Page 77 of The Devil She Knows
Daphne paused for the briefest of seconds, her softer-than-silk lips parted, fixed on Sam’s pulse point. “I don’t know.”
She shrugged and went back to laying kisses against Sam’s skin.
Sam frowned. “What do you mean you don’t know?”
Daphne sighed and her grip loosened, her mouth leaving Sam’s neck. Sam twisted around, no small feat in a twinsize bed.
“There’s no precedent for this, Sam,” she said softly. “Iam the precedent. Or I will be.”
Sam sat up and leaned her weight on her elbow. “You’re telling me nobody’s gotten their soul back? Not ever?”
A frown creased Daphne’s face, barely visible in the dark. “Not any demon whose path I’ve ever crossed. I’ve never even met a demon with a deal like mine.”
“Then how do you know if—” Sam pressed her lips together, cutting off the rest of her sentence.
“How do I know if it will even work?” Daphne surmised.
Sam winced. “Sorry. That was—”
“You think I haven’t wondered the same?” Daphne folded her hands atop her chest and stared up at the ceiling. “Of course I have. Who takes the devil at his word?” A quiet huff of laughter escaped her lips, more breath than noise. “Foolme once.” She paused, the crease between her brows deepening. “You know, you don’t become a demon by simply forfeiting your soul.”
Sam rested her chin on her hand. “How’s it work, then?”
“Demons are born only on deathbeds. You have to be dying to become one. Lucifer—and Lucifer only—offers you your life in exchange for an oath of servitude. You still forfeit your soul, but you get to skip the eternity of torment that awaits everyone else down in the pit. It’s really only an incentive to those who don’t wish to die in the first place.” Her lips flattened into a grim line. “I’ve never heard of another demon with an escape clause. Though it’s not like we can compare the language—all of Lucifer’s contracts are strictly verbal. But I haven’t forgotten exactly what he said. His exact words are burned into my brain. I’ve played them over and over and I can’t imagine how he could possibly finagle a way out of returning my soul short of breaching our contact.”
“He’s the devil,” Sam said. “You’re telling me he can’t do that? I’d assume he does it all the time with a smile on his face and a song in his heart.”
Daphne shook her head. “The deals we make are cosmic contracts and not even the devil can cheat the universe. That chess game I talked about? Less of a joke than it sounds. While demons are making deals, angels are also out there answering prayers.”
Sam narrowed her eyes. “You’re pulling my leg.”
Daphne held up three fingers, Scout’s honor. “I’venever crossed paths with one, but I’ve heard of demons much older than me who have.”
“So that means …” Her eyes flitted to the ceiling.
“Beyond the existence of a god, maybe gods, I know nothing about them.” Daphne screwed up her face. “As much as Lucifer loves to hear himself speak, he’s far from forthcoming with the facts. So I don’t know what’s going to happen, Sam.”
“You’ve been waiting two thousand years. You must have thought about what might happen or—orhoped, at least.”
Daphne stretched out and stole Sam’s pillow, hugging it to her chest. “Of course I’ve thought about it.”
“And?”
She chewed on her lip, staring off into space. “The likeliest scenario I can come up with is that when I die one day, I’ll become a ghost, a shade, maybe, trapped somewhere in between. Or I could wind up in Purgatory, whatever that looks like. The Asphodel Fields, maybe, if I’m lucky.”
Sam swallowed down her discomfort at the thought of Daphne as a ghost, imprisoned in the liminal space she already, in a sense, haunted. Never truly able to move on. “Asphodel Fields?”
A smile ghosted over her face. “When I was young, my mother told me stories of what happened when you died. She taught me of the Elysian Fields, a place where the righteous, the heroic, and those chosen by the gods went to live a blessed and happy afterlife. Of the Asphodel Meadows, a land inhabited by those who were neither good nor evil in life, a place where they would be treated thus after death. And Tartarus, a gloomy abyss where the Titans were imprisoned and vicious souls were punished.” She lowered her eyes. “A soul like mine … neither righteous nor heroic, certainly not chosen by the gods … Paradise, whatever form it takes, does not await me.”
“You can’t know that for sure,” Sam argued. “There’s no precedent, you said as much your—”
“Shh.” Daphne’s mouth found hers in the dark, silencing her with a kiss. “Not knowing what’s going to happen to me isnotthe same as knowing what won’t.”
Sam reared back. “But you don’t evenknowwhat you don’t know. It’s like that Diane Kruger effect andyouare standing at the peak of Mount Stupid!”
Daphne pressed the back of her hand against Sam’s forehead.
“What are you doing?” Sam asked.
