Chapter 3
Espun on her butt to flee, to get away from the flash of teeth and claws bearing down on her.
She didn’t make it far. In fact, she hadn’t even been able to turn away when the monster’s massive hand gripped her throat.
He lifted her up with one hand, though his grip wasn’t hard enough to choke her.
Not yet at least. She still scratched at his hand with her own, kicked out as best she could, but it did nothing.
He brought her up to meet his face, dangling her off the ground as he did so, given their foot-and-a-half height difference.
He shoved her back, back, back, until she hit the wall and slid down it to her feet. His face followed her as she went.
His snarl was all she heard, his fangs all she saw.
The knife-like claws on his hands pressed in, cutting off air, digging into the flesh at the back of her neck but not quite cutting into her flesh.
Before she couldn’t breathe, however, she had breathed him in.
It was an oddly pleasant scent, given everything else about the creature made her want to shrink away in fear.
He smelled of tarnished metal, smoke, and whiskey.
She thought of luxurious candles, dark wooden rooms where she’d never been, vaults of old jewelry she’d never seen in real life.
More than this, however, the scent alone made her heart calm to manageable beats.
Terror ran riot through E’s mind, though a soft tingle started in her gut, pushing out the fear in the rest of her body for some reason.
The monster growled deep and low in his throat as dripping fangs grazed her neck.
He audibly breathed in, noticeably froze for a second, then pulled back to study her face.
He loosened his grip, so she could once again suck in air, which she did in big gulps.
He said something she couldn’t understand.
Something in a language she didn’t know but one which sounded familiar enough she knew it was human at least.
“I…I don’t understand.” Her voice was croaking, harsh because of the claws gripping her neck.
One second she was tipsy, trying to summon wealth to help her solve her problems, then the next this creature was on top of her. She did, somehow, understand the smell now. Not in a logical sense, but in her bones. The smell was significant, comforting, like a home she’d never known.
“English,” the creature muttered. His tongue, long and pointed and oddly flexible, curled around one of his fangs as he gave her a smirk.
He loosened his grip more, his hand coming to rest like a necklace at the base of her throat, and he leaned in again.
She flinched out of reflex and general uncertainty, but all the monster did was breathe deep once again, his eyes fluttering closed before he blinked them back open.
“Name,” he said, his deep, dark voice a combination of promised pain and pleasure, an audible charge zipping from her ears down her spine until it hit her core and made her flutter.
She tamped that down real quick. Lust was something she did not need when some unknown creature from some unknown world had his hand around her throat, even if similar scenarios featured in alone-time fantasies.
“Edith. E, actually.”
“E?” The question rang clear. He wanted more from her.
“E Michaels. From Middletown, Ohio. And… and you are?”
She told herself her engrained Midwestern manners compelled her to ask his name.
She also could be honest with herself and admit it might also be the alluring smell of him.
Or the sear of his body pushed against her own.
All good options for the basic, “What’s your name? Where’re you from?” routine.
“Plutus,” he said, pulling himself back at last. He released her neck and she moved to run, get away, but before she could, he slammed a hand into the exposed brick at her back.
She heard a crunch, felt bits of brick dust fall to her shoulder.
She knew, without having to look, there’d be a massive hand-shaped dent in Lisa’s beautiful, exposed brick feature wall.
The cost of fixing something like that drifted across her mind, but she locked it down, focusing on her current precarious situation, and any possibility she might have of surviving this encounter.
Plutus, the creature in front of her, had taken a moment to look around the apartment, surveying it.
His eyes, a green so bright she thought they might be able to hypnotize, homed back in on her, studying her face once again.
A frown touched his lips as he stared unblinking.
A stray flash of light from the street caused his eyes to reflect red, then green, like a cat.
“You are human. How did you call me?”
“I didn’t call you.”
Plutus looked to the floor with the spell materials on the floor, his hand flexing then loosening more when he studied something there. “The book,” he whispered. Slowly turning his head back to E, he looked her up and down, assessing, and she felt the need to fill the silence with some explanation.
