Sighing, I pressed down the front of my dress, wondering exactly how my life had gotten to this point. Hiding from a demon at a party for supernaturals and hoping that I could hold onto my soul for a month. “I’m taking it seriously, but there’s not much either one of us can do. Just gotta keep my head down and get through this next month. Shouldn’t be that hard, right?”
Her lips flatlined. “My world is crazy, Mia. There’s a reason I never invited you to come with me to things like this. Noah, too. I have to socialize because of my job. If I didn’t have to, I wouldn’t be here. These people can be dangerous, especially for humans.”
My heart pounded, and I swallowed hard. “None of them can be much worse than a demon, right?”
“You’d be surprised.” She crossed the room and took my shoulders in her hands. Her dark eyes bored into mine. “As crazy as this sounds, I want you to stick close to Asmodeus. He needs you for something, which means he won’t let anything happen to you. You’re under his protection, which ironically, is probably the safest place you can be. For now. No one is going to fuck with one of the Princes of Hell.”
“Sure,” I said in a small voice. “No one is going to fuck with Lucifer’s right-hand man, except maybe the angels?”
Her face clouded over. “The angels? What do you mean?”
A fist pounded the door, and a girl called out on the other side of it. “Hurry up! I have to pee, and you two are taking forever in there.”
Serena grimaced and released her grip on my arms. “Our time’s up. Remember what I said. Stick close to Asmodeus. And keep me updated. Some of the rules might not apply to him, but others do. If he does anything that seems off, let me know. I might be able to get you out of this.”
She gave me a quick hug, and then we pushed back out into the party. The clamor of drunken supernaturals flooded my senses, and the crowd pushed in tight. At least fifty more people had shown up while we’d been hiding out in the bathroom, and the earlier partygoers were swaying and slurring their speech. And I couldn’t help but wonder, how much alcohol did it take to get a vampire drunk?
Az loomed out of the crowd and latched his hand on my elbow. Without a word, he guided me down the hallway and into a dark room I hadn’t yet seen. Inside, blue lights cast a haze around partygoers who were swaying to a live musician on a small stage. The singer gripped the microphone and whispered words in a language I didn’t know. A guitarist sat just behind him, as well as a drummer. All their eyes were shut.
“Let’s dance.” He took my hand in his and pulled me close to his body. My lungs constricted; my heart nearly jolted into my throat. As we began to sway to the music, our chests pressed together and he leaned down to whisper into my ear. “I know all of this is a shock, but I need you to trust me.”
I scoffed, tempted to pull away, but then I just continued on, my body betraying my mind. “You can’t expect me to trust you after you tricked me into signing your demon contract.”
“I didn’t trick you,” he murmured, his breath whispering against my ear. Shivers stormed down my neck. “Youwantedthe job. You came to my club, begging me to give you an audition.”
“That’s before I knew what kind of club it was,” I replied through gritted teeth. “You should have told me.”
“And would it have made a difference?”
I opened my mouth to retort that it absolutely would have, but then stopped. My heart pounded as his lips stayed close to my ear, teasing my skin with his wickedly hot breath. Would I have turned down the job if I’d known the club was meant for supernaturals? Probably not. I loosed a sigh.
“Fine, I still would have wanted the job, but I never would have signed the contract. It’s my soul, Asmodeus. You say you’re above all the rules, but fuck the rules. It’s not right to make a deal with someone without them knowing what the consequences are. Not when theirsoulis on the line.”
I could feel his smile against my ear. I had no idea how I could feel it, but I did. I couldn’t see his face, not when he leaned so close to my neck. A strange familiar sensation rippled in my belly, one I’d felt a thousand times, but…I couldn’t place where. Weird.
“You’re talking about right and wrong with a demon, Mia.”
“You say that, but I know you’re not all bad.” I turned to him then, catching the corner of his eye. “You made me pancakes. You brought me Hendrix. And you didn’t want me to walk alone at night. If you were evil, you wouldn’t have done any of those things.”
“If someone kills you, you won’t be able to fulfill your end of our deal,” he said with a wicked smile. “And the other two things were nothing but bribes. You hate me, understandably so. I thought if I dulled your sharp edges then you would be easier to handle. I don’t have time to deal with your sarcastic pouting all the time.”
A low growl rumbled in my throat as irritation stormed through my veins. “And you wonder why I hate you.”
“I don’t wonder at all. I’m an evil, vicious demon who likes to steal souls.”
I rolled my eyes. “Being a demon is not your worst offence.”
Slowly, Asmodeus pulled back. A strange expression flickered across his face, one I couldn’t read. “You know, most human girls would go running and screaming in the other direction. You seem abnormally calm about this.”
Shrugging, I tried to avoid looking too deeply into his ice blue eyes. I didn’t like how they made me feel, like I was completely bare before him. “Like I said, I’ve known about supernaturals all my life.”
“That doesn’t explain it,” he said with a slight shake of his head. “You didn’t know I was a demon until tonight. Why aren’t you scared?”
“I don’t know,” I said with a sigh. “I don’t trust you or like you very much, but that’s less about what you are and more because you’re a total dick.”
His lips twitched, and he pulled me close once more. My heart thundered against my ribs, and I hoped he couldn’t feel the tremor of it. “I should be annoyed at you for that one.”
“So, be annoyed. I don’t care.”
