“You knew I had an incubus?” I asked Ezme and I immediately hated myself for going along with the way she had phrased it. Jinx wasn’t a pet.
“You keep answering the door half naked, stinking of sex and demon,” she said calmly, without taken her eyes off of her work. “I’m not stupid.”
I felt myself flush. I was the stupid one. How on earth had I thought she wouldn’t know? Had I thought I could hide him forever? Jinx had become a huge part of my life. He was my boyfriend. Completely ignoring the absolute drama that a demon hunter dating a demon was going to cause, had been daft.
“Do Mom and Dad know?” I asked weakly.
“I haven’t told them.”
My stupid flare of relief made me angry. The drama problem would not be a problem if he never woke up. He was lying there mortally wounded, and I was fretting over what my parents would think of our relationship. I was an asshole. Never mind the fact that I was the one who had wounded him. He had taken my collar, and I’d promised to never hurt him. I bit back another wail.
Ezme would fix him. Everything was going to be fine. It had to be. The alternative was unbearable.
Chapter sixteen
Ezmehuffedoutatired breath. It was done. The ugly wound was healed, nothing but new pink skin. Soon it would look like nothing had ever happened. If only the actual event and my guilt could be washed away so easily.
But I’d never forget nor be forgiven. Nor should I be. If anyone needed a reminder, there was still stark physical evidence of what I had done. The gaping hole in the tee shirt, complete with burned jagged edges was jarring. I’d never seen anything more awful. Except perhaps, his pale face and his eyes that were still closed.
“Why hasn’t he woken up?” I demanded as my heart hammered.
“Give it time,” said Ezme.
Dizziness washed over me. I had forgotten to breathe. I made myself concentrate on that for ten long agonizing repetitions. In and out, in and out. Time had screeched to a halt and each second oozed by like treacle. Thick, heavy and slow.
Finally, his eyelids fluttered. My heart copied the movement. When his beautiful amber eyes looked up at me, my stomach joined in. He was still Jinx. There had never been a more beautiful sight in the whole wide world. I breathed my thanks to whatever god had taken pity on me and righted my wrong.
I was about to hand Daisy back to her mother so I could throw myself into Jinx’s arms, when his eyes filled with terror. He flung himself off the bed, falling off the side furthest from me and collapsing on the floor. Ezme hurried around the bed before I could, and she kneeled beside him.
“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” she said softly as she helped him sit up. He looked at her, glanced at me, whimpered and scrambled to hide behind her.
My stomach flipped over, my breath hitched. I blinked away tears. He was scared of me. I absolutely deserved it, but I hated seeing him in fear. My guts clenched painfully, like I was the one who had been mortally wounded.
“Oh Sweetie, it’s okay,” said Ezme as she tried to untangle herself.
Jinx clung onto her desperately and wouldn’t let go. Ezme sighed and gave up. She sat down on the carpet and managed to coax Jinx around to sitting sideways in her lap. She put one arm around him. He looked up at her, whimpered softly before resting his head on her shoulder. His whole body started trembling.
Ezme stroked his hair. “You are adorable,” she crooned.
He pressed in closer, trying to curl up into a ball on her lap. Without thinking, I stepped closer. His whole body flinched as he wailed and threw his arms protectively around his head.
I froze, rooted to the spot in horror. What had I done? Daisy was still and quiet on my hip. As young as she was, even she could understand the awfulness of the situation.
“It’s okay, Sweetie, I won’t let him hurt you,” Ezme said to Jinx.
The words hurt, but I was so grateful that Ezme was here and that she had taken a shine to him. Jinx had someone to comfort him. I dreaded to think how terrified he would be if we were alone. One day I’d be the source of his comfort and not his terror. It was going to happen. I was going to make it happen. I’d do anything to earn his trust again. Anything. I couldn’t bear it if he stayed scared of me forever.
Ezme held him tighter. He made a whimpering sobbing noise that broke my heart. How badly had I hurt him? The magic I had thrown at him had included my intention to cause physical pain as well as incapacitate. It seemed to have worked far too well. Guilt and shame flooded through me.
Jinx brought his hand to his mouth and started sucking his thumb. With his other hand he started twirling his hair, in a gesture that was clearly self-soothing.
Ezme looked up at me, her eyes narrow and full of outrage.
“How old is he?”
My world came crashing down. My mind balked at the thought that everything was suddenly a thousand times worse than it had been a heartbeat ago. I opened my mouth but no words came out. His physical body was definitely twenty something, but I was a demon hunter. I knew damn well that a demon’s age bore no correlation to their host body. The human that the summoners had laid out as a sacrifice would have been killed in the ritual. Jinx would have been forced into the empty body. Its appearance had nothing to do with his age.
Sure, he probably had made some adjustments to his new body, like plumping up lips, heightening cheekbones, straightening out the nose. Like decorating when you move into a new place and make it your own. Nothing that would have shown his true age.
