“I know. But…,” I trailed off miserably.
He was still scared of me. He was quite possibly too young. It was all too awful to voice out loud. And I didn’t need to. She knew. Ezme knew everything.
“Get someone else to do it?” she suggested. “What about Rufus?”
“No!” I snapped.
She gave me a puzzled, exasperated look. “Well, if women could feed incubi, I’d man up.”
There was nothing to say to that. So I didn’t reply. I just sat there in my bed looking at her hopelessly like I wanted her to fix my mess.
Eventually, she sighed. “He is bound to you, you should be able to give him some of your magic while touching.”
As I digested that piece of information, she stepped back from Jinx so she could look into his eyes.
“You want to get into bed with Seb and cuddle? I can get in too. Make a Jinx sandwich?”
He nodded keenly, and it melted my heart. He was lovely and adorable and sweet. If anyone in the world had a heart big enough to forgive me, surely it was Jinx?
I shuffled over to make room and they both climbed in. Jinx slid over and attached himself to me like a limpet. The feel of him in my arms was bliss. His cinnamon and wood smoke scent smelled like happiness itself.
I smoothed his hair and concentrated on pouring all my affection and fondness into him. He was vibrating with tension but slowly, very slowly it drained away until he was all warm, happy and relaxed in my embrace.
It felt like a miracle. Not only was he feeling safe with me, I was managing to take the edge off of his hunger. He lifted his head and looked at me solemnly. There was a haunted look to his eyes that crushed my soul, but he looked calm.
“I’m so sorry that I hurt you,” I breathed again.
I’d say it a thousand times a day for the rest of our lives if I needed to. He gave me a small nod to show he understood I was remorseful. Whether or not he forgave me, I couldn’t tell.
“How… how old are you?” I asked, surprised that I had the courage to.
Hopefully, he was now calm enough to be able to answer me. His brows scrunched up in confusion and then he shrugged. I wasn’t terribly surprised. Age was a complicated thing for demons. Without words to explain the concept, it would be hard for Jinx to understand what I was asking.
Taking a deep breath, I tried again. I needed to know.
“So, humans start off as babies, then they are children, teenagers, adults and then old.”
Jinx stared at me, clearly wondering where the hell this was going. I didn’t blame him.
“Are you old?” I asked, attempting to send a picture of an old man with my words.
He shook his head, dashing my hopes. I’d been praying to discover that he was thousands of years old and we could laugh about the misunderstanding.
“An adult?”
Keeping the hope out of my voice was hard. I didn’t want him to tell me what I wanted to hear. I needed the truth.
He seemed to ponder it for a moment before shaking his head. My heart sank and my throat tightened.
“Teenager?”
Jinx tilted his head as he looked back at me. He was trying so hard to understand me. After an agonizing pause, he nodded, but it wasn’t a very confident nod.
I licked my lips. “Child?” I asked with a trembling voice. I projected an image of a school playground full of kids playing.
Jinx scrunched up his face and gave me a disgusted look before shaking his head. I let out a breath I hadn’t known I’d been holding and pulled him back into a hug. He went happily, snuggling into me.
Teenager wasn’t so bad. I was twenty-four. But it was still concerning. What end of teenagehood was he? There was a vast difference between the beginning and end of that stage of life. I needed to somehow narrow it down.
