Chapter 1 #2
Luca’s hands cradle my face, one painted black fingernail grazing my bottom lip as he sighs. “I’m not sorry.”
“You’re also not helping.”
A drop of sweat rolls down from his hairline to his cheek, before finally dripping off the edge of his chiseled jaw. My flames climb higher. He doesn’t let me go.
“Luca,” I hiss. “You’ll get burned.”
He shakes his head, ignoring my warning. “You won’t hurt me,” he says. “Even if I piss you off.”
Luca’s solid confidence in me breaks my anger’s hold, because he’s right. Even the thought of making his beautiful face twist with pain turns my stomach.
The flames die abruptly around us, and Luca smiles. I roll my eyes and shove him back into the chair, reclaiming my personal space and severing this odd tension between us at the same time.
His face is damp with sweat from my flaming wings, his normally milk chocolate brown hair melting to a darker shade at the roots. “I think you’re the one with a death wish,” I mutter, using my thumbs to fix his smudged eyeliner.
The disheveled, messy, rockstar style somehow makes him better looking. Sexier. Like he just spent a handful of hours bending someone over the nearest flat surface and making them scream.
I flap my wings gently, hoping to get oxygen to my brain and stop myself from doing something unbelievably idiotic, like find out if Luca tastes as good as he looks. When the smoke detector squawks, the sharp, bleating alarm is the answer to a prayer I didn’t bother to make.
Luca jumps up, unscrewing the device and taking the battery out, grumbling under his breath the entire time. I leave the dressing room before I’m tempted to say something I can’t take back.
After my shift ends, I push through the heavy back door of the club, more than ready to go home and wind down. The door slams shut behind me, a satisfyingly solid sound marking the end of an exhausting day.
Once I get home, I’ll make some food, then—my skin prickles, little electric shocks shooting from the arches of my feet to the tips of my fingers. Someone is watching.
Rolling my shoulders back, I pretend not to notice and walk confidently toward the alley where I parked my motorcycle. As tired as I am, I can hold my own if someone tries their luck.
Luca’s warning rolls around in my head, and I sigh internally. If whoever the stare belongs to wants a fight, they’ll have to throw the first punch.
Dominant fist curled around my keys, my wings are already stowed away, making me look as human as the people going about their business behind the magical distraction wards.
Absorbing them into my skin is a skill that took me years to master.
If I’m honest, it’s never gotten easier.
I tell people I leave them out at the club because the tips are better—and they are—but the truth is my wings hate to be hidden.
It used to be one of the many things that made him furious with me.
The skin of my shoulder blades itches beneath my leather jacket. Wearing the protective clothes over my simple nylon shorts and crop top is the safest way to travel on a bike. But it’s stifling until I can get some speed going and feel the proverbial wind in my hair.
“Hey, baby doll.” I stiffen at the smarmy voice behind me. “Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?” Only my exhaustion keeps me from rolling my eyes at the universe’s most unoriginal pickup line.
“No,” I mutter. “Because some of us know how to stick the landing.”
His responding chuckle is oily. It makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, yet I refuse to give him the satisfaction of turning around.
Guys try this all the time after close. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, they skulk back into the shadows once they realize I have no intention of entertaining their bullshit. He’ll take the hint. Eventually.
“What’s the hurry, sweet thing? Do I make you nervous?”
Oh fuck no. This guy clearly needs to be taught a lesson.
It’s all I can do to keep my feet moving along the pockmarked asphalt toward my bike.
I tighten my grip on my keys, maintaining the same unhurried pace.
Damn Luca for getting in my head and making me second-guess my stab first, ask questions later philosophy.
My instincts go haywire a heartbeat before rough hands shove me into the grimy wall of the alley.
I catch myself before my nose can connect and shake my head.
That’s it. No more chances. Planting one heel against the concrete wall, I use the momentum to flip backward and drive my other foot into the guy’s face.
He yowls, and I smile as I recognize him. Quarter Guy is back for more, and I kicked him right in his injured mouth with the combined force of about five human men. I may not believe in divine intervention of any kind, but I can certainly get behind a little poetic justice.
Pucker up, asshole. Karma wants to give you a kiss. I’m considering how painful his lesson should be when he pulls a long, shiny knife from his denim jacket, dark eyes swirling with rage as he advances on me.
“Do you even know who I am?” he snarls. “You’re lucky to have my attention.”
I examine my nails, painted a cheerful shade of citrus and filed into the almond shape I prefer, then lift my gaze to my attacker’s.
Gray eyes brimming with entitlement, he has hulking, brutish features.
A mixture of oversized and squashed, they sit unevenly above a harsh, square chin that’s dripping blood.
I snort a laugh. “You know, now that you mention it, you do look familiar. I think my friend carved your face in a beginner’s art class we took together. We were only five at the time, so it slipped my mind at first. It wasn’t her best work.”
For a second he freezes, probably trying to process my insult with his pea-sized brain. Kindly, I tap my foot a few times and give him a second to work it out.
This burly idiot has demon written all over him, the big, dumb kind we see often here on the Fringes. The rage in his eyes and the complete lack of stealth give him away. He’ll be stronger than most supernaturals, but no match for me.
“You won’t be laughing when I carve your face up,” he says.
