Massachusetts, Present Day

In the overgrown grasses of Mount Auburn Cemetery, my best friend Holly held out her arms. Bluebells dappled the grass around us and chinks of light flecked her body, streaming through alder boughs.

The breeze toyed with Holly’s dark hair, giving her an almost otherworldly look, which seemed fitting given that she was attempting to commune with the spirits. Apparently she wanted to draw a powerful spirit into our vicinity—one that would bless us with good luck or help us fulfill our destinies or something.

Considering the complete, unparalleled disaster my life had become, I had been desperate enough to join her.

I lay down in the grass by her side and closed my eyes, humming along.

I wasn’t sure how a spirit’s presence would feel—maybe a whispering or a buzzing of magic, a tingling of energy up the back of my neck—but right now, the only thing prickling over my skin was the sharp itch of a mosquito sucking my blood. My eyes snapped open, and I sat upright again. I smacked my arm, grimacing at the smudge of blood on my tanned skin. I gagged. Freaking bugs. Gross.

Okay. I’d given the séance my best shot.

I scooted out of the shade and into the August sunlight while Holly continued humming loudly on her back. Bathed in the rays of the setting sun, I instantly began to relax. I was a born sun worshipper.

I looked down at my pink nails, watching them shimmer in the light, and smiled at the color. I couldn’t actually afford to buy any clothes, but I could afford nail polish, and I could sew. My life might be falling apart around me, but I’d still look like myself.

Holly opened one of her deep brown eyes. “Dawn,” she chided. “You’re not focusing.”

“I wasn’t feeling any spirits. Were you?”

She sighed. “Not exactly.”

I bit my lip. “Maybe depending on spirits isn’t the best way to turn our lives around. I’m not sure I believe in that stuff. It’s more my mom’s thing. I’m probably ruining your mojo just by being here. I’m scaring the spirits off.”

Sunlight bathed her tawny skin in gold. “Whether you believe it or not, you have a destiny, Dawn. Like, an important one. You just have to find your way to it.”

I crossed my arms. “Oh yeah? Is my destiny to end up destitute, out of work, and wearing shoes discreetly held together with duct tape and glue? Because that’s what’s actually happening in the world of Dawn Geddes.”

There’d been a time when my life had been perfect. In high school, I’d had a 4.2 GPA, access to a platinum credit card, and plans to go to an Ivy League school. I’d carefully cultivated all the necessary extracurriculars: dance team, captain of the cheerleading team, treasurer of the student council, head of the prom organization committee. I’d written my college entrance essay about the importance of plural identities and interculturalism. I’d even spent my summers volunteering at a homeless shelter.

My boyfriend had been the golden-haired, muscular captain of the football team. I’d practically glowed walking through the halls of my suburban high school. And I’d done it all while dressed in Prada.

All that had changed fast.

That had been before Mom’s illness had taken over, before she started seeing demons or angels or something swarming the skies. It had taken her less than a year to blow through our entire savings. The state covered her medical expenses, but I had no money for college. I’d been wearing the same pair of shoes for a year and a half, scrambling from one minimum wage job to another. Turned out, when I applied for a job in a cafe or fast food joint, no one cared at all about plural identities or the dance team.

At least I still had Luke, my high school sweetheart. Without him, I’d probably be homeless. And I’d definitely be lonely.

I blew a strand of platinum blonde hair out of my face. “Look, I appreciate your help, but I just need a job. Seems like even the minimum wage gigs want a college degree. Any chance you could put in a good word for me where you work?”

Holly sighed. “Yeah. I’ll put in a good word with N.B.”

“Who?”

“My boss. He’s kind of a douchebag, but just ignore him when he talks and never make eye contact.”

I smiled, relieved. I didn’t need a profound destiny. All I needed was some rent money and to feel a little better about myself. “Thanks, Holly.” I toyed with my silky, taffy-pink skirt—one of my own creations. “I just want to contribute to help out Luke. He’s been shouldering all the bills, and I need a little more independence.”

My boyfriend was in medical school now, and he had enough stress as it was without having to pay for me. Plus, right now, he got to call all the shots. As long as he was paying the bills, it was hard for me to argue with his decisions.

