by Luna Quinn
By the time Sasha’s gaze returned to Razor, time had not only resumed, but seemed to go twice as fast now as they both tried to register what exactly had just happened between them. Something had shifted, the air feeling different, but she couldn’t name it.
He spun around in shock, taking in the scene and looking between the body and Sasha several times. “What the fuck?” he finally managed.
Her hands trembled, and she realized she still held his rifle. The gun that was not only a weapon, but by the look on his face, a part of him. Suddenly, this all felt too intimate for her. “Pay attention next time, asshole,” she ground out, quickly shoving the rifle at him. He took it deftly, his chest rising and falling too quickly. She really should move away from him. Right the fuck now.
As she drew back, their gazes connected, and his expression was a clash of emotions she didn’t want to see. Especially since anger and desire seemed to be in equal force, a dangerous mix for them both.
Get the hell out of here already, Sasha!
She wiped her palms against her jeans, but his gaze didn’t move from her face. His lips parted, and before he could say whatever he’d been about to say, she teleported the hell out of there.
Chapter Two
“Fuck.” Razor flicked the stub of his smoke away, the urine and who-the-fuck-knew-what other bodily fluids quickly extinguishing the herb blunt where it landed on the ground.
What was he doing here? He should have been long gone by now. He’d hunted down his prey, and like the rabid dog the bastard had been, Razor had put him down. So why hadn’t he moved on? Hell, he had a whole list of things to take care of today all on the newly Sin-upgraded phone. It was a tidy little list, organized with bullets and side notes and perfectly spaced font just the way he liked it, just begging to be checked off. His hands twitched, and if he didn’t cross off all his to-dos soon, he’d possibly begin to hyperventilate.
So then why was he standing in this stank-ass alley, his eyes glued to the spot where he’d just killed a man?
Oh, he knew exactly what he was waiting for. What he didn’t know was why.
The what was an infuriatingly sexy Reaper with turquoise eyes that always looked at him like she wanted to cut off his balls and stuff them in his mouth.
He snorted. She wouldn’t be the first to resort to such threats to get him to shut up. His brothers always said Razor talked too damn much. It wasn’t his fault he always had such clever things to say.
But since that day in the alley, when Sasha had so gracefully and easily snatched his rifle from his body, Razor hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her.
As if he needed yet another excuse to think about her. It was as if she’d imbedded herself even deeper inside his head that day. He was entirely too aware of everything about her now. He wasn’t talking about anything physical, either—the Goddess knew he’d noticed that plenty—but on a strange and primal level. Even his beast was eager, curious, to be close to her. That was strange in and of itself. His Hellhound side had never shown such interest before.
Sasha had certainly surprised him that day, caught him completely off guard. And yes, vulnerable too. He’d been so distracted by her, by concern and suspicion, that he’d left his back exposed. A stupid mistake. Something that shouldn’t have ever happened. She had so easily taken possession of one of his most intimate possessions, second only to his dick, that he’d been shocked motionless. The memory of the speed with which she’d snatched up his rifle still sent little waves of arousal and fear down his spine. Fear, because he was now certain that, if she had wanted to, she could have taken him out the same way she had the threat—efficiently and with such lethal grace he wouldn’t have seen it coming. It had been a one hell of a wake-up call.
After she’d vanished, leaving him wide eyed and more than a little turned on, Razor had wanted to run away. To vow to the Goddess that he’d never go near Sasha again.
His beast had had a different idea.
With bright eyes, perked ears, and a wagging tail, his Hellhound side had stared after Sasha. And even after Razor had commanded the idiot to stop because he was panting after trouble, his beast had huffed and demanded they go after her, to play and test out that cunning and strength she had shown.
More worrisome, something had shifted for him after that. For them. It wasn’t that he hadn’t known she was a tough woman and could handle herself in a fight. But no one, and he meant no one, other than his brothers had been able to get one up on Razor in a long time.
It both infuriated and confused the crap out of him.
One thing had become clear, though: he hadn’t really known Sasha. Not really. Stupidly, he had believed he had. His eyes had been opened that day, and he wasn’t sure if it was a good thing or not, but he was absolutely captivated now.
It made him ponder about fate and such. How that one act, snatching up his rifle, had changed the nature of their relationship. Well, at least for him it had. He had felt something strange and new coming from her, but as was the norm with her, he couldn’t be sure.
Razor rubbed the tiredness from his eyes. The last few days had been filled with work, and to his annoyance, with flashbacks of Sasha holding his rifle in her capable hands, aiming over his shoulder and firing true at the walking corpse. Sleep had been hard to come by.
Even now, if he closed his eyes, he could see her in his mind’s eye… Blue-green eyes focused, dark eyebrows lowered in concentration, wide shoulders squared, and her aim steady. Her scent, like thunderstorms on a tropical beach.
Strong warrior…want her…want to be worthy of her…want to be hers.
A small shiver raced over him at the words, words that seemed to pop up inside his head more often lately. Whether they came from him or his beast, it didn’t matter. They were all true.