I wince. That comeback was embarrassing. Maybe I should give him another chance to think of something better. I open my mouth, then the air shifts against my back. The magic in my body hums in warning as it senses a real predator.
Blockhead looks up, over my shoulder, and glares. “Hey asshole—” the rest of the insult dies on his tongue.
His eyes calcify first, the shiny slate orbs turning dry and dull.
Next, all color leaves his skin, the ruddy flesh transforming into lifeless, ashy stone.
His hand reaches for me, the knife-tip glinting in the moonlight.
He doesn’t manage more than an inch before he’s frozen in place, completely petrified.
“Seriously?” I complain, groaning and whirling around, being extra careful to keep my gaze locked on our feet. “I had it handled. I was giving him a second to come up with some better last words.”
“He pulled a knife on you, Celine.” Luca stumbles over the first syllable of my name, making it sound more like a hiss than a word. I take that as a verbal cue for me to keep my head down.
“Amazingly enough, I did notice that,” I deadpan sarcastically. “Have you stowed the rock peepers, or do I need to give you a minute?”
He sighs. “I’m good.”
Raising my head, I catch the tail end of Luca’s eyes shifting back from unfamiliar reptilian yellow slits to the warm, whiskey-tinted hazel I’m used to.
“At the risk of sounding ungrateful, what are we supposed to do with this monolith you made?” I thump my fist against the demon’s frozen face.
He looks better this way. I wish I could let him know that his final form is a definite improvement. “I bet it weighs a ton.”
“I have a really strong friend,” Luca says with a shrug.
I groan. “I was afraid you were going to say that.” I slump against the statue and examine the knife clutched in its stone fingers. “Go get the push broom and watch for stragglers.”
Luca nods, his jaw clenched as he disappears around the corner. While there’s no one else around right now, that could change at any moment. Even though it’s three o’clock in the morning, this city isn’t known for its regular sleep schedule. Privacy of any kind is at a premium.
I’ll have to act fast. After I check in all directions, I hoist the stone demon off the pavement and hurl it at the alley wall with all my strength.
It hits with a deafening crack, the force doing exactly what I intended and breaking the statue into enough pieces that it isn’t immediately recognizable.
Quickly, I stomp on the rest, imagining the chunks as foot-sized bubble wrap.
As I pulverize the evidence, the first trickle of worry hits me.
We’re a fringe community, which means we typically make and enforce our own code of conduct. An unspoken social agreement between supernaturals from half a dozen realms to do exactly two things: never alert the humans to our presence on Earth and keep the ruling enclave the fuck out of Las Vegas.
That usually isn’t hard to do. Headquartered hundreds of miles away in Colorado, our regional enclave rarely makes an appearance here.
The only time I’ve heard of it happening is when someone important dies.
If the demon was trying to intimidate me, we’re in the clear.
If not . . . Fuck, I should have tested him.
Luca sprints around the corner. With a broom in one hand, a dustpan in the other, and an industrial-sized trash bag clenched between his teeth, he looks crazed. He spits the trash bag out, and it flutters to the ground at my feet. “What the fuck, Celine? That sounded like a bomb going off.”
“I’m strong, not stealthy,” I snap, gathering up the knife, clothes, and wallet that fell from the demon’s pocket when I broke him apart, then pointing at the remaining chunks. “Stop bitching about my methods and sweep him up before someone comes to find out what made the noise.”
Thankfully, Luca doesn’t argue, cleaning up the powdery remains with the efficiency of a skilled bartender who’s been handling unusual spills for years. Within sixty seconds, only a few fragments are left. They blend in with the assorted dirt, cigarette butts, and broken glass littering the ground.
I squat and hold the dustpan level so Luca can get the remaining bits, wheezing as his brisk work with the broom sends a cloud of dust directly into my face.
“Gross.” I cough, shooting him a dirty look. “You got him in my hair.”
Luca’s lips curl into a boyish smile. He swings the full garbage bag over his shoulder, casting a lumpy shadow on the wall—a demented version of the humans’ Santa Claus legend. “Nothing a shower won’t fix,” he says, eyes glittering with mischief.
He killed someone for me. I cross my arms to hide my shiver.
“Goodnight, Luca.”
“You’re welcome, Celine.”
Pivoting, I toss a wave over my shoulder and hurry to my bike, frustration replacing the odd flash of desire for Luca.
He’s got a lot of nerve—telling me to be more careful in the dressing room, then turning around and using his rarest ability in the middle of the fucking road.
A lot of people would love to hear that the Fang’s sexy bartender is a near-mythical shifter.
He risked exposing his basilisk in a situation I had completely under control.
I stuff the wallet, clothes, and knife in my top case, then straddle my bike, sliding my helmet over my hair before pushing the kickstand back with my heel. The roar of the engine and the familiar vibration against my thighs settle the worst of my worry.
My shoulder blades are itching like crazy.
I’ll get rid of the rest of the evidence, but Luca and I aren’t done talking about this.
I navigate the tight alley slowly until I’m out on a main road, then open my bike up as much as possible. Living among the humans means I have to keep my wings hidden most of the time. The closest I get to flying around here is on the back of my bike.
Since my place is only five minutes away, I’m usually bummed that its proximity to the Fang doesn’t give me a chance to let loose. Tonight though, with anxiety turning me inside out, I just want to get home and let my wings down.