The Demon's Bargain (A Deal With a Demon #4)(23)

Chapter 10





Ramanu





I really must be as perverse as Azazel laughingly calls me, because there’s no other explanation for me falling for this difficult, stubborn witch. Given enough time, I have no doubt she’d figure out a way to take that amulet back from the bastard. No one can keep their guard up indefinitely, and in a few years, Kristoff would turn a corner and there Lenora would be. Ready to strike.

But that would mean admitting to her fathers that she lost it, and that’s one thing my witch won’t do. Instead, she’s getting desperate. Desperation is what drives humans to bargain. Desperation makes them sloppy and reckless.

Desperation can get someone killed.

The thought makes me want to snarl, but Lenora will take it as me snarling at her, and then her walls will come up further. I know she wants to send me away. It’s written right there where anyone like me can see it. She doesn’t trust me, and I can’t blame her for that.

Except she trusts me enough to put her body in my hands. It would be so easy to look into that, to fall victim to my own fantasy. The truth is much harsher.

Lenora might guard her heart with spikes and blades and high walls, but she’s startlingly reckless when it comes to her body. I don’t judge her for her past partners or her reasons for being with them, but the urge to bundle her up and keep her safe rises again, stronger than before.

Yes, I’m falling for this witch. I think it started even before I met her.

If there’s some vengeful force out there, it’s laughing uproariously about the fact I’ve so enjoyed needling that damned mate-stricken dragon and now I’m following this murderous little witch around as if attached to a leash.

We pause long enough to grab some food from one of the carts and then head back to the room. I close the door softly and turn toward her, intent on continuing our earlier argument. If she’d just let me help her…

Lenora drops her dress. She looks over her shoulder at me. “I’m going to take a shower.” Without another word, she strips off her boots and walks into the bathroom.

She leaves the door open.

It’s a clear invitation, and I find myself following even as I try to reason through why continuing to fuck her is a terrible idea. It’s taboo in the extreme, but I’ve already crossed that line, so doing it again won’t make a difference. She’s feeling vulnerable and off-center and using sex to keep those uncomfortable emotions at bay, but I’ve already decided not to use it against her, to offer her a safe space amid this storm. She thinks I’m trying to fuck her into agreeing to the bargain, and there’s not much I can do about that assumption. In the past, I would have used every tool in my arsenal except sex to close the bargain.

Now I’m not certain I’d take the deal even if she offered it. It doesn’t feel good. I want her to come to me because she wants to, not because she’s backed into a corner and can’t see a way out.

She asked for a distraction, though. It’s the only thing she asked of me. If I’m not willing to do this, surely she won’t trust me enough to ask for more. Except that reasoning doesn’t quite make the conflicted feeling inside me ease. I want to keep her safe, and I can’t tell if fucking me will offer the distraction she needs…or be the blade she turns on herself in punishment.

I duck my head to clear the door and find Lenora stepping into a steaming spray of water. The bathroom is bigger than I expected, the shower tiled and plenty large enough for both of us.

Lenora turns to face me. Pink rises within her, but it’s tempered with red and gray. She wants me, wants this, but she’s still angry at my perceived intrusion of reading her emotions, and she’s worried about a number of things.

I won’t accept this bargain; Lenora will be a fish that escapes my net at the end of Samhain. Honestly, I should leave her to it. She’s smart and ruthless and fully capable of saving herself. The longer I stay here, the more I risk giving my heart to a witch who doesn’t want it and won’t thank me for the offering.

I always thought it was funny to watch my peers fall for their partners. To see them go sappy and lovestruck. I never experienced it on this level, never forgot myself and my aims so completely.

“You trusted Jack to help you.” I don’t know why I speak. I can’t help the edge of jealousy that works its way into my tone. “Trust me to help you.”

Lenora laughs harshly. “I’ve known Jack since I was eighteen and filled with more hormones than sense. We’ve had our ups and downs, but Jack has more than earned my trust in that time. I’ve only known you a single day, and I don’t care what reconnaissance you’ve done on me or what you think you know about me… You don’t.”

“Lenora—”

“And even as much as I trust Jack, they don’t know—” She stops short.

It’s too late. She slipped up. I narrow my attention on her. “They don’t know what, little witch?” But even as I ask, little inconsistencies click into place. Lenora obviously loves her fathers, but she doesn’t fear them. Losing this family heirloom might get her a lecture, but Lenora is who she is—she’s obviously received plenty over the years. That isn’t enough to cause this level of desperation. “An amulet from a celestial to their human lover…”