“I will kill him,” I murmured.I didn’t raise my voice, but the room went silent.“His soul will haunt the in between with all the rest, forever reliving the way I will kill him.Slowly.Painfully.Gruesomely…”
Troya just laughed.As if her mate hadn’t just made a sworn enemy out of a powerful fae.“I always enjoy chatting with you Oisin,” she said happily.“But don’t worry, Kana and Asa will be fine.”
“So, they aren’t in any danger?”Kaimana asked slowly, skepticism heavy in her voice.
Troya chuckled again.“Oh, no, they’re in as much danger as they could possibly be at the moment without actually dying.We definitely need to get them back as soon as possible.”
I growled and pulled my blades from the aether.“I’m not opposed to killing women, if I must,” I murmured, “even goddesses.”
“Oisin,” Hisashi said with a tired sigh.“You aren’t killing anyone.Troya and Derek, wouldn’t actually let any harm come to our family.”He said that as if he was absolutely certain.But his words carried a meaningful weight.A heavy threat.They wouldn’t let our family come to harmif they knew what was good for them.”
Kaimana’s freckles turned purple, and her eyes went all slit-pupiled and inhuman.Troya was really pushing her luck today.If someone didn’t help us get our fucking children back right now, there would be hell to pay.We might not be able to take on a demon and a goddess individually, but there were six people in this pride.We could at least make them hurt.
“Come on over to the house,” Troya said pleasantly.“Derek and I will be waiting for you.”She paused, then added.“Oh, and will Gesa be coming along?”Her voice was just dripping with fake innocence.
“No!”all three of us bit out at the same time.
Gods, all we needed was for her to find out about this.Heads reallywouldroll then.And besides… I shared a wary glance with the other two… I was pretty sure she was hiding something from us currently.Like another baby, perhaps.And none of us were going to send our potentially pregnant mate into a strange demon’s territory.Not when she had a hair-trigger temper worse than mine.
“Damn it,” Hisashi muttered.
I raised a brow at him.“Agreed.”
*****
“Well, China is nice,” I said as I drew a finger over an ancient vase.After leaving a still sleeping Iolani under Troya’s watchful and doting eye, we had all hitched a ride with Hisashi through the in between.We stood with Derek White and his secretary, Orion, in the most lavish entryway I’d seen in quite a few centuries.
While the energy emanating from further down the hallway felt quite different than the power White exuded, it was similar enough to put me on edge, calling to the ancient fae blood in me, to the part of me that was used to being a predator—and didn’t like feeling like a prey animal instead.
I lifted my chin a notch.Fear was unacceptable.
Hisashi shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot beside me.Another reminder of just how young my sweet, powerful boy really was.His magic would be reacting to the strange demon as well.But he didn’t have centuries of experience ignoring unease and hiding his tells—pretending everything was fine when your world was falling apart.“Breathe, my foxy darling,” I murmured under my breath, earning me a narrow-eyed look.“It doesn’t pay to let the enemy know he has you rattled.”
Kaimana snorted.“Don’t worry, pretty fox,” she cooed.“If he has harmed one hair on our babies’ heads, I’ll eat him alive before he has a chance to use his nasty demon magic.”Asa and Kana might not be hers or mine by blood, but she cared about that fact as little as I did.They were ours.And no one would get between us and our children.
Derek shook his head.“Please don’t offend my new potential business partner with your pedantic show of parental concern.”
Orion sighed.Of the two demons, the incubus was more prone toemotionthan his boss.“You wouldn’t be so dismissive if it were your children being held captive, sir.”
White rolled his eyes.But his dark irises were ringed in red.He was more concerned than he let on.After all, Gesawashis best friend in the whole wide world.And she was going to skin him alive when she found out about all of this, demon or not.
And… it hadn’t escaped my notice that while he and Troya had failed to produce an offspring as of yet, theydidseem to be disproportionately attached to ours.
An ornate door opened further up the hallway, and another incubus stepped out.This one was dark, where Orion was light.His light brown face was all sharp angles, rather than Orion’s softness, and his black hair brushed broad shoulders set on a sturdier frame.But there was no mistaking their nearly identical energy.Sensuality incarnate.
And to think Gesa calledmea walking cock.
Hisashi casually shifted a bit closer to me and I had to fight to suppress my smirk.Was he afraid this incubus would be as hungry for his delicious nine-tail energy as our incubus friend was?Or was he afraid the pretty man would steal me away?Either way, it was cute.
“Good evening gentlemen,” the stranger purred in a pleasant baritone, executing a fluid bow.“I am Leon, Mr.North’s assistant.We have been expecting you.Welcome to Shanghai.”
Apparently, all demons were as bad at choosing human names as White and Black were.Although at least this one had a more interesting first name… Haoyu was far better than “Derek.”I smirked to myself.How wonderfully embarrassing for him.
Derek stepped forward.“Derek White,” he said calmly.He gestured at his own incubus, then at Kai, Hisashi, and I.“My assistant, Orion.And my…friendsKaimana, Hisashi, and Oisin, of the Lionheart clan.”He leaned into the word friends.According to him, demons didn’t make friends back in the demon realm.Everything was a business transaction to them.And giving us that designation now was an indication that we were important to him.
Growing up, I had been taught to disdain and avoid demons at all costs.They were the only beings more terrible than fae, and therefore my father despised them.Decades after earning the label, and I still felt slightly aghast at being called White’s friend.As if just uttering the odd statement would turn the world inside out and upside down.But, here we were.
Leon nodded and held out an arm, inviting us into the room he had just exited.“Mr.North will see you now.”
