“I thought you couldn’t feel anything.” I raised a brow. “You’re not even looking.”
His tail resumed its motion. The pace was faster and more agitated. “You’re like a book I’ve already read a hundred times. I don’t need to look at the pages to know what comes next in each chapter.”
Under my fingertip, the strange movement inside the cracks of his skin pulsed like something alive. I yanked my hand back. “So…what is that? In your skin?”
“Hell.”
“Really?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
His gaze finally shifted back to me, but it wasn’t the cold irritation. For a blink, it looked …haunted. He rubbed his temple. “Not everything has an answer. I’m what the darkness made me. My skin moves like it’s alive because it is—it’s part of me. I might be a keeper of evil, but I’m still flesh and bone. I suppose I am the darkness now.”
Another goblet appeared in front of me. Assuming it was for me, I knocked it back only to sputter as it burned its way down my throat.
“Oh,” he said flatly. “I forgot to mention it wasn’t milk.”
Ha. That must’ve been a kitten joke.
“Tell me,” I started, wiping my mouth, “is it uncomfortable to sit with a tail? Oh, Hades, wait—you can’t feel it. That explains so much. No wonder you’re the Dark One. I’d be crabby too if I couldn’t enjoy any of my sensations.”
He stiffened. “Careful.”
I blinked innocently. “What?”
“Do you wish to return to your cell?”
I arched a brow. “Wait… You mean I had another choice?”
“No.”
I shrugged, and then nearly dropped my fork when my chair jerked backward. One glance down, and sure enough, the tail had wrapped around my pants leg. Oh, Hades. I’d done it now. My heart responded with a bunch of pathetic ka-thumps.
“What’s wrong?” The Devil’s voice carried a patronizing edge. “You’re pale as a ghost. It’s almost like you’re afraid of something.”
“I’m not afraid. Just startled. A totally different thing. Happens when giant Hell appendages sneak up on people mid-dinner.”
The heat radiating off the Devil made him feel closer, but he hadn’t moved.
“That’s not why your heart’s racing.”
“I have random heart palpitations,” I said flatly. “Very sickly for an immortal.”
“You—” The Devil shot up from his chair.
I rose as well, instincts flaring. His tail smacked against my legs as he stormed away.
“Go back to your cell,” he snapped. “Someone is trying to visit.”
Hope flared inside me like the sun through cracks in a clouded sky. My family?
He stopped, turned, and stalked back toward me. “Don’t fight me.”
I didn’t. I couldn’t. That fragile hope rooted me in place. With one arm, he scooped me up beneath the thighs and slung me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing. He didn’t speak againas he carried me back and placed me into the cell. Then he was gone.
At first, I just paced. Let my thoughts catch up. Then, five minutes later, the full weight of what had just happened sank in. I had a normal conversation with my captor.
