When she could, she forced herself to stand up straight, to stare him directly in his red-coated eyes. "They call you Sebastian, yes?"
"That's what the world calls me this time around. When I'm done with you pesky Outsiders, the human race will call me master. And they'll all bleed for my amusement."
"Well, Sebastian." Eden took a step forward, even knowing she must be crazed to do so. She had to be brave. She had to be. "I don't believe you can hurt me in here."
"You'd be wrong about that but, please, do continue." His voice sounded laced with the music that was the southern American accent. Usually, Eden loved the twang. But Sebastian's voice ruined the effect for her.
"This is my vision. Nothing is real here. It's all just a possibility and you're trying to frighten me." She took another step forward. "You must be desperate. We must be getting close to defeating you if you're picking on me. I'm nothing to you."
"You're an Outsider. That makes you my problem." He cocked his head to the side. "Unless you want to make this easier on all of us and just come to me now."
He extended his arms like he wanted her to walk into them and hug him. She raised an eyebrow. There was no doubt the demon was frightening but she could see how he also liked to show off. His actions were those of a person seeking attention. Right now, he had her as a captive audience but she didn't want to end up like Jason. He'd been stuck in his own head for months, captured by a demon and forced to endure horrific pain before Charma had found him.
No. She wasn't going to let this demon continue to play his games with her.
"What made you ask me if I drink blood?"
She swallowed. "Your eyes are blood red. I'm not sure why I knew that meant you must feed on it but somewhere in the back of my mind, I must have picked up that information."
Sebastian rolled his eyes. "Or your parents knew it so it's passed down through that freaky thing you all can do with your minds?"
That freaky thing they could all do with their minds? Eden tried to keep her expression neutral. She didn't want to give away to him that she had no idea—none—what he talked about.
"Right, well, I'm done with this." She looked up at the ceiling. "I want to go back now. I'm done with this vision."
Sebastian raised his eyes to stare where she looked. "How's that going for you? Working?"
"I want to go back," she shouted. Her heart pounded hard. She couldn't be trapped. Everyone told her she could control her own powers. Someway she simply needed to figure out how to do it. This certainly seemed like a good time to gain that ability.
Her palms sweated and she wiped them on her pants leg. "I want to go home."
Sebastian advanced forward. "Which home, sweet Eden? The one where they beat you to try to remove the devil or the one where they basically put up with you like you're a child because you're too incompetent to be any help to anyone?"
Eden wasn't sure how he knew about any of that and she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of letting him know just how much both of those things hurt her. One of them left marks on her body and the other was starting to scar her soul. Even though in the case of the latter, they had the best intentions.
"I want to go home." She closed her eyes. Someway, somehow she could do this. She could make her vision do what she wanted it to do.
"Not working, is it?" Sebastian grinned.
Eden flung open her eyes. Looking to her left, Kal, Leonardo, and Jason still hovered over the future Gabriel, knocked out on the couch. In real life, they'd be helping her. She knew that. The women had all known she was in trouble and they'd reached out to help her. How had that happened?
She bit down on her lip. Her mind was in the living room, talking to the demon, and witnessing Gabriel's injury but her body still remained in the shower where she had been before being overtaken with the vision. Somehow, she needed to get her body to send out an SOS to the Outsiders in her own time.
That had to be possible. Then Marina could bring her back…
"Here's the problem, sweet Eden." That was the third time he'd called her that. Each occurrence made her want to gag. "You don't have a soul mate. I killed him when he was a child."
Eden's eyes got huge. The demon was wrong. She'd spoken to her soul mate. Well, he'd spoken to her, in her own mind. She'd never seen him. But he couldn't be communicating with her if he was dead. There was no doubt—he wasn't around but he wasn't gone from the earth.
"So you can want to go home as much as you want. But you aren't Dorothy in Oz. You don't have ruby slippers. You're never going home. You're dying here with me because you don't have an anchor, which means you are about as useful to the Outsiders as a rat."
No, Eden. You're not useless. You're incredibly powerful.
She jolted. That was him. Her soul mate. The one the demon thought was dead.
I'm not dead. She smiled, which made the demon look at her cross-eyed. Brace yourself, darling.
The room exploded with white light, so bright Eden couldn't see. Her ears rang as she was thrown backward onto the floor. Her head spun. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the demon screaming as he gripped his head. The room spun and seconds later she was back in her body, hot water pounding on her back.
Chapter Two
Samuel Quinn lit up another cigarette and tried to dodge the raindrops hitting his head as he ran through the streets of Portland. He knew smoking was a dirty, disgusting habit but the nicotine helped to slow the decay process of whatever temporary face he wore. Right now, in the middle of the street—even at five in the morning—was not the time to lose his face. No one needed to see that. He wouldn't inflict the horror that was his appearance on anyone.
More than anything else, he needed to get home so he could rest. He was two hours away from Eden. At this close of a distance, he should be able to monitor her without taxing himself this much. Except, the girl had a tendency to get herself into trouble. Apparently, this morning she'd gotten an early start.
Shit.
