Page 38 of Demons in My Bed
I huffed. “What? Why?”
“Because, love, it’s the sweetest kind of physical validation that I affect you. I loved how red you got at the warehouse—my whole crew saw you blushing and knew it was because of me. You were already flushed when you walked up. Post-orgasmic glow is a real thing. You just looked fucking delicious standing there like that.”
“Jesus, Ashland. You have real issues, you know that?”
He barked a laugh and switched lanes. “That may be true, but so do you. I wanted you to touch yourself back there and guess what? You fucking did. So don’t be a hypocrite. I’m honest about what I like, are you?”
I paused just before I ripped his head off. Was I? “Maybe I’m still learning what I like.”
“Yeah? Aren’t we all? Nothing wrong with that. Live a little.” He reached over and patted my thigh. “Something tells me you haven’t ever really let loose before.”
I didn’t respond, mainly because he was right. It was hard to “let loose,” as he liked to call it, when you were raised in an environment like Montague. I’d been training to be a spy for so long that it had been my primary focus since I was sixteen. Before that, I’d focused on my schooling, mastering magic and academics, with the goal of being accepted into the training program when I was old enough. Here I was on this mission, and it was like someone pushing a five-year-old into a candy shop and telling them they can only look. No touching, tasting, or anything else.
My attention was drawn to the city as we neared the next exit. Gray skies were moving in, which wasn’t surprising. Pretty weather wasn’t something that belonged here. It wasn’t until we had left the highway behind and were flying down a road that had seen better days, that I saw something odd. I leaned forward in my seat, squinting at the lighthouse that seemed to pop up out of nowhere at the end of the road.
It was hard to imagine what it would’ve looked like in its original glory, because now? Now it was covered in graffiti. Really, really awesome graffiti. Murals, portraits, words—there was too much to take in at once, and we were still too far away for me to appreciate it the way art like that deserved. It wasn’t until my gaze started rising that I saw it… and then him.
“Oh my gods,” I gasped. “Ash, is that—?”
“Yep. Crazy motherfucker’s at it again.”
“Again?” I balked, frantically looking back up to see Felix near the top of the lighthouse, scaling the side of it like a spider. “What the fuck is he doing? He’s going to fall and break his damn neck!”
Would make my life a lot fucking easier if he did… but I chose to blame the fear I felt on the fact that I didn’t really want to see anyone, demon or not, fall from a height like that and be turned into blood splatter.
“Yeah.” Ash sighed. “Felix gets like this sometimes and he just needs to let out a little steam. This is his safe place. He’s got the inside set up pretty sweet with a kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. Sometimes a man needs his own cave when he’s feeling fucked over something, ya know? Now listen,” he said, putting the car in park at the base of the lighthouse. “There’s a chance he’s not going to be thrilled to see us. Especially if he’s in the middle of creating. Gets real bent out of shape at times if his routines are interrupted before he’s done. So if he snaps at you, don’t take it personally.”
“Okay,” I replied, reaching for the handle of my door.
We got out and met at the front of the car. Looking up at the expanse of the building, I nearly fell backward trying to see the full height. Felix was all the way at the top now, paint cans in hand as he finished what he was working on. It was too difficult to see from this angle.
“Let yourself in. We’ll be right there.” Guiding me to the door, Ash ushered me through it. “Remember, if he’s being a little bitch, it’s not because of you. It’s because sometimes he’s actually a little bitch.” With a wicked grin, he slammed the door, and I heard muted shuffling along the walls. He was probably out there pulling a Spiderman stunt, too.
I figured I may as well look for the bathroom while those two idiots were occupied. Taking in Felix’s lighthouse apartment for the first time was an experience. They kept this place well hidden and to themselves, because I’d never read a thing about it in any of the recon reports I’d gotten about these guys.
Taking in the space, I let out a low whistle. Ashland was right; it was a pretty sweet setup. The walls were covered in paintings, hung directly on the bricks. Made sense—with the curved walls, it would’ve been difficult to hang traditional canvases. One particular painting was a large landscape with a beautiful castle and dragons soaring through the air. The most interesting thing about that painting was the huge red X that had been crudely spray-painted over the entire thing and the wordsRISE UPdone in a traditional grunge graffiti style.
There were couches in the middle of the space and a television mounted to the wall. Covering the ground was a huge rug, which would’ve appeared to have been made from polar bear fur, if polar bears had long hair. Clearly, it was synthetic but I’d be damned if it didn’t bring the room together. The couches were neon green leather, and there were other pops of neon scattered throughout the ground level. As much as I wanted to snoop, I really needed to pee, so when I spotted a door I didn’t hesitate.
“Oh thank the gods,” I sighed as I opened the door to reveal a small, but nice, bathroom. A vintage clawfoot tub sat against the wall, and I actually wasn’t surprised to see neon paint splatter all around the outside of the tub. It appeared Felix was some kind of unstoppable art force when he was taken by his muse.
A loud boom and subsequent growls had me nearly peeing my pants, so I hurried and finished up. What had set Felix off after I saw him last night? A flash of the memory of me on my hands and knees, with him thrusting his big dick in and out of my mouth made me curse, and I pressed a little too hard on the soap dispenser, knocking it off balance. The ceramic broke as soon as it hit the sink basin. Fantastic.
I scooped up the small trash can and set it on the counter. Luckily, most of the ceramic pieces were large chunks and easy to dispose of, but as I reached for the last piece, another boom from above my head startled me, causing me to cut my hand. “Fuck!”
I flipped the water on and stuck my hand underneath, already seeing blood. With my other hand, I opened the medicine cabinet in search of a bandaid. I didn’t see any, but did see several pill bottles and even more bottles of lubricant. What in the hell?
Leaning in, I read the names of the medications, a little confused to see the drug names lorazepam, oxycodone, ritalin, and clonazepam. Demons took human medications for anxiety, ADHD, and pain? That didn’t seem right to me, but I didn’t get a chance to look any closer because the bathroom door suddenly slammed open.
“What in the actual fuck?!” I shouted. “I could’ve been wiping my ass or something!”
“I smell blood. What happened?” Ash’s chest was heaving, and his eyes appeared to be glowing.
“I cut my hand when you two decided to wrestle around upstairs,” I snapped, holding up my hand. The cut along my palm was jagged and bleeding pretty heavily now.
Ash snagged a hand towel from the hook next to the sink, wrapping it tightly around my palm. “Come on, this needs cleaning up. There are supplies in the kitchen.”
“Where’s Felix?” I wondered out loud as I followed him out of the bathroom and up a set of stairs.
