He disappeared into the kitchen without so much as a sound, her skin now cold and clammy from the dark turn in his expression. Secrets were dangerous, especially between supposed partners. One person holding back put the other’s life on the line and she sure as hell wouldn’t let him risk her life when they went up against Isabel next time.
Because there would be a next time.
Her heart settled as she breathed deep, but threatened to explode as she threw back the sheets. Half naked, she covered the distance between the bed and the rack holding her clothes. She pulled a T-shirt and jeans from the hangers and headed toward her small bathroom. She needed to clear her head and a securely locked door promised to do the trick. The weight of his unrelenting gaze sent a current of energy down her spine as their eyes met before she shut the door, but it didn’t have the same effect now.
Spots of brown and red bled through the bandage taped to her shoulder. Stretching her neck to one side, she lifted a corner to study the wound in the mirror, and sucked in air through her teeth. Her legs shook as she removed the rest of the bandage. She’d expected blood and tissue damage from the memory of Isabel’s sharp, animal-like teeth, but not so much. A black, sticky discharge clung around the edges. An infection? Already? “That doesn’t look good.”
Every move stung. Every swipe of a Q-tip across her skin tore another curse from her mouth. And she couldn’t even see the backside of her shoulder without stretching the damaged skin tighter. Damn it. She couldn’t do this by herself. Closing her eyes, she fought the urge to keep her mouth shut. No. Grayson had said there was no way of knowing what would happen if the bite got worse. She needed his help.
She cracked the door and spotted him hunched over the kitchen counter. Head down, shoulder blades reaching for one another, muscled arms tense, he didn’t seem to realize she’d opened the door. “Grayson?”
He lifted his head, all that tension flooding down his back like a waterfall. He faced her slowly, but the darkness that had consumed his expression and eyes didn’t linger. Real concern etched the three distinct lines between his eyebrows, his angled jawline even sharper than she remembered. “It’s infected, isn’t it?”
Was she that easy to read?
“I think so,” she said.
He towered over her in the blink of an eye. How had he moved so fast? He stared at her with those hypnotic jade-colored eyes, completely focused on her as though nothing else—demons, Rachel’s death, the secrets between them—existed. Just the two of them.
She stepped back into the bathroom and he followed with primal masculinity. Her wound vibrated with his attention locked on her. Cool air hit her exposed skin. Goosebumps pimpled along her arms and across her collarbones, drawing his gaze to her sternum. “I tried cleaning it myself, but I can’t get to the back.”
“Let me take a look.” He reached for her, carefully, and peeled the bandage back.
Her body woke with the contact, singing as though a stereo had been turned up too loud. Her pulse doubled in rhythm. Why was it so hard to breathe? She kept her eyes locked on his face as a tingling sensation pooled in her lower abdominals. He was definitely handsome, but not in an obvious way. The hard, dangerous lines of his features probably scared most women off, but she’d always leaned toward the haunted ones. The ones whose eyes said yes, they’d been through hell and lived to tell about it. And Grayson had most certainly been through hell. His guarded words, the darkness in his eyes, even the way he moved said it all. And never in her life had she been so attracted to a man inside and out. Despite their dispute over the fingernail in Rachel’s apartment, he’d followed her back to her apartment to clean and bandage her wound. He might want to find her sister’s killer for himself, but someone intending to harm her wouldn’t do that.
“Well, what do you think?” She twisted her neck to get a better look of the wound.
Grayson would make intimacy easy unlike most of the men she’d had to kick out the next morning. She wouldn’t have to explain why photos of the dead littered her floor or why she’d stayed up into the early morning hours working. He’d already experienced the evils of the world with the FBI.
“We need to get you in the shower,” he said.
Her lips parted on a strong inhale. “What?”
He ran his fingertips along her collarbone, a mere slide of his skin against hers and lifted his eyes to hers. Jade darkened to forest green in his eyes, his pupils wide. Flutters flew through her stomach as desire overwhelmed consumed her. “I promise not to take advantage. I just can’t clean the wound with all of this other stuff inside it.”