If he didn't find a new face before this one dissolved, he wasn't going to make it back to his apartment without being seen. He turned left down Congress and kept his head down. The rain was a fortunate occurrence; no one would think it odd he kept his head down as he ran. They'd just assume he didn't want to get wet.
He slipped quickly into a coffee shop. Not much else was open at that hour and he considered himself lucky to have found anything at all. If he could, he would have stayed home to handle Eden's needs but blowing the demon out of her mind had required fresh air. If he had to be outside, where he could be seen, it was better if he kept moving; that way none of his neighbors got too suspicious about him. He wouldn't have a repeat of the problems he'd encountered in Cleveland. The nights he'd spent in jail barely holding onto his facial features had been a disaster.
Never again.
The cigarette burned down to the butt and burned his fingers. He flicked it to the ground. He might get ten extra minutes from the nicotine in his bloodstream. It's not like the cancer sticks could kill him. His kind didn't get sick like that but cigarettes were still disgusting and the fact that he had to smell the smoke on his clothes for the rest of the day was not going to improve his mood.
Not that anything could.
His face itched. If he touched the skin, it would peel right off. He dug his fingers into his palms to give himself a new sensation to concentrate on as he searched around the shop for someone who would suit.
Looking up in quick spurts, he grabbed a newspaper from the bin and headed to the cashier to pay for it. There weren't a lot of people to choose from in the place; he had no time to dither. He'd been ugly before, the thought didn't disturb him if that was what it came down to, and the Fates knew his actual face was the stuff of nightmares.
He could still remember the screams…
Shoving that thought from his head with the same force he might use to stop a train from slamming into him, he spotted his target. The whole situation felt mildly amusing. O
nce upon a time, he'd actually felt guilty for having to do this type of thing. Now? Nothing. Not even a smidgen of remorse for his task at hand.
Eden needed him to stay alive so he would for as long as it took to protect her. Then he'd see about ending it. He wouldn't die lying supine on a hospital bed. Samuel would see to it that he went down in flames, keeping the woman he loved, but could never have, safe in his wake.
He jerked to the left bumping into the man behind him hard enough to jolt the poor fellow without making him spill his coffee. Samuel's movements were all about the right push, the lightest of touches. He'd had a lifetime to perfect his game.
"Hey man, watch it."
The man sounded way too annoyed for five in the morning. Samuel took a good look at him. With beet red eyes, Samuel would place bets that the dude was just getting home—not getting up in the morning. Blond haired and blue eyed with half-a-day's worth of stubble on his cheeks, he looked to be in his mid-thirties. He needed to take better care of himself, stop the hard nights of partying. But Samuel's mark's personal life was none of his business and he wasn't going to worry about the other man's health.
He had enough on his plate.
Samuel smiled. The guy had a good face. He'd be glad to borrow it for a week.
So quickly that most people wouldn't even know he'd grazed his fingers over their face, he tapped the man's chin.
"Sorry, dude." He grinned and paid for his paper. The hung-over man would have a headache for a few hours, but maybe he already did. As for Samuel, he'd have a face for the next week that would allow him to walk the streets undisturbed until it faded.
He exited the coffee shop, his cheeks already tingling. His Outsider magic wanted to make the shift right away but that wasn't going to work for him this time. He needed to be far far away from the man whose face he now copied. Best-case scenario, he would be home. But at the very least he needed to not be the same room with the owner of his new features.
Samuel picked up his pace. The wet ground beneath his feet splashed as he moved. Each step taking him closer to his goal of finally getting some relief from his agony. He rounded the corner to his apartment building and looked down at the ground. The skin on his face had started to peel. Soon, the old layer would disappear revealing his new look underneath. It was absolutely pivotal none of his neighbors ever got a really good look at his face.
He pushed his baseball cap farther down on his head. When he'd left his home, he'd been a brunet and he was coming home a blond.
Rushing around the corner, he got his key in the door and his body inside of his apartment in record time. In two seconds, he'd thrown the hat onto the couch as he rushed into the bathroom. It helped if he scrubbed his skin while the change happened. Somehow, it made it less gross to peel the dead skin off his face with warm water instead of by ripping the skin from his face.
Grabbing the unscented soap from the side of the sink, he splashed himself with the hot water before lathering up his face. The skin started to peel the second he touched it. Goosebumps broke out on his arms, and he tried not to wretch. He hated this feeling more than anything else about his situation.
Piece-by-piece, inch-by-inch the fake skin his magic had created began to slither off his face and deposit in the sink.
"Shit."
No one was in his apartment, ever, so it wasn't like he couldn't curse all he wanted. But his mother had raised him to be a gentleman. Swearing like a sailor still made him feel like he was about to have his mouth washed out with soap.
Finally, the constant peel stopped. He stared down in the sink to see what damage he'd done. His hands shook as he opened up the drain to let the discarded skin swish down the pipes.
This had been a close one. He should have switched his face before he'd let his mind travel into Eden's. That would have been the smart thing to do. Except that Eden had needed him. He'd barely gotten to that demon in time as it was.
Grabbing a towel, he forced his eyes to meet his reflection in the mirror. Once every seven days he got to meet a stranger in his bathroom. The man in front of him, minus the red eyes and sour expression, resembled his co-customer from the coffee house exactly.
