ANGEL’S POV:With her fashionable black coat worn over a short black dress and that intoxicating air of feline confidence, the woman looked like she belonged to the cover of a high-society magazine, or on the runway, strutting her long legs hidden behind those thigh-high boots.“Who…who are you? And what are you doing in my house?” My composure was back and from her unbothered stance, I suddenly felt the need to stand a little straighter, eyes hardened on hers.How the hell does she even know my name?“I heard you’d be a little feisty.” She smirked, reminding me of a wolf – deceptive and devious. “And you have no house, sweet heart. This dump belongs to the De Novo family.”My heart froze. “W-what…?”“Try not to drop your jaws, there are flies around.” She pulled the door wider. “Come in.”My thoughts doubled with a million questions and a chill ran up my spine at every possibility. Have no house? What? Who the hell was she anyway, standing in my doorway and calling me sweetheart?Irr

ANGEL’S POV:If only she could shut up for one second, then maybe I might be able to hear my own thoughts.Every foreign word Astrid spat, at some point, became a verbal blur of thunderstorms and fury. In between, she’d throw an accusatory finger at me, as if reporting a bad kid to the principal for stealing from the cookie jar. I might have laughed if under a different circumstance.But it wasn’t.Twisted to a sickening extent, my heart bled to the ground, and it wasn’t like the soft pitter patters of the rain, or the small tear drops that stained my cheeks. I was completely drenched in a pool of my own despair, sinking deeper and deeper into every heartbreak, disappointment and exhaustion I’d faced in the past two years.The memories mocked me.The day I gave away my college funds to keep father out of jail. The semester I left school because I couldn’t pay my fees anymore. The days I spent tirelessly searching for a job. The unending rejections. The hell I faced trying to foot fath

ANGEL’S POV:There was a reason I never thought about Christian for two years. He was a mistake. One that consumed my mind at every waking second I spent in Carter’s arms. His icy gray eyes. Intense and haunting. That slow sexy smile he loved to wear. And of course, the blood that coated his skin when I ran.Somehow, that scene had permanently etched itself to my memory.It drove me mad with anger and disgust that I’d let myself roll in bed with a man who had a relation with my mother’s murderers, that I had tossed away my relationship with Carter just to quench a single desire that had been conceived from a stupid dare.I glared harshly at the white tiled walls of the bathroom. The cold water freely falling from the shower head did not nearly extinguish the scalding resentment that coursed through me. I scrubbed my skin with intent to bruise it.If I could go back to that night, I’d have never said yes to Nadia and Sage. Hell, I’d have slapped some senses into the naïve girl I’d been

CHRISTIAN’S POV:I leaned closer, languidly meeting her gaze through darkened ones. Confusion ran deep in her eyes as she tried to piece together my next move. I leaned even closer and before she could back away, I snatched her waist, holding her down against my body. Her eyes grew wide.She opened her mouth in an attempt to protest and I smirked, but right before she could get any words out, a chaotic thud jerked both our attention to the corner it came from. A bumbling idiot had fallen right into the room, knocking down an entire column of mannequins.Christ.Cherry was fast behind him, click-fucking-clack, as she immediately pulled the man – scratch that, the boy to his feet. With the suspenders and glasses twice his fit, my guess was that he escaped adult daycare.From the new distraction, Angel slipped out of my grip and left that bloody distance between us again. Irritation scratched my surface but rather than act on it, I forced my gaze back to the two people that were now