“Sadly, no happily ever after. Tell me, how is Mason these days? Still eating pinecones and wishing for a mate?”
“Maybe if you visited during the day you’d find out… rather than creeping along the shadows like a freak.”
“Ah, but I am a freak.” The man sounded upset about this. “A freak during the day and the night, no matter what humans may see… I am not good. Remember that, Alex, and tell your human to pay more attention to detail. I could have killed her at least a dozen times this evening.” He bent down again and sniffed my hair. I tried to jerk away, but my arms wouldn’t cooperate. “Pretty though, very pretty.” His eyes narrowed and then went completely black, but not before I saw a flash of blue fire — it matched the fire I saw on my wrist. “What is she?”
“None of your damn business.”
Red eyes flashed and then a hiss escaped from his mouth before fangs shot out from both the top and bottom row of his teeth. “Well, well, well… This is interesting.”
Alex glared at him. “Are you finished?”
The man slammed his hand against my arm and then bit down on the spot he’d touched.
My body erupted with pain.
“You can thank me later,” he said.
And then his voice sounded in my head. “Stay safe, my Hope.”
“TIMBER!” Alex shouted.
But the man was gone.
And so was my sanity, because when I looked down at my arm, it was covered in a tattoo of fire with a gold T inscription.
I opened my mouth to ask what it was as darkness closed in on me, and I lost all consciousness.
Alex
“TRY HARDER!” I screamed until I was hoarse, but it was no use.
Cassius hung his head. “What’s done is done.”
I was seconds away from pulling my own hair out while Cassius once again placed his hand on her skin only to come back as if he’d been burned.
“You’re an archangel and still you can’t undo this?” I cried. “What good are you?”
Stephanie, my sister, glared at me. “Watch yourself, Alex.”
I ignored her and pounded my hands against the wall causing a picture to slam against the ground. “He marked her!”
“There go the family pictures.” Mason sighed.
Hope let out a little moan. My heart lurched in my chest as she blinked open her eyes and stared up at all of us hovering over her. “My head hurts.”
No shit.
She was going to be in a lot more pain if something wasn’t done. What the hell had Timber been thinking?
You know, a voice whispered.
Exactly what I’d been thinking.
Even now power surged within me, danced along my arms.
Demons sensed darkness.
And I had to wonder — if Timber knew mine.