Yesterday I caught him standing in the laundry aisle at Target holding fabric softener with the serious expression of somebody making military decisions.
And somehow…that was the moment my life officially stopped feeling normal.
“You cannot keep buying black shirts,” I informed him while pushing the shopping cart down another aisle. “You look like a depressed vampire.”
“I am literally from Hell.”
“That is not a personality.”
My demon pursed his lips, carrying three shopping bags in one hand like they weighed nothing. The hood of his sweatshirt was pulled low over his dark hair while humans casually walked past us completely unaware that one of the most dangerous beings in existence was currently debating blanket quality beside scented candles.
“You chose this shirt for me,” he reminded me calmly.
“Yes, because your entire wardrobe looks like you threaten kingdoms when you were bored ”
“I HAVE threatened kingdoms before ”
“Nothing surprising here .”
For the first time all afternoon, he almost smiled again, and that had become a problem too because I’d started noticing every small shift in his expression, and worse, he’d clearly realized it.
By the time we returned to the apartment, my arms were overloaded with grocery bags while my demon carried literally everything else without effort. The hallway outside my apartment smelled faintly like somebody cooking garlic bread two floors down, and for one dangerously normal second, it was less like supernatural chaos and more like we’d slipped into domestic life accidentally.
Then the lights in the hallway flickered. My demon stopped walking instantly. The shift in him happened so fast my stomach dropped instantly.
“What?”
He gazed deeply toward the far end of the hallway.
“Stay behind me.”
The warning sent a cold wave of fear down my spine, and less than a second later something moved near the stairwell darkness so quickly my eyes barely caught it.
A shadow slammed into the hallway wall hard enough to crack plaster before I even fully understood what I was seeing. Glowing eyes flashed briefly in the dark, followed by claws scraping violently across the floor tiles.
I stumbled backward but my demon moved faster. One second he was beside me. The next he had me shoved safely behind him while dark energy cracked sharply through the hallway air hard enough to shake the walls around us.
The creature lunged again, and this time I caught a glimpse of far too many teeth before my demon caught it by the throat just inches away from me.
The impact slammed both of them against the apartment wall hard enough to rattle every door in the hallway. Neighbors started yelling somewhere downstairs while black smoke curled violently around my demon’s hands.
Then the creature remained motionless onto the floor before dissolving into ash.
I stared at the black scorch marks covering the hallway tiles while my heart tried to escape my body permanently.
My demon turned toward me. “Are you hurt?”
I shook my head too fast. “What the HELL was that?”
His expression tightened slightly. And instantly, I knew.
“No.”
He went quiet.
“No,” I repeated, fear rising hard in my chest now. “You said you were handling it.”
“I was.”
