Falling for Cyn Read online

  Cynthia flashed him a questioning glance as she hostess led them up a short flight of steps onto the rooftop lit with thousands of twinkling lights. That gasp, which was quickly becoming his favorite sound, echoed from her lips once again.

  “Oh, Damien! It’s beautiful!”

  He held her chair for her as she sat, whispering in her ear, “Not enough to compare to your beauty, Cyn.” Damien felt cheesy saying it, but he meant the words. Honestly, Cyn radiated a beauty which paled the city lights by comparison.

  He’d already ordered when he made the reservations, so the servers poured the wine and left them alone, only interrupting to place dishes in front of them and then leave.

  By some unspoken agreement, they didn’t talk about her pending surgery, but Damien got the impression she thought she was going to die and was using him for some fun before she went. Knowing his own situation, he was confident The Boss wouldn’t give him a woman, only to take her away. By the same token, he wanted her to understand she was more than a fling for him. He’d had flings. Hundreds of thousands of them. Cynthia was different. And he would wait until she gave him the green light, then he would rock her world.

  They’d finished eating, but the soft music piped onto the rooftop called to Damien. “Would you like to dance?”

  She nodded, and he stood, holding out his hand for her. She took it and willingly let herself be enfolded into his arms. Damien was lost.

  He led her around the rooftop, wind rustling their hair, while Cynthia wrapped her arms around him. Her soft curves under his skin while they moved together in tandem was almost too much for him.

  “You’re a very good dancer,” she offered quietly.

  “I’ve had lots of practice.” Evading the next question, he spun her into a dizzying set of steps. He didn’t want to lie to her. If he was supposed to have her, he had to do it right. Not that he knew what that was exactly, but he had the feeling honesty was the first thing on the list. Of course, the fact he hadn’t told her he was Satan was a huge drawback to this plan, but he wasn’t sure how to do that yet.

  Damien realized something during dinner: he wanted to get to know this woman. He wanted to know what made her smile, what her favorite flowers were, what sorts of things ran around inside her head, why she thought she was going to die. There was an intense craving inside him to know her, something he hadn’t felt in his existence. A mental image of Cyn with a rounded belly, fat with his young, sent him reeling. The yearning had always been for destruction, but now it was for creation. His senses were aflame with more than he’d ever felt, and Damien didn’t know how to handle it.

  After dinner, he walked her to her door, unsure what was next. He was starting to think of Cynthia as his new life, and he couldn’t scare her off. In his past life, he would have taken her inside and fucked her, hard. But he didn’t think that was the right thing to do in this situation.

  She unlocked her door and then turned to him, green eyes wide with curiosity. She didn’t know what he would do, either, and that thought made him pause. He was going to kiss her as chastely as he knew how, but her indecision made him wonder if even that was appropriate.

  Instead, he rested his hand on her tiny waist and bent his head closer to hers.

  “I had a lovely time tonight.” His voice sounded funny to his ears, thick with something. He figured it was probably lust, which should have been a familiar feeling for him, but this lust with Cynthia was different, more intense.

  “I did, too. Um… do you want to come inside for some coffee or something?” She looked hopeful, with a slight smile, and Damien knew coffee wasn’t what she was thinking of.

  He kissed her forehead. “I do,” he whispered against the creamy skin there. “But I’m not. You are the first woman I’ve wanted to do things right with, and if I go inside, I won’t do the right thing.” With physical restraint that left him trembling, he pushed himself away, still holding her waist.

  Cynthia’s eyes dropped and her cheeks flushed. “Okay, well then, I guess I’ll see you around.” Disappointment etched her features, and it gutted Damien. He couldn’t leave her thinking he didn’t want her. He’d just told her as much, but actions spoke louder.

  He tightened his grip on her waist and pulled her closer to him, lowering his mouth to hers. He tried to kiss her gently. He’d never really done that before and wanted to try a sweet kiss with this sweet woman. And that’s how it started.

