Lord of Embers(The Demon Queen Trials #2)(26)

“Orion!” The panic in my voice echoed off the rocks. His skin felt ice cold, muscles slack. “Orion, wake up.”

If he didn’t come alive again, then the last thing anyone said to him would be, “I’m trying to figure out what made you such a dick.”

His heart had been damaged, so much that it was no longer pumping.

Cold panic crawled over my skin. How did I fix this? I didn’t have healing magic.

I froze. That wasn’t true, though, was it?

An incubus healed through sex. I’d felt it when I’d nearly died on the way to the City of Thorns, when all I could think about was sex, even if I’d been bleeding all over the place.

I lifted his chin to look him in the eyes. Still alive—just barely. “I’m going to heal you.”

His pupils dilated, mouth parting. Already, I could feel the silky warmth of Lilu lust magic caressing us, growing hotter. His eyes darkened, and the look in them was ravenous. I didn’t even have to kiss him yet for the magic to start working, to feel electricity crackling between us. All I had to do was want him, which wasn’t difficult. And that was good, because he looked very alert now, so I felt less creepy about kissing him.

My heart beating faster now, I slid into his lap. His shadowy eyes searched mine.

I leaned in, pressing my lips against his. Immediately, he seemed to draw strength from me, fingers tightening on my waist. His lips opened, and he kissed me deeply, desperately. Warmth spread through my body, making my pulse race.

As Orion healed, one of his hands moved up my spine, and he threaded his fingers into my hair. I could feel his pulse, his heart coming alive again, beating. He broke away from the kiss and pulled my head back.

His breath had gone shallow, and his hot magic slid over my skin.

With a languid swirl of his tongue, he kissed my neck. I laced my fingers in his hair, pulse racing.

“I can’t stand you,” I said through labored breaths. My pride made me say it, since I knew how he felt about me.

“The feeling is mutual,” he whispered against my neck, “but I will die if I don’t kiss you.”

For one bright moment, it sounded desperately romantic—until I realized he meant it quite literally. He would die if he didn’t

actu ally

kiss me.

Still, I forgot that when he gazed into my eyes again and brushed his thumb over my lower lip. He was looking at me like I was the most exquisite thing he’d ever seen, and I felt my cheeks go warm. He kissed me again, hungrily, his tongue sweeping in. The way he was kissing me, it really didn’t

like he found me boring

feel

With one hand, he unbuttoned a few of the buttons on the front of my dress, then pulled away from the kiss, nipping my lower lip in a way that made heat rush to my core. Molten lust pulsed through me, making my thighs clench.

But I wasn’t going to let this keep going on—not after what he’d been saying to me. I only needed to heal him, and that was it.

With an iron will, I stopped him from leaning in to kiss me again.

He looked at me, his eyes an abyss of midnight.

With my mouth inches from his, I said, “I think we’re done. You seem to be feeling better. And as we both confessed earlier, neither of us actually likes each other.”

He closed his mouth, jaw clenching. His finger tightened on me. “I could die at any moment. And why deny yourself this pleasure?”

Never in a million years would I admit how much I wanted him. I brushed my hand over the center of his chest, feeling the smooth, completely healed skin beneath his shirt. “What pleasure? I was going through the motions so you didn’t die. I was bored.”

“Going through the motions? With me? I find that hard to believe.”

“Looks like Purgatory left your ego intact.” With a supreme act of will, I shifted out of his lap onto the rocky ground. “How did you end up with a knife in your chest?”

For the first time since I’d met Orion, I saw his ever-present self-assurance falter. He was catching his breath. “A snake.”

I stood, buttoning my dress again. “A snake stabbed you?”

“No, a snake crawled up my coat, and I stabbed it. Except it was a hallucination.” He reached for my backpack and pulled out a bottle of water.

“Orion… are you scared of snakes?”

He unscrewed the top. “The Belphegor demons fuck with your head.

That’s all.”

I supposed I wasn’t normally scared of keys. Maybe our tattoos came out to haunt us.

He downed his water quickly, then leaned back against the wall. His eyes had gone pale again. “And what did they show you?” He reached into a bag for his apple. “Did they bring back any memories of condemning all of your kin to death long ago?”

… “It’s very thoughtful of you to remind me You sacrificed you r kin

exactly why I had to stop kissing you.”

“Oh? I thought it was because you were bored and going through the motions.”

I reached into the bag and pulled out an apple for him. “Have a snack. Maybe you’ll become less annoying.”

He bit into it, waiting for me to fill him in on what I’d seen.

I sighed. “I saw a demon crawling toward me, and I saw my own death, apparently. Hanging.” I stared out of the cave at a forest before us. “It looked like it happened in the clothes I’m wearing now. Can we die here in the underworld?”