She was going to hate him for ruining her perfect life.
“Good morning, angel.”
Eve spun to face him. Despite hours of hard sex, she looked none the worse for wear. Her dark eyes, almond shaped and framed by thick sooty lashes, were clear and bright. She would heal with remarkable speed now. At least on the outside. As for the inside . . .
He ran a hand through his damp hair. Would she understand when he explained? And even if she did, would it mitigate the fact that he was the reason this had happened to her?
She held up a hand, halting his advance when he was a few feet away. “What am I now?”
“You’re a Mark.” He spoke calmly, while inside he felt far from it. “You’re stronger, faster—”
“Better, stronger, faster?” Her laughter was harsh. “I’m the fucking Bionic Woman? What the hell was that fever I had?”
Alec crossed his arms over his bare chest and decided to take the high road. She had every right to be pissed and confused. “Punishment. Women’s sexuality has been used against them since my mom ate the forbidden fruit. Why do you think childbirth is so painful?”
“Are you insane? What does childbirth have to do with me?” She made a slashing gesture with her hand. “On second thought, don’t tell me. Just explain what I’m being punished for.”
“For tempting me.”
“I haven’t seen you in ten damn years!” she snapped. “You got your rocks off and left.”
Eve had never been able to hide anything from him. She was hurt. The knowledge tightened his throat and made him speak gruffly. “I love you.”
A visible shudder moved through her. She reached out and gripped the door frame. “Screw you.”
“Evangeline—”
“Go to hell.”
“My job is to send demons back there. Now it’s your job, too.”
“You’re nuts. You need help.” She jerked her chin toward the door. “There are lots of shrinks out there. Go find one. I’ll even let you take the Yellow Pages with you. For old time’s sake.”
“Did he show you his wings, angel?” Alec stepped closer. “Did he spread them wide? Intimidate you with them?”
Her fingers gripping the jamb were white, as were the edges of her lips.
“I bet he made a great show out of the marking, didn’t he? How did he say it?” He deepened his voice, then growled, “Bear the Mark of Cain!”
The coffee cup fell from her fingers and shattered on the hardwood floor, coffee exploding outward in a wide splatter. Her knees buckled and Alec lunged forward, catching her.
He carried her to the sofa and sat, cradling her in his lap. Tucking Eve’s head under his chin, he rocked her, taking comfort from her embrace even as he gave the same to her.
“What about you tempting me?” she accused, her breath gusting across his throat. “How was I supposed to resist you? A girl my age . . . a guy like you—”
A soft sob escaped her. Alec thrust his hand into her hair and held her tight against him.
That night haunted him. He’d rented a suite, bought every beautifully scented flower he could find at the florist’s, and lit the room with a profusion of candles. He took her virginity on white satin sheets covered in rose petals.
“I couldn’t have done anything differently,” he said softly.
“You knew you weren’t going to stay before you seduced me.”
He spoke with his lips pressed to the crown of her head. “I tried to spare you any suffering by leaving. I hoped that if we separated, you could still have the same future you would have had before you met me.”
Eve struggled out of his embrace, fighting him with such fervor she fell on the floor. “You’re an asshole.” Rising to her knees, she slapped him.
Alec clenched his jaw and turned the other cheek.
She cursed and pushed to her feet, her robe askew. He stood with her, securing his towel while facing her head on.
“Spare me any suffering,” she scoffed, glaring at him. “That’s lame, Alec. You have to do better than that.”
“What do you want me to say?”
She ran both hands through her hair and growled. “Something that makes sense. Something sincere and believable.”
“I’m sorry, angel.”
Pausing midstep, Eve gaped at him. “That’s it? You’re sorry?”
“Would it be better to say that I would do it again?”
She looked away. “Don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?”
“Look at me like that.”
“You love me.” Alec smiled wryly.
They stared at each other across the few feet that separated them.
“Hate to burst your bubble,” she said grimly, “but I have more important things in my life than you. You’re expendable.”
“Actually, I’m not, but we’ll get to that later. In the meantime, you can’t ignore what happened last night.”
“It doesn’t mean what you think it means.” She walked past him to the kitchen.
