Chapter 2
HOLLY
As soon as I woke, I asked myself the obvious question. Am I dead? This didn’t feel like any afterlife I’d heard of.
I took a deep breath, nose filling with a mixture of wood smoke and hot metal. The warm air was welcome and comforting after the frozen wilderness. My ribs didn’t hurt anymore, either. Perhaps I hadn’t cracked them?
Someone had wrapped blankets around me, snug and warm. The crackling sound of fire explained the smoke and the warmth. None of it answered the question of where I’d ended up or how I’d gotten there.
With a groan, I forced my eyes open, expecting immediate blinding pain, but the dim lighting didn’t hurt my eyes. Flickering firelight illuminated a cozy room with wooden walls and roof. Heavy curtains shut out all outside light, and bookshelves covered the walls completely.
Wrapped in a heavy wool blanket, I lay on a sofa made from rough wood and thick cushions. Cautiously turning my head toward the fire, I saw my rescuer sitting by the fireplace. Beside him, blocking much of the firelight, lay one of the biggest dogs I’d ever seen.
Usually, the dog would have held my attention. This time, it wasn’t enough to distract me from the man. I blinked and looked again, making sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks.
Okay, he really has horns on. Did he miss the memo that Halloween’s over?
In the flickering firelight, his skin still looked crimson.
And he looked magnificent. A strikingly handsome face framed by long black hair, eyes like smoldering coals.
I remembered falling into his brawny arms, and seeing the muscles gleam in the firelight just reinforced my perception of his strength.
His bare, muscular chest and rippling abs should be in the dictionary, illustrating the definition of ‘hot’.
Thank God he wore pants.
“You are awake. Good.” His voice rumbled like thunder, deep and low and powerful. I felt it in my bones as much as I heard it. With an effort, I pulled myself up to sit, keeping the heavy blankets tucked around me.
“Where am I?”
“You are in my cabin.” He stood as he spoke. Loomed would be another word for it—his horns almost touched the roof. “And you are lucky to be alive. You should not have been out in that storm.”
No shit. I didn’t say it aloud, but it was a near thing. “Yeah, well, you’re not wrong about that. I didn’t realize it would get so bad.”
He muttered something under his breath, something that sounded like ‘humans.’
“There were warnings. Many warnings. You cannot have missed them all.”
“I didn’t think it would take me so long to reach my cabin.” My cheeks heated as I answered. It was a stupid excuse, and I knew it. “And I think I got lost.”
He made a noise, half-annoyed, half-amused. “Yes, you were lost. My cabin is at the end of the road. You are very lucky I found you.”
“The GPS stopped working,” I said. As soon as the words left my mouth, I regretted them. Blaming my car for the mistake sounded like an excuse. “Um. Anyway, thank you. If you hadn’t found me, I’d me…”
I trailed off, and he finished for me. “Dead. You would be dead.”
“Yeah.”
He stepped closer, standing over me, and I caught myself biting my lip as I looked up at him. His presence was like nothing I’d ever encountered, nearly knocking the breath out of me.
“I’m Holly, um, Holly Lucas.” I spoke to fill the silence, to save myself from staring up at that gorgeous, implausible body in mute embarrassment.
He looked down and met my gaze, and I’d swear his eyes glowed. A dark red, like coals almost burned out. Above them, his horns curled up and back from his forehead, and I couldn’t see how he kept them on.
“I am Abaddon,” he said after a weighty pause.
“Just one name, huh? Are you a rock star or something?”
“It has always been enough for me.”
Was he joking along with me? He sounded entirely serious.
“I guess Abaddon is kind of a unique name,” I said dubiously and tried to stand.
‘Tried’ being the operative word. I got halfway up before my legs buckled and I fell back, only for Abaddon to catch me.
Powerful fingers gripped my arms with curious delicacy, holding me like a precious ornament he might break if he wasn’t careful. His fiery touch burned, not just warm, but burning hot in a pulsing rhythm. As though instead of blood, his heart pumped fire around his body.
The fire didn’t burn me, though it should have. The pulses of heat made me shudder and breathe a deep, gasping breath. Which was a big mistake, because I got a lungful of eau d’Abaddon, and I was not prepared.
Heavy, musky, indefinably manly, Abaddon’s scent was smoke and darkness and need, all wrapped in a heady incense. I shuddered as it filled my senses, and my body responded eagerly.
He steadied me, making sure I’d caught my balance before letting go and taking a step back. I grabbed onto the sofa for balance, staring at him, and letting myself really see him for the first time.
It wasn’t a trick of the firelight; his skin was crimson. The horns weren’t props, they grew from his skull. No makeup could explain his burning gaze, either. And now I noticed his tail snaking out behind him, flicking through the air.
He looked enough like a human that I could pretend he was one, but once I paid attention, I knew he wasn’t. Which left a question I wasn’t sure I wanted to ask.
“What are you?”