to her. Tension had turned every inch of him to polished steel. His skin was smooth and sculpted, the muscles on his arms and back bulging. His shoulders were hunched, as if he fought to contain or subdue something unimaginable and powerful.

  “How?” That one simple word spoken from his lips gave flight to all the butterflies in her stomach. He directed his razor-sharp gaze her way. “How are you dying?”

  She filled her lungs with an emboldening breath. Cool, damp air slid down her throat. “Six years ago I was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. I’m in remission now, have been for four years, but I’m not cured. The only way to ensure the disease doesn’t come back is a bone marrow transplant.”

  “Then that’s what we’ll get you.” He made it sound so simple.

  She rose and approached him. She wanted to reach out and touch him, but his dark mood discouraged her from doing so. “It’s not that easy. The donor has to be a genetic match.”

  He spun on her so suddenly, she nearly stumbled back. In one stride he narrowed the distance between them and seized her by the arms. “I won’t let you die.”

  She could tell by looking at him that he wasn’t the kind of guy who accepted defeat. His certainty almost made her believe that he could do it, that he could singlehandedly save her.

  “It’s not up to you.” She lowered her tone to a soft whisper. “But there is one person who could be a match.”

  “Who? Tell me who that person is and I’ll track him down and make sure he gives you what you need.”

  Despite the heavy stone lodged in her chest, Angie smiled. Overprotective men could be a real pain sometimes, but they could also be undeniably sweet.

  “You can’t. She hasn’t been born yet.” Her mother was so convinced the child she carried was a girl that Angie had become accustomed to thinking of her sibling this way. In truth, the baby could very well be a boy. “My mother’s pregnant. If the baby’s a match, the doctors could use the stem cells to cure me.”

  The fight in him eased, and his shoulders relaxed. “What are the chances this child will be a match?”

  Angie hesitated. The last thing she wanted was for him to get his hopes up like her mother, only to end up disappointed. “I’m not sure. A full sibling would’ve been a better bet. As it stands, this baby is only a half-sibling.”

  Before her father died, her parents had attempted to conceive through in-vitro fertilization in the hopes of producing a donor for her. They’d gone to the best clinics, undergone numerous unsuccessful treatments. Angie was convinced the stress and disappointment of these attempts had ultimately triggered her father’s heart attack. He died the day after they’d learned the fourth and final treatment had failed.

  “But there’s a chance?”

  She tamped down a sigh. “My mother seems to think so.”

  Adrian dissected her with his keen stare. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

  A turtle sat on a moss-covered rock. Briefly, it poked its head out to look at them, only to promptly retreat within its shell. “I’m just trying to be realistic. My mother’s blind faith scares me. If it turns out this baby isn’t a match, it’ll destroy her.”

  He drew closer, his presence invading her personal space until she became painfully aware of him. The rustle of his clothing as he approached, the sound of his breathing, the unique, seductive scent of him overloaded her senses and made her long to let him carry her burden. “Maybe she needs to believe.”

  “Maybe.” Angie swallowed a sigh. “But to go off and have a one-night stand—” She shook her head. “That’s just not like her.” A familiar heaviness settled in her chest. “She won’t even tell me who the father is.”

  He touched her cheek with gentle fingers. “It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that this child—however it came to be—cures you, because now that I’ve found you, there’s no goddamn way I’m letting you go.”

  He watched her with an intensity that turned her knees to water. Hoping to steady herself, she clutched his shirt and held on to him. His strength enveloped her, strangled her fears, filled her with the very hope she’d been struggling to hold at bay.

  “What if you don’t have a choice?”

  The clouds parted slightly, and daggers of light cleaved the sky. Maybe it was a sign that the turmoil within Adrian had eased.

  “Then I swear I’ll find you again.” He stroked her face with a tenderness that threatened to make the tears come. “Even if it takes me ten lifetimes, I’ll find you.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Angie wanted to remember everything. Now that she’d uncovered Adrian’s secret, the need to know him—really know him—consumed her. So she persuaded him to take her back to the theater in Times Square, where he claimed he’d first confessed to her. The building in question was a two-story, redbrick structure adorned with posters and flashing neon lights. The place was closed at the moment, the windows dark. The first showing wasn’t until later in the evening.

  “Do you want to go inside?” he asked her tightly, as though he didn’t really relish the thought.

  “How? The place is locked.”

  He flashed that wicked, melt-your-bones grin of his. “We’ve had this conversation before.” To her surprise, the door magically swung open.

  “And I guess the same thing happened last time.”

  “Pretty much.” He arced his arm in a gesture that was so over-the-top chivalrous it made her chuckle.

  She squeezed past him, squinting to see in the dark. Adrian walked in after her, and the door magically slammed shut in his wake. He flicked a switch, and light flooded the place. Angie took in her surroundings with a touch of fascination. Red velvet drapes adorned the narrow windows, copper doorknobs and light fixtures glinted in the artificial lighting, and a thick carpet stretched beneath her feet.

  “It looks exactly like the theater in the flashbacks I’ve been having,” she told him.

  “That’s because it is.”

  She touched one of the doorknobs. “You shouldn’t be in here. Copper makes you sick.” She couldn’t remember how she knew that. She just did.

  “I’ll be all right as long as we don’t stay too long.”

  In a trancelike gait, she ventured farther into the theater, stopping only when she reached a plush blue sofa. With reverent fingers, she caressed the backrest. “I fell asleep on this couch. You stayed here all night with me.”

  Midnight-blue eyes silently observed her.

  “Why? That must’ve been pretty uncomfortable for you.”

  He bridged the distance between them until she could feel the energy resonating from his body. His head fell forward. “I needed to make sure you were safe.” Her cheek prickled where his breath touched it.

  She fought t
he urge to close her eyes and thrust her chin up in unvoiced invitation. “Safe from who? Your uncle?”

  He nodded, his gaze affixed to her mouth. A pleasant shiver raced down her back, and she almost forgot her next question. “Why was he after me?”

  “Not was, is. He realized my old soul dwells within you.” His voice deepened, took on a morbid quality. “Now he’ll stop at nothing to destroy it.”

  Angie’s blood ran cold. “If you’re trying to freak me out, it’s working.”

  He palmed her face. “I won’t let him anywhere near you. No one will take you from me.” His fingers stroked her cheek. The caress was so sweet, so tender, emotion clogged her windpipe. If she had forever at her disposal, there was no doubt in her mind she would spend it with Adrian.

  “Kyros can’t track you,” he explained. “I made sure of it. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t looking for you.” He gripped her by the shoulders and squeezed. “The best thing for you to do is to move away from New York.”

  Her stomach folded in protest. “I can’t do that. My life is here—my home, my mother, my work…everything.”

  “Maybe so, but your safety has to come first. You have no idea what my uncle is capable of.”

  Her hands rose to his chest. Corded muscles spread beneath her palms, warm to the touch. “I can’t move. I won’t.”

  “Then you leave me no choice.” Decisiveness hardened his features. “I’m going to have to guard you every minute of the day.” He lowered his mouth to her ear, whispered silkily, “And night.”

  A pleasant shiver ran down her spine. “Is that a threat or a promise?”

  “Both.” His eyes sparkled with a predatory gleam that was more seductive than a hot kiss or an intimate touch.

  Her body grew warm and languid, and she melted like butter in his embrace. Every hard, muscled inch of him pressed against her, sending small sparks of pleasure racing over her skin. A pocket of heat formed around her heart, until the darn thing bucked and sputtered in her chest.

  A feral smile split his face, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he’d heard it.