His attention returned to the present when Sasha appeared by the body. Unlike everyone else who had to use the gateways, Reapers had the ability to transport anywhere instantly. One minute they were in one spot, and the next, they were butt-fuck there.
Shadow Realm had three Reapers assigned as the soul guides to the dearly departed—or forcefully departed. The Reapers came to the scene of a death, collected the soul, and delivered it to whichever gate they were destined to enter: the Realm of Eternity—or as it was known to humans, Heaven—or the other option, the Pit.
Once the collected soul was at the correct gate, another escort, a Receiver, would meet the Reaper and take the soul to its final destination. That had always sounded less than convenient to him. Having one escort would surely save them on payroll, right? However, he had learned there were reasons for the transfer system which had nothing to do with convenience and everything to do with boundaries.
He smirked. The only thing the human religion books from before the Great Fires had gotten right was that the Pit was a place bad souls went. But what they hadn’t known until after the Great Fires and the subsequent revelation of the Others and new realms, was that their torture and eternal suffering in the Pit was what fueled the black magic of the universe. So, too, did the good souls that went to so-called Heaven. Good souls produced white magic, bad souls black. It was all about balance.
They might have gotten the essence of the Pit right, but the Pit was only a small part of the Underworld. The land of his birth wasn’t at all how their books painted it. Like the human realm, the Underworld had cities, people both good and bad, jobs for those people, and mountains and pretty lakes. Though some of the terrain was certainly…deadlier than the humans’, it was still a world very similar to New Earth.
There were times he missed the beauty of his birthplace. Then he remembered what his life had been like there and he got over it.
“Fucking Hellhounds.” The words came from the prettiest lips Razor had ever seen. Sasha’s gaze landed on what was left of the dead Demon—which was little more than body parts thrown haphazardly on the side of the street.
He watched as she surveyed the scene, her slim figure mo
ving, silent and stealthy around the body parts, a grimace on her face.
The Demon had put up a good fight, Razor would give him that. The fucker hadn’t wanted to die. Too bad for him. Once you got on Razor’s to-do list, there were only two ways to get off of it: die or—no, that was pretty much it.
The one way to get off his list wasn’t always pretty; Sasha should have known that by now. Did she think he had gone too far? If she knew what the bastard had done, she wouldn’t think so.
You shouldn’t even be here, much less care what she thinks.
Rubbing a hand over his closely cropped hair, he cursed inwardly again. If his brothers got wind of his new favorite little hobby, he’d never hear the end of it.
Shifting a little deeper into the shadows of the alley, he let himself take in the sight of Sasha. There was so much to admire about her.
From the tip of her shit-kicker boots to the top of her corkscrew curls, she was truly beautiful. Stray wisps that slipped out of her hairband gently swept back and forth over her shoulders as she analyzed the remains. Her body reflected the hours of exercise she obviously put in. Wide shoulders and back, with hints of toned muscle. She was athletic, with gently curving muscles in her abdomen. Not that she was showing skin just now, but Razor had seen her a time or two when she’d collected a soul in workout clothes.
He had never met any other woman that could make a four-pack look so damn sexy.
She was tall for a female; he’d put her at five-foot ten, give or take. But with him being six-foot three, she still had to tilt her head up to meet his gaze. Something he really, really liked. Watching her eyelashes flutter in annoyance before moving up to glare death promises into his eyes, her obvious dislike of him burning in her sea-green eyes. But it was the occasional spark of humor, and, dare he say, attraction, he saw deep in them that had him coming back for more.
He didn’t understand it because he barely had to breathe in her direction and her claws were out. What he should have been was annoyed by her, not fascinated. And maybe he saw what he wanted, but he would say that Sasha, more often than not, enjoyed their banter, too.
“I can hear the fleas crawling all over you, you smelly mutt. Come out so I can direct you to the nearest pet store,” she suddenly called out, her voice sounding as if she was dying of boredom. “Might I suggest a flea collar, Razor?”
He chuckled, excitement swirling in his belly. Even as he wondered how the fuck she had caught on to his presence.
As a Hellhound, he was a predator down to his very bones. Sneaking was part of his nature. He’d never once been caught while becoming one with his surroundings, just as he’d been doing now. Even if Sasha had senses like his, the stench of the alley should have canceled out any of his natural scent. There was just no way she should have been able to sense him. Yet, she had.
Goddess, the woman was unnerving! And once again, alarms were going off in his head. Back off, go, go, go! But just as he had after the rifle incident, he ignored them.
He kept his body relaxed as he pushed off the wall and strolled over, trying hard not to give away any of his warring emotions. “Sasha, how the hell are ya?”
She eyed him suspiciously, sweeping his body up and down before settling on his face. She crossed her arms over her chest. Ouch. She hadn’t even paused anywhere on him, as if she’d found nothing of interest.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, ignoring his greeting.
He stopped a few feet away. “You didn’t answer my question, Reaper.”
“That’s because I didn’t feel like answering it, Hellhound.”
He smiled at the way she emphasized the word. She was pissed. That was quick. Must be some kind of record for him.
