Red Demon

by Deidre Knight

  “What? You like to be in pain? That’s just stupid and way too macho.”

  “I am not one of your Spartans! I have no need to prove my manhood at every turn.”

  “Then you do enjoying suffering.” She nodded, sucking in her upper lip. “Yeah, makes sense. Demon. Check. Anguish as drug of choice. Got that, too.”

  “You are a very strange person, Sophie Lowery,” he said honestly. “You confuse me greatly.”

  She beamed at his remark. “I’m so glad! That’s a wonderful compliment.”

  He shook his head, mystified. “And you seem stranger by the day. Why would you want to help a creature like me? I wish only to bring torment on you and your kind. Perhaps you’d do well to remember that the next time you try laying those healer’s hands upon my body.”

  “And also like your kind, you trade in deceit and lies. Noted.”

  “Your point?” He stomped indignantly, folding both arms across his chest, which was smooth and free of horns because of how she’d touched him.

  “You like me.” She smiled up at him, her light blue eyes sparkling in pleasure. “A lot.”

  He shivered, rearing back. “And you call me the liar.”

  She shrugged, rooted to where she stood. “No, I just call it like I see it, Sable.”

  A movement in the distance caught his attention. It was the spirit—well, Layla and the spirit, joined in one physical body—walking down the sidewalk with Ari.

  “What force does Aristos bargain with?” he asked absently. “Does he even understand?”

  Sophie frowned, tracking with his gaze. “That’s Juliana.”

  “Is it?” he returned evenly.

  “Do you know her?” Sophie stared up at him, a flash of surprise, maybe even concern, in her expression.

  Inside his chest, his heart began to thunder, hammering at an accelerated tempo. He should warn her, warn all of them, he thought. The Spartans shared a common cause with him. Two, really: the desire to keep Ares at bay, and to live according to their own rules, not the god’s cruel will.

  He gave his head a shake, trying to cling to his true nature, shoving aside the lying, half- human portion of his soul. Lately, that bastardized bloodline of his had become abominably irritating. He felt wave upon wave of malevolence rise inside of him like bile. Yes, he thought with satisfaction, you are still wicked.

  He smiled, welcoming it, inviting the rush of depravity. . . .

  But not before grabbing Sophie’s arm, shaking it harshly. “Be aware of the darkness you entertain in your midst,” he hissed.

  She stared up at him, her feathery black eyebrows lifting in confusion. Slowly she replied, “I walk in the light. You know that.”

  He shook his head. “Because of the light in you, Sophie Lowery, evil follows you everywhere you go.”

  Like me, he thought, galloping out of the square. Like me, drawn to you and always unable to stay away.

  He turned back, his lips pulling into a twisted imitation of a smile as he gave one last warning. “Careful, Sophie. Something wicked this way comes.”

  They’d wandered in and out of several brand- name stores, but it wasn’t until they left Broughton Street and started nosing around some indie designer boutiques on Oglethorpe that Ari got genuinely interested. Banana Republic had been an exercise in the sexually frustrated (himself) doing their level best to appear gentlemanly (occasionally himself).

  While Em and Sophie had dragged Juliana back into the dressing room of that store to try things on, he’d been left with little else beyond his impatient imagination. It was rife with images of Juliana in that blue satin robe, hair tumbling all down her back. His hands working their way through those tresses and then skimming all over her body. Moving them over her breasts with long, careful strokes, then lower still, down between her legs, where he’d no doubt find a silky tuft of auburn that matched the hair atop her head.

  Not exactly the sorta thing you were supposed to fantasize about while shopping in Banana Republic, but then again he wasn’t exactly the sorta guy who usually frequented that store. Nor was Juliana their typical customer, for that matter. What was up with that chain’s name, anyway? He’d done a few tours down in Central America, spent enough time to know that a banana republic was hardly a politically correct concept. And he’d never been particularly impressed by what anyone was wearing down in those regions, either.

  While in the store, Sophie and Em had seemed determined to give him some sort of fashion makeover, with Soph muttering “Project Runway reject” at him under her breath every five minutes. That and “Slouchy black T-shirts don’t emphasize your physique. At least get tight ones.”

