Page 3 of The Fate of Black Hearts

“Dangerous evening, isn’t it?” she commented.

The corners of his lips pinched as if he struggled not to smile.

“Mine wasn’t as dangerous as yours, it seems.”

The words washed over her like warm water—like a half-remembered melody. She wracked her brain, still coming up with nothing. His smell was the soap he used: thyme and bergamot orange. A soap from…

Holy hell. I remember something!He purchased it in Nepal.

He knew her before someone wiped her memory. Approximately six years ago, someone extracted very specific details from her life to the extent that huge segments of her past made no sense. They fluttered like disjointed dreams, although she was certain they’d happened.

Why do I know the soap he likes?

His head snapped around to face her as if he’d heard her thought. Breath caught in her lungs. His crystal-blue eyes were an arresting contrast to the darkness of his hair. That iris color…

Can’t be.

Oh, shit. Close your mind to him.She wasn’t sure how she even knew how to do that, but she did.

His eyes were the same color as Lyra’s. This creature had answers to the questions she’d sought for years. First on that list was: How did she get pregnantbut remember nothing of how?

Five years ago, she gave birth. She had zero clues to the identity of her child’s father. She wasn’t a person who tolerated that kind of mystery. Visits to any being who could delve into the past and tease out this kind of information yielded nothing. Except the angel who directed Roman on what evils he and his brothers needed to eradicate from the world. The angel had answers but refused to talk. He couldn’t be coerced or bribed.

The bartender slid her drink across the countertop.

“I don’t like games.” She sipped the martini. It wasn’t blended with enough vermouth.

“I know, Evie.”

He knows my name. She fiddled with her locator bracelet and calculated she had about fifteen minutes until one of the boys tracked her cell phone and sent someone to get her.

“Are you often in Slovenia?” The moment the words left her mouth she realized it sounded like a cheesy pickup line.

“Are you going to ask me what a nice guy like me is doing in a place like this?” Humor lit up his eyes.

“You’re not nice. You just blew the head off a demon.”

“So did you.”

“My niceness isn’t in question.” She rotated to face him. “Why are you following me?”

He sipped his brown liquor and shifted to give her his full evaluation rather than a side-eye. “Seems to me it’syouwho followed me.”

“This isn’t the first time you’ve watched me.”

“You need to stop.”

She tapped a sharp, pink-painted nail on the countertop in time to the beat of the background music. “Stop what?”

“You’re bleeding.”

She ceased tapping to glare. “Someone distracted me.”

“Why aren’t you healing? Are you ill?”

A sliver of cold dread squeezed her gut. He couldn’t possibly know that her natural healing ability had gone on the fritz over the past few months. This wasn’t the first time she’d gotten hurt while acting as sniper for her kids. It also wasn’t entirely his fault today. He was a convenient excuse. Her becoming injured on a job hadn’t happened in… Well, itneverhappened. Until this year.

She placed a few bills on the counter, dumped the martini in her mouth, and swallowed all of it fast. “If you don’t stop following me, I’ll kill you.”No one endangers my children, even if they are over a century old and vicious enough to protect themselves.