Maybe I could give her the rest as a peace offering, something she could work on building an immunity to. That would make her feel more secure, less weak.Yes. That was what she liked, being strong, in charge. Unbeatable.
It was a lucky coincidence I got my uncle’s text ping to all the available agents in the vicinity to go after and kill Rayla Desmond and her companions. As soon as I saw her name, I crushed the phone in my surge of anger. How the fuck had he known she was nearby? I knew there was a fair amount of his people close by, but I also knew her talents, so I didn’t rush in. I waited to see if the situation called for me, hiding from both sides to see how it played out.
I couldn’t help myself when it was only her against five of my uncle’s men. She could probably have taken them on herself, but it would’ve been a stretch for her as she was exerting a lot of power while having fun tearing into her enemies. I stepped in, letting my inky demon magic slither along the desert floor, creep up into his clothes, and sink into his skin so it could travel straight to the brain and heart and take them out without lifting a finger. I thought she might be impressed with me. I would have to ask her when she gets up.
I got up slowly, looming over her angelic, sleeping face. It was fascinating that a savage creature like her could not only exude an ethereal beauty but also look the exact opposite asleep as she did awake. I closed my eyes at this rising need inside of me to chain her to this bed, to make sure this angel never left this room. Then I could close the door and be the only one with a key to it. The only one that got to see her perfect, rosy eyes. Those wide, gorgeous orbs would only look upon me for the rest of her days.
I could make her happy, I knew I could. I had studied her for almost all our lives. I knew Rayla like a second skin. I watched the rise and fall of her chest as she slept, caught in the hypnotic rhythm, wanting to settle in next to her and just hold her as I watched her as the time ticked by.
No, I couldn’t keep her like that, even if every cell in my body wanted to trap her, consume her, make her and me one so we would never have to be apart again... No. I enjoyed her spirit too much, her sass. She was like a wild rose in a field of dandelions, something special and unique. There were only two options on how to handle unique beings: capture them and make them rely only on you or let them run wild and be there when they might need a push back onto the tracks. I think I would much rather see what she could do on her own than try and break her to only rely on me.
I ran my finger down her arm, and she jolted like I knew she would. I smiled like a little schoolboy. It only took a drop, a single drop of my blood, and her lips closing around my finger all those years ago for me to know we had a deep bond, deeper than the other heirs or her friends.
It took me years to figure out why I yearned for her so much. Why I couldn’t get her out of my head. I would see her out of the corner of my eyes, feel those jeweled eyes on me and shiver. It wasn’t until I hit puberty and my horns broke in, growing whenever I thought of her, that I knew she was my mate.
I have always wondered why she didn’t feel it? Why was I the only one who seemed to understand it and ache for it? I concluded that because we were different species, it worked differently for each of us.
For demons, it was simple. An exchange of blood and sex would solidify the bond. I wondered what was required for vampires?
Species usually kept that information close to the chest because knowing about their mates made them a weakness, a target. There was also only a fifty-fifty chance of anyone getting a mate, then a seventy percent chance it would be someone in your own species. Interracial matings were not common or widely known, so I felt like it was a trial-and-error kind of deal.
She made a small noise, just a blip, but it tugged on my heart strings like a violin, pulling me to her. I crawled into the other side of the bed, facing her, staring into her face as she slept. Her body relaxed at the dip of me climbing into the bed, and my soul lit up.
I stayed there, watching her, smelling her, feeling the air she breathed, and memorizing everything about this moment. I wanted to be able to pull it up at a moment’s notice, be so in tune with it I could transport myself back and relive it over and over again.
I got bold for a second and leaned over, placing my lips along her forehead, then her cheek, making a soft trail down her arm. That lustful side of me awakened as I got hard from those small, few touches. There would be time for that later. In fact, I was counting on it being one of Rayla’s default settings in trying to learn more about me, but I would show her that sex with me was different from all the others. I would make sure of it.
I lay there for another twenty minutes, envisioning all the ways the next few days could go, getting more and more excited about how I would surprise my rose.
As much as I wanted to lie in bed and stare at her until the end of time, I knew she would wake up in a few hours, and I needed to do a few things to get stuff ready.
I got up and made my way downstairs, going to the barrier and deactivating her name. I didn’t plan on keeping her locked up here forever, but I needed time to have her understand. She was fiercely loyal, and I had to prepare for her to try to run from me the second she opened her eyes.
I put my hand on the door and spoke the incantation to deactivate a name from the exit roster. It was much easier to deactivate a name than it was to add or remove one. That required a different spell and the original mage that set the barrier. Neither of those I had since his body was rotting in the ground a few miles from here. I couldn’t have someone walking around that could get into and out of this house at will, that was a horrible safety breach.
After that, I went to check on my uncle. I pulled out the orb and his trinket, making sure I didn’t hear her stir as I found his whereabouts. I heard a huge thud before the picture went clear, and my uncle was having another tantrum again.
“Are you fucking kidding me?! How hard is it to take out a single vampire girl?!” He backhanded the messenger who told him that Rayla escaped. “Thirty men. Thirty fucking men, and you couldn’t kill one little fucking girl!” He smashed the desk with his hand, and a cracking sounded before the desk collapsed. “Idiots! Imbeciles! Waste of fucking blood and bones!” He was about to hit his crescendo as he jumped onto the messenger and wailed on him until his face was swollen and bloody.
I pulled over the bowl of popcorn I made, chomping on the empty calories, not wanting to ruin the meal I planned to make and have with Rayla, but I also needed something to do to calm my jitters. I was so nervous about sitting down, talking to her, being in her presence when she was conscious, I needed something to keep my body busy. I shoved a whole handful in my mouth, and the salty, buttery taste exploded on my tongue as my stomach growled. I realized I hadn’t eaten in twenty-four hours. Oops. I guess I was too excited about today to think about anything else because of my rose.
I looked back at the bloody mess my uncle was making as I brought the bowl into my lap and chomped down on more. Blood was pooling beneath his victim, and he slowed down and pulled back. My uncle always had this uncanny ability to know right when he needed to stop, the point where a fae could heal you without needing any additional help. I was lucky he never laid a hand on me outside of the times I was training. When I was training, everything was allowed. Back then, I needed healers in the middle and at the end of training.
His shiny loafers scuffed the wood floor as he got up, and his eyes roamed over his room. A low mumble sounded from his lips as he lifted papers and debris off the floor, searching for something.
“Ah,” he said as he’d reached down and picked up a small bell. He rang it, and two guards appeared in the doorway. “Take this to medical.” He flicked his hands over the wheezing body of the unlucky messenger. He turned, and his eyes swept the room as his upper lip curled in disgust. “And call for Greta.”
Greta was a low-level mage but was so devoted to my uncle it was sickening. She was more like his personal maid than a real member of the Devil clan. She would come to his office soon and clean it all up, putting each little speck back into place like it never happened.
He left his room, knowing Greta would take care of it, and stalked the halls of the stone and wood compound. People would jump out of his way, seeing the mood he was in as he complained to himself. “It’s just too fucking hard to find decent workers these days,” he huffed out. His fists tightened as he growled, shaking his head at his own thoughts.
“Sir.”
My uncle swiveled around to face Kevin, his ganglily, curly brown-haired mage assistant. He looked like what you would envision was a typical science nerd, but since he was also a mage, everything involved the mixture of the two.
Kevin adjusted his glasses on his nose, not fazed by my uncle’s anger. I had never seen Kevin take any of my uncle’s famous punishments, which always seemed odd.
“I have completed the side project we talked about, and I wanted you to take a look at it before implementation happened.” Kevin’s face never changed as he waited for my uncle’s response.
