Sighing miserably at the thought of spending the evening in proper clothes—and underwear—I got dressed in some jeans and a much nicer sweater than the one I’d had on earlier. As I pulled on some thick socks, I gazed longingly at my fluffy bootie slippers. I’d wait a little longer before showing Beryl all the embarrassing parts of myself. The parts Agma had huffed and rolled her eyes over and judged me for.

I stared at myself in the mirror as I combed my wet hair. Did Beryl think demiurgus were ugly? She’d spent so long around people who fawned over my kind and acted like we were god’s gift that maybe she’d gone the other way in defiance. Maybe her time with the cult had completely soured her on demiurgus as a whole. She didn’t seem that way, but that didn’t mean she liked the way I—we, I meant we—looked.

I didn’t think she was ugly. Not at all.

Scowling at my reflection when the spikes around my hairline twitched, I turned from the mirror and stared anxiously at the door. What was she doing out there? I couldn’t hear the TV or any sounds from the kitchen.

Fuck, had she left?

Panic streaked through me, making me jerk toward the door. At the last second, I veered back around the bed to grab my smoking tin. One way or another, I was going to need it.

I held my breath as I inched open the door. The house was completely silent. A sharp pain went through my chest at the thought of Beryl sneaking out in secret. Maybe she hated the house. Maybe she thought I was a total weirdo.

A faint rustling from the living room doorway opposite made me freeze, my pulse leaping. When I heard it again, I took a fortifying breath and shuffled out of my room, closing the door behind me. Then, trying to walk normally, I stepped across the hall and into the living room.

Beryl looked up from the couch, a fat book open on her lap. She gave me a big smile that made me sigh in relief.

“Hey. I found this down the side of the couch.” She lifted the book to show me the cover. It was a hardboiled detective novel that I hadn’t read in years. “I started reading it just to pass the time, but I’m already addicted.”

The tips of my ears fluttered wildly. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to take so long—”

“Oh, it’s fine. It’s been nice sitting here without people constantly coming and going. We had one big communal living room at the compound, so it was always busy.”

I took a step back. “Oh. Uh, I didn’t mean to… I can go—”

She huffed and set the book down on the coffee table. “I didn’t mean I don’t want you in here. It’s your house.” Patting the seat beside her, she said, “Come and sit.”

With a gulp, I slowly walked over, but stopped on the way to pick up the box of matches and light all the candles. Humans had weak eyesight, right? It was already getting dim in here, and she’d been sitting there reading in the dark while I had a minor existential crisis in my room.

“I’ll just go and get some lamps—”

“It’s fine, Greid. Just sit down.” She looked around as I lit the final few candles. “I like it. It makes the room even cosier.”

I mumbled in response, keeping my head bent as I closed the little latch on the front of the stained-glass lantern by the couch. After setting down the matches, I awkwardly sat and wiped my clammy palms over my jeans.

Would this human skin stop sweating so fucking much if I spent more time in it?

After a moment of silence, I fumbled with my phone in my pocket. “Why don’t we order some food?”

Food was good. Food was an icebreaker, right? And it meant fewer awkward silences, because we’d be too busy eating to feel the need to talk.

“Sure, sounds good.” She shifted a little to face me better. “Burgers, right? I really want burgers.”

“I could always eat a burger.” As I unlocked my phone and swiped over to the food delivery app, I could see Beryl staring from the corner of my eye.

“Your phone is so cool.” She nodded at it, and I eyed its black outer case, more organically shaped than the straight lines of human-made phones. “And it’s massive.”

I waggled my fingers over the screen. “Long fingers.”

“Right, of course.”

Suddenly remembering my earlier offer, I quickly said, “I can go and get my old one for you.”

“No, it’s okay. I need one of those things before I can use it anyway, right? The thing that goes in it?”

My mouth twitched. “A SIM card, yeah.”

I was reminded of how little of the world Beryl had experienced. It helped put me at ease as the driving urge to give her things rose to the surface. The chance to discover new things. Everything she’d missed out on.

Holding out the phone, I asked, “Do you want to look through the restaurants? There are a few burger places that deliver to here. You can pick which one you like the look of.”

Her green eyes, which looked darker in the candlelight, flared with excitement. “Yeah, okay.”

Our fingers brushed as she took the phone, and I quickly raised a hand to my ear on the pretence of scratching it so she hopefully wouldn’t see its embarrassing twitch. Beryl was too busy staring down at the phone screen anyway, her freckled cheeks illuminated by the glow.

I tried not to stare.

“Holy crap, all these places deliver to here?” She hesitated, then used her finger to scroll down. “There’s so many different kinds of food.”

I shifted, tugging at the uncomfortably stiff fabric of my jeans. “What did you eat at the compound?”

She made a face, eyes still glued to the screen. “It wasn’t bad, it was just… really boring. The same stuff every week. Super healthy stuff, like lentils and tofu and steamed vegetables. Lean proteins. Low-sugar fruit for dessert. Only water or skimmed milk to drink.”

Tofu? Fruit for dessert? I felt a little faint. “Why don’t we order dessert as well?”

My stupid stomach clenched with some equally stupid emotion when she lifted her head to beam at me. “Can we?”

I smiled. “Of course.” Nodding at the phone, I said, “If you swipe along the top, you’ll see a tab for dessert places.”

She peered down at the screen with a frown, then shifted closer to me. “Show me.”

Throat bobbing with a nervous swallow, I leaned as close as I dared and swiped back up to the top of the app to do it for her. When the list of dessert places appeared, she bent her head closer to look before I could move back. The scent of her hair hit me in a wave. It wasn’t soft and flowery like a lot of the shampoos humans used, but… kind of warm and spicy. Like hot cinnamon.

I jerked back and cleared my throat, swiping my palms down my jeans again. I could not start associating words like ‘hot’ and ‘spicy’ with Beryl. It was just wrong. She may not have seemed vulnerable, but she kind of was. She’d been sheltered for almost her entire life, not really experiencing anything. She’d put a huge amount of trust in me by agreeing to come and live here, and I’d sooner chop off my own dick than betray that trust, even in my thoughts.

But as she shifted closer to me to point out a place that specialised in giant waffles with a million different toppings, her arm brushed against mine, making my pulse go crazy again. And I realised that keeping my thoughts about Beryl completely innocent was going to be really, really difficult.

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Chapter Thirteen

Greid

After the food was ordered—with Beryl seeming amazed by how I only had to look at my screen for it to recognise my face and process the payment—I set down my phone and pulled my smoking tin out of my pocket.

“So, um, I don’t know if you still want to try shade…” Shit, was I being a terrible influence, offering her drugs within hours of her arrival? Granted, shade was completely harmless except for how much food it made you want to consume, but still. “You don’t have to, obviously,” I added quickly.