His eyes remained locked on hers. They didn’t drift below her neck to her curves. There was an intensity in his gaze that worried her. “It’s not a game,” he breathed.

“Then what is it?” her heart was racing. Why did it matter? She shouldn’t care about what he said. His eyes were golden, like the sun, burning—consuming her. Eric was fire and light, beautiful and devastating. She couldn’t look away. She couldn’t move.

Eric’s eyes slid over her face, admiring the smoothness of her skin without touching her. Her pink lips remained parted, watching him, waiting. She didn’t breathe until he spoke.

Eric lifted his hand, and in that moment every ounce of her body wanted him to touch her, but he took a strand of her blowing hair instead. Lifting it to his mouth, he kissed the strand and breathed her in. When he inhaled, his chest swelled and brushed against her chilled body. Natalia’s stomach caved in, crashing into her toes. It felt like someone stole her ability to breathe.

His voice was soft as he released the strand of her hair. He loved her scent. “It’s me and you. It’s the way things have always been. It’s never been a game to me, Natalia. There’s too much to lose when people play games.”

He stepped away from her and the air rushed back into her lungs in a surge. Eric turned away and was walking back toward the motorcycle. Natalia watched his broad shoulders, the way his shirt slid across his toned muscles beneath. He didn’t touch her. He said he wouldn’t. She pulled her shirt over her head and followed him to the bike, not knowing what to think.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The next few days passed oddly slow. Eric hadn’t seen Natalia since he took her to the beach. He deposited her at her house and went to orchestrate the rest of his plans. The look in her eyes worried him when he left. She agreed to stay hidden, out of sight of Carina’s men, but it was the same look Ivy had given him a million times. He doubted she stayed inside more than ten minutes after he left. That girl had a death wish, and Carina would be happy to grant it.

Eric’s plans came along slowly. It was almost painful. There were so many facets and it appeared that someone was moving against him. If he didn’t act quickly enough, he would lose what he worked so hard to achieve. He managed to avoid Valefar, though he knew they were looking for him. A spell here and an incantation there blocked the minds of the people who saw him, making it like he didn’t exist.

The closest anyone had come to capturing him was Mandor, and Eric wasn’t sure how Mandor located him. Maybe Ivy could sense his whereabouts, but being locked in the Underworld prevented her from appearing herself. And the Accords between the angels and the demons about when it was permissible for the Queen to extract one of her kind, well, the angels would prefer killing the disturbance rather than drawing attention. His final act would cross the line though, and he knew without a doubt, that Ivy would be within her rights to extract Eric. In the meantime, she would have Valefar searching for him, but he was always two steps ahead.

The only variable was Natalia. He hoped that they didn’t realize how he felt about her. He couldn’t turn himself in yet. There was more to do, an act that would be unforgivable. It would warrant his death. Without that act, he knew what would happen.

It was too late for Natalia, already. He could feel it. That girl was attached to him, and he didn’t think her perversions—if she even had them—would make her exempt from the curse. She’d die. It was that simple. This was the only way to prevent it. Eric told himself, coldly over and over that she’d just have to deal with it, like his death wouldn’t matter to her, that she could deal with losing him the same way she dealt with everything else. But Natalia wasn’t that cold. His disappearance would hurt her. She’d mourn him. They’d grown too close, been together too long. It was his own damn fault. He should have left her to the demons, but… there was something about her.

He’d seen hundreds of people slaughtered when the gates of Hell open. Those months, he kept telling himself that one life didn’t matter—it was the twisted Martis way of thinking—and it made him look at the big picture and what would be lost. One life didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things. He’d almost walked past Natalia. He’d almost left her behind. The Martis had groomed him better than he realized. Thinking about it now made his skin crawl.

Eric stood in front of the gates, looking up at the mansion beyond. A woman sat leaning against the metal, weeping, with a lifeless child in her arms. Normally, he would have said nothing. People were starving everywhere, dying en masse. The war was devastating. Life didn’t resume when the demons left—it got harder. Crops failed, worldwide famine, the likes he’d never seen before, made food scarce. Governments collapsed and war prevailed. It was only in the recent months that things had quieted down, that the people grew too weary to fight any longer. They’d accepted the state of things, knowing their lives would be so much harder, and so much shorter. Unlike when Eric was a boy, the people that walked by him on the street didn’t know how to do anything. They’d had corporate jobs and sat in offices. The idea of tilling soil and growing food was for peasants in third world countries. Now, those skills were all that separated survival from starvation. That and power.

The wealthy kept their money, and retained their power. They commanded everything, using their influence to better themselves. Meanwhile the poor starved to death or died from illnesses that could have been treated. Medicines were stockpiled, stored, and sold at an astronomical price. The man beyond the gates controlled much of the medicines in this hemisphere, and it did not escape Eric’s notice, despite his attempts to hide behind gates.

