He glared back, blood seeping from his tight-clenched fist. How could she ask why with the monstrosity still staining her hands? All her questions served only to stir up memories and trouble. He resented the memories more than the trouble.
Light-headed with exsanguination and fury, he stalked forward, lashing up his demon. He leaned down and grabbed her, to pull her away, and do the last dirty deed himself.
His blood spattered her cheek, the tear-shaped drop crimson on her pale skin. He froze, aghast at the violence in his touch, which leapt from him like embers from an inferno. He couldn’t even blame the brutality on his demon, interrupted mid-ascension within him.
She faced him as boldly as she had the evils of the dark, as fierce as when she’d rolled him across the bed in his garden while knowing the night might end with his assassin’s blade, as if death and damnation held no terror for her. With all she’d been through, maybe they didn’t.
So what chance was there that one battered, filthy, pissy male would faze her? With the edge of his thumb, he wiped the blood from her cheek.
The droplet fused his skin to hers for a heartbeat, slick like the sweat of passion, a hint of salt—his demon senses rousing unbidden—like the balm that had welled from her body on their joining. His breathing grew ragged.
He saw her lips part, and her wordless exhalation feathered across his palm. He wanted to follow her down to that place she conjured, where the empathy in her hazel eyes softened barren winter shadows to spring.
He yearned to gather her close, to fit those deliberately forgotten fragments back into the tattered remnants of his soul, to let her shine into his darkness and find those pieces he’d thought long lost—light, life, desire.
He leaned down, set his lips softly on hers, prelude to all he wanted, the first step that would change the world around him. The salty sting in the back of his throat tasted not of blood, but tears.
He recoiled. The yearning in him tore free, with an unvoiced cry. She fell back onto her haunches. The feralis husk rolled off her lap.
“Fucking teshuva,” he whispered, staggering back from her. “No touching.” Had the destroyer in him forgotten the risks of temptation? Had he forgotten the agony of wanting what he couldn’t hold on to? As if damnation weren’t bad enough without the mockery of what he’d lost thrown back in his face. “You are an innocent fool.”
“And you are bumming me out.” She gave the husk a halfhearted kick that waggled the lolling tongue. “Why’d you freak? I thought you were going to let me exorcise it this time.”
“I didn’t do anything to the feralis.” It could go to hell for all he cared. She’d certainly taken him halfway there. “And I did not freak.”
“But it’s gone.”
She was right. The feralis’s eye had grayed, empty and cold as his heart. He would have thanked God, but he doubted the Almighty wanted credit for either the feralis or his heart.
He glanced at the other carcass, opening his teshuva senses for the inevitable scraps of ether. Nothing. All the demonic energy was gone.And she’d never even touched it. She’d just touched him. His blood still thrummed urgently through him, as if he’d escaped a fate in her eyes every bit as damning.
“But I didn’t do anything either,” she said, as if she’d heard his thoughts. “I don’t think.”
He certainly hadn’t been thinking, lost in his pointless craving. Still, the demons were gone. What more could he want?
He told himself not to answer that question.
But her touch, his yearning, and the demons’ fate seemed fatally intertwined. His mind reeled at the implication. Whatever they’d done, they’d done together—just as she accused. Now the malice and ferales were gone.
The headlights of a passing car swept over them, catching on the feralis’s fogged eyes. Sera jumped away from the husk with a muffled curse.
He dredged up a smile, trying to keep the twist of his lips more toward the wry side than the bitter. “So the world goes on without us. We keep the battle in the shadows for their sake.”
And maybe for his own sake too. He steeled himself against the glimpse of light in her eyes that tempted him to reach out of his darkness. Why did he have the feeling that temptation could be the end of him as surely as she had somehow banished the feralis?
Sera prowled a wary circle around the downed demons. “I read that demons are solitary hunters.”
“We are. They are.” An unease he couldn’t pin down played along his spine. “These two must’ve honed in on you and found each other.”
“It’s nice to be wanted. By someone.” Her low tone required no reply.
She didn’t touch him again, but his skin ached for her, his bones yearned. His blood heated, a thousand times more scorching than his wounds.
If once some strange bond had joined possessed lovers, some wise talya had probably torn it out by the roots. Hell, he felt torn in two. He’d lived with pain a very long time, he reminded himself. But somehow, this time, it hurt worse.
He took her back to his loft. Sera kept silent as he slammed the door behind her and coded the lock.
She’d nearly gotten them killed. She thought she knew how to handle the stark reality of death. The pockmark freckles of demon spatter were healing even as she watched, but her hands still shook. So much for handling anything.
She cut a glance at Archer. In the cab, he’d called Jonah about the attack, using not particularly subtle code words such as “accident in the park” and “hazmat disposal.” He’d also called Liam and tersely recapped the night’s events. Without looking at her, he’d added, “She’s fine, untouched. Unless I kill her.”
Now he stood in the middle of the unlit room as if he’d forgotten she existed.
She hesitated to remind him. “Maybe I should stay at the league hotel. Liam said he had a room for me.”
“This place has energy sinks too. You won’t lure any more demons here.”
That hadn’t been why she suggested it. She wondered whether he emoted enough to leave a drip mark in those energy sinks. “All right. Your arm . . .”
“I got it. Help yourself to some clean clothes.” Without a backward glance, he left her standing there.
She waited until steam fogged the glass-block bathroom before exploring. The incongruous plantation shutters concealing the low-framed bed from the rest of the room also hid an armoire and dresser.
Keeping her gaze off the bed, she rifled through the drawers. A pair of cotton flannel pants and a T-shirt soft with wear seemed like the fabric equivalent of a consoling hug.
She cleaned up at the kitchen sink. Other than her mud-spattered jeans and faintly scarred hands, she’d escaped the evening unscathed, if she didn’t count the memory of her father’s screams, the sickening stench as the feralis dropped from the tree, or Archer’s bleak stare as he wiped away the gore.
The last of the suds swirled down the drain, and she wished she could purge her thoughts as easily.
The shower gurgled to silence. Her heartbeat ramping up for no reason, she quickly pulled on the fresh clothes, inhaling the whiff of cedar from the too-large T-shirt. On the couch, she tucked her bare feet underneath her. She pulled a pillow onto her lap, realized it didn’t make much of a shield, but held on to it anyway.
The lights in the bathroom went out. Archer appeared, a darker shadow in the doorway.
His clothing matched hers. She felt the weight of his glance, but he made no comment as he padded across the living room.
With the two blades they’d used on the ferales in hand, he pulled up a chair across from her, took up a rag and a bottle of fluid, and began to clean the axe. Head bent over his task, his wet hair glistened like the steel.
Her fingers itched to smooth the hint of damp curl. Instead, she pushed the pillow aside and took the smaller knife. She rummaged through the case at his side for a second rag.