  He simply brushed her soft lips with his, but she made the fatal mistake of releasing a delicious whimper against his mouth, so he went back for more, a little harder. Cyn pressed her little body against his, tempting him, opening her mouth to his. When her fingers tangled in his hair, Damien realized he couldn’t just peck this woman on the lips. It wasn’t possible.

  Sucking her bottom lip into his mouth, he bit it before opening his own mouth to cover hers when she gasped. His tongue danced with hers while his hands spread across her waist, dropping to cup her bottom, hauling her against his groin. He needed to show her how she affected him. He drank her in, willing her to understand his intentions as his mouth devoured her.

  He could sense she was willing, but Damien knew it was too soon. He needed this to be about more than sex for her, because for him it was way more than that.

  His chest tight with regret, Damien broke the kiss. He couldn’t breathe, and what little air he managed to get in came out with broken gasps.

  Gulping raggedly, he spoke in an awed whisper, “You see why I can’t come inside?”

  Cynthia nodded, biting her lip. “Yeah. I guess it’s a little too soon.” Her hand was on her doorknob, and as much as Damien needed to end the night while he still had some semblance of control over himself, he was reluctant.

  “Can I take you out again, soon?” He searched his brain for things that seemed innocent. “The movies?”

  She nodded, smiling at him broadly. “I’d like that.”

  Kissing her quickly one more time—just to remind himself how amazing her lips felt—he turned to go, wishing he could give her more. Wondering if his brothers had felt like such huge pussies when they’d fallen.

  That night, Cynthia had another strange dream in the long line of strange dreams this tumor had induced. She’d appeared to waken in a barn of some sort, an old, wood-frame building filled with bales of hay and old, like, really old tractor implements.

  She gazed around, wondering what the hell was going on inside her brain, inhaling the sweet scent of hay and earthy odor of manure. It was silent, the sunlight spilling through an opening in what she could only assume was the hayloft above her, dust modes swirling in the ray of light.

  Cynthia had never been inside a barn before and marveled at the details her mind created: the rust spots on the attachments lined up in a row next to her, the small drops of dew on the canvas drop cloths covering something in the corner, the grasshoppers hopping around on the stack of hay bales.

  She screamed when a man dropped in front of her, coming from nowhere. Cutting of the scream, she realized he didn’t appear to want to hurt her despite the irritation emanating from him.

  “He’s not who you think he is,” the man grumbled.

  Cynthia rolled her eyes at the familiar refrain her dreams seemed to keep harping on, then focused them on the man in front of her, studying him.

  At first glance, he had a lot of similarities to Damien, in his build, mostly. Wearing a tight leather motorcycle jacket, he gave off a definite bad-boy vibe encased in muscles. The leather creaked when he extended his hand.

  “Michael,” he stated bluntly. “The archangel.” She shook his hand, and his grip was firm, taking her attention away from his words. “You see, none of us are what we seem.” He raked his hands through dark hair framing a strong, chiseled face. Bright silver eyes pierced through the darkness.

  This was some dream.

  “You don’t believe, do you?” She must have been staring at him blankly because she shrugged, and his head fell back in a harsh
bark of laughter. “Perfect. No fucking wonder.” He turned away from her, chuckling to himself, but swiftly turned back to her. “Okay, then I’ll just start over.”

  He lowered himself onto a bale of hay, perching his butt on the corner, legs spread wide in front of him. Cynthia just stood still and watched him.

  “My brothers, Gabe and Uri, were the ones who met you in your car the other night. They’re really good, and kidnapping you was so far outside their comfort zone it was almost painful to watch.”

  “So, your brothers held a gun to my head? Angels did that?” She couldn’t hold back the disbelieving scoff any longer. This was so absurd.

  Holding out his hand, a small metal cylinder appeared in front of Michael. “Pipe. They don’t do guns.” Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a small revolver and held the two together for comparison.

  Cynthia’s eyes widened. She couldn’t help herself. She saw how the cold metal pipe, held against her neck, could have fooled her.