The woman brushed back the child’s hair, as she looked down at the lifeless little body in her lap. Eric asked, “How long have you waited here?”

She didn’t answer at first. When she turned her head, she gasped, as if she saw a ghost. Eric’s eyes darted side to side, trying to decipher what she was seeing. “Please, angel, give me my baby back.”

Eric smiled sadly. At one time, he heard those words. At one time, he was an angel, but not anymore. She must have sensed it in him. Those who mourn can see things others can’t. His voice was soft, compassionate, “I can’t bring him back, I wish I could.” She lowered her eyes and nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks. He hated this. He shouldn’t have spoken to her. Calling him an angel only made it worse.

The woman looked ahead, a vacant expression on her face. Finally she spoke, “Three weeks. We sat at the gates for three weeks and he ignored us. I only needed a little medicine. Everything would have been fine, but he didn’t send help. He didn’t do anything. The others left. They wept when their loved ones died. They mourned, but I would not leave. I couldn’t give up, and now it is too late.” Her voice hitched and cracked as she spoke.

Eric’s gaze burned holes into the house. There was part of him that was eased by her suffering, but it paled in comparison to the anger that her words incited. This was wrong, and he would stop it. Eric walked away from the house, knowing he had to plan this perfectly or there would be unwanted complications. This was not supposed to be the next mark, but it was now.

He deserved it.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

The rest of the day passed without incident. Eric evaded the Valefar that were scouring the city looking for him. He’d caught a glimpse of Mandor just as his effonation took hold, leaving the dark Valefar with a grimace on his face. Damn, he was getting close. It wouldn’t be much longer now. His final strike would force Ivy’s hand. She’d extract him with a vengeance that made him feel sick inside. The thought of doing that to her was deplorable, but there were no other options. No demon, no king of the Underworld, had ever had as much power as Ivy. There had never been someone so powerful before and he knew exactly how to play her. His stomach twisted just thinking about it. He cared for her. He loved her once. Maybe he still did. Maybe that was the only thing keeping his infatuation with Natalia at bay. But it didn’t matter anymore. Not after this. Ivy would think that he was the most evil person alive. Her pact with the angels would force his death, at the hand of his best friend. He swallowed hard, trying not to dwell on things he couldn’t change. This was the only way. Ivy was a means to an ends. And it was an ending that would be better for everyone. Even Eric.

Dusk was falling. The sky was streaked with brilliant oranges and reds. Eric stopped in front of a massive pile of rubble. This marked the entrance to Natalia’s house. It was once a grand mansion of pale stone and dark wood. The owner spared no expense on creating their home, which drew attention to it during the war. The front of the house had exploded, crushing the rock, splintering the wood, and twisting the black iron, before caving in on itself. The back of the home, the east and west wings—all of it—caved in leaving no entrances to the once grand villa. But Eric knew that the center of the home still stood under the rubble, and he had cleared a path to it. He walked through it now, feeling like a miner walking into the belly of the earth. Eric checked the support beams as he walked through. After being away so long, he assumed they would have caved in, but the stone and wood pillars he put in place still held firm.

Though he made this place for Natalia, he didn’t visit her here. It felt too intimate and opened the doors to too many questions that he didn’t want to consider. But he stood there now feeling his pulse pounding in his chest. The last time he was here, this place wasn’t her home. Now there would be things that made this place hers. He wondered what they would be, what it would look like, and most of all—he hoped it had her scent. Closing his eyes, he imagined the light sweet scent that was Natalia’s and hers alone.

Eric stood before the front door, which he relocated to the end of the mineshaft, hoping that Natalia wasn’t home. She promised that she’d remain inside, but he was sure she broke that promise as soon as he walked away. There were people that you could tell what to do and they listened—Natalia wasn’t one of them. It’d be easier to get inside if she was out. Eric placed his hand on the door and pushed. It wouldn’t open. Damn it. She was inside and barred the massive door.

Eric hesitated, running his hands through his hair. He didn’t know what Natalia thought of him, and he didn’t want to, but he intentionally hid that he wasn’t mortal. When she was around, he contained his power. He didn’t effonate and disappear in front of her. He didn’t call shadows to manipulate things the way he wanted. And he rarely let her see the full extent of the darkness within him. The only way to manage his pain was deplorable, but now she knew. She’d seem him at Carina’s, and if she hadn’t said his name to break Carina’s enchantment… He shuddered to think what he might have done it to her.

Eric had fallen farther than he thought possible. Using Satan’s Stone may have saved everyone else, but it damned him in a way that was utterly inescapable. But he had finally found a way. After all this time, he’d be free. The pain was changing again. He could feel it snaking through him and unraveling his mind. Though he battled it, Eric could feel himself becoming something more dark and twisted than he already was. It didn’t matter how he fought against it, he was becoming something more. Something worse. Staring at the light, meditating, thinking of who he was, who he is, and what he will be had always kept him grounded—at least a little bit. But now, that was over.