When Trevon’s face turned blue, I gulped and rubbed my sweaty palms together. If Eros didn’t let him go, Trevon would die. And as much as I didn’t want him in my life, I didn’t want him dead. This wasn’t his fault.

I yanked on Eros’s wrist. “Eros! Stop. He can’t control it.”

Eros turned to me, body shaking. “You knew about this?” he asked harshly. I nodded my head, gaze remaining on Trevon as Eros hurled him to the other side of the room. He smacked against the wall—hard—and pieces of drywall fell next to him. I ran towards him, something inside of me aching to help him, but Eros snatched my waist and held me back.

Trevon charged at us, and again Eros swiftly placed me behind him and snatched his throat.

“Eros, don't hurt him! I can stop it, please. Let me help.”

Eros’s eyes burned with rage—an emotion that didn’t suit him well. “You’ve been around him like this?” he asked. I pressed my lips together, trying not to show the menacing demon standing over me my fear. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I just found out about you!” I yelled at him. “Now, let me help.” I pulled on his wrist and actually pulled Eros away. Trevon was still lashing out, body thrashing, but I placed my hands firmly on the sides of his face. “Trevon, look at me.” He turned his head, looking toward the door. “Please Trevon,” I said softer.

When I finally got him to look at me, the tint of red vanished from his eyes, and I sighed in relief. He reeked of blood and wrath but placed his hands on mine and trailed his fingers down my slender ones, taking a deep breath through his mouth.

Eros growled, causing Trevon to snap his gaze back to him and start squirming again.

“God, damn it,” I said. I tightened my grip on Trevon. Eros was the one triggering Trevon to act this way, even if he wasn’t trying. “Eros, can you leave?” I asked. “Please.”

Eros stepped closer, eyes pure darkness. “I’m not leaving you here with him.”

Trevon stepped forward, but I placed my hands on his chest and pushed him back against the wall. “Eros, please.”

“I’m not leaving.” He took another threatening step. “I let you try to fix him, and it didn’t work.”

My eyes widened, and I spun around—keeping one hand on Trevon’s chest. “It worked! You just ruined it.” I clenched my jaw, and Trevon pushed against my hand. If Eros didn’t leave soon, I didn’t know if I could calm him back down. “Leave now,” I said to him.

Eros’s black eyes were dancing with white little lights as he stared at me. He bared his fangs at Trevon, then stormed out of the room.

When he left, I lightly stroked the sides of Trevon’s face. This better calm him down, because if it didn’t, I would have to let Eros do whatever he was planning with Trevon.

After five minutes of just staring at him in pure angst—aching to grab Mom’s necklace that was becoming colder and colder against my chest—he stopped thrashing around, and his eyes faded to brown. He slid down the wall. “Shit,” he said.

I took a deep breath, inhaling the strong scent of vanilla, and crouched next to him. “Why’d you go ballistic on Eros?”

His muscles twitched at the mere sound of his name, but he crossed his arms over his chest and stayed still. “I don’t know why.”

“Well, get yourself together,” I said, standing. I didn’t know if I’d be able to ever calm him down again. This time was harder than the last, and it was bound to just keep getting worse. “And don’t come out of this room until I say so.”

I slipped into the living room, when I knew he wouldn’t shift again. Eros paced around the room in his human form, brows creased. Zane leaned against the counter with a confused expression. And Maria stared wide-eyed at both of them. “What’s going on?” she asked.

“Don’t, Dani,” Eros said, warning me not to say a word.

I flared my nostrils, feeling drained from dealing with Trevon. “She already knows,” I said, harsher than I meant.

Zane pushed himself off the counter. “You knew about this?”

Maria furrowed her brows. “I knew about what?” she asked. I nodded to Trevon’s bloody jacket on the counter—the most obvious thing in the entire room—and her lips formed an ‘O’. “You mean…” She held two fingers above her head, mimicking devil horns.

I slapped a hand over my face. Eros rubbed his forehead and mumbled something under his breath.

Maria stepped closer to me. “I thought we were keeping it a secret.”

I shrugged. “Eh.” It didn’t matter anymore. Eros was a demon. Zane was a demon. Kasey was a demon. Everyone was a goddamn demon nowadays.

Zane turned to Eros. “Who do you think sent him?”

Eros stared at me for a few moments, as if he was thinking hard about something, then looked at Zane. “The Chains is the only way to find out.”

My eyes widened. “The Chains? You’re going to lock him up in chains? In… Hell?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Eros said, just brushing me off.

I shouldn’t have cared. Trevon was dangerous, and if he were in chains, he wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone else, but a feeling of pity sat heavy inside my heart. This wasn’t his fault, and this past week he’d fought against the evil inside of him.

I crossed my arms over my chest. Maybe I was always compelled to see the good in people because I wasn’t sure why I seemed to care so much about Trevon going to Hell. But I cared—a lot. “Don’t tell me who or what to worry about. I’m perfectly capable of doing that myself,” I said.

Eros stood across the room, biceps flexed, his eyes darkening into black pits. Maria screamed and shuffled backward. “You’re one of them too?” She plastered her back against the wall, gaze flickering between Eros and me. “Dani! Why aren’t you freaking out?”

“Maria, don’t get mad, but—”

“You knew about this, didn’t you? Oh, my gosh. When were you going to tell me? Next thing, Zane is going to be one too.” She looked at Zane who scratched the back of his neck. “OH MY GOSH. You know what? I can’t do this right now.” She stuffed her mascara stick, her phone, and a bag of Lindor chocolates that Dr. U gave me last week from the kitchen counter into her purse and hurried to the door.

“Maria, wait!” Zane ran after her, but she slammed the door in his face.

Once he followed her out, Eros began his stride down the hallway toward my room. I wrapped my hand around his forearm and dug my heels into the ground. “Eros, please, I don’t want him to get hurt down there.”

“You don’t want him to get hurt?” He shook his head, lip curled in disgust. “Do you know how much danger you’ve been in with a fucking wrath demon living in your apartment with you?”

Yes, but I wasn’t about to tell him that.

“He hasn’t hurt me once. What makes you think that he’d hurt me now?”

He clenched his jaw and pulled his arm from my grasp. “Because my family would do anything that they can to break me, even if that means killing someone I love.”

My lips parted, and everything that we were fighting about seemed to vanish. All of my worries and all of my doubts were nothing now.

“You love me?” I whispered, shock running through me. Eros froze. His black eyes softened, and I found that strange comfort in their darkness again. I tried to steady my breathing, but it was no use. “Do you?”

Eros gulped. “You make me happy,” he said quietly. “Something I haven’t felt in a long time.” His voice nearly cracked toward the end. He gazed down for a moment at his ring. “And, with you, I don’t have to hide who I am. I feel free and my heart feels full and I don’t have to try too hard. It all comes so naturally.”

I smiled.

He grabbed my hands, intertwining our fingers. “But I don’t know what love feels like. I know a lot about lust and flirting and fucking, but I don’t know the first thing about love anymore. This feeling scares the Heaven out of me… Is love supposed to do that?”

Was love supposed to smell like cinnamon? Was love supposed to have black eyes and curved horns and a heart that I wanted for my own? I didn’t know what love looked like or what it was supposed to do anymore either.