I longed to pull him into my arms but hesitated. I didn’t want to scare him even more. I stared down at him helplessly. Horrified by the tiny criss-crossed cuts all over him from the net. It was a good thing he was wearing clothes for a change, they would have given some protection. The tight pink tee shirt and black jeans looked good on him, if a little tatty.
Suddenly he flung himself at me, and I nearly lost my balance. His arms wrapped around my neck and he burrowed his head into my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around him and held him tightly while he cried.
I felt awful. I should have been paying attention, I should have sensed him first, I should have reacted quicker and stopped Rufus. So many things I should have done. And through all my guilt and shame swirled immense happiness at having Jinx back in my arms.
Relief, satisfaction and a deep protectiveness and possessiveness. All stormed through me as well. My mind and emotions were a mess. It made no sense. He was just an incubus I had hooked up with a couple of times. One that had got me into a huge heap of trouble that I was still in the process of digging myself out of. I shouldn’t be feeling any strange emotions at all.
But somewhere, somehow, Jinx had come to mean something to me. There was no point trying to deny it. Love is blind, as they say. I winced. It wasn’t love. Infatuation, obsession, fondness. A desire to keep him safe, to protect him and have him by my side always. It was something along those lines. Not the L word. Never that. I didn’t think I was capable of that.
I picked him up and sat him on the edge of the bed so I could take a closer look at his injuries. He clung onto my shoulders as I prised myself just far away enough to look him over. My gaze fell to his wrist and an angry red cut around it. There was a matching one on his other wrist. I lifted one up to look closer. That hadn’t been from Rufus’s net.
Cold dread and horror flipped my stomach over as my mind put the jigsaw pieces together of what had happened.
Someone else had caught him, hurt him. Bound him with magic and tied him up.
I stared in alarm into Jinx’s sad eyes. He’d gotten into trouble and had come to me for safety, for help, and had been attacked again. He’d been scared and needed me.
All this time I had been moping, he could have been trapped. Used by dark mages for his power or who knew what nefarious purpose. I hadn’t even looked for him. I hadn’t helped him. He had been all alone. Imprisoned, scared, in pain. Had he waited for me to rescue him, only to be dismayed and broken when I never came?
Yet still he had come to me as soon as he could. Only to be hurt again. And despite all that he still sought comfort in my arms, looked at me with trust in his eyes. Like he thought I was a good person. Like he forgave me for abandoning him.
Humans had hurt him. Again. As if summoning him from his home wasn’t bad enough. Yet, once free from his captors and then Rufus’s net, he hadn’t hurt either of us. Instead of attacking in rage, he had burst into tears. He wasn’t a vengeful demon at all. He was sweet and adorable. What kind of human monster could look into his eyes and hurt him? Jinx was too lovely for this world. I should have been there to protect him.
Rage roiled through me. White hot and all-consuming. With a trembling hand, I wiped his tears away.
“Who did this to you?” I demanded.
I needed to know. I needed to make it right. I’d find a way for him to tell me or he could take me to them. Either way. They were going to pay.
Chapter nine
Jinxwriggledinthepassenger seat. Unease and uncertainty rolled off of him in waves. I put my hand on his knee and gave it a little squeeze. It was very late at night and the streets were nearly deserted.
“It’s going to be fine,” I reassured.
He shot me a worried look, but pointed right. I took the turn.
“You took those mobsters out for me, let me sort these assholes out for you,” I said with gritted teeth as my hands clenched the steering wheel.
Jinx pointed at a house on the left. I pulled up, switched the engine off and stared at the old tatty house in surprise. It looked like a frat house. It certainly wasn’t the home of any mages that I knew. The magical community was small. We all knew each other.
What the hell was going on? I turned to Jinx to check he was sure he had the right house. One look at his wide-eyed, pale face confirmed it, as well as twisting my gut and impaling my heart.
I leaned over, gently took his chin to tilt his face up, and kissed him. A soft, tender, reassuring kiss that then grew deeper and hungrier. He melted into it with a soft moan. Reluctantly I pulled away. His eyes were hazy and his lips swollen. I grinned. That was better. I liked seeing Jinx happy, it made me feel all warm and gooey inside. Seeing him sad and scared did the opposite. It felt like my insides were cold, hard ice. I’d never felt an anger like it.
I wanted to jump out of the car and deliver my vengeance immediately, but I needed to be sensible about it. I needed to be prepared. Failure was not an option. Carefully, I reached out with my magic to see what I was dealing with.
To my surprise, there were no wards or sigils. No trace of magic users in the house or any signs that there had ever been anyone with magic anywhere near the place. I could sense traces of Jinx’s essence but no other paranormal beings.
Puzzled, I reached out further and finally found something that suddenly made everything make sense. There was a Grimoire in the house. Fuck knows how it had fallen into their hands, but it had. A bunch of stupid mundane students had found a Grimoire and played with things they had no hope of understanding.
Another puzzle piece fell into place.
“Is this where you were summoned?” I asked.
Jinx nodded solemnly.
Some idiots had summoned a demon and got themselves killed. Now their friends had tried to catch the demon their buddies had released upon the world. Grudgingly I respected their attempt at trying to fix their friends’ mistake. Misguided as it was. They were so lucky their dumb friends’ summoning had caught them a mostly harmless incubus rather than anything truly dangerous.
