Red Demon Page 7

  Because that was how Juliana had always affected him, in any century.

  By so much as glancing his way, she’d turned him as stupid as one of the turkeys that roamed their new property, following him around like he’d adopted the damned things.

  And if she flirted or, gods help him, allowed her hand to graze any portion of his clothed anatomy? He’d thrown wood like a Major League Baseball player up at bat.

  Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he groaned, “Juliana, why are you so determined to mess with my head?”

  “I’m sorry, Aristos, but I don’t know exactly what you mean.”

  She was right here, in his room, gazing down at him on the bed.

  “Holy shit, Jules!” he shouted, scooting as far back against the headboard as he could. This wasn’t Emma channeling his onetime love; this wasn’t some spirit whispering in his ear. No, this was Juliana, in her physical body, dressed in that pale blue, lace-collared gown that he’d always particularly loved.

  He pointed numbly. “That . . . that dress. You’re wearing our dress.”

  She smiled, brushing her fingertips over the bodice. “I remembered.” The words were sensual, flirtatious.

  Her hair was swept high off her neck, delicately curling tendrils falling free across both cheeks, and her face was flushed. Alive. Not dead. Here, now, having the gall to blush. Her clear blue eyes were wide as if amazed herself at being alive again.

  “I don’t know how you got here . . . ,” he began, but she didn’t seem to hear. Instead, she sank onto the edge of his bed, settling so close that the physical weight of her graceful body pressed against his thigh.

  She was no ghost; she was a woman. His woman, or at least she had been, and she’d come back. Somehow, some-way, the infernal female had found a loophole in eternity, chasing him all the way to the compound—a zone that Leonidas kept warded so that no supernatural creature ever got behind the wire without permission. Which only made her sudden presence that much more impossible to understand.

  “So how are you here? What did you do? What devil did you bargain with?” he blustered.

  Ignoring his questions, she touched her face with childlike wonder and then stared down at her palms in surprise. “I really am here, aren’t I?” Leaning forward, she lifted those same hands to his own face, slowly stroking his scratchy beard growth, drawing one fingertip down the length of his nose, outlining the faint scar beside his right ear. “You feel exactly the same,” she declared, tears filling her eyes. “I never thought I’d touch you again, not with my own hands.”

  Without analyzing, without trying to make sense of the unnatural moment, he drew her into his arms, clinging to her as if to life itself. “Jules,” he murmured against the top of her head, drawing in her scent. He bunched the back of her dress within his hands, desperate to feel and prove that she wasn’t an illusion. “Jules. Sweetheart. My love. How is this possible?”

  Wait. How was this possible?

  With a rude shove, he pushed her out of his grasp, nearly knocking her off the edge of the bed. “You’re not right. This . . . this reunion . . . isn’t right.” He shook an angry finger at her. “People die, and they’re dead! You are dead.”

  After River and Emma had lugged him home with that concussion, they’d stuck him in here, planting a remote in his hand and putting on the DVD of Gladiator. Then they’d told him not to fall asleep, not until Sophie could come heal him. But what had he obviously done? Oh, just the one thing you should never do when you have a concussion. Zonked out. No wonder he was hallucinating.

  He clutched his head. “Skata, I’ve got to be dreaming or I’m truly screwed in the skull. You can’t be here, not like this.”

  She reached out a very physical, very warm hand and stroked his arm. “You held me at my house tonight, so you know that I’m real.”

  “That was Emma!” he thundered. “And it was her body you hijacked so we could do the tongue dance. You weren’t ever there, not really.”

  Juliana cocked her head, studying him. “I don’t understand these words. Hijacking. Tongue dance,” she repeated uncertainly. “Is that the latest trend from New York City?”

  “Kissing!” he shouted, climbing down the length of the bed and out of her grasp. “We were kissing!”

  Her expression brightened. “Oh, that. The French style of affection. I never thought of it precisely as a dance before.” She seemed amused, watching him scramble away from her. “You shouldn’t move, Aristos. Not with a head injury.”

  “And how do you even know about that?” He eyed her warily.

