Wicked at Heart by Danelle Harmon Read Free Book Online

table for support, the
breath rasping through his lungs as he fought for air.
    He looked up at
her, his eyes burning with something worse than fury.
    And Gwyneth
stood gazing down at him, a triumphant, haughty little smile playing across her
face.
    "I would
beg you, Lord Lucifer, to remember just who is the dangerous one here,"
she said smoothly.  "And by the way, don't bother escorting me off the
ship; I can see to it myself."
    She picked up
her hat.  Then, leaving him to his agony, she sailed to the door and slammed it
in his face.

 
    Chapter
3
     
    He hadn't
expected her to be so young.  He hadn't expected her to be so dauntless.
    And, he hadn't
expected her to be so damned beautiful .
    He shouldn't
have been fooled by the sweetness of that heart-shaped face; behind those wide,
violet eyes was a hellcat.  Damon could still taste her on his lips, could
still feel the throbbing ache in his groin where she'd kneed him.  Medusa had
no right to be such a beauty.  Medusa was supposed to have snakes as her
crowning glory, not thick piles of shimmering gold hair; Medusa wasn't supposed
to have a neck like a swan's, or skin so deliciously white that even a freckle
would've looked foreign on it; Melissa wasn't supposed to have rosy soft lips
and flashing violet eyes that had not quailed with fear even under the devil's
most deliberate intimidation.
    He hated her.
    He wanted her.
    He —
    The attack hit
just as he was hauling himself back to his feet via the aid of the table leg. 
Pain slammed into his chest.  It was no ordinary pain, but a horrible,
constricting sensation, like a giant fist squeezing his heart, tight, tighter,
now so tightly that he couldn't breathe.  Gasping, he half fell into the chair
and over the table, his body breaking out in a cold sweat, his hands shaking,
his vision narrowing until it was merely a scope through a gray and shrinking
tunnel.  He grabbed for the Peterson's , curling it under his chest as he
sank down over it, the heavy book pushing against his heart.
    He closed his
eyes, feeling himself detaching from his body, leaving it.
    I'm dying. 
This time, it's for certain.  Oh, God, help me, I don't want to die as I have
lived —
    Alone.
    "Milford."
 His knuckles turned white as he gripped the Peterson's and he heard his
heart racing like a galloping horse.  " Milford ! "
    Silence.  Stillness. 
Lazy footsteps on the deck above.  Gasping, the sweat rolling down his temples,
Damon raised his head and tore open the medical encyclopedia, desperately
searching for the correct entry, the subtitles growing foggy beneath the
encroaching grey clouds of the constricting tunnel.
    His heart
fluttered madly in his chest.
    He couldn't
think, couldn't concentrate.  He had to read the entry four times before its
meaning sank into his dizzy brain.
    "A sharp
and incessant pain in the chest can be the result of overwork, worry, or
impending death —"
    " Milford !"
Damon shouted, hoarsely.
    Further on, "or
a stomach colic caused by an excitement of nerves."
    He lunged to his
feet, the book crashing to the floor.  This wasn't the stomach, the stomach was
much lower than where this pain was, the stomach didn't flutter erratically
beneath the sternum.  No, this time he was truly dying because his heart was
pulsing, stumbling, that gray tunnel was collapsing in on itself, and now he
couldn't think, couldn't breathe, couldn't see, couldn't get enough air —
    Damon lunged forward,
clawing at his throat, fighting desperately to breathe.
    Air!
    The tunnel
collapsed.
    The next thing
he knew, he was lying on the deck flooring, staring dazedly up at the bulkhead
and the Reverend Peter Milford's worried face.
    "Damon?"
    He took a deep,
tentative breath.  The pain was gone, as though it had never been.  Stillness,
silence, engulfed him.
    "Are you
all right?"
    "Christ,
I'm dead."
    "I'm not
Christ, and no, you're not dead."  Stretching out a hand, the young
chaplain helped Damon sit up and pressed a glass of