Page 30 of Fallen

One of thebenefits of being a paladin was that he didn’t have a strict schedule. Some did, such as the administrators and teachers in the boarding school. But for field agents like Alex, as long as he did the required drills with his squad each week, showed up for patrols, and kept up with his paperwork, his hours were his own.

It was especially convenient when he slept an extra three hours longer than usual, his body boneless and sated in a way he’d never experienced before.

He woke with a shock, blinking in the cheery morning sunlight. Did Talon really appear in his bedroom and get him off, or was last night just another one of his inexplicable dreams of the demon? He remembered hungry dark eyes, slick kisses, sucking heat, and a strange, hot fullness he’d never known before. It wasn’tsodifferent from some of the dreams he’d been having, but the mornings after didn’t usually leave him feeling so wrung out.

He was naked, his boxer briefs on the floor across the room. He felt distinctly different as he rose and dressed. There was a mild soreness in his ass. His legs and abs were sore in an unfamiliar way. It wasn’t until he got to the bathroom that he found the irrefutable proof.

There were teeth marks in the curve of his neck. They hadn’t broken the skin, but there was no denying that was what they were, bruised, curving lines in an oval shape.

His lips parted in shock as the reality of what happened hit him.

Talon didn’t just come into his apartment last night. No, Alex remembered dreaming about his childhood home. Talon had appeared there, yanking him from the dream and sending him hurtling into his own bed. He’d seen Talon in his dreams, acting out exactly what was happening for real, and when he’d woken, Talon was there. How could he enter Alex’s dreams? Halflings couldn’t do that.

Anxiety lurched through him. Maybe they could, and the guild just had no record of it. They knew the black-eyed ones were stronger than the red-eyed ones. Maybe they had special powers that allowed them to dreamwalk. He couldn’t know for sure without… asking Talon himself. And he wasn’t sure he could trust the demon’s word. If he’d been entering his dreams all this time, it meant everything Alex had experienced there wasreal.

Oh, God, it was all real.

‘I’ll keep you safe,’he’d said. In both Alex’s dreams and reality. And he had, hadn’t he?

His head swirled, and he staggered from the bathroom. He needed to get a grip. He blindly grabbed some clothes from the dresser and went into the kitchen to make coffee. Caffeine would help.

What was Talon’s angle? He was a demon. They manipulated people into doing what they wanted. What did Talon want withhim? Was it just about the thrill of corrupting a paladin? Was it just a game for him?

‘I had to see you, couldn’t let you walk away for good.’

‘I want to take you apart, little bird. I want to make you feel so good you can’t think about anything but me.’

He shivered. That didn’t sound like someone playing a game, but he couldn’t figure out why Talon would take an interest in him in the first place. Alex was nothing, nobody, in the grand scheme of things.

And what about what he’d said right before Alex dropped off into the first dreamless sleep he’d had in weeks? He’d offered to help Alex find the mozgoran.‘Come to my apartment,’he’d said. It didn’t seem wise to let a paladin know where he laid his head, if he was truly playing with him.

While the coffeemaker gurgled, Alex fetched his phone. Enough with the endless questions and wonderings. He had Talon’s number. He could confront him.

When he unlocked the screen, he was surprised to find a text waiting for him.

I know you’ll have questions when you wake. I’ll answer.

Well,good. He did have questions. Starting with this one:

Have you just been playing me this whole time?

He set the phone down hard and pulled a coffee mug from the cabinet, shaking his head in frustration. He focused on the anger, letting it burn under his skin, rather than the betrayal andhurtthat tried to form. Talon was a demon.Of coursehe was just playing with him. Alex might’ve been a nobody, but it was probably still fun for a demon like him to tempt a holy warrior to sin, wasn’t it? And that was exactly what happened last night. He’d let himself get complacent because he’d thought the dreams were just idle fantasies. The subconscious curiosities of a lonely mind.

His phone chimed. He scowled at it. It didn’t really matter what Talon said. Alex was done with him. But against his better judgment, he tilted his head to glance at the screen.

Ten minutes.

Alex scoffed. Ten minutes until what? He left his phone in the kitchen and strode to the living room, hitting the power button on his rarely used television and turning it to a random news station, and sat down heavily on the sofa.

He screwed up. He let a demon…do thingsto him. His mouth went dry at the memory, at the remembered burst of pleasure when he’d come down Talon’s throat.

He couldn’t even go to confession about this. He couldn’t guarantee Father Hawley wouldn’t report him, and he couldn’t afford to be suspended. Steam rose from his forgotten coffee. The liquid was almost as dark as Talon’s eyes.

Why protect Alex from the nightmares? Why hide him from Michael? Why, why, why?

“Most people look more relaxed after the kind of night you had, little bird.”

Alex jolted, spilling hot coffee in his lap. With a yelp and a hiss, he abandoned the mug on the coffee table and leaped to his feet. “What the hell are you doing here? How do you keep getting in? I have wards on the door!”

---