“Yes. Work.”
“Well, take some time to see the aquarium.”
“I’ll try.”
There was silence for the space of a few heartbeats, but Eve was used to it. Her father was the master of silence—companionable, awkward, and disapproving. She could handle screaming shrews and bellowing a**holes, but Darrel Hollis’s wordless disapproval could make her feel smaller than an ant.
Usually she’d try to fill the void with inanities, but tonight she was just glad to have an open line to someone who loved her.
Her father cleared his throat. “Your mom isn’t here right now. She went to her tanka group.”
“That’s okay. I’m fine with just talking to you.”
“Is something on your mind? Are you having trouble with Alec?”
“No. We’re good.”
“You both should come over for dinner when you get back into town.”
“Sure. We’d like that.”
Another stretch of silence, then, “Are you having work trouble?”
Not that she could share. “Nothing’s wrong, Dad. I just called to say hi. I miss you.”
“I miss you, too. Looking forward to having dinner with you.” He yawned. “I’m going to call it a night, honey. Don’t work too hard.”
Eve sighed, wishing they were capable of doing more than making small talk. “Say hi to Mom for me.”
“Of course. And find a way to the see the aquarium. You can’t go to Monterey without seeing the aquarium.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Night, Evie.”
She snapped the phone shut just as the kitchen door opened behind her. As she pushed to her feet, a hand settled on her shoulder and urged her to stay down.
Eve looked up. “What’s up, Richens?”
“Stick around,” he said, joining her on the small step. “I could use the company; this place gives me the screamin’ abdabs.”
“Is that like the creeps?”
“Yeah.”
It was the first real overture any of the Marks had made to her, so she stayed.
She slid over a little to give him more room. “Me, too.”
“Is that why you called home?”
“Kinda.” She was keeping her health to herself.
“Your old man isn’t very chatty, eh.”
“Didn’t anyone tell you that eavesdropping is rude?”
“No. So what’s your sin?”
Glancing at him with arched brow, Eve was struck again by his youth. He’d been a pudgy teenager when she met him just three weeks ago. He would retain that youthful appearance until he lost the mark, but the baby fat was gone. The mark made the body too efficient to carry around extra weight. His acne had cleared up, too, and the scars from them. What remained from the transformation was a young man of average height and build with somber features and wily gray eyes.
“Is that like ‘what’s your sign?’ ” she queried.
Richens shook his head. “I wouldn’t piss off Cain by hitting on his girl. Besides, you’re a bit long in the tooth for me.”
“Ouch.”
He shrugged. “So, what did you do to end up here?”
“Cain.”
“That’s it?” He scowled. “You’re here for shagging?”
“So I’m told.”
He muttered something under his breath.
“Sorry to disappoint,” she said.
“It’s okay,” he said magnanimously. “It can still work out.”
“What can still work out?”
“My plan. I killed people. Two of them. That’s why I’m here.”
Eve blinked. “You?”
She’d pegged him as the type of kid who drank too much soda, ate too much junk food, and played too many intricate, complicated video games. Murder, however, did not become him.
“Don’t act so bloody startled.” He shoved his hands in his sweatshirt pouch. “The owner of the store where I worked was an arseface. I was doing his job, too, but not getting paid for it.”
“You should have quit, not killed him.”
“I didn’t kill him.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“It was supposed to be a simple robbery. I knew how much money came in and when it went out to the bank. I’d helped to select the security system for the place, so I knew all the codes. The scheme was aces. I was to work the counter and play the victim, and my girl’s cousin was to pull off the heist.”
After her initial surprise, Eve didn’t find the tale too unbelievable. Richens was so detached, so cerebral. He would have viewed the whole thing as a game. “Something went wrong, I take it.”
“I was swizzed,” he bit out. “That’s what went wrong. The bloke wasn’t her cousin at all, she was banging the git. They thought they’d hie off with my share of the spoils? Not bloody likely.”
Eve didn’t know what to say to that, so she said nothing at all.
“Then the blighter shot a kid dead,” Richens continued, his voice rising along with his temper. “Wasn’t no more than ten years old, I’d guess. Buying some chocolate. That’s when I pulled the gun out from under the counter and shot them both dead.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I think teaming up is the way to get ahead.” He looked at her. “Like that television show Survivor, I think working together in small groups is the way to win.”
“But we’re not trying to eliminate each other in order to win a prize.”
Richens’s gaze narrowed. “So? We can still help each other. You’re the brawn, I’m the brains. Better to be at an advantage than at a disadvantage, wouldn’t you say?”
“Why me? What about Edwards?”
“Edwards is in with us. He has his reservations, of course, because he doesn’t want to irk Cain, but he’ll come around. It’s easier to work with girls. Less chest thumping. He’ll see that.”
Eve laughed. “You could have approached Izzie. She’s brawnier than me.”
“She’s also ’round the twist,” he scoffed.
“Aren’t we all?”
He stood. “If you’re not interested, just say so.”
She noted his short fuse for future reference.
“I’m all for working together,” Eve murmured. “I could use some friends around here.”
His smile was nothing less than charming. It transformed his features and brightened his eyes. He held out a hand to her and helped her to her feet. “We’ve got a deal, then.”
“Sure.” The coming week was going to be interesting.
Richens opened the kitchen door, which swung inward, and stepped inside, completely foregoing the “ladies first” rule. Eve shook her head and was about to enter behind him when the low growl of a canine rumbled through the evening air. Chills raced down her spine.
Pivoting on the narrow stoop, she blinked and engaged the nictitating lenses that allowed her to see in the dark. She searched the nearby area, the heat of her already fevered skin rising.
But she saw nothing. No gleam of moonlight in malevolent eyes, no betraying movement. She sniffed the air and smelled the sea.