“Oh. Too bad.” Was she insane? Urge swelled inside her, the one telling her to lean in a bit further and finally get a taste of him. She dropped her scrutiny to his lips. There was something between them. She’d recognized it the second he’d crossed her vision back at the bank. He had to feel it too.
“Nika.” He’d barely whispered her name as she closed the distance between them.
She hiked onto her tiptoes and leveled her mouth with his, hesitating. Yes, she’d definitely gone insane. Blame it on shock. Blame it on needing comfort through this trauma. Didn’t matter, did it? She leaned just a bit further, locking her lips onto his. An immediate zing of electricity shot throughout her body and she opened her mouth further. Grayson took advantage. His grip on her shoulder slid to the back of her head, pressing her closer, trying to make them one. Patches of chapped skin on his bottom lip heightened the pleasure expanding throughout her lower abdominals. A slow burn erupted from within, something strange yet familiar, and even though she didn’t trust him concerning Rachel’s investigation, she couldn’t pull away. He swept his tongue inside her mouth and fought to caress a part of her she believed long dead: her soul.
She twirled her tongue around his in an attempt to stoke the fire between them. And succeeded. She dropped her hands to his waist and dug her nails into his hips. Hot strokes of energy brushed through her as he titled his head for better access. He teased the top of her mouth with his tongue, eliciting a moan from deep in her lungs, and with a sharp nip nearly sent her over the edge. Hot sensations overwhelmed her to the point all she could think about was him and she strengthened her hold. She’d lost her damn mind.
His fingers trailed a burning journey down her back to the sensitive skin of her thighs. He hoisted her onto the countertop and wedged himself between her thighs. She couldn’t catch a full breath, lost in the feel of him, and pressed the junction of her thighs against him. Her small bathroom faded as Grayson became her entire world. Demons, lies, murders, none of it existed inside the bubble they’d created and for the first time in a long time, she dropped her guard. A strengthening feeling of release replaced the violence she’d dived into head first with her job. The vibrations he’d seduced from her body journeyed down her throat and under her ribs, but didn’t end there. Her stomach shuttered as though a million panicked butterflies fought to escape. In the day she’d known him, he’d changed her life and she never wanted to go back, never wanted to wake up from this dream.
He brushed his thumb over her breast and her nipples peaked in response through her thin bra. Another caress sent a tingling ripple across her chest. He pressed the bulge behind his slacks into the crook between her thighs, targeting her most sensitive spot. Pure sensation shot up into her core. Legs trembling from the onslaught of pleasure, she sucked down a lungful of much-needed air. He traveled to the other side of her neck without so much as missing a beat, kissing, licking, nibbling, and she opened for him even more. Such an impossible idea.
The harsh ring of her cell phone drowned her desire with reality.
He pulled away—too soon—and exhaled hard. His hands slipped from her waist as he wedged distance between them. Desire pulsed in his eyes as they flickered to her wound then vanished. Going cold. Business-like. “You should get that. We can clean the wound when you’re done.”
She swallowed around the tightness in her throat, out of breath. Out of h
er mind. What the hell had she been thinking? She didn’t know a damn thing about this man, yet she’d been willing to give him anything in the last two minutes.
“Yeah.” Disappointment darkened that one word and she cringed. She’d never lost control like that with a man before, simply letting the world dissolve around her. It’d been a bad idea with a killer on the loose and from his expression, he thought so too. Heat crawled into her face as she hopped down from the countertop, all semblance of intimacy between them turning into a memory. She followed the irritating sound of her phone and picked it up off the kitchen table. The morgue. Swiping her thumb across the screen, she brought it to her ear. “This is Russo.”
“Nika, I’ve got something for you on that fingernail and you’re not going to believe a word of it.”
“Dr. Anderson?” She swung her attention to Grayson as he closed the bathroom door. She flinched as loss and control consumed her with the sound of the lock clicking into place. He’d shut himself inside her small bathroom, shut himself off from her. Like he couldn’t stand to look at her.
“Detective?” Dr. Anderson asked on the other line asked.
