Page 48 of Demon Queen
“Her sister had to pay for feeding on my queen’s fear,” Dorian growled, digging claws into her chest.
She sputtered and looked up at me, then past me at Frisco who was still lit up. I was also still biting him. I should probably learn how to actually fight people. Biting wasn’t getting any reaction, except for the lights.
“I swear fealty to King Drigo,” Frisco said in a low voice like a bell.
The female struggled and then slumped, letting her head hang off the edge of the table while she scowled at me. Her eyes flickered and then her markings faded and went out before flickering back on green. She was like Christmas. I’d have to use her in my Christmas display.
I pulled my teeth away from Frisco’s arm taking a chunk of flesh with me. Mochi never melted on my tongue as quickly as that demon. Made of technology or dessert? And here I was eating another demon. Also hyperventilating.
“Put me down,” I said, elbowing Frisco. Unfortunately, apparently he had spikes coming out of his chest, and I’d justnailed one. I squeaked in pain while he growled and carefully released me, stepping to the side.
“Be careful with your elbows.” He frowned at Dorian. “She needs to be more careful with her elbows.”
Dorian vaulted over the table and scooped me into his arms like a big, winged harbinger of doom. Was he really the good guy? Compared to Frisco and Roberta’s sister, I’d say maybe? Roberta’s sister? No one else had been feeding on my fear, right? Right? More hyperventilating.
Dorian carried me out of the restaurant and into the back of the black car, like that whole situation was resolved since we got the green light instead of the red. Demon markings. So weird.
I gurgled a slightly hysterical laugh when confronted with the demon in the car. It wasn’t big enough for both of us. Once we were tucked inside, I said, “Dorian, maybe you should shift into a more bite-sized glamour. Your spikes are going to ruin the upholstery.”
The door opened and Frisco was there, only back in his normal glamour of sushi chef. He handed to-go boxes to us. “You didn’t have dinner. Also,” he frowned in concern. “Be careful with her elbows.” He bowed low, then closed the door, leaving us alone once more.
Dorian stretched out my arm, turned it and then bent his head, eyes flickering as he cover my elbow with his mouth.
I melted like mochi, letting him do whatever he wanted with my elbows. So what if it was the world’s most awkward position? So what if I couldn’t feel my legs?
“My king,” I mumbled.
He pulled away to say, “Your slave,” before returning his mouth to my elbow.
I touched his wings, relishing the silk velvet feel of them before my fingers wandered to his spikes. Even his spikes were silky. Frisco’s were not.
The connection bloomed into happiness that silenced every other noise in the world until it was just that perfect contentment on a sea of bliss. No, it was a river called denial, and I was happily drowning in it. Better than fainting or throwing up. Again.
fifteen
. . .
I wokeup with a lurch while panic clawed at me. I scrambled out of a mountain of black silk and velvet to stop when I hit the floor of Dorian’s bedroom where Regis had been. Right on this floor. There was no sign of blood in the dim light. I took a second to breathe, to press my palm to the cool gray tile before I stood and looked at the bed.
Dorian was stretched out on his side of the mattress wearing black silk bottom, the magma lines in his skin a mellow glowing orange instead of the rage red. I pressed my palm against my chest and stared at him, longing welling up and spilling over from the time I went to the club and saw him with other women. Did he really love me? Could a demon love?
A vision of the Halloween display hit me, monsters in love, like a dark and inky Valentine’s display with a hint of fifties diner. That’s what I wanted, a fairytale happily ever after like those fifties shows I’d watched with my foster siblings, all of us wishing we understood what that life was like. Security. Stability. Love. And three of us had ended up monsters. Maybe that’s what idealizing other people’s fictional lives led to. Or maybe monsters were the ideal.
I grabbed my bag and went to sit next to the waterfall while I sketched in my notebook. This was it, the Halloween candy display that would blow everything else I’d ever done out of the water. If I had demons working in my shop, I’d use them to make it a Halloween like no other. Not that I hadn’t already had demons… Anyway, animatronics! If Regis was technology, he could help make me animatronics no problem. I was thinking a twenty-foot Frankenstein’s monster that could dispense candy samples.
When Dorian pressed a kiss to my shoulder, I stiffened up like I’d been electrocuted.
“My Queen,” he rumbled, low as he slid his hand down my Frankenstein arm with its demon claws, Tom’s stitches, and Frisco spikes to my hand. “Is that your plan for your Halloween display? Monsters in love? I’m in love with it. It’s so perfectly you. You’ve created so much love out of madness.”
I turned to raise a brow at the ridiculous demon. “Next you’re going to say that you’re in love with me.”
He drew me up and pulled me against his chest, his hands running over my skin like they belonged there, like he couldn’t help himself. His voice was low, sweet. “You’re absolutely right. I’m in love with you. And I’ll never stop. You are the beating heart in my chest, the craving for sweetness on my tongue, the cherry blossoms in a dark, soulless world. You are the queen of my heart, the love of my life, the joy of my existence. Will you let me help you with your Halloween display?”
Of all the things he could have said, that was the most seductive and ridiculous. I pulled his head down, fingers splayed between the spikes coming out of his back, and I kissed him.
Fire and flood. Cinnamon bears and maple syrup. And he’d saved my baby from the Zombie Queen. And he wanted to help me with my work. Was anything sweeter than my demon?
Maybe, just maybe I could trust him not to break my heart again. As long as he didn’t find out I was an angel.
