“Where you are! Where you are!” The monster flapped his hands. His tail was nearly standing straight up.
Atlas had shocked him. That was kind of funny. “That’s the question.” Hadn’t he just asked that?
“But how!”
Atlas rolled his eyes. “How am I supposed to know that? It’s not like I’ve ever been in monster land before.” Or wherever he was. Atlas could only assume at this point.
The monster held up a hand. “Monster land?”
“Making guesses here. You know, because I don’t actually know where I am. You’re not being very informative.”
Red eyes flashed at him.
Oh! That was kind of scary. And sexy. But Atlas was pretty sure that he should be scared.
“Let’s start over.” The monster cleared his throat.
Atlas leaned back and kicked his feet. Seriously the chair was so big that his feet didn’t come close to reaching the floor.
The monster stepped forward.
“Hey! No! Bad monster! Don’t come any closer,” Atlas ordered.
The monster stilled before slowly cocking his head. “Please stop calling me a monster. It’s offensive.”
Atlas nodded. He could see that. Monsters probably didn’t think of themselves as monsters, after all. “Then what should I call you?”
Pushing his chest out, the not-a-monster spoke. “I am Belphegor. Demon Lord. One of the seven princes of hell. And you are in my office.”
* * * * *
Bel
The human male’s eyes widened. Bel still wasn’t scenting fear from the small person. Instead, the human’s curiosity grew. Bel had no idea what was currently happening in front of him. Or what to do with the sudden appearance of this tiny little thing.
“Belphegor?” The human, no; he’d said his name was Atlas, repeated. That was an unusual human name. Whatever happened to names like Bob, or Chris, or whatnot?
And what in the hell was the human doing sitting in Bel’s office chair like he belonged? Bel was trying to ignore the alluring scent that screamed that the human did belong. Belonged to him. Atlas was his.
One word was all Bel could focus on.
Mate.
The same human male that had served Bel popcorn and drinks was now in his realm and smelled like mate.
His mate.
What was happening? This…Bel hadn’t been summoned. He hadn’t done a summoning. Hadn’t even known the male was his mate. Oh, he’d blocked his scent when he’d been inside that building. But that didn’t explain how the human had gotten into Bel’s office.
The human, no Atlas—Atlas, Bel should know his mate’s name and use it—was muttering to himself. Something about monsters being bad enough and now he had to deal with demons.
Bel cleared his throat. “Are you okay?” Atlas didn’t sound okay. He sounded, well, a little bit crazy. Still not afraid of Bel. That wasn’t a normal reaction.
Atlas threw his hands up. “Sure. Great. Perfect. I just followed a demon prince and now I’m…I’m…where the hell am I?” The last bit was nearly shouted at him.
He’d been hanging out with Asmos too long. Bel knew that when his response popped out without proper thought. “Hell is right. But it’s the nice part of hell, if that makes any difference.”
Oh! Wrong thing to say.
