“Hmm.” Stolas tossed his cards onto the folding table. “Bit of a cheap trick, isn’t it, Caim? Too scared to try and win on your own?”
Caim rolled his eyes and gave us with a lazy smile, folding his arms as he leaned back in his chair. “Thought I’d see how long it took you two to figure it out. Turns out, I could have tricked you for weeks. Or maybe even longer. If it wasn’t for Sansa here, you’d never have known.”
“Sansa is very clever,” Lucifer said in a purr. He strode toward me and twisted a strand of my hair around his finger. Jerking back my head, I fought the urge to spit in his face.
“Yeah, sure,” Bael said, clearly uncomfortable. “Listen, Lucifer, mate. Want to join us for a game? We suddenly need another player since Caim here can’t play straight.”
“A little game sounds delicious.” Lucifer leaned closer and sniffed my neck. My teeth ground together and my fingers formed claws. An overwhelming urge to punch him in the gut rushed through me.
Get the hell away from me!
Caim stood, and the chair toppled violently behind him. “Take my place then, Luc.”
Lucifer’s eyes slanted toward Caim, and his voice came out a hiss. “Is there some kind of problem? You all seem so very tense. Where are the rest of you, anyway? Shouldn’t Phenex and Valac be here by now?”
He knew. Something had tipped him off. Or maybe he’d just been clever enough to put two and two together. Clearly, he couldn’t prove it, or this whole place would be in flames by now. The Legion would be gone from earth, sent straight back to Hell.
And I’d be sitting beside him as his bride.
He didn’t have proof, buthe knew.
Caim shrugged. “Haven’t seen them all day, but that’s nothing to worry about. They’ll be here by the time the doors open.”
“Who cares where the others are?” Stolas growled. “Caim here has been cheating us for weeks. Do you know how much money I’ve lost to this asshole?”
Bael caught my eyes across the table, and he gave me an almost imperceptible nod. Somehow, I knew exactly what he was trying to tell me.Get the hell out while you can.
I cleared my throat and drifted toward the door. “Speaking of the club opening soon, I better head to the dressing room to get ready.” A hollow, tense laugh popped from my throat. “You know how us girls are. It takes a long time, but you I’m pretty sure you knew that. All that primping and curling and…”
I was rambling now.
Cheeks burning, I made quick steps out the door. Just when I thought I’d made it to relative safety, a firm hand latched onto my elbow. Lucifer spun me toward him, his eyes glittering with barely controlled rage.
Uh oh. This wasn’t good.
“I wasn’t finished speaking with you, Sansa,” he said, his lips curling back to reveal his teeth. “Isn’t there something you’re forgetting?”
“Um…” Panicked, I glanced at Bael and Caim. They wore matching expressions. Thin lips. Downcast eyes. Tension simmered in the room like a boiling pot of water about to spill over and burn everything in its path. “I’ve got to be honest with you. If there’s something I’m supposed to do, I don’t know what it is.”
Not an ideal answer, I knew. Was this part of the game? A test? Would Sansa, the werewolf, have known the answer? Was I supposed to show my claws right now?
His smile widened. “Can’t you tell what it is I want from you?”
I mean, we all knew he wanted Mia McNally to be his Hellish bride, but I couldn’t say that out loud. There was something else I was missing.
He curled a finger against my cheek. “I told you that you’re beautiful. Your body, your hair, those eyes. I would like to take you out on a date.”
My jaw literally dropped.
Wait a minute.What?!
Now this…this I had not been expecting. The shock of it all made me speechless for a few moments. Lucifer was asking me out on an actual date? For...dinner or something?
“This is…unexpected,” I finally said in a choked voice.
That definitely wasn’t the answer he wanted to hear. The smile fell off his lips, replaced by a deep, twisted frown. His eyes went dark, and the grip on my elbow tightened.Ouch.
“Are you telling me that you don’t sense the desire between us?” he asked in a low hiss. “And here I thought werewolves were attuned to that kind of thing.”
