Read Online The Demoness of Waking Dreams by Stephanie Chong - Free Book Online

fun.”
    He whipped the shawl off her back.
    She flinched, but willed herself, Do not cry.
    “If you’re planning on raping me, you’ll never get away with it,” she said sullenly.
    “Believe me, I would never do that. That’s not how I operate. But I will gag you if necessary. And for that, all I’ve got are old socks,” he said, mildly amused. “So I’d keep my voice down, if I were you.”
    Without speaking, he inspected her wounds. He touched a spot.
    Don’t cry, she told herself.
    “What is this, some kind of divinely charged handcuff?” she grumbled, twisting to stare down at the curved metal and willing the tears not to fall from her eyes.
    “No, ma’am, just plain steel. I like to do things the old-fashioned way.”
    “Old-fashioned,” she said. “You have no idea what that means. Aren’t you worried that I might dematerialize?”
    “If you were capable of that, you would have done it by now. You’re bound to your physical body.”
    “Doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.”
    She jerked against the cuffs again, shaking the bed. He looked down at her, bored. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You’re just going to injure yourself further.”
    She glared back at him, letting the hatred flash in her eyes. So she was at the mercy of this lout. She had never been in such a position before.
    A position of total vulnerability.
    She had negotiated, surely, had bartered her body to gain advantage in countless situations. But handcuffed and held against her will?
    Never.
    It infuriated her, as nothing had before. She had gotten herself into—and out of—many situations before. But she had never allowed a man to render her so completely helpless, a s this one had.
    She watched him as he moved around the room, digging through his bag for a clean change of clothes.
    He went into the doorless bathroom. She wondered if the unmannered American barbarian was going to open his fly and piss right in front of her. Instead, he went to the dingy sink and began to wash the blood off his forearms. His gray gaze stayed trained on her, ensuring she remained chained to the bed.
    He examined his wounds, whipping his bloodied, torn shirt over his head and checking himself over for major damage.
    Brandon had the body of a warrior, tattooed like a man who had seen many battles—each one had been etched on his skin, the story of his bravery mapped out in dark ink.
    Right over his heart was a tribal design, a swirling dragon whose body extended to his biceps. From there, at the top of his left arm, the design continued with a tree of life, the branches stylized in a Celtic pattern with four interlocking corners. On the other arm, an ancient Mayan sunburst. Continuing down the sleeve of that arm were bands of tribal designs and different types of animals, some real and some mythical. Lions, snakes and eagles intermingled with griffins and phoenixes. So many different creatures and symbols, all of them rendered in monochromatic shades of black and gray ink, creating an impressive aesthetic harmony on the canvas of his skin.
    He turned, bending to inspect the cut she’d inflicted on his abdomen. Giving her a full view of the most impressive tattoo of all.
    The huge tattoo stretching across his back was a massive angel rendered in black and gray. Feathered wings extended from the lines of a human body, the wing tips of the tattoo outspread along each of Brandon’s shoulder blades.
    A tattoo that might simply be a decoration on any other man.
    On him, the tattoo was like the divine staring her in the face.
    She had always known this day was coming, the day of her reckoning. After all the crimes she had committed, she supposed she deserved it. What a strange manner of capture, though, to end up strapped to a bed in a cheap hotel.
    She turned her gaze away, unable to look.
    “Oh, Dio.” Oh, God.
    The words slipped off her tongue, not a prayer, but a profanity.
    “Those aren’t just ordinary tattoos, are they?” she