Holly made a face. She wasn’t a big fan of Luke. “Money for rent or for moving out. Whichever.”

I glared at her. Luke was the one topic we always argued over. “Drop it, Holly.”

“Fine. How’s your mom doing?” Holly twirled one of her long chestnut-brown braids. “The last time I saw you, you said she was getting worse.”

I swallowed hard, my mind burning with images from the start of her illness: the episodes where she’d buy four thousand Chanel scarves because she thought it would somehow save the world; the days when I’d come home to our palatial house in the hills to find that she’d scrawled incoherent phrases all over the walls in Dior lipstick:

Angels. Stars alarming the wars of Mars. The end is coming.

I twisted the hem of my silky skirt around my fingers so tight my knuckles turned white. “Not better, no. She keeps going off her medication. She says she wants to see the angels, that only she can save the world.”

“You ever think she could be right about any of that stuff?” asked Holly. I could hear a little bit of hope in her voice. Of course she’d want to meet angels. She probably considered them a step up from spirits.

“Nope. Not even for a second.” I reached into my raspberry-colored handbag—handcrafted by yours truly—and pulled out a small compact mirror. My platinum hair hung in soft waves around my face, and the sunlight glinted in my pale blue eyes, framed by dark eyelashes. I pulled out my pink lip gloss, running it over my lips.

Like I said, the world could fall apart around me, but that was no reason to let myself go to pieces.

“I don’t believe a flipping thing my mom says about angels,” I added, snapping my compact mirror shut.

Holly narrowed her dark eyes. “You know why I think our séance didn’t work? You need to embrace your primal side.” She jabbed her finger in my face. “You have a stick up your ass.”

“Holly!”

“You’re twenty-two years old and you can’t even swear.”

I straightened. “I don’t see any need to be vulgar.” Discomfort with swearing was a relic from my mom—even if she’d changed drastically in the past five years. “Anyway, don’t you remember what happened the last time we tried to ‘embrace our primal sides’?”

“I guess.”

“We ended up having pudding on a bench in Harvard Yard. Granted, it was amazing pudding, but I’m not sure it brought out our feral sides or connected me to primordial power. Face it. You’re as boring as I am, Holly.”

“Bullshit.” She cocked her head. “Let’s try again. I can feel a power stirring in the air around us. The gods of luck are going to smile on us. Someone magical lurks nearby. Someone who can help you fulfill your destiny.”

I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes. Holly was starting to sound a little too much like my mom.

She crawled over to me in the sunlight, then held her hands out to me. I took her palms in mine, closing my eyes.

“Spirits of the primordial realm,” she intoned. “Gods of luck. We ask for you to bring us good fortune, to bring us to our destiny.”

She began humming, and I joined in. It felt a bit stupid, but Holly was trying to help me, so the least I could do was play along.

Strangely, as we hummed in harmony, I did feel something thrumming over my body, moving over my legs, my hips, in a slow, primitive crawl. Was it the summer breeze kissing my bare skin? A deep, primal power that would burn from the inside out, coiling around my ribs in some kind of ancient invitation to adventure?

In fact, as I hummed along with Holly, I could feel a strange sort of magic moving over my breasts—

With a jolt, I realized it wasn’t magic at all. Snapping out of my trance, I yanked my hands from Holly’s. Something was definitely crawling over my skin, but it wasn’t magic. What the cuss?

With a hammering heart, I pulled my cream blouse away from my skin, and my stomach dropped. There, slinking between my cleavage, was an enormous freaking spider the size of a plum. I unleashed a scream, leaping up. I didn’t want to touch the cursed thing—I just wanted it away from my skin.

Desperate, I pulled off my shirt, then bent over to try to shake the monster off my chest. I may have been screaming a bit. Screaming bravely, I assure you. I was vaguely aware of Holly’s howls of laughter. I was not, however, aware of the brick wall I was stumbling into until I looked up.

My face reddened. Not a brick wall, no. Shirtless, with a spider clinging to my womanly assets, I’d stumbled into a six-foot-tall man.

I looked up into his face and found a wry smile curling his beautiful lips.

So here I was, topless in a cemetery, with a giant arachnid crawling over my lacy pink bra, and a stranger smirking at me like it was the funniest freaking thing he’d ever seen.

