Guardian Falling (Eternal Sins MC #2)

Chapter One

CHARLIE

The night air feels like freedom after too many vodka cranberries. I’m sitting on the hood of Jake’s car, or Jason’s. Names start to blur after the third drink, and I checked out somewhere around round two.

“What was your name again?” I murmur against his mouth.

“It’s Jake,” he says against my neck, like this is important.

I hum thoughtfully. “You look like a Jake. Or a Jason. Maybe even a Chris.”

He laughs, tilting his head back to look at me. “Wow! Feeling special already.”

“Hey, I climbed onto the hood of your car voluntarily,” I say, tipping my head back to give him better access. “That’s at least a silver-medal level honor.”

He shifts closer, settling between my knees, and whatever comeback line he has dies in his throat as his mouth trails down my neck, stubble scraping just enough to make me shiver. His hands brace on either side of my thighs like I might disappear if he doesn’t hold me there.

The lookout sprawls above the city, all glittering lights and distant traffic dissolving into white noise below us.

The perfect makeout spot, a classic hookup hideaway, and exactly the sort of place that makes me forget I have a shift at the coffee shop in six hours and student loans that make my stomach knot if I think about them too hard.

But right now?

Right now, I’m just Charlotte fucking Harris, twenty-three years old and living my best goddamn life.

His fingers slip under the hem of my skirt, palms warm against my skin, and I arch into the touch with a breathless laugh as he dips beneath my panties.

“Bold move,” I murmur. “You usually skip straight to this part, or am I getting the deluxe package?”

He grins against my mouth. “You seem like a deluxe package kind of girl.”

“Right!” I say, kissing him anyway. “You rehearsed that, didn’t you?”

“Maybe,” he admits. “It sounded better in my head,” he says as his finger slides against my clit.

A low moan breaks loose, my head tipping back, my throat bared to the night, reckless and untouchable up here, perched above the world with alcohol pulsing through my veins.

“You’re amazing,” he murmurs against my lips, his finger circling my clit, working me higher.

I pull back just enough to squint at him. “You say that now, but wait until I steal your fries when you take me to dinner after this.”

“Worth it,” he says immediately.

I laugh and kiss him harder, letting the moment carry me. There’s no point in correcting him, since we’ve known each other for exactly four hours. This isn’t anything more than the reckless high of being wanted without complications.

The metal beneath my hands is still warm from the engine. The breeze off the valley smells of fresh pine. His tongue traces the seam of my lips, and I open wider for him with a soft whimper that disappears into the dark.

Twenty-three should feel exactly like this, wild and reckless.

Jake, Jason, or whatever his damn name is, mouth on mine, his touch bold and certain.

I let myself sink into him, into the thrill of being wanted.

My focus is purely on him, in the way he makes my body respond, until the air grows heavy and something around us quietly shifts.

He stiffens between my legs, his mouth going still against mine, his breath hitching in a way that has nothing to do with desire. A heartbeat later, I hear it, the soft crunch of gravel, slow, deliberate, and far too damn close.

“What the…” he starts, pulling back, withdrawing his hand from my panties just when it was starting to get to the good part.

“Dammit, Jason!” I groan.

I’m still half joking, still not catching up, because my brain hasn’t processed the way he’s gone rigid between my thighs.

“Jake,” he corrects as I twist around, still smiling, still riding that pleasant vodka buzz, and my almost climax, expecting campus security or another couple looking for privacy. And I notice Jake staring at the woman standing beside the car.

She hadn’t been there a second ago. I’m sure of it. No footsteps, no approach, just… there. Close enough that the warmth of the hood suddenly feels inadequate, the night shifting off-balance around us.

Her gaze flicks over us, Jake’s hands on my hips, my legs hooked around his waist, and something unreadable crosses her face. “Well,” she says mildly, as if we haven’t been caught mid-foreplay on the hood of a car, high above the city. “This is awkward.” Her voice is calm and almost amused.

She stands only a few feet away, backlit by the city lights glittering far below, and for a fractured second, my brain latches onto the fact she’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.

Porcelain skin that seems to glow in the dark, as if moonlight has taken up residence beneath it.

Long, dark hair spilling over shoulders draped in something that looks both ancient and obscenely expensive.

Her features are too perfect, too carefully balanced, as though someone sculpted her from marble and then decided to see what would happen if they breathed life into stone.

