Holly, Emma - The Demon's Daughter

Title: The Demon's Daughter
Author: Emma Holly
Series: Standalone
Pub: Berkley
Pub Date: November, 2004
ISBN: 0425199185
Genre: Historical Steampunk
Time Period: Victorian
Setting: Avvar, England, UK
Hero: Inspector Adrian Philip
Heroine: Roxanne McCallister

Summary:

Inspector Adrian Philips keeps the peace between demons and humans in Avvar, a city not unlike Victorian London. To do his job, he's allowed his strength to be enhanced by demon technology, a choice that's cost him his wife, his family, and—some would say—his humanity. Rejected by both races, he hungers for a woman's touch.

Roxanne McAllister is an outcast, too: the illegitimate daughter of an infamous chanteuse. One fateful night brings Roxanne and Adrian together, and though the border between human and demon is treacherous, they might be just the ones to cross it. The question is, will the exquisite pleasure they find together be worth the risk?

Excerpt:

    Take a holiday, his superintendent had said. You’re working far too hard.
    Eight hours later, Inspector Adrian Philips was fleeing for his life through Avvar's fog-shrouded slums. He could have activated his implants, the tiny devices the Yamish doctor had tucked so cleverly beneath the tendons of his wrists. His muscles would gain power then, as much power as the demons it was his dubious honor to police. Unfortunately, the surge of artificial strength wouldn’t last and, once past, would leave him drained. That he couldn’t afford--even if those who chased him were mere humans. Better to save the advantage for when he truly needed it.
    He tried to run faster on his own, but the soiled overcoat he'd donned as camouflage in this seedy section of the capitol flapped about his legs. Though the hem threatened to trip him, he dared not break stride long enough to discard it. His pursuers were too close. Even now he heard them splashing through the lake yesterday's rain had made at the intersection of Fifth and Heaven's Gate.
    Heaven's Gate.
    Despite his fear, a laugh rasped in his throat. Call him a Bedlamite, but he'd rather be here, running from a gang of slumboys, than home with nothing to do but contemplate the mess he'd made of his life.

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