Demon Marked

Table of Contents

 

 

Praise for the Novels of Anna J. Evans

“A wonderful read full of sexual heat and a potent tale.”

—Coffee Time Romance

 

“Evans pens a tale that is hot, scary, and sweet all at the same time. The protagonists ... will keep you turning the pages long into the night, and the happy ending is emotional enough to please any romance fan.”
—Romantic Times
(4½ stars)

 

“Anna J. Evans weaves a tale full of passion, intrigue, betrayal, and friendship that will leave readers in awe of the raw power behind the words.”—Romance Junkies

 

“Enough sexual heat to create an avalanche.”—Fallen Angel Reviews

 

“Arousing, amorous ... pulled me right into their sexual encounters.... Ms. Evans's storytelling ability was amazing, without a single flaw.”—The Romance Studio

 

“A powerful story about the deep and undeniable connection between soul mates.... The love scenes were so primal and raw that you're going to want to keep a spare pair of dry panties, a bucket of ice, and extra batteries nearby.”—TwoLips Reviews

 

“Extraordinary. ... I didn't put this down until it was read all the way through.”—Romance Divas

ALSO BY ANNA J. EVANS

SIGNET ECLIPSE
Published by New American Library,
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First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, January 2011

Copyright © Stacey Iglesias Fedele, 2011

All rights reserved
SIGNET ECLIPSE and logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Evans, Anna J.
Demon marked: a demon bound novel/Anna J. Evans.
p. cm.

eISBN : 978-1-101-47824-0

1. Demons—Fiction. 2. Lawyers—Fiction. 3. Gangs—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3605.V363S53 2010
813'.6—dc22 2010034843
Set in Albertina

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication maybe reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

PUBLISHER'S NOTE

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thank you to the production team at Signet Eclipse, to my agent, Caren, and to my amazing readers. Thank you, readers, for every e-mail and every book you pick up off the shelf. I appreciate you so much. Also a big thank-you to my family, my husband, my writer and nonwriter friends, and my children for love and support. I am lucky to have you all.

E
mma Quinn took a pull on her beer and scanned the crowded bar—Death Ministry gang members, some frat boys from Columbia looking for danger they couldn't handle, and a couple of prostitutes trying to masquerade as party girls. The real party girls never wore dresses or heels. They stuck with jeans and sensible shoes, even in the soupy humidity of August in New York. When you lived on the wrong side of the barricade, you never knew when you might need to make a run for your life. Heels weren't suited for a jog through the rubble of the demon ruins.

No, the real party girls had left hours ago, the frat boys were well on their way to being too drunk to stand—let alone make their way to one of the all-night diners where they could get a coffee and sober up while waiting for the barricade to open at five a.m.—and the gang members ... well, they just stank of trouble.

Death Ministry thugs had never come into the bar before. They usually preferred to haunt the abandoned docks near what had once been East River Park, plotting their drug runs, planning who to kill, and taking care of whatever other assorted business Very Bad Guys had on their nightly to-do list. But tonight ... they were here shooting tequila—and interested looks in the prostitutes' direction.

It was three a.m. at the Demon's Breath Pub, and all was not well.

But it never was at this time of night; Emma had learned that much in her first few weeks as manager.

Most of the tourists had left hours ago—trundled across the barricade that ran along Fourteenth Street in their tour buses—and demon-infested New York City had dropped its civilized veneer. Gone were the shiny-faced men and women offering guided tours and the food trailers selling demon-inspired snacks—ice cream cones painted gold to look like Hamma demon claws, funnel cakes dusted with silver sugar to mimic the Squat demon nests.

In their place were hard men and women tough enough to party in the urban jungle, addicts looking for their fix of demon drugs, and nocturnal predators waiting for humans foolish enough to wander too close to the ruins. The demons—ancient monsters descended from dinosaurs—were amazingly well adapted to the habitat they'd created when they'd surged from caves deep in the earth during the earthquakes of the previous century.

They lurked in wait for easy prey, killed, ate, and disappeared back into the rubble. The bounty hunters and gang members who earned their livings killing and harvesting demon parts were their only predators—aside from one another. The demon ecosystem was as well balanced as any other on earth. Large demons fed on smaller ones, and smaller ones fed on rats and mice. New York City hadn't had a vermin problem for years.

It was something Emma had been grateful for during the months she'd spent locked in her sister's psycho ex-boyfriend's basement. It was cold and dark down there, but at least there hadn't been any rats.

Emma grimaced and downed the rest of her beer. She
did
look on the bright side, in her own jaded fashion. Growing up where she had, the
way
she had, she'd been forced to create her own happiness. Even Father Paul had only so much time, so much energy, and most of it was used up by the time he got back to the halfway house at the end of the day. He'd saved her life, but Father Paul was too busy to worry about her contentment.

Her long-lost sister and brother had been able to lean on each other, but Emma had only ever had herself. Even now—months after she had helped save her sister, Sam, from her ex-boyfriend and the nasty aura demons he'd been trying to summon onto the earthly plane—she still hadn't learned to depend on anyone else. Even her new family. Sam and her husband, Jace, were good people, but they were just so ...
grossly
in love—and lust—with each other.

Emma didn't do love. Or lust. She'd never been able to afford the luxury of either.

“Dude, do you think we should call demon patrol? Or ... somebody?” Ginger, the bartender on duty, asked, pouring a shot of whiskey as she closed out one of the frat boys' tabs.

Ginger cast a pointed look toward the corner of the room, where several Death Ministry members—easily identified by the scars marking their faces, one long slash for each life they'd taken in the name of gang business—sat sharing a bottle of tequila.

“Nope.” Emma placed her empty beer glass in the dishwasher under the bar. “Demon patrol doesn't deal with gang stuff.”