  He’d plucked at the front of his tee, thinking that Jules had seemed to admire his look well enough earlier and she was the only one whose opinion really mattered. Still, a niggling bit of insecurity had gotten him trying on a few leather jackets, including a size XXL black duster that Sophie had discovered. She’d ogled him in it, saying, “Yeah, work it. Own it.”

  He’d given her a blank look until Emma had explained, “Ignore her. She’s seen Pretty Woman way too many times.”

  Finally, the ladies had decided to move on, with a wide-eyed and somewhat dazed Juliana in tow.

  “It’s so . . . bright. All those electric lights and silver and mirrors . . . and that pounding music made my head hurt,” she said, hesitating on the bustling sidewalk. Saturdays were big shopping and tourist days in downtown Savannah, even with the aftermath of Hurricane Eric still causing the occasional downpour. “And the smells are . . . not very pleasant here on the street.” She rubbed her forehead, eyes fluttering.

  “You all right, Jules?” He had his arm around her in an instant, afraid she might faint. It was a lot to process, more than a hundred years in the span of a few hours. For him, the past millennia had moved second by second, hour by hour, and although the years became a blur after a while, at least he had a human’s timeframe for processing them.

  “I’m fine,” she said, smiling up at him, but he couldn’t help thinking she looked a bit pale around the feminine edges. She wore a flowing sundress that Emma had loaned her, one that fell to just above her knee because Juliana was at least two inches taller than Em. But the fit had been close enough, and given the other alternative—that high-necked Victorian gown—the dress worked.

  He reached for her hand, looping it through the crook of his arm. It felt strange to be out here on the same streets where they’d once walked, she in her promenade dresses, parasol in hand, he in his fine suits and gloves. To touch her openly, with his bare hands, took some getting used to on his part. No wonder she blushed and hesitated briefly before sliding her hand firmly through his arm.

  “We gotta find something that’ll work for you,” he said, lower so Emma and Sophie wouldn’t hear. They were forging ahead, leading the way. “Soon,” he added more huskily, making it clear that he had important plans in mind.

  Juliana glanced down at her borrowed dress, smoothing it out. “I thought this was the fashion now.” She chewed on her lip, dismayed.

  “I’m not talking about you putting clothes on. I’m thinking about plans for later.”

  “Won’t clothes be useful for any outings?” she asked, eyes mischievous. “Or perhaps they’re no longer necessary in the twenty- first century.” She glanced about, noticing a young girl wearing what he would’ve generously termed “denim underpants.” The girl twitched her rear, the overall coverage scanty at best, lewd at level worst.

  Juliana frowned at the outfit. “Although some young women display far more skin in public than we ever thought proper.” She shook her head in wide-eyed shock. “Strange bloomers, indeed.”

  “Don’t worry; diapers aren’t really the rage in current feminine fashion.”

  “Perhaps you should try a pair of those pantaloons,” Juliana teased, turning her full attention back on him. “They would undoubtedly accentuate those masculine portions I noticed earlier this morning.”

 
Darling, you should see me in my leather Spartan garb, he almost blurted, wondering what she’d think about that tight loincloth—including how it emphasized said male endowments, and most spectacularly.

  But that would mean confessing his full history, and the thought of making himself that vulnerable was like throwing cold water on the lusty flirtation.

  They walked into an indie designer boutique run by one of Emma and Sophie’s friends, and one of Shay’s closest, he realized. The trio greeted the owner with happy trills of “Angelina Ballerina!” Then Emma introduced the coquettishly dressed woman as Angela O’Sullivan. Sophie immediately piped in, “A brilliant, brilliant designer! She’ll dress Juliana up right! She’s a total fashion muse.”

  Angela whisked Juliana off to the back area for a private fitting, her assistant Gregg flitting about like an agitated firefly. “Such a divine figure!” he proclaimed, already whipping fabrics and designs off the shelves as he scuttled after the women.

  Emma translated the flurry of activity: Angela O’Sullivan was Savannah’s most sought-after couturier. He could see for himself just by looking around the place that her creations, with their individuality and Victorian- influenced Goth style, were nothing like the processed Banana Republic outfits they’d been looking at.

