“So desperate for your pleasure, poison?” He smirked, full lips curving up on one side. “No pathetic human able to meet your needs, huh? You need a demon to satisfy you.”
I ground my teeth so hard my jaw throbbed in protest.
It would have been great to have someone even try to bring me more pleasure than a damned demon, but Leo had ensured no hunter would go near me. Not that I was particularly into vicious serial killers.
Anyone I dated outside the hunters would be drawn into my uncle’s web, and he wasn’t above threatening someone to get me to fall in line. Even a man I barely knew.
I rolled my eyes at the demon. “The only thing I’m desperate for is a rigatoni carbonara loaded with parmesan, and a pinot grigio that isn’t from the sale section. Your little nibbles are a necessary evil.”
“Nibbles?” His lips twitched into what could have been a genuine smile if he’d let it bloom. “Perhaps I should remind you just how vicious my bite can be.”
I snorted. “Please do.”
“You’d like that, huh?” He angled his horns aside, tapping his chin with a pearly claw. “What was it you said in the ring? That you wanted me to show you my true nature?” A low chuckle shook his muscular chest. “You want us all to be monsters, don’t you? Does it ease that weight you’re carrying, poison? The guilt of living with what you’ve done?”
I jerked back, arm dropping from the feeding slot. Was I being that transparent?
My hands fisted at my sides, nails digging into my palms. “You don’t know the first thing about me, demon.”
“Call me Sin.”
He looked surprised by his own words.
I blinked at him, shock parting my lips. “What?”
The demon snorted, some of the tension leaving his frame. “I’m tired of you calling me demon. You might not believe it, but we’re people. With names, and families, and lives of our own.”
He had no idea how aware of that I was. It had cost me everything.
And yet not nearly enough.
“Liliana,” I said, voice tight. Why I was indulging in this madness, I had no clue.
His pupils dilated as he took in my name, lips pursing like he could taste it.
“Sin…,” I murmured, testing out his name on my lips too. I smirked as it sank in. “Is that your stripper name or something?”
“Short for Sinclair, actually. But if it’s a show you’re after…,” he purred, claws hooking inside the waistband of his low-slung joggers.
“No!” I raised a hand to ward him off, heart pounding for an entirely different reason.
If I saw whatever little monster he hid in his trousers, maybe it would put me off and finally kill the shameful lust that had haunted me since his bite gave me the most intense orgasm of my life, five agonisingly long days ago.
Or it could give an edge of reality to the fantasies I desperately tried to ignore.
Ones I only had because of the unholy venom in his bite.
He chuckled, the rich sound far too warm for such a murderous beast. “I’m kidding, poison.”
I scowled. “A demon with a sense of humour? Clearly, I’ve died and gone to hell.”
He snorted, looking almost boyish despite the feral cast of his features. “Hell is much nicer than this shithole.”
“I’m sure you think so,” I snarked, pressing my wrist back to the gap in the glass.
He grinned, showing off wicked fangs a second before he dropped to his knees before me. I swore I could feel his heat through the glass.
Leaning forward, he rested his pearly fangs against my offered wrist in a faint prick, letting me feel their threat without breaking the skin.