He followed. “It means we’re in a lot of shit. It also means getting you out of this mess just got a hell of a lot more complicated.”
She grabbed two mugs from her cabinet and changed the subject. “You want to explain the winged man?”
“Yes, brother, would you like to explain me?”
Eve turned at the sound of the voice she would never forget. He strode in from the balcony as if he owned the place. The man who’d screwed her into unconsciousness in the stairwell. His smile was sensual and slightly cruel, and it made her shiver, not entirely with fear.
Alec snarled and vaulted across the room with a ferocity and speed that frightened her, hitting his brother in the midsection with a brutal tackle. The ensuing scuffle was far from brotherly tussling. It was a fight to the death, and the sounds and sights of the battle did something strange to her. Made her mark burn, made her pulse race. The scent of blood in the air caused a physical reaction that she likened to blood lust. A rough growl rumbled up from her chest.
Alec lifted his brother into the air like a WWE wrestler and smashed him onto her glass-topped coffee table, destroying it. A moment later, he finished off the job by braining his brother with her Waterford crystal candy bowl.
The sickening crunch of a crushing skull should have horrified her, should have made her vomit, and she was in fact stumbling toward her sink to do just that when Alec disappeared.
Vanished into thin air.
One moment he was pushing to his feet, his bare body sheened with sweat and high-velocity blood spatter. The next he was gone.
Eve paused, unblinking, her body’s natural response seized by shock. Her gaze dropped to the dead man on the floor.
Then she spun to the sink and wanted to retch, but her body wouldn’t cooperate.
“Oh my god,” she gasped, hanging on to the curved granite edge to remain standing. As her mark sizzled within her skin, a sharp sound escaped from her throat.
“Yeah, that’s where he went,” came a dry voice from the living room. The corpse on the floor rose to its feet, its disfigured head restoring before her very eyes, the dent slowly filling like a balloon. Wings sprouted from the man’s back and he shook them out, testing each side with a quick flap before retracting them.
“Cain never learns,” he said, winking at her, once again looking like the Armani-clad businessman from Gadara Tower.
“I’m insane,” she gasped. “Certifiable.”
Alec’s brother laughed. “Don’t get your pan ties in a twist, babe. He’ll be back, and in one piece, too.”
“You’re dead,” Eve muttered, “and I’m going to pass out.”
“You’re too healthy for that. All the physical reactions you used to have to stress won’t happen anymore.”
“What the hell are you?”
He smiled, the arrogant curve of his lips a faint echo of Alec’s.
Brothers.
She could see it now. All the hints of Alec that had drawn her to him the other day were Alec. His blood. His genes. His traits. But all the warmth and love that shone in Alec’s dark eyes were absent from this man’s. His gaze was filled simply with mischief and male appreciation.
Somehow that was easier to bear right now.
“I’m the guy who fucked you into three screaming orgasms, babe.”
“I see asshole runs in your family.” The full reality of talking to a stranger she’d screwed in a public place, on camera, a stranger who happened to be Alec’s brother, and had wings, and had been a corpse a minute ago, hit her hard and she leaned heavily on her countertop. “I could use a good bout of unconsciousness right about now.”
“Reed,” he said more softly, his leer fading into something more sincere. “My name is Reed, Evangeline.”
“What did you do to me?”
“Did Alec tell you that you’re marked now?” Reed settled onto a barstool and picked an apple from the fruit bowl. “Damned to hunt the scourge of the earth and make the world safer for everyone?”
“I got the damned part. Who’s doing the damning is a bit murky.”
“Let’s just say you should reconsider being an agnostic.”
Eve turned on the faucet and splashed water over her face. “Christ . . . Shit!” she hissed, as her mark burned.
He grinned. “You’re getting warmer.”
“Ha-ha.” Forcing herself to act normal, she retrieved one of the mugs she’d set out earlier and filled it with steaming coffee. “Why now? It’s been ten years.”
“The wheels of justice turn just as slowly up there as they do down here.”
“How does Alec fit into all of this?” She shot a worried glance over her shoulder. “Is he okay?”
“He’s fine. It’s not the first time he’s killed me. As for how he fits . . .” Reed shrugged. “He could have spared you if he’d kept his dick in his pants.”