Pressing my hand to the door, desperate for even a single moment of connection, I whisper, “You have nothing to fear from me. I will walk away before I will ever harm you, even though it will be the hardest thing I will ever do.”
And it is. Each step towards my bedroom feels like I am mired in quicksand, and the pain in my heart deepens with every footfall. But eventually, I close the door. Tomorrow, we will need to find a way to work together to stop Thorn once and for all. But for tonight, I will leave her be.
Zoe
I’ve cried so much, my eyelids are swollen to twice their normal size, and I don’t know how I’ll ever sleep tonight. My head still aches from resisting Sin’s influence—not that I even knew I was doing it at the time—and as I flop down on the bed, all I see are images I don’t understand.
Dark stone. Blood. Flames. And Sin. But not like he is now. Could…could he have left me with some of his memories when he fed from me? That’s not possible. Is it?
It’s still early, and while I”m exhausted, I’m not sleepy. So I pop in an earbud. I need a friend. Need to take my mind off of everything that’s happened in the past forty-eight hours. But as I dial, it strikes me as so odd that I literally only have one person I can call.
“Hey, hon,” Dion says, her voice smooth. There’s music in the background, but it’s quiet, relaxing. Jazz or maybe Blues?
“Hi. Um, shit. I didn’t even think. You’re not working tonight?”
“Nope. I’m only at the club on weekends. I work the streets the rest of the time.” As soon as I start to sputter because I’d never have guessed she was a sex worker, Dion chuckles. “Oh, I wish I could see your face right now, luv. I’m kidding. Kinda. I’m a counselor for at-risk BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ youth in the other community. Which usually involves me walking the streets of the Tenderloin and the Haight all day.”
“Maybe I’ve been on the job too long,” I say. “Before I joined the Bureau, I was with the SFPD. You had me worried all my supposedly ‘finely-honed’ investigative instincts had failed me. Which…after the day I’ve had… I’m starting to worry I shouldn’t be in this line of work.”
“Zoe, every single thing about you screams cop.” The music in the background quiets. “What happened when you went back to the office? If that demon was an ass to you—?”
“No. He actually wasn’t.” With a sigh, I curl my legs up and settle back against the pillows. “This is about me. I’m not…fuck. Dion, there’s something about me that isn’t human.”
I’ve cataloged every single line and whorl of the ornate cornices in Sin’s guest room, and I still can’t sleep. Talking to Dion helped, but it also highlighted just how “different” I am. She has all these amazing, vivid memories of her parents and sister, her first shift, even her high school prom. And me? I can barely remember my mother’s voice. Or getting my driver’s license. All those big life events that should have made an impact on me? That should have shaped who I am? They’re like faded photographs I can only see from a great distance, and that terrifies me.
My stomach growls, reminding me that I haven’t eaten since lunch. Sin’s been quiet for a few hours, and it’s late enough he’s probably asleep, so I pull on a robe I find in the closet and pad out to the kitchen for a piece of cold pizza.
The city sprawls out before me, bright lights, cars zipping through the streets, a few people far below dotting the sidewalks. And the water. San Francisco Bay stole my heart the first time I saw it. I know that as well as I know my own name, but…the memory of that day is fuzzy too. I know my grandmother was there, her hand on my shoulder. It was sunny. The wind whipped my curls into my eyes, stinging my cheeks.
“This is your home now, Zoe,” my grandmother had said. “Until the end. I will not always be here with you, but you are never alone.”
Tears burn the corners of my eyes. The easy friendship I’ve found with Dion? At the moment, it’s all that’s keeping me sane. Because the only other people in my life I trusted—my grandmother and Temple—they’re gone. Nana lied. I am alone.
Trudging back towards the guest room, I stop when I hear a low moan from the master suite. Then a loud thud. “Stop…please,” Sin slurs, and I don’t pause for a second before rushing into his room.
Oh, shit. He’s naked, huddled on the floor with his wings folded against his back. His eyes are closed, and I don’t think he’s awake, but he rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet, reaching out for something he can’t seem to grasp.