With pressure to change gone, he let himself examine the features he would have as his own for, hopefully, a full week. Unless he had to use too much magic again and then he'd be replacing the current ones for a new set in less time. The thought exhausted him and he ran his hand through his now blond hair. Before the fire he'd had what his mother had called golden-brown hair. Basically, it had been brown with streaks of blond intertwined with the strands. It had been so long since he'd seen it; he couldn't remember the exact color anymore.
Oddly enough, he'd been coping with this problem for so long that the thought that he'd never see himself again as he'd once been didn't even make him sad. He just felt… nothing.
But his new features were fine. They'd be pleasant to look at for a while, not startling or disturbing. His nose was long but not so big that it looked like it didn't belong on his face. Not like the time he'd taken the face of someone who'd had a nose job and scared the crap out of himself when he'd seen the dude's old, hawk-like nose staring back at him. His magic, he had learned that day, didn't accommodate personal alterations.
This nose was fine. It would probably be called aristocratic. He wasn't exactly sure about that. His chin was long with a cleft in the center and his cheekbones were high. The new ears didn't poke out too much, which was good. Samuel didn't particularly enjoy feeling like Dumbo. His blue eyes were clear and strong.
He shook his head to see how his hair would fall and found that his current state, basically messy and unruly, would have to remain. The new guy's hair didn't cooperate to change.
"That was close." His voice sounded rough, probably from the disgusting cigarette he'd just smoked. Clearing his throat, he walked to the window and leaned his forehead against it. The glass felt cool and he took a few moments to try to center himself against the sensation. That had been too close of a call—too damn close.
Eden. He could picture her face in his mind's eye. Samuel had only seen her once in person. She'd been walking with her family through the streets of Boise, handing out pamphlets on God and the apocalypse. He'd already known a ton about her, having walked through her mind hundreds of times since they'd been children. She hated the ordeal of talking about God, always afraid a member of her family was about to start raving that she'd been possessed by Satan.
Samuel had stood up; ready to approach her, ready to tell her who they really were and that she belonged to him. He'd take her away. Somehow, she'd deal with the fact that his appearance had to alter every week. They were soul mates. Then his skin had started to itch. He could still remember the horror of the feeling. What had been the matter? In anticipation of meeting her, he'd changed his face the day before. There was no way it should have needed to be replaced so fast. Darting to the left, he'd found a person whose features he could steal and ran back to his hotel room.
The truth had dawned on him as he'd scrubbed the skin from his cheeks. Being in Eden's presence required too much magic from him. If he was near her, he couldn't maintain his illusions. As much as he'd hoped Eden could deal with the face changing, he had no doubt she would not be able to handle the real him. He could barely deal with it. His own parents hadn't been able to stand looking at him. They acted like the very sight of his profile burned their eyes.
No way would he do that to his soul mate. She needed his help more than she needed his presence.
So he stayed away. Beautiful, strawberry blonde Eden with her round luscious ass so perfect for squeezing that his hands ached to touch her there. An intimate pat only he'd be allowed to give. She was a strong, capable woman who had battled her own abilities for so long, in order to stay alive, she could hardly control them now. He wanted to kiss her soft lips, to tell her, in person, that she'd get it together, that ultimately she'd save them all.
Except he'd never get the chance t
o do so. And the demon had almost gotten to her because he'd been so sound asleep he hadn't heard her pain until it had been almost too late to expel Sebastian from her mind.
"Eden." Sometimes he spoke aloud simply to hear the sound of his own voice and if that made him crazy, there wasn't a thing he could do about it.
He needed to do some work soon. His job working as an editor for instructional manuals made his brain ache with boredom but he didn't have to see anyone to get it done. He could work from whatever location he rented and no one was the wiser that he didn't look the same from week-to-week. His checks were deposited into the same account without him ever having to see a bank teller. The computer age had made Samuel's life a lot simpler.
Tapping his fingers against the window, he sought her mind. One last touch before the day had to begin. One last glimpse of what heaven on earth should have been for him would have to sustain him for the rest of the day while he added grammatical comments to the instructions for the use of a toaster oven.
He opened up his mind and he could feel his consciousness escape his body. Without a doubt, he knew where he'd end up—in Eden's mind. That was where he always traveled. She pulled him like the end of a magnet he felt powerless to avoid. Not that he would ever want to go anywhere else.
His eyes snapped open as his mind arrived in Eden's. After a few seconds of tugging, Samuel was able to manipulate his magic to go where he'd like it to the last few times he'd visited—right next to wherever she stood. Right now, it looked like the kitchen. Very different than his own abode—which he decorated for quick escapes and functionality—the kitchen in the Outsider lair held neat things like a cat clock that meowed every hour and place mats that matched seating cushions. The room looked to be the kind of place he could spend a lot of time relaxing in. He didn't even try to push down the envy that made his hands shake. What would be the point in suppressing the feeling?
Eden sighed and leaned back against the black wicker chair on the left side of the table. They only had eight matching seats. They'd have to find more chairs if they ever located all their soul mates. Except that they never would—because he could never present himself.