"Keller?" she called, feeling a little nervous as she headed for the living room.
She paused in the doorway to find her Squire sitting in an uneasy slump on the couch across from an unknown man who was seated in her armchair. All she could see was the back of his blond head. Even so, she could tell he was sitting very stiff and formal. It was a pose of command.
"Hey, Danger," Keller said in a nervous greeting as he saw her in the doorway. "We have a guest. He's, um... he's Ash's Squire."
She went cold at his words. Her heart started thumping as adrenaline rushed through her.
The man stood up slowly and turned to face her. Danger's gaze quickly fell to the white coat he wore over his solid black clothes. To the way he stood there in all his arrogance as if he dared her or anyone else to question him.
Everything he wore was black, except the coat... and it belonged to Ash's Squire who was blond like a Daimon...
Danger's reaction to her "guest" was swift and automatic, and it happened without any premeditation on her part. She pulled out her dagger and threw it straight into the man's heart.
To her shock, he burst apart into a golden dust just like any good Daimon would.
"Mere de Dieu," she breathed.
Kyros had been right. The man was...
Entering the room from the doorway on her right!
Her jaw dropped as he sauntered into the room with an arrogant swagger and a less-than-amused smirk. He pinned her with a droll stare as he moved to stand in front of her. Her dagger shot from the floor, where it had fallen after he exploded into dust, and into his hand.
He held it out to her, hilt first. It was painfully obvious that he wasn't the least bit afraid she'd use it on him again. "Could you please refrain from the theatrics? I really hate doing that. It seriously pisses me off and it ruins a perfectly good shirt."
Danger continued to gape as she stared at the hole in his black turtleneck where the dagger had gone in. There was no blood. No wound. Nothing. Not even a red mark. It was as if he hadn't been stabbed at all.
I'm dreaming...
"What are you?" she breathed.
He gave her a dry, almost bored stare. "Well, had you listened before you stabbed me, you would have heard the 'I'm Acheron's Squire' part. Apparently that somehow escaped your hearing and you mistook me for a pin cushion."
He was certainly a snotty bastard. Not that she didn't deserve a degree of snottiness seeing how she'd just tried to kill him. Still, he could be a little more understanding, especially since, if Stryker and Kyros were to be believed, he'd been sent here to kill her.
"He has some really sweet talents, Danger," Keller said from the couch. "He made all the Daimons explode without touching them, but he won't tell me how he did it."
Danger took her dagger from Alexion's hand, then, without thought, touched the ragged tear in his black turtleneck. He felt solid underneath. Real. There was cold skin beneath the silk and wool fabric and it was hard and masculine.
Yet human beings didn't shatter like Daimons and no Daimon reappeared after death...
In that moment, she was terrified of him and terror wasn't something Danger St. Richard felt. Ever.
Alexion ground his teeth at the sensation of her soft fingers on his flesh. His body roared to life as he watched her examine him like a scientist with a lab experiment that had gone tragically wrong. She was very short for a Dark-Hunter which meant Artemis must have taken an unusual liking for the woman. The goddess preferred to create Dark-Hunters who were equal in height to the Daimons they fought.
No more than five two or three, Dangereuse was petite and athletic. He'd seen her many times lately in the sfora as he kept watch on what the Mississippi Dark-Hunters were up to.
There had been something about her that caught his interest. An innocence that still seemed to be inside her. Most Dark-Hunters were jaded by their human betrayals and deaths, and by their duties. But this one... She appeared to have avoided the cynicism that eternal life often brought.
Of course, she was young by Dark-Hunter years.
Still, it would be a shame to see her lose that inner glow that continued to allow her to enjoy her immortality. How he wished he could feel it too. But too much time and lack of hope had long robbed him of it.
Her dark, chestnut-colored hair was worn in a long braid, hanging down her back, but pieces of it had escaped to curl becomingly around her pale face. Her features were angelic and delicate. If not for her carriage and self-assuredness, she would have appeared fragile.
And yet there was nothing fragile about her. Dangereuse could more than take care of herself and well he knew it. As one of the newer Dark-Hunters, she was only a couple of hundred years old and had died while trying to save the noble half of her family from the guillotine in France during their revolution. It had been a monumental task she had set for herself, and had she not been betrayed, she would have succeeded.
Not to mention that the woman had the most kissable mouth he'd ever seen. Full and lush, her lips were the kind that a man dreamed of tasting at night. That mouth beckoned him now with temptation and the promise of pure unadulterated heaven.