The Unlikeable Demon Hunter (Nava Katz #1)(55)

I nodded sagely.

“But sitting down with the guys and realizing I could put all the shitty things I was feeling, all the dreams I never thought I’d share with anyone, into words that I wanted to belt out to the world in this incredible music? Having my lyrics come alive for my audience?” He laughed, but it sounded too soft, deflated.

“Sing for me,” I blurted out.

“More teen fantasy?” he teased. “I don’t think you can handle intimate and interactive.”

“Try me.” I swear I was still talking about his singing. Not my fault that that his lids lowered a fraction over his eyes with a look of simmering desire.

I swallowed, desperately trying to get saliva into my very dry mouth.

Honestly, I didn’t expect him to start. I sure as hell wasn’t prepared for it to be his first number one hit “Toccata and Fugue.” The song jolted me back to being thirteen, to the first time I’d heard it.

It was a hot summer night. Leonie and I were slumped in the backseat of her older cousin’s beat-up Jetta that to us seemed like the greatest car in the world because it was owned by a teenager, not a parent. I remember resting my hand out the window and the hot wind rushing through my splayed fingers as we drove back from the beach. Our hair was a wet tangle of salty strands and the faint scent of coconut clung to our skin.

Leo was pissing off her cousin, dusting the sand from her bare feet onto the backseat carpet. Then this song came on the stereo and a guy’s raspy voice singing a stream of consciousness love song overrode the bickering in the car.

That voice unnerved and excited me, igniting this wildness that at that tender age, I didn’t know how to handle and couldn’t name. I’d strained against the seatbelt to push my face and shoulders up to the night air, like the breeze could make the restlessness subside. I don’t think I breathed until the song was over.

I caught myself holding my breath the same way now. Rohan’s voice called that same wildness to the surface of my skin, dancing over me. His eyes never left mine as he sang the chorus of the girl with the lightning eyes and the boy with demons in his soul.

My stomach plummeted. What the holy fuck were the chances of universe convergence that would make me, him, and those lyrics end up in the same place? It freaked me right out. I’d just learned of one destiny in the past couple days and him singing this song right here, right now, was calling into prophecy something that I wanted no part of.

I’d give freely of my body. My heart was off-limits. Especially to a guy like him. Seriously. I’d take the demons.

Thankfully, I wasn’t the only one unnerved. Rohan broke off midway through the second verse, looking like walls were closing in on him. He cleared his throat a couple of times as I stuffed my feet into my shoes, and grabbed my clutch.

“Good thing my eyes are bluish-gray,” I joked. “We should get–” I didn’t even bother to finish. Just up and bolted along the sidewalk, ready to push anyone out of my way who tried to get between me, a taxi, and home.

I spied the steady “on” light of a cab, waiting at a traffic light a couple of blocks away, and sped up, cutting through the playground to hit the street in time to flag it down.

The ground shook as I passed the swings. I grabbed onto a chain, trying to keep my footing as a massive being winked into existence with a rumble of thunder. Nothing like a demon arrival to sober a girl up.





14





Rohan yanked me away from the swing set, shoving me behind him and blocking my body with his.

“I got your message, Rasha,” the demon growled. “So delighted to see who killed my children.”

Asmodeus. Oh, shit. Leo wasn’t supposed to have been this efficient. He wasn’t supposed to have found me until I was safely behind the chapter house wards. At least I had Rohan.

“Message?” Given the cold, flat fury on his face, Snowflake would happily feed me to the demon himself.

I rose onto tiptoe to see over Rohan’s shoulder. His body was taught with tension, which was unsurprising since Asmodeus was built somewhere between a tank and a small mountain range and boasted three heads: a bull, a ram, and an ogre. His chest was covered in hardened scales. Gulp.

“Kill now, talk later,” I muttered.

“If there’s anything left of you when I’m done,” Rohan murmured back.

Blades snicked out to outline Rohan’s entire body, running up from his left ankle, along the outer edge of his leg and arm, over his head and down the other side. Plus the short wicked steel extending from his fingertips. His front and back were still vulnerable but he was pretty fucking intimidating glinting in the moonlight.

Asmodeus sauntered forward, as if giving us puny humans time to marvel. I couldn’t see this creature inspiring anyone to lustful thought and deed because he was a ghastly fucker. Prime candidate for needing a glamour. Though it was interesting to see who his spawn took after, in a huh, would you look at that? way.

I tossed my purse and Rohan’s jacket on a bench with trembling hands, visualized throwing my power switch to on, and stepped out from behind Rohan. “Good of you to reply in person.”

Asmodeus stopped, not ten feet away, showing the first glimmer of interest since his arrival. Little clouds of dust swirled around his rooster feet. Then he laughed. At least, his ogre head did. “A female Rasha.”