OceanofPDF.com

CHAPTER 39

OceanofPDF.com

Dani

“It was a pleasure getting to know you,” Lucifer said after Eros drove us back to his apartment. He stood in front of a portal to Hell in the center of Eros’s living room. “I look forward to next time, Dani.”

Eros curled an arm around my waist, resting his chin on my shoulder. “Meet us here in two days for the dinner party.”

Lucifer gave us one last lingering look and stepped into the portal. When he left, the portal closed up as if it had never even been there. Eros sauntered to his kitchen and pulled out two wine glasses from the cabinet. He was wearing a forest green sweater that hung comfortably on his body, and he was more relaxed than I expected him to be after that.

He popped off the cork to a bottle of wine and gazed over at me. “You’re quiet.”

My mind and body were both numb from the past three hours, I didn’t even know what to say. If I knew something like that was going to happen tonight, I would’ve prepared. Maybe did a little workout so I could keep up with two demons who were hell-bent on fucking me over and over and over again.

After he placed a glass of wine in my hand, he led me to the living room. He sat on the couch and pulled me onto his lap. “Relax,” he said. “I know that was a lot for you.” His fingers trailed up my arms, and he began massaging my shoulders. “How are you feeling?”

One of the living room windows was open a few inches, letting a cold breeze into the room to cool me off. I leaned against him, closing my eyes. “Good.” Really good. I just had questions.

“Why did you agree to that?” I asked. I should’ve asked before it happened, but I was so caught up in the moment that I couldn’t think straight. “I thought you only liked one partner at a time and didn’t want something like that.”

He tensed, his fingers pausing. “I just… wanted to gauge your reaction for… the future.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he said too quickly, rubbing my shoulders. He was hiding something. Again.

“What are you not telling me?”

“Nothing.”

I placed my hands on his. “Please Eros, trust me.”

He stayed quiet for a long moment. “It’s too dangerous to tell you now. Once I get everything sorted out with my parents and Javier, I will tell you. I promise.”

I knew that this whole family thing was bothering him, but I didn’t want to be lied to. It hurt more than anything to know he was keeping something big from me, and that something meant being with many other people in the future.

“We should talk about the rules in our relationship,” he said.

“Um, okay.” I sipped my wine. “What kind of rules were you thinking about?”

He took my glass of wine and placed it on the coffee table, then sat me next to him. His lips were set in a small smile, and his dark eyes were comforting. “I think that if—when we rule the Kingdom of Lust, we should keep our relationship closed.” When I furrowed my brows at him, he continued. “I mean, we shouldn’t see anyone else romantically until we think otherwise.”

“I thought that’s what you wanted to do.”

His cheeks grew the faintest color red. “It is, but you may feel different once you become queen. It’s a different world down there, and relationships with more than two people get messy in Hell. There are demons that are envious, wrathful, greedy, prideful, slow, hungry, filled with desire. They’ll backstab, kill, and cheat to get what they want.” He paused. “All I’m saying is that until our kingdom is strong and stable, we should refrain from other romances.”

“Okay…” I said. This man was so confusing. No open relationship. Three some with Lucifer. No open relationship. Was I missing something?

He shook his head and chuckled. “Dani, you’re so innocent. I think you’re getting this all confused. I don’t mind sex with other people once in a while, just no feelings. If you want us to share a bed with someone—like Lucifer—for the night, I’ll most likely agree to it, but it’s not something I’m looking for everyday or even every other day honestly.”

Whew. Okay, that sounded so much better. If I ended up in a romantic relationship with another person and Maria found out or—worse—Dr. U found out, I wouldn’t hear the end of it. But having sex—especially sex that amazing—with other consenting people, I didn’t mind.

“Do you have any rules that you want to talk about?” he asked, grasping my hands.

There was one thing that had been bothering me, and I wasn’t sure how to ask it without appearing jealous. But after taking a deep breath, I gazed down at Eros’s ring—feeling drawn to it—and brushed my finger against the darkness. “Are you going to be having sex with other people when I’m not with you?”

Tonight, I learned that his sex drive was extremely high. What if I couldn’t please him the way he needed me to? I didn’t want to come home one day to find him in bed with someone else—even if there were no feelings attached. Trevon had little control over cheating on me—since he was under Javier’s lustful spell—but it still hurt. I needed Eros to be honest with what he needed.

He placed a finger on my chin and lifted it until my gaze reached his. “I am faithful to you, Dani. Only you. I will not have sex with someone else, unless you’re there and/or you’re okay with it. And, honestly, I prefer to only have sex with someone I’m romantically attracted to.”

I smiled and slowly nodded my head. Okay, I could do this. We could work.

Dr. U flipped through a file at her desk, the overhead light reflecting off of her glasses. I peeked my head into her office and knocked. She looked up from her work, her eyes growing wide. “Dani! What’re you doing here this late? It’s nearly 7 o’clock on a Friday.”

There were a lot of reasons that I was here. I held up a brown paper bag from Crimson’s Nouveau and smiled. “I wanted to bring you something before the office closes the next few days for Christmas.”

She closed her file and gave me a soft smile. I handed her the bag and sat across from her, gazing out the window. It was a terrifying kind of dark outside tonight and reminded me of the night Mom was murdered. We were walking down Fourth Street on Christmas Eve, listening to Joy to the World which was playing in the city center a few blocks over. Mom was twirling me around, her blonde hair blowing into her face. We were happier than we had ever been.

And then she saw a woman across the street, stopped dead in her tracks, and kissed my forehead, telling me that she loved me more than anything. I tugged on her hand, wanting to get to the ice-skating rink before it got too packed. She gave me a smile, her lips twitching, and looked at the woman again who was hurriedly crossing the street at the crosswalk. Even in the darkness, that woman’s eyes were a piercing red.

Mom told me that we would have a race to the rink, that she’d give me a head start. So, I sprinted as fast as I could down the road to the rink that I’d been to a thousand times before and stopped when I noticed that she wasn’t following me.

I couldn’t remember what happened next, just that Mom was lying on the ground not moving and the woman was standing over her and I was screaming at the top of my lungs.

Dr. U was coming out of her office, briefcase hanging off her shoulder, when she found me. She crouched down to my level and asked me what was wrong. At the time, I didn’t know, but I knew that something wasn’t right, so I just pointed to Mom and the woman with red eyes a block away and clutched the necklace that Mom put around my neck earlier that night. Dr. U looked over to them, fear clear in her eyes, and grabbed me.