Demon Marked by Anna J. Evans

EXCERPT:

Food. Damn, she was hungry. The dark craving that had been her constant companion since the day her parents offered her as a sacrifice surged through her body, making her fingertips itch and burn.

“Come and get it,” Emma whispered under her breath as she slipped into the shadows behind the bar.

The alley was wide and clear except for two small dumpsters and an oversized ashtray—the city made sure the streets were kept tidy to prevent infestation by demons who made their nests in tight, crowded places—but it was still dark. It wasn’t a place where a woman should walk alone. There were predators in Southie who didn’t need teeth or claws, who used fists and knives and guns to dominate, steal, and kill.

She wondered what kind of weapon Blue Eyes was packing—the trademark DM knife or something with a little more firepower. Either way, it wouldn’t matter, not as long as she got him close enough to touch before he whipped anything out.

Anything other than his dick, of course. Emma didn’t mind when men whipped out that particular “weapon.” A man with his dick in his hand was a man with his head in the clouds. Or maybe someplace a little less wholesome than the clouds, someplace darker, more dangerous...

The door creaked open and Blue Eyes stepped out of the bar, his movements confident, but careful. He was a man used to watching his back, accustomed to keeping one eye peeled for possible threats. But she was one “threat” he would never see coming. They never did, not one person in the eighteen years she’d been stealing from the wicked.

“Over here,” she said, her voice trembling a bit. The man turned toward her, looking even scarier in the shadows. “What’s up?”

“You said you were taking out the trash. Figured I had something that needed to be thrown away.” He held up the nearly empty tequila bottle and his features twisted into what Emma supposed was meant to be a smile.

“That was thoughtful of you.”

“That’s me. Thoughtful.” He closed the distance between them in four long steps, and reached out, cupping her breast in his hand and squeezing, making his intentions abundantly clear.

Guess he wasn’t much for verbal foreplay. Good. She wasn’t either.

“So you want to do this here?” She asked, running one hand up into his greasy hair as he pulled her close, willing her fingertips to find the pressure points on the skull that made her job so much easier. She had to make sure he was one of the bad guys. It was what Father Paul had insisted upon, and she’d never gone against his teachings. She’d never wanted to. She might be a killer, but she wasn’t a monster.

“Fuck yeah. Here’s good.” He laughed and tipped the tequila bottle back, emptying it before throwing it against the bricks behind them.

“Good, I—” Emma groaned as he slammed his mouth down on hers, his tongue probing between her lips, sending second-hand tequila rushing into her throat. It was swallow or gag, but Emma regretted her decision to drink as soon as the tequila hit her stomach.

Her belly clenched and cramped, and the dark craving grew even stronger, sizzling along her nerve endings, making her fingers feel like they would catch fire at any moment. The tell-tale blue light erupted from her hands before she could control it. She’d waited too long. She couldn’t remember feeling this weak, this needy, even in the months she’d been Ezra’s captive. He’d known what she was and helped her survive, bringing her suitable “snacks” every few days.

Thankfully, the thug’s eyes were closed, but he’d notice the pale blue glow sooner or later. She had to hurry.

Forcing her attention away from the thick tongue that moved sluggishly in her mouth and the meaty fingers squeezing first her breasts and then her ass, Emma concentrated on the hands pressed against Blue Eyes’ greasy head, sending her intention out through her fingertips.

Almost immediately, images flashed on her mental screen—Blue Eyes’ rat hole of an apartment near the ruins, the interior of a nearly empty fridge, a pile of dirty laundry he’d dug through to find his shirt for the evening. The mundane flooded in first, as it always did, but Emma swam deeper, sending her mind into the man she touched, the need within searching for what it craved.

She found it seconds later—the pale face of a little girl with a split lip, bleeding from where one of Blue Eye’s fists had connected with her face, the gutted corpse of a man he’d shoved out of a boat into demon infested waters, the mascara-stained cheeks of a woman who screamed as his hand fisted in her hair.

Emma had seen enough. More than enough.

Silently, she reversed the flow of her energy, no longer diving into her victim, but swimming to the surface, pulling his evil along with her. The sin-filled memories flowed into her fingers, up her hands, surging through her arms and into her chest where her heart slammed against her ribs, her body working to disperse the energy to her demon-altered cells.

The aura demons fed on the pain and suffering of humans; Emma fed on evil. It was a slight difference, but an important one. When her parents had given her blood to the demons, the very essence of her had been changed, mutated. A part of her became more demon than human, In many ways, she was like the monsters that had nearly killed her. She craved human life force and had to steal the vitality of others to survive. But she only stole from those who deserved what she did to them, those whose karmic balance was firmly tipped into the realm of evil. The choice allowed her to sleep at night, and as an added bonus…

Evil was damned tasty.