But it’s her eyes that shatter me.

They’re the color of blood under moonlight, dark, luminous, and they lock onto me with an intensity that makes my chest seize.

There’s no warmth in them, no curiosity, only hunger.

Old, patient, and focused in a way that bypasses thought entirely and punches straight into something primitive buried deep in my brain.

Prey.

The word doesn’t form consciously, but my body understands it anyway. Every hair on my arms rises, my pulse skids, and the vodka warmth drains out of my veins as if someone pulled a plug, leaving me cold and suddenly, terrifyingly sober.

Run.

The instinct screams so loudly it’s almost painful.

“Hey, lady, this spot’s taken.” Jake, Jason… fuck Chris! He starts, stepping in front of me with a burst of misguided bravery that would be sweet if the air around us didn’t feel so heavy that it’s hard to breathe.

The woman tilts her head in a small, graceful motion that’s too smooth, as if gravity doesn’t apply to her the same way it does to the rest of us. When she smiles, something gleams in the darkness, white, sharp, unmistakably inhuman, and my stomach drops as understanding slams into me far too late.

“I’m not here for you,” she says, her voice smooth as honey poured over broken glass. “You are of no consequence to me, and you reek of desperation.”

“The fuck?” he snaps, but before he can finish saying anything else to defend himself, she moves.

No—appears.

Reality seems to fold in on itself, the space between us collapsing in a blink, and suddenly she’s in front of him.

One hand clamps around his throat, fingers digging deep, her thumb finding the precise point beneath his jaw.

His feet lift from the ground when she raises him effortlessly, his body jerking as the air is forced from his lungs.

His face shifts from red to purple, veins rising stark against his skin while he claws frantically at her wrist. His eyes bulge, wild and panicked, darting to mine when his mouth opens in a soundless gasp.

Spittle flies as he struggles, heels kicking uselessly in the air, the fight draining out of him in seconds.

She doesn’t strain, doesn’t even brace. She holds him there, steady and unmoved, lifting him as if he weighs nothing.

My brain can’t catch up.

This can’t be happening.

“Stop!” I hear myself scream, the word thin and broken, dragged out of me as I scramble off the hood of the car, stumbling forward, my breath coming in sharp, ragged bursts that burn my lungs.

She tilts her head slightly.

Then she twists her wrist.

The sound is unmistakable, a sharp, wet crack that slices through the night and echoes across the empty lookout, final and absolute.

His body goes slack instantly, all tension vanishing at once.

His head snaps sideways at an angle no living neck should ever bend, chin collapsing toward his shoulder as if the bones inside simply gave up.

She lets go.

And he drops.

His body hits the gravel with a dull, hollow thud, limbs folding in on themselves like something discarded. His eyes are still open, staring at nothing, his mouth frozen mid-gasp.

For a heartbeat, I stand there.

Staring.

My stomach revolts violently, bile surging up my throat as the truth slams into me all at once.

He’s dead.

Not hurt.

Not unconscious.

Fucking dead!

Because I just watched his neck snap in her hand.

My brain scrambles for explanations, for tricks, for a version of reality where this didn’t happen.

He’s dead.

One second alive, breathing, trying to impress me with cheap courage. His hands warm on my body, the next… a crumpled heap of cooling flesh at my feet. A person, a human being, is gone so fast my mind can’t even keep pace with the loss.

My hands start to shake, but no scream comes.

No instinct to run kicks in.

All I can do is stand here, staring at the body of a man I barely knew, my pulse roaring in my ears as the world tilts violently.

Because whatever she is…

Whatever stepped out of the dark and ended a life as if it meant nothing…

It’s still standing right in front of me.

And now it’s smiling.

Whatever this thing is—it’s fucking grinning at me.

The scream building in my chest never makes it past my lips. Terror clamps around my throat with iron fingers, freezing the sound before it can escape. My legs unlock on pure instinct, and I stumble backward, my ankle twisting in my stupid heeled sandals, but I don’t care because I need to run.

I need to move.

I need to survive!

I make it three steps before her hand locks around my wrist.

Cold sears into me on contact. Not the cold of night air or ice water, but something deeper, the absence of warmth, the kind that belongs to graves, crypts, and things that were never meant to breathe. The shock of it steals my breath, panic detonating in my chest as instinct finally takes over.

Run. Fight. Anything.