Her eyes were tinged with humiliation. His fault.
For a demon who usually didn’t give a fuck about anything, it didn’t sit well with him. He prowled back to where she stood near the couch. “Ely—”
“If you want out, just say so. I can—”
“What? Find another?” he bit out, unfulfilled desire and anger gripping him by the balls.
“I meant I can manage.” She shot him a frustrated glare.
Now he felt like shit. Hell, he was so damn fucked up. He couldn’t even do this for her when she needed him.
His hands clenched and released so as not to touch her and haul them back to a disaster waiting to happen. “It’s because of what I am that I can’t! When I come, I’ll be at my weakest, and this damn beast could take over.” He thrust his hair back impatiently. “It wants you, Ely, and I don’t mean in the wayIdo. And that, I refuse to let happen!”
Several tense seconds passed before she spoke. “So, this has happened before?”
“No. None of them mattered until you, and it senses the difference. I know, because when my emotions run high, usually in matches, it’s when the bloodlust takes over, and the beast causes havoc.”
“Matches?” Her eyes narrowed, then she shook her head. “We’ll come back to the matches part. What do you meanbloodlust?”
“I’m a monster,” he said, tone flat. “I feed on fear and terror during the fights.”I feed on blood and death, but he stopped short of revealing his malevolent side. It would send her running from him, and that he didn’t want.
“Well, that answers a little of the matches comment,” she said with a deep sigh. “I know you house a deadly creature, Nate. I’ve seen a bit of it. But it’s not the sum of you.”
Hell, she would still see the good in him? “It’s only during the matches that it’s fully satiated,” he revealed.Giving me a modicum of peace, short-lived as it is.
“And what about us?” She took a step closer, eyes searching his. “Won’t we ever make love? Properly, I mean, with usbothbeing a part of it?”
“I want that more than anything. But the creature I house is dangerous. If I ever let it free, there will be carnage. Your Guardians brethren will take me out in a heartbeat.”
Her throat worked as she swallowed. Yes, she knew that, too.
“I don’t understand. Shadow never said anything about her symbionts overpowering her. In fact, they seem to aid her in times of distress.”
“No symbionts are alike, Ely. Shadow has had hers for five years. Yes, it was difficult for her to feed also, but her mate has probably found a way to aid her. I’ve had mine for a lifetime.” He stalked to the small dining table near the window, thrusting his fingers through his hair as helpless fury torqued him. “Every time the Black—”
“Black?”
“Because of its scales. Every time it stirs awake, it splinters my mind, fighting me for control. And every time I participate in a match and win, it grows stronger. I feel it.”
“Then stop fighting.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not? Just say no to your agent or whoever signs you on for these damn matches, and you’re free!
Nate shook his head wearily and resumed pacing. How did their time together, filled with needs and longing, turn into this disaster? And another fucking thing he could never tell her about—the death fights. “It’s not that simple.”
“Why?” She stomped to him, stopping at the table. “I know I don’t know your history, but you could find a way out if you wanted it badly enough, Nate. Everything has a loophole.”
“I can’t because I’m bound to a fucking archdemon!” He crashed his fists on the wooden table, a crack echoing. The timber splintered, collapsing to the floor in two halves.
Silence rang out like a death knell.
* * *
Ely lifted her gaze from the broken table to him, her stomach heaving, his last words reverberating in her head. “What do you meanbound to an archdemon?”
“To save my sire, I took over his debt, a debt that should never have been.” Bitterness saturated his every word. “He took symbionts belonging to Azgor—the demon I’m tied to—and used them on me so I could live.”
