Page 6 of Can't Bite This Feeling
He stands and draws his sword. “She was my legacy.”
“She wasmy love,” I growl, launching myself at him.
Steel meets supernatural speed. His blade slices my skin. I taste blood. He lands a cut across my shoulder, another at my thigh. But I’m stronger. And I’m no longer holding back.
He screams as I break his arm with a snap. I drag him to his knees, fangs bared, heart pounding like war drums.
His eyes burn with hatred. “I should’ve drowned her at birth.”
Those are his last words before I tear out his throat. Not cleanly. I make ithurt. I make it last.
And when he dies, choking on his own blood, I whisper her name into his ear.
Drusilla.
The earth is silent when the blood lust fades. My hands are drenched in blood. My soul is hollow. But my vengeance is complete.
I swear on her blood, her name, her love, that I will find a way to bring her back. Even if it takes centuries. Even if I have to crawl through the fires of the underworld to find the pieces of her soul.
Even if it means becoming the very thing she once saved me from.
Chapter 1
Rapha
One day, I’m going to blow this popsicle stand and get a real job.
Looking around at the luxurious, if slightly hellish, waiting room in Glutton Hall, I can’t help but wish I’d made different choices in life. Ones that hadn’t brought me straight to, well, Hell. In living color. Or rather, undead color, which could totally catch on as a home furnishing palette.
My recently acquired talons tap against the side table, a masterpiece of marble stone masonry that occasionally shifts into a blood-red stone that screams in agony until it becomes marble again. Like I said, I’m in Hell. Not,oh I hate my hometown and its narrow-minded people Hell,but actual,Lucifer rules us all, souls are tortured, I’m the demon of greed and a reaper of souls Hell.
I look up when a noise distracts me, but it’s just Lucifer’s personal assistant coming out of his office. I’m here to answer a summons I received two hours ago. Lucifer does like to keep us all waiting. It’s part of his schtick.
I retract my talons and sit back in the pressed-foam chair that should be comfortable but isn’t. That’s also something Lucifer likes to do—give the appearance of opulence and comfort, then snatch it away. It’s needling, but not quite annoying. Just another layer of the hell Lucifer brings to life daily.
“Excuse me, sir,” the assistant says suddenly, his red gaze taking me in with a dismissive glare. How can a glare be so dismissive? I don’t know, but the assistant pulls it off. “Lucifer will see you now.”
I nod and stand, tugging the jacket of my black tailored suit to ensure it’s straight. The suit isn’t a necessity, but I thought I should wear it since I’m meeting the Fallen One.
The assistant goes back to typing aggressively on his keyboard, a sound that rattles my nerves. I’m not the kind to scare easily. I’ve lived for millennia, once as a man, then as a vampire, but now I’m a demon, I’ve seen it all. Every horror and blight people can produce, every form of torture, and some rather inventive betrayal plots.
And Lucifer? He’s the king of all that’s wrong with the world.
When he summons you, he always has some new, ingenious method of torture in mind. Whether it’s aimed at you or someone else doesn’t matter. It’s the thrill he seeks in his endless, vapid existence. I expect today to be no different.
“Rapha! Thank you for being so patient,” Lucifer says as I walk into the grand hall he reserves as his personal playground. The large room is as richly decorated as usual, although I’m fairly certain one of the paintings of a half-naked female on the wall has come to life. I’m sure she’s pulling grotesque faces atme from the corner of my eye but quickly resumes a benign expression when I glance at her directly.
“Of course, Lucifer. I am yours to command,” I say as I approach Lucifer’s throne.
Once, I was striking as a mortal and formidable as a vampire. I may appear unchanged except for my crimson eyes and the talons, but with every soul I claim, I sink deeper into the demon I chose to become.
Lucifer lounges on his throne with the effortless confidence of a rock star crossed with a fallen angel. Today, he wears a tailored midnight-black suit embroidered with gold thread that shimmers like molten coins, each cuff dripping with red silk that pools like fresh blood around his wrists. Sharp-shouldered and extravagantly cut, the jacket clings to his lean frame as though afraid to be discarded. His hair is slicked back to gleaming perfection, and a ruby the size of a pigeon’s egg glitters at his throat, catching the flicker of hellfire that frames the marble dais. He is vanity incarnate, and he knows it as he flashes me a grin that could melt wax and gestures for me to come closer.
“You are reaping many a fine soul for me to torture,” Lucifer begins before he’s distracted by a tray of jellied eyeballs. I’ve never seen Lucifer eat anything, but there’s a first time for everything, I suppose. “How are you liking your demonic powers?”
“They serve a purpose,” I reply without emotion before asking the question I’ve posed for the last few months since Lucifer transformed me. “When can I expect Drusilla’s return?”
Lucifer tuts, and his eyebrows pull together. “Patience is a virtue, remember, Rapha?” He sits forward on his throne, his all-seeinggaze taking me in. He doesn’t look quite as impressed as he did when I was a vampire. “I’m not certain this role suits you. Do you think I should get Mammon back?”
