I, Evonie Essex, was in trouble. It was literal hell in this club, and I was head under water in the sweaty D.C. underbelly, sniffing out my prey: the East Coast's Demon Mafia King, Niko Valentine.
"Shit, and I thought being a Female Alpha would be easy," I muttered to myself, lighting a Chesterton as I looked into the silver-scarred side mirror by the bar. A glass of Malbec in hand, I looked like a dark-eyed temptress. The curves of my muscled, toned body were hell to pay in a little black dress. Gold skin, green eyes, white hair.
I stood out in a crowd, but I had used my pheromones to infiltrate the Demon King's nest unnoticed: The Crow's Reach was half-brothel, half blood-at-stake gambling den, and had all the fixings of a turn of the century speakeasy. I traced the Colt 45 in my pocket, disguised by a peplum, and thought of sinking a bullet – or maybe my claws – into Niko's red throat.
He'd screwed over my best friend Alexandra in a deal gone wrong – she'd ended up with three silver bullets in the shoulder, and was in the ICU.
The room quieted as down a balustrade came a posse of suave, politico types. Drunk senators, old money Russians, Italians who dressed in Gucci. Amongst them, a muscled sylph, was red. Glaring, daring red – ebony hair, fangs, skin the color of a tomato. He was dressed in a white suit, his clean cut face grinning mutedly. Everything about Niko was guarded. He was trim, well-shaped – and his pheromones blossomed with the sex appeal of dynamite. Two silver horns curled like a ram down his shoulders.
Hatred boiled my gut. So this was the man behind the shit supply of wolfbane the Potomac Pack had received, where Alexandra had been ambushed by assassins. All because Niko had wanted to send a warning – encroach on Georgetown, and you're in the shitter, Evonie and co..
I slipped some drugs into a cocktail – some peach whiskey number – and put on my best smile. My stilettos pumped to the music as I wended my way through mafia lords and Shedim – Hell ran on blood money, and Hell controlled D.C. – and I caught Niko's eye. He wouldn't recognize me with my pheromones pumping, my striking silver hair and green eyes disguised to be muted browns and duns.
"You look thirsty, hotshot," I purred, my breasts slick as the heat of the nightclub wore down on me. Demons liked it hot.
Niko looked at me with disdain. "And you would be…?" he asked, his voice honey and mallow.
I winked, tracing his cufflinks. "No one important, King Valentine. Just a damsel in distress. See, my boyfriend cheated on me last night. I'm just out here to heal a broken heart."
Niko's blue eyes – they were so icy, almost glacial – softened, and he tucked his black ponytail back over his muscled shoulders. He smelled of Tom Ford Tobacco Vanille cologne. "Oh?" There was a glimmer in his eye like sun off a candle flame. "D.C.'s crawling with heartbreakers, isn't it? Thanks for the drink." He took it with searing elegance – his clawed fingers hot on my hands – and sniffed it.
Suddenly, he spilled it on the floor, then crushed the glass. Nobody noticed. It was a cacophony. Nobody dared look at Niko when he was around – a feared king, merciless, murderer – no one approached him – they always looked the wrong way.
"So, tell me what you're trying to do, Evonie," he said with a voice like chains, his icy eyes boring holes in my head. I paled.
"How did you know it was me?" Hatred boiled my gut. He took his brown loafer and kicked the glass behind the bar.
"The cheap perfume gave you away, kid," he grunted. "Give me the gun."
"Fuck you, Niko. You screwed over Alexa! She almost died!"
"I don't control those under me. When will you fur-skulled werewolves get it: hellions owe allegiance to no one. Just because I'm king, doesn't mean I control shit. Everybody listens, sure. But when the rambunctious ones want to screw you over… accidents happen."
I gripped the gun and pointed it at him. "I'll shoot. Piss off and give me the wolfsbane I asked for, from the back warehouse, or I'll kill you."
"And what do you have in that little codger of a gun from the dollar store?" he lazed, lighting a Cuban cigar. He spread red dragon wings, Niko's face serpentine. He was casting a spell to divert attention – no one could see a Crow's Nest upset, now could they?
"Adamantine. From Michael."
"Eh, you're trafficking with archangels now? Your dead as dirt dad didn't raise you right. Just to think of it: a nineteen-year-old female "alpha." You give werewolves a loony bin name."
He grasped the gun. The metal got hot, burning. Flames licked his palm, and I cursed, dropping it.
He threw it, bent and destroyed, over his shoulder.
"Come back when you have something worthwhile to barter wolfsbane for, honey," he said patronizingly, towering over me, at least seven feet to my six foot one. "Running a pack is hard business. It's not my fault you put a girl in danger. And don't joke about adamantine – Michael takes souls for lesser deals than your alleged transaction."
