She hated it here. She never said it out loud, but I could surmise as much from the strongest of her thoughts that leaked through her mental barrier. As much as I tried to stay out of her head, some things just slipped through the cracks. The stronger the emotion behind the thought, the harder it was for me to ignore it.
Yet, she never complained or pushed me to leave a floor sooner than I wanted. She waited for my vision of a better Hell to be complete before we moved on.
I passed the soup back to her, and she took another drink, the steaming liquid curling up around her face in thin tendrils.
We sat in silence for a few minutes, but with Lilith, awkward silences were never a worry between us. I never felt the need to break the quiet with pointless babble. We’d spent so long in each other’s company that even days of endless silence were comfortable.
Once the jug of soup had been drained, she set it aside with a sigh. “I never properly thanked you for what you did back on the third floor. You didn’t have to carry me…but you did. I should have just shifted.”
“You didn’t want to. You don’t like your beast form, and that’s just fine.”
I hadn’t forgotten what Lilith had told me when we’d been stranded on the River of Souls. About what Abaddon had done to her.
That knuckled-headed demon was a brute and a bully. Sure, he was powerful, and for whatever reason, he held sway over many of the demons native to these lands. He would have his uses in the future, but getting him to bend beneath my command was going to be a task in itself, one that I would have to put off until later. For now, I’d had enough of this pit. My biggest fear at the moment was that the ex-king would try to reclaim his throne in my absence while I looked for Eve on the surface. It was part of my reason for rebuilding Hell. In my eyes, it was easier to win the respect of the locals by making their home into a tolerable civilization rather than keeping it the abusive cesspit of chaos Abaddon favored.
“Well, I think you’re beautiful just like this,” I murmured, my gaze softening as I took in every detail of her soaking human form. She looked at me, drops of rain still clinging to her dark lashes.
“You know… It’s part of the reason I stay in this form. My beast can sense you like it more, and she wants to please you. You’re the first male she’s ever cared about pleasing.”
Her words had my muscles coiling. A swell of heat rushed through me despite the torturous cold. Fuck me. Day by day, her subtle hints were growing not-so-subtle. I wouldn’t have the strength to fight my beast and hers.
“You don’t need to please me,” I muttered. “I’m not your mate.”
“Lucifer. Our spirits resonated with one another on the Styx. You keep pretending that didn’t happen. The Fates have determined that we’re true mates.”
“Abaddon was your mate.”
She stiffened, her gaze growing dark with murder in the flamelight. “You know he’s not. He was my husband, my king. But he wasn’t mine. You know that.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because my beast knows. She’s my true nature, my gut instincts. You should try listening to yours more. You may have lost your wings. But you haven’t lost the celestial spirit inside you. He’s still there, trying to guide you. You keep ignoring him. I’m waiting for you to come to your senses.”
“What is it you’re trying to tell me, Lilith?”
Her nostrils flared with a sharp exhale. Her mind was a swarm of pointed thoughts, as sharp as daggers aimed right at me. It was almost as if she was projecting them, trying to get me to read her mind.
“Why don’t you just come out andsayit? I grow tired of all these little hints you’re dropping,” I growled through clenched teeth, battling my beast and her emotion-charged thoughts.
“Because maybe I want you to realize the obvious on your own, Lucifer.”
I narrowed my eyes, crossing my arms over my chest. “Perhaps it isn’t so obvious if I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, woman.”
“On the River Styx, you kissed me. Or are we still pretending that didn’t happen either?”
My body went hot, recalling the memory, the same one I’d replayed in my mind countless times. I had memorized every detail. The way we’d been holding each other at the bottom of that infernal boat we’d been marooned in for Father knew how long. The way her parched lips parted, how they felt on mine. My every nerve lit up with the thoughts of that moment. The way she’d purred for me.
“You’re denial isn’t so cute, Lucifer Morningstar. Are all celestials as shit as you when it comes to listening to your instincts?”
My lip curled, my eyes flashing in the dark. “Listening to my instincts is what landed me in this damn pit.”
She shot to her feet, growling at me with her teeth bared and her fists balled at her sides. “So that’s it then, after the hell we’ve been through, you’re crawling out of here just so you can obey your daddy and do what he wants you to do? Wake the fuck up, Lucifer. He tore away your wings. Literally threw you out of your home. Now you’re going to go find some girl you fucked once because, why? Because Daddy said so?”
“Because she’s my true mate,” I said through a clenched jaw, loathing way the words that weighed on my tongue like a lie.
“That’s not true! Now you’re just feeding into Daddy’s ignorance.”
Over the course of my travels through Hell and its layers, I’d experienced pretty much every emotion there was. Anger wasn’t something to which I was a stranger, especially not after the hand I’d been dealt by ‘Daddy,’ the Almighty Himself. Anger was just a tool I used to drive me forward. It wasn’t something I was usually a victim to. And I certainly wasn’t accustomed to having it dealt by Lilith. She made me feel a lot of things. But she never made me angry. Until now.