“Yeah, I’m here.” She strode across the living space to her rack of clothes. Couldn’t go back in the bathroom for the first set. “I’ll be there in ten minutes.” Nika ended the call, tossing the phone on her bed, and dressed as fast as she could. Grayson still hadn’t come out of the bathroom, but she didn’t have time to wait. She had another lead to follow. And this time, she wouldn’t let him get in the way.
Chapter Seven
Lust was simple biology. Just physiology. Not a sign anything had changed. He’d taken an oath to bring Nika to the Deceiver in three days. In exchange for his soul. And he would, damn it.
Air rasped up and down his throat as he hung over the small bathroom sink. The tips of his black, bone-like talons stood stark against the white porcelain. They receded into his nails the deeper he breathed. Too close. Thank God she hadn’t noticed. He swiped his tongue over his teeth. No elongated incisors. Heart racing, he twisted the cold water faucet on and doused his overheated skin. Didn’t help. Remnants of her warmth had spread throughout his body. The pressure of her legs wrapped around his hips lingered in his muscles. Other parts of his body remembered her too and he shifted to relieve the aching pulse behind his slack’s zipper. The arousal that had deepened the color of her blue eyes reflected in his as he stared at the flushed man in front of him. Her flowery scent coated his skin, fresh, exotic, and additive. He’d breathed her in deep, made her a part of him. Had it not been for her incoming call, he would’ve taken Nika right there on the countertop.
The beast inside purred as he imagined every angle, every kiss, every touch, and moan. He wouldn’t have been gentle, but the deep muscle ache from her grasp on his arms said she wouldn’t have wanted him any other way. He’d fought to keep his control since he’d become a monster, but she’d swept that aside the moment he’d touched her skin. Twice now the beast he’d kept caged had almost escaped. All because of her. Shit. “Have to be more careful.”
Grayson dropped his chin. He couldn’t deny the beast’s fascination with her, but the alternative meant keeping his distance. He’d never look into those intelligent eyes, never swipe his thumb down her arm. His gut flipped violently, dread taking up residence where desire had gripped him hard. Nope. Not a possibility. Not after what’d happened back in Detective Reynolds’s apartment. Isabel knew exactly who Nika was and what she wanted. There was no way he’d leave her to deal with an Arch-demon on her own. Or was it his attraction to the seductive detective he didn’t want to acknowledge?
A shiver chased down his spine as quick flashes of that searing kiss played across his mind. His erection twitched and his hands itched to dig into the flesh of her thighs again. Sans talons. He backed away from the sink. No. Nothing could happen between them. Despite the bounty on her head—one he’d accepted—he wasn’t even human.
Then again, according to Vdarra, neither was Nika. So what did that make her?
He cupped his hands together under the tap and splashed his face. Water plastered the collar of his charcoal-colored dress shirt against his skin. The difference in temperature shocked his system. A rough exhale cleared his lungs of her scent, but hints still clung to his clothes and skin. A quick study of her bath products said a shower wouldn’t help either. All lavender-scented.
His shoulder blades sharpened as he collapsed his weight into his palms onto the counter. No talons. No sharpened teeth. Just a regular guy again. Yeah, right. His heartbeat faded in his ears as his hands gripped the edges of the sink. Straightening, he used the hand towel on the wall to clear left over droplets of water from his face. He’d known this day would come the moment he realized what his oath to the biggest jackass on the planet entailed.
The day when he wouldn’t want to hand over a target.
Didn’t matter that the Deceiver had saved his life the night his suspect lured him into that warehouse and it didn’t matter how many targets he’d neutralized for the bastard since. Nika deserved more than what the devil had in mind for her. She deserved...what? Him? A laugh bubbled past his lips and he stared himself down in the mirror. “No. Definitely not you, asshole. Stay away from her and you both might make it out of this alive.”
The space under his sternum squeezed the air from the bottom of his lungs. He had to get out of his own head.
A familiar brush of dark power reverberated beneath his skin, hot and crazed, but no one else had come into the small bathroom. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end with the weight of his savior’s invisible attention focused solely on him. Son of a bitch. Speak of the devil.
