Page 21 of Hellish Witch

“Your kitty knocked my coffee over, so I thought I’d encourage her to leave the rest of your things alone before you had to drink directly from the pot.”

Broken shards of painted clay littered the island’s countertop. He’d already picked them up, and the idea of Killian not only in my house, drinking my coffee, but cleaning up sent my mind into a tizzy.

Why was it so hot for a topless guy to cuddle a fluffy animal and clean for me?

I cleared my throat, trying to unstick my tongue from the roof of my mouth. “Thanks… Um, that’s notmyhellcat. She’s a menace that’s been breaking in and stealing my food. But I meant…what are you doing in my house, Killian?”

He smirked, but the lazy mirth didn’t soften the intensity in his dark eyes. “After you passed out on me, I carried you home, but I couldn’t just leave you, kid.”

Kid.

The reminder of how he’d seen me was like a pail of ice water, snuffing out the lingering fantasy from my dumb dream.

A dry chuckle forced its way up my throat, just this side of bitter. “Oh. Well, um, thanks, I guess.”

Yeah, real smooth, Eve.

His sinful lips twitched, and he placed the monster kitty down on the counter. She rubbed her head against his hand, as if she couldn’t resist one last snuzzle, and turned to me with what I swore was a smug expression.

She sauntered to the edge of the rough-hewn marble top. Her sinuous tail smacked into the tower of mugs beside the coffee machine, rattling them ominously.

The hellcat sat back on her haunches, lifted a huge paw, and looked me dead in the eye.

“Kitty, no! Don’t you do it…,” I hissed, watching her from the other side of the island, too far to do anything.

Her lips peeled back to reveal a vicious maw of pointy teeth. A feline grin.

She smacked the tower of mugs, wicked glee burning in her eyes. My cups crashed to the floor with a harsh shattering.

I gaped at the destruction. “Why!?”

Her eyes seemed to scream, “You know why!”

She lifted her snooty tail, daintily picked out a cookie from the somehow lidless jar next to where the tower had been, and leaped off the counter with the silent fuck-you grace only a feline can possess. The psycho sauntered off into the living room. Probably to get crumbs and fur all over my sofa.

“Ugh, stop stealing my damn cookies, you monster!” I yelled at her retreating cat butt.

No wonder humans thought Hell was a place of tortured souls.

It was a hellcats’ world. We just tried to survive it.

A husky chuckle drew my attention back to the winged incubus dominating my kitchen, and I finally allowed myself to take in the rest of him.

My jaw slackened. “What the fuck happened to you?”

Bloody gashes tore through Killian’s impressive chest, slicing the avian tattoos across his torso and arms. The bleeding was down to a trickle for most of the wounds, some almost healed, but damage littered his body.

The amount of pain should have been excruciating, yet he’d had a casual chat with me about the ungrateful feline who’d been bullying me.

A sardonic grin curved lips pouty enough to make a succubus jealous. “I’m an enforcer, kid. I was enforcing. Or did you forget what I do for your uncle?”

His insistence on always calling me “kid” and referring to Rex as my “uncle” irritated me to no end. Sure, he and Rex were years older than me, but that didn’t mean I was a child.

“He’s more like an overbearing brother,” I muttered under my breath, even though I called Rex “Uncle” to his face all the damn time to get under our king’s thick skin.

I was already reaching for the light I kept inside me as I rounded the counter towards the stubborn demon. Getting close to Killian was like stepping into the shadow of a mountain: dark and awe-inspiring. Nothing could draw my attention away for long.

I met his piercing gaze, fighting not to squirm under his intensity. Especially after the dream I’d just had.

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