  “Because our tongues were . . . dancing . . . when your friend—River . . . is that his name? When he punched you into the wall.” She frowned. “That, unfortunately, ended our ‘dance.’ Until now, when I’ve found a way back to you. One that will last this time. And so shall the . . . tongue dancing.”

  All he wanted was to put as much distance between them as he could manage without screaming and fleeing the room like a serious pansy. “Let me teach you another phrase, one I learned from a friend of mine. That dog,” he said ferociously, “ain’t gonna hunt.”

  She rose from the bed, following him toward the bedroom door, where he’d flattened himself. With the crook of her finger, she beckoned him. “Ari, come back. I need you. . . .”

  Never taking his eyes off of her, he bellowed River’s name, then Emma’s, and when he didn’t get an answer, he tossed in Ajax’s. Dead silence answered him. Great, he was supposed to be laid up in bed, recovering from his own best bud’s sucker punch, and they were off doing gods knew what. Anything other than, it seemed, watching his back.

  Maybe it was realizing that his nearest and dearest had left him unprotected right when he needed it. Or maybe it was that small voice inside his mind—the one whispering that Juliana was alive, here, back in his life. Really, it might’ve been the wicked hard-on he’d developed just from staring at the woman, his body reacting as if they’d never spent time apart. As if time didn’t exist at all.

  Whatever the cause—the roiling heat in his body, the ache in his groin—all of it coalesced in a heartbeat. He stormed toward Juliana, furious. “What happened to ending it all?” he shouted. “What happened to leaving me?” Then, lowering his voice into a seething, livid tone, he asked, “What happened to you being dead?”

  He was furious, off the chain without a moment’s warning. His entire body shook just like the windowpanes currently did from the gale- force winds raging outside. She opened her mouth to reply, but he cut her off, raising his voice over the riotous buzzing noise inside his head.

  “No, I don’t believe Juliana would’ve changed her mind about that,” he said coldly. “She made a final decision, and it didn’t include spending another moment near me. I was so repulsive, she had to leap into the Savannah River during one of the worst recorded hurricanes in history.”

  He pointed toward his large bedroom windows, the ones that overlooked the farm’s sweeping pasture. They groaned as if to underscore his fury. “Speaking of which, maybe you could try for a repeat performance. We’re in for another whopper of a storm this week.”

  She shivered visibly, casting an anxious glance toward the panes, but he seized both of her thin, strong arms. “You see, we were in love. But my love . . . was a poison for her. I was a poison that drove her to suicide.”

  Tears brimmed in her eyes as she let him throttle her like some rag doll. “Why won’t you fight?” he growled bitterly. “Slap me. Denounce me. Fight back!”

  She began to cry, her delicate shoulders shaking. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that . . . you don’t understand. I have to explain, have to understand what happened myself. No matter how hard I try, I can’t remember. But there is one fact, Aristos. One unwavering truth—I loved you. I still do. . . . I have always loved you.”

  He yanked her flush against his body, pinning his left forearm across her back, preventing her potential escape. “What are you, woman? Some kind of demon?” he demanded hotly.
“A ghost?” He cupped her jaw roughly, forcing her to look up into his eyes. “You can’t possibly be the same Juliana I once knew. So you tell me right now. What are you, and who sent you here?”

  He knew he was being brutal, handling her as if she were a soldier, not the sophisticated, beautiful woman she’d made herself appear to be. Then again, whatever she actually was, it sure as hell wasn’t delicate. It probably possessed horns and fangs and scales when in its true form; he’d lay honest money on that. He tightened his hold on her jaw, shoving her back against the wall, pinning her there by the collarbone.

  “Aristos,” she whimpered, squirming beneath his harsh grip. “You’re hurting me. Please. Please, just let me explain.”

  He sniffed at the air, expecting the scent of sulfur or decay, but swore he caught only the fragrance of jasmine. “Stop with the crap,” he insisted, sliding his hand lower beneath her chin, keeping her face tilted upward. “Stop with the lies, creature. Reveal your true self. Now.”