His hands itched to pull both guns from his shoulder holster, but they wouldn’t do any good. The guy was already dead and more powerful than any other being from the Afterlife he’d dealt with. Bullets wouldn’t stop him. As far as Grayson knew, nothing would. The muscles along his neck and back tensed the longer silence enveloped around him. He’d never had the gift of patience. Even when he was alive. “Why don’t you show yourself so we can get this over with?”
Could Nika hear him through the thin door?
He strained to hear movement—anything—that told him she was still in the apartment. He’d shut himself off from her for her own protection, but with the Deceiver here, it seemed that decision had bitten him in the ass. She wouldn’t have enough strength to go up against a demon again, let alone the Deceiver himself. Hope she’d left the apartment to answer the call gripped him hard. What if she didn’t? He could take on the world’s strongest demon long enough to get her out of harm’s way, but he wouldn’t make it out alive. Adrenaline and a protective impulse surged through his veins. He’d come to that bridge if needed. Until then, if the bastard broke one strand of hair on her head...
“You disappoint me, Grayson.” Ghostlike, a black mist rose from the linoleum floor and thickened at his feet. His skin prickled. Numb. Frozen. The mist shaped into legs, arms, and a head. Slick brown hair, black eyes, and a three-piece suit solidified less than four feet from him. That dark gaze met his and the slow beat of his heart exploded into a sprint. The Deceiver. “After everything I’ve done for you, you’re actually helping the target I’ve assigned you to bring to me.” He tsked with a wave of his index finger, back and forth. He dropped his hands to his side and the black in his irises flashed red. “Did you think I wouldn’t find out?”
Grayson’s heart stuttered. The space where his soul used to reside enflamed as though his body sensed it close by. He swallowed hard. Numbness dissipated, his toes tingling with each shift in his weight. The bathroom didn’t provide a whole lot of space for two bodies, let alone room to fight if he had to. Only option: talk his new boss down so it wouldn’t come to that. But the stone-like quality to the Deceiver’s expression said that wasn’t happening. “If by helping, you mean I’m assisting on her sister’s murder case in order to hunt down Isabel. Then, yes, I’m helping by usi
ng her. She’s a good detective, one of the best I’ve seen. She’ll find your rogue demon for me and save us both some time.”
“Now why don’t I believe you?” A close-lipped smile spread across the Deceiver’s mouth, but Grayson found no humor in the situation. His heart palpitated. He had three days to surrender Nika to the devil, three days to figure a way out of his damn oath. But it seemed his savior had run out of patience. A quick twist of the Deceiver’s hand ignited an explosion in Grayson’s heart. “Maybe it’s the fact I can smell her on you.”
His throat constricted as a flood of pain singed his veins, cutting him off mid-scream. The wave crested and forced him to his knees. Linoleum cushioned the pressure on his kneecaps, but little else. He ground his teeth to derail the debilitating pain, but nothing short of the Deceiver releasing his fiery hold would calm the storm that thrashed inside. Darkness slithered beneath his skin. The void already ripped from his body intensified. He tried to stand, to fight, but the beast lay dormant. Coward. He groaned hard and loud.
The Deceiver closed the distance between them. The blackness in his gaze transformed into fire, yet his expression remained cold, distant, as he towered over Grayson. Thick fingers ran through Grayson’s hair and collected the sweat beaded across his forehead. The action, so intimate, forced bile into his throat. “Whatever it is you think she can give you—or do for you—is a lie. Her very existence is an abomination whether she realizes it or not and she will destroy us and everything we know if she discovers what you really are.” The Deceiver crouched in front of him. “Now, are you still thinking about betraying me for her?”
Son of a bitch. He blinked around the fuzziness clouding his vision. Why hadn’t he made the connection before? The battle between the Deceiver and his heiress had taken more power from the self-proclaimed god than Grayson had realized. The bastard still hadn’t recovered. If Nika really posed such a threat... He saw it now. The flushed skin, the dark circles under the Deceiver’s eyes. And was that hints of gray streaking the demon’s flawless dark hair? Grayson exhaled hard around the fire burning through his veins. “You can’t touch her. That’s why you sent me. You’re not strong enough to kill her yourself.”
His Seductive Target (Afterlife, #2) Page 7