Chapter One
CADE
Three Years Earlier…
“You are one gorgeous specimen of a man.”
I smirked as Nikki tripped over my feet on the way back to her chair, throwing me a look that indicated it was my fault my feet were at the end of my legs.
I steadied her with a hand on her hip, taking the chance to caress her waist, my fingers twitching with the urge to lift her top and feel her skin against mine.
While it would have made more sense for her to walk around my chair rather than in front of me, I’m certain she chose to cross over my legs to offer me a good view of her ass before she sat down.
She stretched her legs less than gracefully over mine, bending slightly and holding the table, careful not to spill her drink as the curves of her ass were on display for me.
Dropping into her seat, Nikki grinned over her beer before taking a long drink and finishing with an almost comical ahh. I still hadn’t responded to her and preferred to sit back and listen to her talk. Besides, how does one even respond to a comment like that?
Wanting to listen to a human talk was new to me. I’d had my brother, Nuno, tell me of a similar feeling toward a woman he met in a bar, and I humored him but thought nothing further of it, putting it down to a crush on a woman who had been a great fuck.
Until Nikki.
She’d come waltzing into the bar, dressed in black and fresh from a funeral, looking to drink her sorrows away and perhaps find some company for the night.
Nikki had her eyes on me as I spotted her the moment she crossed the threshold.
I liked that she was fit and looked as though she’d pose a challenge to any human in a fight, regardless of their gender or build.
She was taller than most women I’d met, although she still had to look up at me.
I imagined picking her up and throwing her on the bed or taking her against the wall.
Elevated strength had its benefits.
While Nikki was evidently made of something tougher than most humans, the funeral had broken something in her, and it was something she wasn’t willing to face yet.
So, she was drinking, talking to a stranger about her job, while throwing in a generous amount of clumsy flirtation. Like she hadn’t done it in a while, or perhaps it was part of her charm.
My guess was the former.
And as a cop in a city as messed up as this one, it turns out her job was an interesting topic to discuss.
She tucked a strand of hair, almost perfectly straight, behind her ear as it came loose from her ponytail.
Nikki was fighting a losing battle trying to keep her hair up.
The tie had slipped too far down, and while it could be tightened, I don’t think her fingers could manage the fiddly task with how many drinks she’d been putting away.
I wished she’d give up and let her hair fall wild and free to match her mood.
“Nothing to say there, hot stuff?” she prompted me, rousing me from my musings.
Taking a swig of my beer, my smirk was still firmly in place. It was practically my dominant expression by now, amused by humanity and life on the surface as I was. It was nice to feel comfortable here like I never did in Hell. “Nothing much to say to respond to that.”
“Don’t you want to return the compliment?”
“Did you only compliment me to get one in return?”
“No…” she emphasized the word by slamming her glass down on the table, “… but it would be gentlemanly to return the compliment.”
“You have a very fuckable mouth.”
She laughed, drinking again. “Not much of a gentleman, are you?”
“Not that I’ve been told.”
“Fine, I’m not looking for a gentleman.”
“What are you looking for?”
She shrugged. “I don’t want to think about today. I just want to forget until tomorrow.”
“What happens tomorrow?”
“I return to my job, my life, and have to consider the implications of his death.”
Should I ask her whose?
She was watching me. “A coworker, if you must know.”
Her lip lifted, revealing perfect teeth, her sneer perfectly matching the scorn in her tone. My, wasn’t she an open book? She wasn’t bothering to hide her hatred for someone, even on the day of their funeral.
But her reaction did beg me to say, “Doesn’t sound like you were too fond of the guy.”
“I wasn’t. He was a crooked cop.”
I waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t. “So why are you here drinking your sorrows away over someone you didn’t like?”
“I’m not sad about his death, but I’m certain the person who was responsible was also accountable for my father’s murder. It just brought up a lot of stuff, okay?”
She was challenging me to push further, but this wasn’t a line of questioning I wanted to pursue. Besides the fact she had made it clear she didn’t want to talk about it, I was here for a good time, just like her.
I held up my hands. “I’ll ask nothing more about it.”
She smiled, the frown melting away. “Good, thank you.”
My head tilted slightly to the side while I watched her.