Tears of anger dotted my eyes. "I'm trying, asshole," Niko's face softened. He gave me the cigar. I puffed angrily. "You've always looked down on the Potomac Pack. We've fallen into ruin since daddy died. I'm the only one to – sniff – carry on his legacy."
Niko took the cigar back, spreading his wing around me to veil the tears. "Don't cry, jailbait. It makes you weak. A word of advice: get friends. You're so lonely, you're spilling your heart to a 23-year-old demon."
"You're not that much older than me," I sniffed. "What gives you airs?"
"Power, Evonie. You have it too. But it won't be unlocked until you take a mate. That's the way of wolves – you need the pair bond before you can unlock your powers. Let's go upstairs. I'll pour you a drink and try to sort this wolfsbane nonsense out. Tell me, how much were Alexa's bullet extractions and wound care?"
"$10,000."
"I'll give you $15,000, and you can go get a haircut. It's getting long again. And a new gun."
"I don't need handouts!"
I found myself following him upstairs to his penthouse. A place I visited often with dad. Dad had been respected, the Potomac Pack had been the richest supernatural clan in D.C. But one night two years ago, he was killed out in Mason Neck when he was hunting deer in his shifter form. All that was found at the site?
Blood – his blood – and three red roses.
I slumped into Niko's couch, hatred at his power, his success, him putting Alexa in danger roiling in my gut like bad wine. I was too young to drink, but I didn't care. Georgetown was hell right now, and running the pack was taking all I had.
Potomacks were loyal, but they had bite, and the men had resisted the idea of a female Alpha: but when Diana had appeared to our pack priestess in a vision, our Roman goddess, and anointed me – the first female Alpha America had heard of in 200 years – there was rebellion. I'd had to battle all of them in the fighting pit – it wasn't until I'd bested even Rodrick, the most brutal of the Potomacks – that I had been declared the Potomack Queen.
He stared at me. Then, he opened the Wall Street Journal after I refused to say anything. He draped a handwoven blanket – fine Ifrit quality with warm coals embedded in the fabric that warmed me – and then he poured me some scotch, saying nothing. I watched a summer rainstorm in muggy autumn out the fancy, dark windows. Everything inside was old wood, pristine, black and gray and charcoal. It smelled of cloves and myrrh. Orange, even. I reigned my pheromones in – and then, suddenly, a strange sensation bubbled up.
"Niko – I, what the hell, I feel fucking sick. Did you drug my drink?"
He narrowed his blue eyes at me: "Evonie, what would I benefit from drugging a teenager's drink? You're the one who tried to pull that trick."
Suddenly, he smelled like heaven. I balked. What the fuck, Evonie? Heat gathered in my thighs, and I shuddered as my blood began to ice. "I think I'm gonna barf, bastard. It must be the stench of your apartment. It smells so sweet – you smell so – so fucking sweet. Are you using magick?"
"Demons can't do any white magick – we are curses and destruction. It's just cologne."
He sat down gently next to me. "I think you've had too much to drink, Evonie."
He lifted me up. The room spun. His black brows and red jaw looked heavenly. I wanted to taste them. To reconcile darkness and light on his manly frame.
"Niko – I – I, for some reason, I'm in… heat," I blushed, cursing myself. Now? Why now! There was no werewolf in miles? Had there been one at the bar? But imprinting on one would have consumed my every waking moment – we could only imprint on our own kind.
So why did Niko look like a chocolate strawberry? Why did his strong hands and musk feel like silk and taste like wine? I began to sob, and he soothed me, setting me in the guest bed.
"Don't touch me, asshole," I cried. "It hurts. My belly hurts. I – I – I don't know what to do. Why now. If I don't mate, I'll die? You made me imprint on you! What black magick did you use!" I fingered the joining of my thigh, the lace over the gap between my legs. The friction was delicious.
For the first time in his life – all the D.C. court functions and our time in high school together – Niko looked surprised. "What the hell are you saying, Evonie? You can't imprint on me! That's not allowed. It's against all know natural laws – I – shit, Evonie, what do I do, you're getting so pale and hot?"
He began to panic, his red brow vein throbbing.
"This is your fault," I sobbed, aching to be filled. "You must have cursed me!"
"Evonie, like hell I did," Niko sighed, unzipping my dress. "You're in heat, you need to focus. There has to be a way for us to solve this – I'll go get some potions. It's impossible for you to imprint on a fucking demon-"
Sudden strength – the prophesied strength of an Alpha Queen, granted by Diana when she came of age on her first night of mating – seized me. I grabbed him and pinned him on top of me.
"Unzip. Your. Pants," I demanded.