Still, she knew something was out there.
The bushes dividing their yard from the neighbor’s rustled. Eve leaped to the yellowed grass and landed in a crouch. A tiny puff rushed out at her and she caught it, lifting it by the scruff and drawing her fist back to strike.
Hold it, sweetie! the toy poodle cried, flailing its tiny legs.
Eve paused midswing, her marked senses retreating as quickly as they’d come, taking the overwhelming urge to kill with it. The mark created power and aggression in highly intense quantities. The sensations were base and animalistic, not at all the elegant sort of violence she might have expected the Almighty to use in the destruction of his enemies. The surge was brutal . . . and addicting.
Don’t punch the messenger.
“Jesus—ouch!” Eve winced as her mark flared in protest. Since she wasn’t a pet owner, days could go by without any animals speaking to her. She often forgot that the mark had given her new senses, such as the ability to converse with all of God’s creatures. “What are you doing running at me like that?”
I’m in a hurry. Put me down. This isn’t dignified.
Eve set the little creature down and watched as the obvious stray shook herself off. Despite the filth that darkened the poodle’s cream-colored fur to a café au lait color, the dog was adorable. “Why are you growling at me?”
Not at you, doll face. The teeny poodle pranced daintily and looked at Eve with somber, puppy-soft eyes. At those around you. You feel it, too. You’re smack dab in the middle—
An explosion rent the air. Eve jerked in surprise, then found herself splattered with gore and fur.
“What the hell?” she screamed, leaping to her feet.
Izzie stood in the doorway with a gun. A second later, the light from the kitchen was blocked by the number of people crowded behind her.
Eve looked at the carcass on the ground and the mark’s potency rushed through her. “You idiot! What did you do that for?”
“It was attacking you,” Izzie said, shrugging.
“It was the size of my shoe!”
Gadara materialized on the stoop and held his hand out for the gun. Izzie passed it over.
The archangel looked at Eve. “Are you okay, Ms. Hollis?”
“No.” She looked down at the blood on her clothes. “I’m really f**king far from okay.”
“What happened?”
“A stray wanted some dinner scraps.” She glared at Izzie. “And ending up getting blown to smithereens instead. What the hell caliber pistol is that?”
Gadara turned his attention to the gun, then to Izzie. “This is yours?”
“Yes.”
“You were told to come unarmed. I will provide everything you need.”
Izzie’s purple stained lips thinned stubbornly. “I told you, I saw that ghost program on television. I could not come to this place without protection.”
“You have no faith,” he said, eyeing her with a narrowed gaze. “You have no belief in me. I am here to help you rebuild you life and attain the skills to live it to the fullest.”
“And there are millions of demons prepared to end it,” she argued.
The archangel hovered above the stoop, his silence as condemning as shouted rebukes. Even Eve shuffled nervously and she had done nothing wrong.
“What happened?” Ken yelled from the back of the kitchen.
“Seiler shot something.”
“What? Let me by.”
“It was only a dog,” Izzie muttered, looking mulish.
“A dog?” Ken scoffed.
“Everyone back in the house,” Gadara ordered, his voice resonating with celestial command.
The persuasion was so forceful, it was nearly tangible, and Eve took an involuntary step forward. She forced herself to stop by supreme effort of will.
“Why were you packing heat right now anyway?” she asked Izzie. “And where did you hide it?”
Izzie turned on her boot heel and shouldered her way back into the house.
Eve quickly moved to follow her. She didn’t feel sick anymore, at least not physically. Sick at heart, yes. And so furious with Izzie she wanted to strangle her.
Gadara caught her arm as she rushed by. “Leave her.”
“Her problem is with me.”
“And now it is with me.” His dark eyes burned into hers, taking on a golden sheen. “You suffer from lack of faith, too, Ms. Hollis. It is why you often find yourself in situations such as these.”
She opened her mouth to protest, then snapped it shut again. They both knew what was really going on. Reiterating wasn’t necessary. “I want to know what answers she gives you.”
He smiled indulgently, his teeth white against his brown skin. “You assume I mean to question her.”
The cryptic reply was so like him. So like all the angels actually.
Gadara gestured toward the drive way. “Take Dubois and two guards with you back to the other side of the duplex. You can clean up and prepare for bed.”
“I don’t feel . . . right,” she said, surprising herself. She wasn’t quite sure why she was telling Gadara that when she didn’t trust him.
He studied her. “In what way?”
“I’m hot.”
His brows rose.
“Hot flashes. Intermittent fevers. That sort of thing.”
“That is impossible.”
“Tell that to my body.”
“You are under stress, Ms. Hollis, and experiencing dramatic and rapid change. It is not surprising that your mind would expect your body to have physical responses to such extreme pressures . . . even to the point of phantom maladies.”
“Which is just a convoluted way of saying it’s all in my head.” She dismissed him with a frustrated wave of her hand. The persuasive undertone in his voice wasn’t lost on her, but it wasn’t effective either. “My on-the-fritz brain and I will just run along now.”
He dismissed her as easily, turning his back to her and levitating over the remains of the stray. As he spoke a foreign language in a low tone, his arm made a wide gesture over the gore, turning it into ash, which sank into the earth.
Eve was depressed by the waste and tantalized by the tiny bit of information the poodle had managed to impart before dying.
. . . those around you. You feel it, too. You’re smack dab in the middle—
Smack dab in the middle of what? And what did the people around her have to do with it?
CHAPTER 5
Alec made it as far as Santa Cruz before he pulled off Highway 1 and secured a motel room. He didn’t want to travel any farther in Eve’s car. The Alpha had obviously sent his dogs to track her, hence the attack at Qualcomm Stadium. Alec would need to switch to a rental to avoid being recognized before he drove into Brentwood—the Black Diamond Pack’s den.