  She blinked up at him, and his heart clenched with a painful sensation. Those haunting, alluring eyes. Oh, by the very Highest God, he’d never forgotten them. Whatever this entity was, it was doing a marvelous job of mimicking his Juliana. His very dead, forever-lost-to-him, ghostly Juliana.

  He gave his head a shake, dropping his hand from her chin. “Do you have any idea what I’m capable of? What me and my kind do to the likes of something like you? I’ll give you kudos. . . . You’ve sure got a whopping pair on you.” He forced a laugh. “I’m betting you’re not even female, whatever the hell you are.”

  “I never knew what you really were, Aristos. That night when you came to me, and I saw your wings—”

  “Shut up!” he barked, clasping at his pounding head. No way would he let this thing taunt him with his own memories of that horrible night. The image before him now was false—cruel, wrong in every way.

  But her ethereal, lovely blue eyes fixed on him again, widening slightly. “Why can’t you believe that it is me?” She leaned closer, sounding frustrated. “I promised to find a way back to you. I promised, Aristos. Do you not believe Cecilia, who proclaims me to be true? As does your friend Emma.”

  “They’re deceived,” he hissed. “They don’t know demons like I do. They don’t know Juliana Tiades like I do.” A stabbing pain of anguish hit him hard, spearing him through the chest. He realized then that his fury at the entity wasn’t even about what it was—he encountered demons and destroyed them on a near-regular basis. No, it was about everything this illusionary being wasn’t. “You’re not her. I’d know if you were. You’d . . . feel the same.”

  “Yes, I have changed. But you’ve changed, too. A hundred years is a long time.”

  Her words caught his attention. “What do you mean exactly, that you’ve changed?”

  She gave a diffident shrug. “Certain arrangements were involved in regaining a physical form. Nothing significant.”

  “Oh, just hurdling across this little thing called eternity. One minor detail of getting your body back, and poof, you’re here with me again.”

  She frowned. “A guide helped me find my way here, to you—to this very room. A kind female spirit who saw how deeply I love you, still, after all these years.”

  He laughed darkly, shaking his head. “I know way too much about the kinds of deals you gotta make in order to come back from the dead, and it’s never that easy.”

  “Is that why you appeared that night . . . winged?” She cocked her head, studying him with wide eyes. “Because you really are an angel?”

  “Sweetheart, I’m definitely no angel,” he muttered. “In fact, I might be the very devil himself.”

  “There is no darkness in you. I was always sure of that, even though I never knew what you were.” Juliana reached a hand to his chest, splaying her palm over Ari’s heart. The fucker was slamming like a Gatling gun, a tempo that only increased with every moment beneath her gentle touch.

  “Yeah?” He snorted. “Well, I don’t know what kind of bat-shit crazy thing you are, either, woman! But I sure as bloody hell know you’re not my Jules.”

  She smiled, a lazy, slow reaction that had him growing rock hard inside his pants all over again. And that look, that smile, was pure Jules. It was her flirtatious look, her pleased one. She’d always glanced at him just that way whenever he made her feel beautiful. He’d recognize that look in any city, on any continent. And definitely in any age.

  He tensed, struggling to process his conflicted emotions, but took just one slight step closer.

  She rubbed her neck. “I was always yours. There was nothing, absolutely nothing that I wouldn’t have done to find my way back to you.” She patted her chest imploringly as if she were offering up her soul as collateral. “I am truly alive again now, eager for your love.” She looked down right then, her gaze lingering on his tight groin. “Eager for all of you, Aristos. At last.”

  Ari’s entire body began a free fall right then, a headlong dive into an intoxicating mix of power and arousal. His spine began to burn and prickle, and he knew it was only a few heartbeats before his wings emerged of their own volition. He had no control over the rapid, unnerving transformation that came over him in that moment, just from being near this female.

  He blinked, but his eyes were on fire, blazing with blinding white light that reached toward her like moonbeams. “Only a demon could call forth my power this rapidly,” he declared, his voice harsh and tight. “Only the darkness would summon my Change.”

  The prickling of his feathers pierced the skin along his spine, and he barked out a cry, feeling trapped by his clothing, knowing it would be shredded if he couldn’t halt the rapid alteration in his shape-shifter’s body.

