“Yes, spell daddy,” I said innocently.
He snorted. “You’re adorable.”
“She always is,” Dimitri chimed in.
Drecken flicked his gaze to him. “Keep her safe.”
“Obviously,” Dimitri scoffed.
Blue fire licked up around Drecken again, and then he was gone, the room settling back into quiet.
I sagged against Dimitri, all the adrenaline draining out of me at once.
“Come here,” he murmured, pulling me down with him.
I fell willingly, curling into his side, and pressing my face into his chest.
“You sure it was just a dream?” he asked after a moment, fingers stroking slowly through my hair.
“No,” I admitted. “But if it wasn’t, there’s nothing we can do about it right this second. And I’m too tired to hunt a nightmare demon tonight.”
He huffed a soft laugh against my hair. “We’ll keep an eye on it.”
I smiled, eyes closing. “Thanks, overachiever.”
The bond smoothed out again as his emotions settled. Comfort. Possessiveness. A thread of lingering anger at what happened.
“I love you,” he murmured, lips brushing my hair.
“I love you,” I whispered, the words slurring as sleep grabbed at me again.
This time, when I let go, nothing waited for me in the dark.
drecken
. . .
I hadplenty of other things I could’ve been doing.
Instead, I was forced into sitting through yet another meeting with the Human Council. I sat in my chair at the table in the Supernatural Council’s meeting room, listening to the humans’ excuse for what had transpired.
Sabine sat at my right, her green hair styled into a sleek bob, while her dull green eyes glowered at the humans.
Smoke trailed lazily from Rowan’s nostrils across from us where he sat upright in his chair.
Dante, our vampire representative and Ambassador of the Night, sat beside him, and Kaelith, our cultural liaison for interspecies relations, tapped her nails softly on the table.
Ted flickered in and out of corporeal form at the far end.
Hunter, the vengeance demon representative and co-owner of a vengeance business, was also here.
All other members were busy overseeing political issues.
Above the table, the holographic feed to the Human Territory had shimmered to life, forming the image of the Human Council.
Their council’s leader, Evelyn Smith, had her brown hair twisted into a tight knot at the back of her head. A few strandsfrizzed loose around her face, and her brown eyes were sunken with dark circles carved beneath them.
Humans wore their stress like attire, unable to physically handle the complications life brought, despite how short their lives were.