Oh, the gods of luck were not blessing me today. The gods of luck were distinctly flipping with me.

“Do you need help with that?” he asked, his voice deep and accented.

Even if he was handsome as all get out, I wasn’t allowing this strange man near my boobs. Scowling, I forced myself to pluck the spider off my skin by one of its hairy legs. With a shaking hand, I dropped it in the grass.

I shuddered and said, with as much dignity as I could muster, “no, thank you. I have everything under control.”

“Of course. You seem perfectly composed. I’m sure you often stumble around cemeteries half-naked and covered in insects.” British. He was definitely British and definitely laughing at me, and maybe I couldn’t quite blame him. “I’m not sure this day could get any more interesting,” he continued. “Unless, perhaps, you have a spider hiding in your skirt?”

I was certain that my cheeks were flaming red at this point, and that a deep flush had spread over my chest. I turned to search the grass, then scrambled to snatch up my blouse and the last vestiges of my dignity. Pulling on the shirt, I shot Holly my most blistering look. She’d been no help at all. In fact, she was still laughing into her hand, tears streaming down her cheeks.

I turned back to the stranger and flicked my blonde hair over my shoulder in what I hoped was a defiant gesture. “You shouldn’t sneak up on people in cemeteries.”

“True. You never know when someone might be running around naked, covered in exotic spiders. It’s just that something drew me here. I can’t be sure if it was some magic, the shrieking, or perhaps the sheerness of your bra.”

My cheeks flamed deeper, and I glared at him.

As I did, I was struck for a moment by his staggering, infuriating beauty. The scent of cedar smoke curled off him, caressing my skin in distinctly intimate places that I didn’t want to think about right now. I had a feeling this man could seduce the frock off a nun if he wanted to.

The wind toyed with his dark hair, sweeping it across his sun-kissed skin. Amusement danced in his eyes as he looked down at me, his irises a deep blue flecked with gold. Whorls of dark tattoos covered his muscled forearms—stars and moons with brutal swirls between them that ended in sharp points. It must have been some kind of optical illusion cast by the setting sun, but it seemed like his body almost glowed with golden light.

Maybe it was the way he stood with a strange, animal stillness, but I couldn’t escape the sense of menacing allure he exuded—or that magic had drawn him here.

Nope. That was crazy. Magic wasn’t real.

Anyway—tattoos, leather pants. This was exactly the kind of guy my mom would have warned me about. Before she lost her mind, it would have been something like, “women from our family don’t mix with men like that.”

After she lost her mind, it would have been something about how he was a demon hell-bent on destroying the Earth.

Either way, as I stared at his breathtakingly beautiful features, alarm bells were ringing in the recesses of my mind.

So why was it that I wasn’t turning away from him? Must have been the muscular physique, I guess, or the sensual curve of his lips….

Freaking heck, Dawn. Get a grip. I had a wonderful boyfriend and had no business gaping at other men.

I smoothed out my blouse. “I’ve never seen a spider that size in Massachusetts. It could have been venomous. Pulling off my shirt was a rational reaction.”

The honeyed sunset seemed to cast a halo around him. I couldn’t explain it, but it almost felt like a gravitational force pulled me closer to him, and my pulse raced. His gaze traced over the contours of my body, as if he was remembering exactly how I had looked without my shirt on. And given the power in his body, I could almost picture his large hands picking me up by the waist—

“Venom,” he said. “Of course.”

I crossed my arms. “Who are you, exactly?” I wasn’t sure why I even asked. What did I care?

“Raphael Valis.” As he looked down at me, smiling faintly, the light seemed to intensify around him.

For just a moment, I had the strangest sense that he wasn’t completely human. The moment was over as soon as it had come, though, and I blinked away the insane thought.

A sly smile. “Shall I call you my Queen of Venom, or do I get the pleasure of knowing your name?”

My pulse raced harder. “Dawn.” What was I doing still talking to him? I cleared my throat. “I have to go.”

I turned, pinning Holly with a furious gaze, and I grabbed her by the elbow. I needed to get as far away from the cemetery as possible before that man’s overwhelming beauty made me lose my mind.