“Do not…take her…”
Her. His Genevieve. An intense burst of jealousy prickles over my skin, but it vanishes as soon as he cries out again. “No!”
The anguish in his voice…it breaks my heart, and I drop to my knees to wrap my arms around him. “Sin. Wake up. It’s Zoe. Come back to me now. Please.”
His embrace threatens to crush my ribs, and I can’t breathe. “Sin,” I croak. “Sin!”
“Fuck.” He draws the word out, like he’s pouring all of his pain into the single sound, and shifts me closer, still holding just as tightly, but in such a way I’m no longer worried about passing out. “Zoe. Do not leave. Not again. Never again.”
“You’re not making any sense—“
“I will not survive losing you again.” He buries his face in my neck, inhaling deeply. “I understand now.”
“I don’t. Sin? What’s going on?” Wriggling back far enough I can meet his gaze, I beg him for answers, but he shakes his head like he’s just now realizing I’m here in his arms, despite saying my name.
“Stay with me,” he whispers, lifts me, and gently deposits me on the bed. “I need you close.”
I don’t have the heart—or the strength—to tell him I’m not going to have sex with him again. But when I try to scoot to the edge of the bed, he stops me, cupping my cheeks and kissing me. It’s not a demanding kiss. It’s a desperate one. Like he’s terrified I truly am going to disappear if he lets me go.
“Don’t try to glamour me,” I say against his lips. “It’s not right.”
“I will not. I cannot.” Warm fingers cup the back of my neck, and his eyes…they’re wild, but his irises are bright blue, honesty shining all the way down to his soul. “You are immune to my charms, Zoe Dawes. But I am afraid I have lost myself to yours.”
“I have no charms. Whatever I am, Sin…whatever powers I might have? I don’t know how to use them. I don’t think I ever will.”
“You are wrong, my sweet pearl. You will find them when you need them most. That is how it has always been. And when you do, I am afraid we will never have this,” he gestures between us, “again. Give me this night? Let me worship you like I have dreamed of. Let me show you how much I lo—how much I care for you.”
He turns his head, trying to prove to me he isn’t influencing me at all, and all I want is to see his eyes again. To feel his lips on mine. To be one.
I slide my fingers into his hair and gently turn his head so our gazes collide. “Show me, Sin. Show me everything.”
Twenty-Five
Sin
I must be dreaming. Zoe is curled against me, her hair tickling my nose. The scents of our coupling mix with watermelon and coconut, and I do not ever wish to move from this spot. She does not know yet. Who she is. Who she was. Who she will be once again.
But I do. And when the pieces all fell into place, I could not breathe from the weight of it all. I know what is coming for her. What she will try to do and what it will cost her. I will find a way to save her. I have to. What I do not know is whether she will forgive me. Or how much time we have until the end.
“Zoe. My love, wake up.” I cringe as I let my feelings for her slip through the wall surrounding my heart. As we came together for the third time in the early hours of the morning, I knew I could deny it no longer. I love her, and I always will.
If only Fate were not so cruel, conspiring to keep us apart. Even now, with Zoe naked in my bed, her lips swollen, her eyes sleepy, I can feel the distance between us
growing. Once she accepts the truth of who she is, she will leave me. She will have no choice.
“Hmm?” She is still in that blissful state between asleep and awake where anything seems possible. Where one can choose to stay in their dreams just a bit longer or return to the real world.
Kissing her gently, I try to ease us both back into the world of dreams, but our phones ding simultaneously. Hers from the guest room, mine on the bedside table.
“Stay here,” I urge as I wrap my arm around her waist. “It’s the commander. We are being summoned.”
“Shouldn’t we go then?” Despite her words, she settles against me with a sigh, and I pick up my phone so we can both see the screen.
Another body turned up this morning. Corner of Castro and Pine. Get down there. Now.
“Shit,” Zoe says and sits up. “We’re out of time, Sin. He’s going to take another woman tonight.”