  These dresses, like the ones Jules had worn back in her era, were made of silk and lace and ruffles.

  “Steam-punk rocks!” Sophie declared, then looking around, added, “But geez, I can’t afford any of this.”

  “Knock yourself out,” Ari said numbly, waving Sophie toward a flouncy wine-colored miniskirt. “I’m paying.”

  “For real?” Sophie gaped up at him in astonishment, her impish, almond-shaped eyes growing wide, and he just gave her a light shove toward the racks.

  Seriously, he had bigger thoughts on his ancient brain than the cost of clothes. Like . . . by all the gods of Olympus, were those petticoats he was staring at? On open display, as if they weren’t risqué at all? He moved closer, stroking the folds of a black satin one that made him swallow hard. These bustles weren’t remotely like what Jules had worn. Instead, they flounced at a much higher and provocative length over flirty little short skirts.

  His imagination took off like a thoroughbred running for Kentucky roses. Then it became most courtly, supplying an image of him trailing one of those victor’s buds up Jules’s thigh, stroking it beneath the layers of the petticoat’s fabric.

  Skata. He had to get a serious postmodern grip. It wasn’t like twenty-first-century women waltzed around in this kind of stuff—did they? His gaze shot about the cramped boutique, taking in several women wearing punked-out versions of dresses that Juliana had worn more than a hundred years ago. Maybe they did.

  The Trio of Feminine Influence, aka Sophie, Emma, and Shay, had vanished with Juliana into the dressing room at the back of the shop. A convenient fact since he’d been getting increasingly aroused by the designs on display, which meant that his erratic energy was gyrating like the storm-battered barometric pressure they were currently enduring. He loped about the shop, shaking out both his hands, trying to bring his body back in line. As he did so, his gaze landed on the front window display.

  He’d missed those dresses when they walked in, but now he grew as hard as stone as he noticed a magenta-colored velvet affair, one with sexy, provocative black ribbons that crisscrossed over the bodice. The entire design was clearly intended to tease, to hint at a Victorian modesty that it had no intention of delivering. It was a fashionable lie, a come-on wrapped in velvet, lace, and bows.

  He walked a little closer, trying to adjust his pants so that the bulge under his zipper wouldn’t be obvious, and only then did he realize that the titillating ribbons revealed the most arousing secret of all: The dress was undergirded by a semi-exposed black corset.

  Damn, this little hothouse was like landing on Park Place in the Bordello version of Monopoly. He wanted to toss his head back and bellow, “Lemme pass go and give me my two hundred bucks, okay? And give me my woman back . . . so long as she’s wearing that dress right over there!”

  “What do you think, Aristos?” Juliana asked from behind him, and he froze. He didn’t dare pivot and face her, not with how aroused he’d already become.

  Not with the husky, wine-rich timbre of her voice. As if she knew exactly how high his hormones were already raging and that whatever she was wearing now—whatever he was about to see on her body—would be his final undoing.

  He drew in a slow, steady breath and braced himself.

  “Ari?” Jules pressed. “Don’t you want to see the outfit?”

  Cursing inwardly, feeling fire burn beneath his skin, he turned.

  The dress fell in flouncing layers of ruffles that flared outward just above her knee, making her look like some dainty, sexed-up little teacup. The kind he’d like to sip from slowly, lapping his tongue all around the edge while never taking his eyes off of her.

  The neckline was as high as fashion had dictated back in her day, and her collar was accented by a proper cameo pin. But apart from the jewelry and the lace and ruffles, this dress shouted naughty sensuality. It was as if all the mores and limitations of Victoriana had been inverted, creating a very sensual version of the same promenade gowns Jules had once worn for their walks through Forsyth Park.

  Sophie beamed with a stylist’s pride; she brushed a hand along Juliana’s hip, emphasizing the ripe curves. “And there’s even a bustle,” Sophie exclaimed with wide, suggestive eyes. She lifted the dress hem, exposing the undergirding lingerie made of wicked crimson. “See?”