  Wait. This was a dream. Something her brain had made up.

  “We’re trying to tell you something here, and you’re getting too wrapped up in the sexual chemistry between you and Damien to realize it.” His lips curled into a sneer when he spoke Damien’s name.

  But it wasn’t just sexual chemistry. She really felt something around Damien. He made her laugh, feel protected, made her feel like someone special. And nobody had ever done that before.

  She couldn’t hold back the scoff, knowing it was rude. “So they try to kidnap me and terrify me into a seizure to tell me he’s not who I think he is? That’s rich.”

  Michael stood, and his massive frame suddenly towered over her.

  In the blink of an eye, Cynthia was transported. Breathless with wonder, she realized she was on a small airplane, ten thousand feet in the air. Michael crouched in front of her, wearing a parachute. Her arms went to her shoulders, verifying she didn’t have one.

  Then Michael grabbed her and hauled her out the gaping maw of the door into nothingness, plummeting to the ground at a hundred and twenty miles an hour. Without a parachute of her own.

  She panicked, gripping him tightly around the neck, wrapping her legs around his lean hips, franticly hooking her ankles around his backside.

  He spoke in her ear as the wind whistled. “We’re trying to get your attention, Cynthia. Damien is evil. If you think we’re trying to scare you, you’re right, and we’re taking drastic measures because you’re not frightened by what you should be. If you think we’re doing it wrong, just remember, we’re the good ones.”

  They fell for what seemed like an eternity, air rushing past them at alarming speeds, the plane disappearing above them. Michael turned so she could see the ground taking shape below them, rushing up making her dizzy. She clenched her eyes shut, burying her face in Michael’s neck, continuing to grip him tightly.

  “This is for your own good. We’re trying to protect you from an eternity of misery here. You have to listen to us.”

  She could see people there, and they were pointing at them. The fact she could make out that detail told her the ground was too close. Even if he pulled the shoot now, they would still die.

  But he pulled it, and they both jerked up so hard that she couldn’t hold on. She started to fall to her death, screaming, but Michael’s hand reached out. He pulled her back to him, to safety, and as they fell, floating down gently on the breeze, Cynthia gasped for air in ragged gulps, her heart pounding fiercely.

  “Damien would have let you fall,” he said simply in her ear before the dream ended and she woke up.

  What. The. Actual. Fuck.

  Two nights later, Damien took Cynthia to a movie and out for ice cream afterward. He didn’t watch the movie, though, and the ice cream outing was too short. It had served to remind him she had an amazing laugh when she accidentally spilled a bag of tiny chocolate candies in the movie theater. He’d spent the rest of the movie tossing them at her when she wasn’t looking, just to hear the tinkly peals of laughter bubble from her lips.

  His next date with her was a picnic and a stroll in the park. After they’d eaten, they went for a walk, his large hand wrapped around her tiny one.

  “Life is so short.” She said it like she was speaking to herself, so softly he wouldn’t have heard her if he was a mortal.

  “It is.” If she only knew.

  She turned to him, seeing something no one else had ever seen in him before. She looked at him like he mattered. Regret shone on her face, and Damien ran his knuckle across her cheek.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I just wish I’d met you sooner, had more time with you.” Her eyes were glassy, and Damien was now familiar with the sensation of tears filling them.

  “Do you really think the surgery will be it, then?”

  She nodded. “I’m trying to prepare myself for the worst. I thought I was ready, but…” She swiped a hand across her cheek. “I never wanted to be one of those people who always thinks everything’s going to be okay, only to be disappointed when it’s not.” She tugged on his hand, moving him back to their walk. “I’m a scientist. I understand numbers. The numbers on this particular surgery aren’t good.” She shrugged. “I don’t want to get my friends’ and family’s hopes up by putting it all in the hands of some benevolent higher power.” She said the last part with a rare sneer on her face, and Damien froze.

  “You don’t believe in God?” he whispered, rocked to the core.

