I want to laugh at her naive view and the ridiculous notion that I can be used for anything good, but I can only shake my head. She thinks all I’ve done is seduce a few girls for a bit of fun. The only reason she fell for me is because she doesn’t know everything about me. It’s time to remedy some of that.

I tell her about Father’s relationship with Marissa and watch as her eyes narrow in horror when I mention an underground prostitution ring in Atlanta. That’s right, sweet Anna, I want to say. I’m involved with sexual slavery. What do you think of me now?

“The girl they brought me the night before our trip was the youngest ever. She couldn’t have been twelve. For the first time ever, I refused him, told him I couldn’t.”

She shakes her head, face pale as I release some of the demons that haunt me.

“You put thoughts into my head that Neph shouldn’t have.” I look away from her, out the window. I’ve never shared any of my fears with anyone. I should tell her to get out of the car and go, but now that I’ve opened these cursed floodgates, I can’t stop. She’s the only person in the world I can talk to, and I have to make her understand. “He’ll be watching me now, testing me. I can’t afford to have anything more to do with you.”

“Kai . . . I know you’re freaked out. I am, too. But maybe this sword is a sign that something’s going to happen. Something good for the Neph.”

I feel my shoulders slump. This might be her most naive thought yet. If anything’s to happen with that sword, it’s nothing to do with me or the Neph. Nothing good can come to us.

“You felt power when you touched the hilt, didn’t you?” I ask. I look at her and she nods. “Well, I didn’t. I’m not worthy to help with whatever plan they have for you. So just go back to your sweet and innocent life and stay away from me.”

“Please,” she begs. “Don’t push me away. We can be friends, and—”

This is heart wrenching. I take her face in my hand, forcing her eyes to look straight into mine to make her understand. “We can never be just friends, Anna. Get it through your head now. There can be nothing.”

I let her go and get out of the car, but she doesn’t follow. So I approach the counter and get her boarding pass. Then I open the door to let her out. I want her to leave without another word. This is maddening, and I’m drained. She climbs out slowly and stands before me. I take out the cash and push it into her pocket, thrilled by the small touch.

When she leans her forehead against my sternum I nearly pull her back to my SUV and drive us away. It would mean our doom, but we might have a few more days of fulfilling enjoyment before we were found and brutally killed.

I clench my fists at my sides and resist the urge to touch her. “It’s time for you to go.”

“Wait.” She gazes up at me with those brown eyes. “Remember at the beginning of the trip, when you said you always know right away what you’d have to do to get a girl into bed . . . even me?”

Ah, shite. I don’t like where this is going. I bury my hot hands in my pockets and give a tight nod.

“What would you have to do? For me?”

This is dangerous territory. “Let’s not go there,” I warn.

“Tell me. Please.”

I look into her sweet face, at that freckle at the corner of her mouth, and I clench my jaw. Perhaps it will be good if she knows the truth about my plan to seduce her. It will be better if she doesn’t know how I feel. It will make it easier for her to get over me and move on. It’s bad enough that I know what I’m going to be missing. She doesn’t need to know it, too.

“I’d have to make you believe I loved you.”

Her eyes drift closed and her face scrunches in pain. Knowing I’ve hurt her makes me want to gouge out my own eye.

“I wish, just once, that I could see your colors,” she whispers.

My sweet and lovely little Ann. This is good-bye.

I swallow hard. “Well, I’m glad you can’t. And I wish I’d never seen yours.”

What Anna does next fills me with pride at her strength, and as much as it stings, it gives me hope that she’ll be okay. She simply picks up her bag, and without a backward glance, she walks away.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Off to Work I Go

“Do you still consider me . . . the boy you laughed with or that you learned to live without?

. . . You wouldn’t get me on the phone, and you couldn’t make me not alone.”

—“Logan to Government Center” by Brand New

I am obsessed. I believe this is what they call “getting a taste of one’s own medicine,” and it’s a bitter flavor.

I didn’t work on the way home from Los Angeles. I drove like a zombie with hardly a wink of sleep. It wrecked me to see Anna’s number calling my mobile and not be able to answer.

That was over a week ago. Since being back in Atlanta I’ve thrown myself into work with a flourish, determined to get her off my mind. Surely another person’s body will make these thoughts of her go away.

No?

Right then, two people.

Three . . . ? New bodies day and night. Different smiles on different lips. Different arses, different hips. I’ve even been writing songs, much to Michael’s bloody delight.

Music, sex, pot, bourbon. Vast quantities of all of the above at once.

Nothing. Fucking. Works.

I get into trouble when school starts, which pisses Father off, as if I’m some human boy who gives a shit about his senior year and his future. He just doesn’t want to play nice with the humans when they call with their concerns. It’s not high on Father’s to-do list to pretend to care for his troubled son who comes to school with bloodshot eyes and sleeps through history lessons.

Although he has seemed otherwise impressed with my performance outside of school. Good on me.

Because not one bit of this makes Anna go away. In fact, with each girl I abandon and each arsehole thing I say and do, I’m filled with shame. I see her face at every party. In every car I pass. She is everywhere, but I cannot have her. I’m constantly surrounded by people, but I’ve never been more alone.

I’m not sure how long I can sustain this level of self-abuse, but I cannot stand to be sober, and the more I fuel my lust, the more I seem to need. I am a disgusting disaster, but there’s an apparent “tortured soul” appeal about me, because chicks have never been so keen to have me. I’m getting more action than James Fucking Bond. My bandmates joke that I’m a god.

And yet, I’ve never been less fulfilled.

Each time Father leaves I listen to Anna’s voice mail messages. I shouldn’t. It’s stupid for many reasons, but what can I say? I have become an idiot. Like that time this week when I called Marna, blasted out of my mind, and mentioned I’d met a new Neph named Anna, daughter of Belial. I figured word would have spread about her from Father by now, but Marna was obviously shocked and overly interested. Gin was in the background shouting questions.

“What’s she like? Why haven’t we met her? How old is she?”

“Erm, she’s a year younger than me. Father asked me to help train her up.”

“Train her up?” Marna asked. “What for? Isn’t she trained and working already?”

“I meant, we work together. Or something.”

“Or something?” she asked incredulously.

Even in my drunken state I knew enough to cut the conversation short.

Today, I make another idiotic phone call. This time to the band’s manager.

“Ay, it’s Kai,” I say.

“Rowe! What’s up?”

“Couple months ago this bloke called Jay gave you a CD of his songs. Think I can come by an’ give ’em a listen?” Cripe, I’m drunk. Hope I’m not slurring.