“Well, what I mean is, I didn’t intentionally call you.
Specifically. I didn’t think the spell would work, you know?
Because, like you said, I’m human and all.
I just needed…” E turned her head away from the monster, unintentionally exposing her neck to him, but she didn’t care.
The embarrassment of what she’d done, the desperation touching every corner of her life, made it impossible for her to tell him exactly what happened.
One too-pointy, gold-tipped claw flicked under her chin, making her eyes widen.
He nudged her face back, so she looked in his eyes once again.
“I see,” was all he said. He nodded and took a step back, releasing his hand from the brick and her chin, giving her space she needed.
However, she felt his eyes like a touch when they moved down to her feet and climbed back up her body, taking in all she was, which in her opinion wasn’t much.
“Are we in Ohio?”
“No. Uh, this is New York. City.”
He smiled wide then, his mouth transforming into something sharp and dirty and lovely all at once.
He looked damn sexy, despite his horns and fangs and claws and the barely leashed power radiating off him.
Something about Plutus called to her, scraped against her desire, and she wasn’t too happy about it.
Still, she wasn’t one to ignore the obvious, so she could at least acknowledge a spark of want existed in her when she looked at him. Smelled him.
“Almost like home.” His voice, smooth, held an odd accent she couldn’t place. Old world somehow. Old money even. Something she never knew.
She blinked. Hard. Couldn’t hold back the question any longer, though it maybe came out a bit ruder than she intended. “What are you?”
“Plutus. A god of wealth. The Greek God of Wealth, to be exact.”
“A god?” she whispered, in pure disbelief.
Sure, all humans knew about supernaturals, but they made up three distinct categories: witches, werewolves, or vampires.
No one talked of gods, unless they were in a church.
Or a mythology class. This dude in front of her—all six-and-a-half feet of muscle and power and sexy vibes—sure as hell wasn’t myth.
He waved a hand in a dismissive way, still studying his surroundings. “Yes. God. Surprise! Gods exist. You should get used to the fact.”
“Because you’re in my apartment?”
“And I plan to stay,” he said, the wicked smirk stretching back over his mouth.
The god turned, to take in more of the apartment, his eyes falling on the small bits of luxury she used every day that weren’t hers. “A lovely home you have here. Makes me wonder why you’d attempt to call a being like me.”
She straightened, wanting to defend herself. “First off, I didn’t call a being of any kind. I called, um, well, money or something.”
He barked out a laugh. “Or something? You’re unsure,” He tsked at her. “You really shouldn’t try to cast spells you don’t fully understand. You might bite off more than you can chew.”
She ignored the very good advice he gave her a little too late and went on. “Second: this place isn’t mine. My friend, Lisa, owns it. I stay here at a steep discount.”
The smirk washed away and his head turned, right to her small alcove-made-bedroom.
She felt something ugly move in her, and she pushed past him, for the first time truly unafraid, to rip the curtain open so he could see all her space.
“Happy?” E asked, standing to face him with arms crossed and hip jutted.
He nodded, as if he’d decided something, and instead of answering, moved to sit on the misplaced couch. “Come,” he said as he patted the couch cushion beside himself, his tone a clear indication he was used to being obeyed.
She didn’t move. The more time she spent with him, the more she felt his scent seep into her, making her calm and admittedly feistier than she should be in this situation.
Annoyance apparently overrode any lingering fear.
E didn’t move. Didn’t come as he asked. She stood and stared, hard, and waited.
He sighed deep, the sound a mix of delight and exasperation, and leaned back, making himself more comfortable.
“I can make you come.” The words curled from his forked tongue, past his fangs, hitting her hard in her gut.
She knew from the glint in his eyes he meant what he said in multiple ways. Still, she stood strong.
“Very well,” he said, then he moved. Or she assumed he moved.
One second he was sitting on the couch, and the next he was in front of her, gripping her waist and hoisting her up as if she weighed no more than a backpack.
He slung her over his shoulder, and then the room blurred and she was bouncing, hard but safe, on the couch.