  “Why would I? I’ve studied. I know there is no way all the miracles of science and the human body can be attributed to some lonely, omnipotent creator of the universe and everything inside it. That’s a simplistic way to educate the poor, down-trodden masses, giving them false hope in something that’s impossible.”

  Here was the catch. Damien was quiet while he absorbed the ramifications of her words.

  She didn’t believe in God. Therefore, she probably didn’t believe in the Devil. She didn’t believe in him. Not as a fallen angel, anyway.

  Gobsmacked, Damien contemplated her words. Since the creation of this earth, his entire existence had hinged upon humanity’s belief in his abilities. Only recently, in the last few hundred years, had that come into question on a broad scale. The fact that Cynthia didn’t believe he existed, and she was his chosen one, left him completely at a loss for words.

  In some ways, it was a Godsend, pun intended. He’d chosen a woman Damien wouldn’t have to overcome stringent belief systems to woo. But as an entity, it invalidated his very reality. As far as she was concerned, he wasn’t real.

  Wow.

  “What about the balance of good and evil in the world?” he managed to croak out. It was hitting him harder than he realized that he wasn’t a concrete being to her, nor even an abstract concept.

  “Biology takes care of its own. Apex predators keep the cute little furries from eating all the green stuff up, cancer does its part, mental illness…” She started ticking things off on her fingers, and he realized he’d never actually had a conversation with an Atheist. Why, he didn’t know.

  “So, no Heaven or Hell?”

  A bark of laughter rose from her throat. “I didn’t peg you for one who strove for entrance into the pearly gates, Damien.”

  He had to admit, that particular image had always baffled him. He knew the passages in the Book humans read that alluded to it, but the reality was so different. Although, his caves were pretty close. His time with Dante Alighieri had insured certain depictions would serve his own purposes.

  “What happens when you die? Surely, you read the studies about bodies weighing less after death, signifying the departure of the soul. There’s even some video of the phenomenon.”

  She shrugged. “Nothing happens, Damien. We die. We cease to exist, on any plane. There’s just… nothing. But we’re dead, so we’re not aware of it, either.”

  The thought gave Damien the now familiar heaviness of sadness. If that’s what she believed that was probably what would
happen. A non-believer couldn’t really spend an eternity in some place that didn’t exist to them, could they? By the same token, they couldn’t spend an eternity with someone who wasn’t real to them, either.

  Damien stopped walking and spun Cynthia into his arms. He hugged her tightly, trying to convey what he was feeling. He couldn’t have put it into words if he tried.

  With two weeks left until her surgery, Cynthia needed more data. The fragrance would be sent out for testing in three weeks, but she needed more of her own testing done, before the surgery, to satisfy her own curiosity. That was why she’d brought home the physiologic monitor. It was similar to a lie detector, only a bit more complex, measuring brain waves as well as heart rate and breathing patterns.

  What she was doing was very unscientific, but she was primarily interested in Damien and his effects on her. Could she attribute those effects to the fragrance? She wasn’t exactly sure how to test that but knew she needed more data.

  So she made herself comfortable in her living room, wearing her pajamas, and started hooking herself up to the machine. Sticking the sensors to her temples, chest, and various pulse points on her body, Cynthia focused on remaining calm and breathing deeply. She sat that way for a good five minutes, getting a baseline reading of her brain and heart activity with a clear mind.

  Then she pulled out her phone. She started with looking at various pictures she’d taken of Damien while they’d hung out. There was a series of pictures she’d taken at the park, he was smiling graciously into the camera lens. Cynthia smiled at the memory. With all of his dangerous good looks, Damien was really a sweetheart. His deep eyes shone in the camera lens as she zoomed in on them, a look of adoration as he smiled at her. She remembered the afternoon. It had been a lot of fun, even with their serious conversation about her lack of faith. That had seemed to alarm him at first, but he’d settled into some sort of relief which she didn’t completely understand. There were a lot of things about Damien she didn’t quite get. But that was okay. They were still new.