“I know.” Throwing the phone down on the bed, I hold her close. I need one more moment with her. One more embrace. One more kiss. “Promise me something, Zoe.”
She tips her gaze to mine, uncertainty and so much more churning in her green eyes. Concern. confusion. Maybe even…love. “What?”
“You will be careful today. Stay by my side. Do not take unnecessary risks.” Capturing her lower lip between my teeth, I bite down just hard enough for her to feel it for the rest of the day. Everything I am belongs to her. It always will.
“I’m a cop,” she says when she pulls back, her cheeks flushed. “I still am, even though I carry a different badge. My job is to take risks to protect the innocent. If I don’t, they die, and I can’t—“
“This is different,” I say sharply. “This is Thorn. Even a single risk could get you killed.”
“You’re not my keeper, Sin. You’re my…” She stares down at our linked fingers, then lets her gaze rove over my chest. “You’re my partner. But you’re also more. Something…we haven’t figured out yet.”
Say it. Please. Do not get out of this bed without remembering who you are.
“I’ll be careful.” She brushes her lips over a long scar just below my collarbone. “Because I want to figure it out. Figure us out.”
It is not enough, but at the same time, more than I could have hoped for. More than I had centuries ago. More than I may ever have again.
Zoe slides from my embrace and runs a hand through her mussed curls. “I need a shower.” Her lips curve into a smile. “I don’t suppose you’d like to join me?”
Before she can take another step, I scoop her up and cradle her to my chest. “I would like nothing more.”
Zoe
Every step is pure torture with Sin next to me. It’s like my body is completely attuned to his presence, and my swollen lower lips rub against my clit as we walk up Castro to the crime scene.
Focus, Zoe. Someone is dead, and you’re thinking about banging your demon partner again. Ridiculous. You’re a fucking cop. Act like it.
He took me twice in the shower, then made me coffee while I dressed and tried to calm myself down. On the way here, he stopped so I could get a breakfast sandwich, and now, he stays close but doesn’t touch me. I think he’s afraid if he does, we’ll be all over one another again and won’t be able to stop.
There’s something more in his blue eyes this morning, though.
Fear.
We don’t need to show our badges to the crime scene crew. They recognize us, and what I now know are magical wards that hide the street from view admit us into a private, gruesome cocoon.
The young woman’s body isn’t arranged as reverently as Jacinda’s. No. She was dumped. Quickly and without ceremony. Her arms and legs are tangled and broken, her skin scraped along elbows, knees, and her bare shoulder, and a long, thin piece of white silk is wrapped tightly around her neck.
Crouching next to her, I stare at the hollow sockets where her eyes would have been, and the all-too-familiar nausea burns its way up my throat until Sin grasps my shoulder.
“Look at me, Zoe. Only me.”
Snapping my gaze to his, I rein in my panic. “I’m all right. Really.”
“No, you are not,” he says with a small shake of his head. “But we do not have time for that discussion now.” Snapping on a glove, he reaches over the body for a moment. “There. I have lowered her lids. Now look at her and tell me what you see.”
Taking a single, slow breath, I return my focus to the woman. “She’s in much worse shape than Jacinda. Probably held for longer. Emaciated. Recent, rapid weight loss. Her skin is pale, but there are signs she used to have a tan, so she was probably in the dark for weeks.”
A chill starts deep inside me, like a ball of ice in my belly. The snap of padlocks echoes in my ears. Chains. I can feel metal bars all around me, and I suck in a sharp breath. “We need to turn her over,” I rasp.
“Zoe…”
“No. Now.” I wave the crime scene technicians closer. “Do it. Please.”
The two mages dressed all in black chant words I don’t understand, and the body rises, spins in mid-air, and then settles back onto the concrete. Sin is still wearing a glove, and pulls the woman’s dark brown hair off her neck.