Humans were fascinating, and it had been several months since I’d decided to take up permanent residence on Earth.
There weren’t many of us who made the move permanent compared to the total population of demons, but if humans knew how many demons there were on the surface, they’d be disturbed.
No doubt they’d be disturbed by even one.
Although Nuno seems to have found a human who stuck around even after she saw him for what he truly was. But the fear on her face when she witnessed him beginning the change—his eyes yellowing and skin a map of black and bright red—isn’t something I took pleasure in.
When I wanted people to be afraid of me, then I’d take pleasure in it.
Nikki was talking about work again. I supposed she didn’t have many people to vent to.
Either that or she was drunk.
“Just yesterday, in fact…” she said, slapping her palm on the table, “… some perp made some lude-ass comment about my hair, ooh did it hurt when you fell from Heaven?” She made a dry-heaving sound and pointed a finger into her mouth.
“I like your hair,” I said.
She rolled her eyes but smiled. “Thank you, but I’ve only just recently stopped hating it.”
“Why would you hate it?”
She dropped her other hand to the table and stared at me. “Do you always ask so many questions?”
My eyebrows shot up, a momentary wave of uncertainty flowed through me—was I doing something wrong? Before my swagger returned—demons don’t question themselves—I smiled again. “Is that not how you have a conversation?”
“Well… yeah.”
She rolled her eyes again, and it was my turn to laugh. “Are you going to answer the question then?”
“Because I am tired of the comments I get about looking like an angel, looking innocent, looking like I could do with corrupting and all sorts of other bullshit. It also means people don’t take me seriously as an officer… they see my hair and assume I’m a bimbo.”
“You’re not? Shit, so I’ve been wasting my time chatting with you when I could just find some bimbo to get laid?”
Nikki laughed, laying a hand on my arm. “Oh, trust me, you’re definitely getting laid tonight.”
I arched a brow, taking a drink. “Well, all right then.”
Putting my drink down, I leaned forward, scootching my chair across the floor until I was next to Nikki.
She watched me, her eyes on mine as I reached behind her, gently undoing the hair tie and sliding it from her hair so her ponytail fell out.
Her hair must be naturally straight, because it was left with no kink from the formerly tight ponytail as it fell over her shoulders, so blonde it was almost white.
I got it, the comments about her looking innocent and corruptible, but I’m glad she didn’t change it.
Because it did make me want to corrupt her, the way her eyes flashed with lust at my touch. I wanted those lips to beg me, to say my name, and to cry out nasty words when she came.
Soon.
“You’re beautiful,” I crooned.
She chuckled. “I already told you you’re getting laid, so you don’t have to sweet-talk me.”
“So, I wasted my fuck-me voice as well?” There was a sharp intake of breath past those gorgeous lips as I ran my thumb over them.
Smirking, I dropped my voice again, allowing the seductive nature of my demon to ooze through my tone.
We’re sexual beings, and sometimes we can’t control our effect on humans.
They tend to gravitate toward us, drawn by a force they don’t understand.
But with control, our effect can be switched off as efficiently as it can be ramped up, and although Nikki was already responding to me on a physical level, I let it out a bit more.
I wanted her to get wet while sitting here in the bar because I wanted her to be practically squirming and begging by the time I had her naked.
“Mmm…” I hummed, still tracing my thumb across her bottom lip, “… maybe not completely wasted.”
She trembled, her light hazel eyes staring into mine. “You’re really good at this,” Nikki whispered.
“I know.”
Nikki chuckled, her voice wavering slightly. She leaned back away from me, and I let my hands drop from her face. She finished her beer, not taking her eyes from mine, her look taking on a hungry quality.
She stood. “Shall we get out of here?”
Finishing my beer, I threw some notes on the table and stood too.
Nikki went to move for the door, and I slid an arm around her waist, pulling her in next to me and smirking as she gasped.
Nikki could be tough and could look after herself, obviously, having taken on an already-dangerous career in a city filled with criminals.
And demons.
But she still fell apart when I touched her.
Demons had two modes—fucking and fighting.
And damn, Nikki was simply oozing lust. I could smell her arousal and feel it coming off her skin in waves. Pulling her close against my chest, I growled when she trembled, the vibrations sending another shiver up her spine.