  Jules blushed, swatting at Sophie’s hand. “Stop that, Sophie. Please.”

  Sophie ignored her, running fingertips along Juliana’s waist. “And a corset, Ari.”

  “Oh, but there’s another outfit, too,” Emma piped in, and slung an arm around Ari’s neck, hugging him. “You’re gonna really love that one.”

  He’d already promised to buy as many outfits as Juliana wanted; wasn’t that enough? He had the Spartan Holding Company AmEx. She could shop to her seducing little heart was content.

  Especially because at that very moment, a burning sensation chased down his spine like a trail of electricity, and he felt the tightening of his skin there—a full-on threat that his wings were beginning to emerge. They became aroused, sometimes, just like the rest of him, all the more because they were a highly erogenous part of his immortal body. His hawk nature could become very aggressive about mating and lovemaking.

  His hands began trembling, and he shoved them against his belly, suppressing a groan. It was the blasted power, hitting him like a tsunami of energy when he least expected it. A high-pitched buzzing kicked on inside his brain right then, and he was aware of Emma coming to his side.

  He pulled at the collar of his T-shirt, trying to breathe. “Em,” he ground out, feeling several feathers pierce his skin. “Emma . . . help me outta here.”

  She began shoving him forward toward the door, calling back to Juliana.

  “No,” he warned, seizing Emma’s arm. “Keep Jules away from me. I’m . . . it’s not safe. For her or me.”

  Emma hesitated, looking back once more, and he hauled himself onto the sidewalk, doubling over; his muscles were cramping and bulking, his hawk form determined to overpower his human one.

  “Ari, tell me what to do,” Emma said, placing a soothing hand on his back. Then she quickly withdrew it, undoubtedly feeling the change in his body. “I’ll go get Juliana; just . . .”

  “No,” he snarled, standing tall again. Every direction he looked, the world had washed out in hues of silver. He was becoming the warrior, the changeling . . . and, he now knew, a berserker. Just as River had always been.

  “No,” he repeated, panting, still feeling the heat and lust that had consumed his body in the shop. Why it had been different from at the compound, he didn’t know, but something about the combination of his desire for Juliana and being back here downtown, where they’d been together in the past
, had his power off the rails.

  “I can’t be near her,” he moaned. “She’s the one . . . causing my change.”

  Chapter 20

  There were so many people, and in every direction that she tried to move, the crowd barricaded her. Juliana attempted to make her way down the sidewalk but found herself pressed up against a very obese man wearing a shirt that said, THE SOUTH WILL RISE AGAIN.

  Had it fallen again during recent years? From what she could see, Savannah thrived with industry and commerce.

  The man snickered and didn’t move from her path, but instead stared down at the top of her tight bodice.

  “Excuse me,” she announced tartly, sidestepping around the man. Pushing forward, she frantically searched the sidewalk for any sign of Aristos. He’d fled the boutique moments earlier, mumbling something about needing air and not feeling well. Emma had been glued to his side, and when Juliana tried to follow, Emma told her it wasn’t a good idea.

  She’d flushed at the warning, hating herself for being jealous of her own relative—a pregnant, married woman no less—but Ari’s obvious and very close bond with her felt threatening in that moment. Because Emma Lowery knew his secrets, understood why he had to flee the dress shop with barely a backward glance.

  Goodness, Emma even understood how that flat, hard rectangle would purchase the clothing Juliana had selected. Emma had pressed the calling card labeled AMERICAN EXPRESS into her palm, saying, “Use this to buy whatever clothes you want. I’ll call you guys in a little bit.”

  Juliana had watched them leave, turning the card in her hand. She was convinced that something was terribly wrong after watching the physical reaction Ari had experienced right before leaving the boutique. Sweat had broken out across his brow, and he’d turned from her, beginning to tremble. He’d behaved the same way last night, and then River had spoken in those low tones, managing to calm him.

  Since she’d known him years before, Aristos had obviously changed in some very fundamental, critical way. A way that she’d begun to worry threatened his most basic well-being; she hated the agony she’d just seen in his gorgeous dark eyes, the way his lashes fluttered erratically, his hands shaking as he pressed them to his brow.