  Desperate, his back and shoulder muscles aching from the transition, he yanked at the edge of his shirt, dragging it over his head until he stood before her, bare chested. He pressed a hand behind his back, wincing, and practically held his breath in expectation. Juliana stared at him, eyes wide in . . . wonder. It wasn’t an expression of horror or disgust on her face; she appeared amazed.

  “Is this how your wings emerge?” she whispered hoarsely. “Do they . . . sprout? Along your back?”

  He swallowed hard, nodding, feeling the heavy, dragging sensation of wings form along his spine.

  “Oh, I so want to see them! Up close this time,” she said, beaming at him.

  As opposed to last time? When Juliana had gaped in horror at the truth of what he was, a man who bore dread wings upon his back? An eternal warrior capable of flight and transformation, part human, part hawk when changed?

  No, he thought, battling the urges inside of him, trying to retract the emerging wings. No, you must resist her dark effect! This isn’t Juliana. She never wanted this part of you—she reviled it.

  He palmed himself, giving his length a rough, cruel yank through his jeans. “I’m halfway to orgasm with a demon,” he hissed. “But I won’t let you finish this job, creature.”

  Reaching to the floor, he snatched up his discarded T-shirt and yanked it over his head, retracting his wings as he did so. “Gonna get this dog-and-pony show back under control,” he said, grabbing her by the upper arm.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded as he yanked her toward the closed door of his bedroom. “Are you taking me somewhere?”

  She dug her heels into the carpeted floor. “A gentleman would declare his intentions, sir.”

  He opened the door to the hallway, hauling her along with him. “Madam,” he warned her, “I never have been and never will be a gentleman.”

  Chapter 8

  “Go on and tell me,” Ari announced, still clutching “Juli-Gana” by the arm, twisting his hold violently. “Just say it.” He glanced between Nikos and his own brother Ajax, bobbing his head. Waiting for the confirmation of what he already knew but needed to hear from their lips.

  Both men sat at the glass-topped kitchen table, eyeing the female he held manacled in his grasp as if she were a specimen of dis
ease. Or an alien that had suddenly flown into the room, complete with green skin and bug eyes. “Come on, brothers. Tell me.”

  Nikos pointed at her. “Who is that?” he asked with slow, meaningful precision.

  “And what is she doing here?” Ajax tagged on impatiently.

  Ari waved a hand between them. “Stop trying to sound reasonable, and tell me what I already suspect.”

  Ajax kept his eyes on the female. “Tell you what, you malaka?”

  “That I’m still under the influence of my concussion.”

  Nikos stepped forward, black gaze moving up and down Juliana’s form. “She’s not dressed right.”

  “I beg your pardon?” she asked tartly, standing a little taller.

  “He means, for this century,” Ajax clarified.

  Ari maintained his hold on the female, even as she squirmed in his grasp. “So you see her, too? It’s not just me?”

  “Yes. There is a woman standing in our kitchen,” Nik confirmed. “Who appears to have emerged from the past? From the Victorian era, it would seem, based on the clothing.”

  Ajax jumped out of his chair and smacked Ari on the top of the head. “You pousti, what the hell kind of mess have you gotten into now?”

  Ari slapped his brother right back. “Watch the concussion. Besides, you’re the pousti in our family.”

  Ajax volleyed the macho shit right back. “I’m married. When’s the last time you got any?”

  “Almost did tonight,” Ari muttered, wishing that, for once, he wasn’t outranked by his younger brother. He dragged the woman toward the table, shoving her down into one of the chairs as if she were a felon. Not sexy as hell; not a dead ringer for Juliana.

  Dead ringer. He castigated himself. Loaded word choice.

  Ajax, of course, missed nothing: not one iota of emotion or subtext, thank God. His brother, their captain, stalked toward the female, glaring suspiciously. “So,” he said, sidling onto the edge of the table beside her. His tone was almost friendly, but Ari knew better—his little brother was a master interrogator. “You apparently have a way with Aristos, no?”