Since he was still unsure what had set off the change in her demeanor in the alley with the zombie, Razor had decided to keep all future teasing light. He hadn’t liked it one bit how she had seemed to close off after his not-so-subtle offer. That wasn’t the only reason, though. Discovering that he didn’t know her as well as he thought he had left him feeling unbalanced. He would proceed with caution.
“Fair enough,” he told her.
“So again, what are you doing here? Don’t you have judge-y business to attend to?”
He looked away because he was about to lie, big time. He pretended to find the blood under his fingernails interesting. “The dead dude had some buddies with him tonight, thought maybe they’d come looking for him. I need this whole gang dead. They’re breaking laws left and right, and I’m not that tolerant of assholery.”
It was mostly true, he supposed. There had definitely been a gang, but he’d already killed them all tonight. This guy had been the last.
When he looked up, she was already looking at him.
Even when several steps, a shredded leg, and half a torso separated them, Sasha’s gaze remained wary, her body tensed and ready for anything. He wondered if it was because the air between them kept crackling, growing more charged the longer they stood together.
He offered her a smile when she didn’t immediately say anything. And, man, keeping a respectful distance from her was harder than he had thought. Since that day in the alley, all he wanted was to pounce on her, to play and sniff and lick, and, if she’d allow it, fuck her until he discovered what it was about her that drew him in without fail. Perhaps then he could move on and put an end to this growing obsession.
Chancing it just a little, he stepped around the bloody mess. Sasha watched him for another moment before clearly deciding he wasn’t a threat. Her body relaxed slightly.
“What did they do?” she asked, her gaze back on the bloody mess.
“I caught this one beating one of his call girls tonight. He’d had warnings about paying them their proper percent before. But the complaints stopped after that. Then tonight I go to check on him, and…” He took a few deep breaths, still fuming over what he’d witnessed. “I talked to every single one of his girls. They were scared, but they told me how often it was happening lately.”
She shook her head. “Bastard. I know I’m not supposed to be this happy about someone dying, but some people deserve it.”
The arms she’d unfolded from across her chest now hung loosely at her sides, but when she saw how close he suddenly was, she glanced up at him, frowning. He’d walked around until he was standing next to her. Not touching her, but close enough that only two steps separated their shoulders. Electricity fizzed in the space between their bodies.
He sensed more than saw her hands turn into fists. Was she planning on hitting him?
He wanted to laugh. Not at her, but at himself, because his dick seemed to be finding the visual of Sasha sucker punching him very…exciting.
He was about to take a few steps back when her body visibly relaxed again. She shook her head in a berating manner. Razor frowned, but then she surprised him by lightly patting him on the shoulder.
“The streets are yet again safe thanks to the great judge,” she teased, her eyes soft with laughter.
Razor blinked and then grinned when his brain caught up. She was playing with him.
Pleasure bloomed in his chest, both Razor and his beast eager to participate.
Sighing dramatically, he shrugged in mock modesty. “It’s all in a day’s work, pretty girl.”
He had expected her to laugh, and when she didn’t and only stared up at him with some emotion he couldn’t name swirling in her eyes, he began to worry. Shit, had he screwed up by using the endearment again?
Heartbeats passed, but still, she said nothing. When the silence stretched, he started getting twitchy. What was she thinking? Was there a chance Sasha was feeling the same confusing emotions that he did?
When the moment turned into awkward silence, she finally inhaled deeply, her chin lifting a fraction. He was hit with disappointment to see a wall come up again over her gaze. Still, he kept his grin in place.
“Well, as you can see, no one came.” She made a shooing motion with her hand. “Now move
along. I have a soul to collect.”
Razor’s smile slid off his face. He didn’t like it when she grew cold around him, but he hated it more when she dismissed him so rudely.
The predator inside him reacted instantly. He closed the distance between them, a rumbling sound coming from deep in his chest. As he’d known she would, Sasha stayed put. Didn’t back down, didn’t cower like any other person would. And dammit, another thing he liked about her. A lot. The fact that she stood up to him only made him want her more.
He was careful not to physically touch her. Her hair was held away from her face by a wide black band, but the rest of the curls shifted slightly with his heavy breaths, brushing the side of her neck. He inhaled her scent, and she just stood there as if one of the feared Hellhounds weren’t standing in deadly proximity to her jugular.
He could smell her hair, coconut and lemongrass. He could smell her.
Hellfire, she smelled good.
“I’m not scared of you,” she said.
“Good.” Razor tried to keep his voice calm, but there was no way to keep the slight growl out of it. “I’m not trying to scare you. But I want to make sure you hear me, Reaper. You don’t like me half the time. I get that, and am okay with it. But you will respect me the same way I respect you. You want me to leave, tell me. Don’t treat me like a fly circling your lunch.”
Her breathing had sped up a little, and he was thankful and more than a little stunned that it wasn’t fear suddenly coming from her, but chagrin. Yet another thing unique to Sasha. It was usually difficult to read her by scent, which was beyond frustrating since scents were important to predators like Razor and his brothers. He could tell a lot by the way a person smelled; that he could read Sasha at this moment had him feeling more than a little amazed.
He blamed that feeling for what he did next. Razor hadn’t planned on, didn’t even catch himself doing so until he had already done it.