The faery tattoo glows in the sunlight, and Sin swears quietly behind me, because drawn on her lower back in what looks like permanent marker is another image. An orange blossom. “He will take another tonight. He is practically gloating about it. Get the body to the morgue,” he snaps at the mages. “And tell Dr. Breslin that we need to know exactly how old the tattoo is. Have her run tests on the ligature marks as well.”
Standing, I scan the street around us. “Traffic cameras. There’s one on the corner, and another at the next block. We need the footage. Maybe we can get a make and model on whatever car was used to dump her.”
Sin strips off his glove and tosses it into the small trash bag the techs have set up at the edge of the perimeter. “Come. We need to get to the Bureau. There, we can find everything we need.”
We’ve been at this all day, and we still have no answers. The woman’s hands were so damaged, the medical examiner couldn’t even pull her prints. She was Fae. At least one hundred and thirty years old.
“The tattoo was done over two weeks ago,” Sin says as he drops his phone onto his desk. “And from the weight loss, Breslin believes she was held for a day, maybe two longer than that.”
“How can she tell?” My head is pounding, and I drain my fourth cup of coffee, knowing it’s just going to make things worse.
“Some calculation having to do with how dehydrated the woman was when the mark was made.” He rubs the back of his neck, then stares up at the ceiling. “The timeline fits with what I can remember. Thorn wants the women weak and terrified before he marks them. Broken enough that the pain will often push them over the edge, but not so broken they do not fight him. He…enjoys…the fight.”
“Sin…” Reaching across the desk, I brush his fingers with mine. “You didn’t do this. Remember that.”
“But I did. When I chose not to kill him all those years ago. When I failed to protect—“ He jerks his hand away. “I need some air. Do not leave the Bureau. Do you understand? You are safe here. He cannot get to you behind these wards.”
“Where are you going?” I ask, rushing to follow him as he strides towards the door.
“To see an angel.”
I snag his wrist. “He’s after you too, you know. Wouldn’t we be safer…together?”
Sin steps into the fading sunlight, but then turns, bands an arm around my waist, and pulls me close. “You are safest here. Promise me,” he growls then kisses me like he’s afraid he’s never going to see me again. “You will stay.”
“I’ll stay,” I gasp when he lets go. “The commander’s handing out assignments for tonight’s stakeout in an hour. Be back by then, okay?”
“I will try.”
Twenty-Six
Zoe
Where the hell is Sin? He’s been gone for two hours, and we’r
e supposed to head to a seedy bar in the Tenderloin in twenty minutes. The Bureau has a full wardrobe of undercover outfits tailored for each of its agents, and one of the witches helped me choose a tight black skirt, patterned stockings, and a shimmery red tank that dips low between my breasts and leaves next to nothing to the imagination.
Oh, and no bra.
“Stop fidgeting,” Amber says as she pins my hair up so delicate ringlets tease my neck. “That spell won’t hold the top to your boobs forever, you know. The more you tug at the material, the weaker it gets.”
“Great. So I need to worry about a wardrobe malfunction all night?”
The shy witch blushes. She can’t be much older than twenty, but her hazel eyes hold wisdom well beyond her years. “Not all night. Just maybe after 10:00 p.m. I’m trained in reading auras during interrogation. Physical magic was never my passion.”
“Auras?”
Amber steps back and gives me the once over. “Spin for me?”
I try and almost fall over with the three-inch heels I’m wearing. “Don’t we have anything more…sensible? How am I supposed to chase after anyone wearing these things?”
“Easy,” Amber says with a grin. “Just say the words, ‘Feet, don’t fail me now.’ They’ll turn into sneakers.”
“Really?” Just when I think I get a handle on this world, there’s something new to process. “Feet, don’t—“
“Not yet! Otherwise I’ll have to reset the whole spell!” Amber shakes her head. “Sorry, I should have said that up front. I forget that you’re human. You carry yourself like one of us.“
“I have no clue what the fuck I’m doing most of the time,” I admit. “But what do you mean ‘one of us’?”
“An other.” The witch frowns and narrows her eyes. “Stand still for a minute, okay?”
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