Page 293 of The Spider Queen
Lucifer stepped back and looked away from me. “My home is your home. Nothing will harm you here.”
“Except you.”
He flinched like I’d hit him, but his icy facade still didn’t crack.
“What am I supposed to do here?” I demanded. “I had a life. I had hobbies.”
It hadn’t been much of a life—working all the time because I had no real relationships with anyone except Herron. Hunting for emotions at night with strangers so I didn’t go insane.
Lucifer’s eyes glowed indigo in the Hellish moonlight. “You don’t believe that anymore than I do. Besides, a bargain is a bargain.”
He shrugged like he didn’t care if I lived or died, if I was happy or miserable here. And that’s when I realized he didn’t. I was a commodity.
Rage sizzled under my skin, and if I thought I’d be able to inflict him bodily harm, I’d have considered it.
“It doesn’t have to be like this, Stella,” he purred.
He peered at me from beneath sooty eyelashes, and I was blasted with a charge of lust. I gritted my teeth against it.
“You’ve been toying with me the entire time. Haven’t you? Leaving me alone to get settled, pretending you’re a decent sort. But you’re not. Are you?”
“I am the Prince of Darkness.” His voice boomed and echoed across the rolling hills of Eden. He seemed to stretch and grow, blotting out the starlight with his massive wings, which were now expanded.
Lust roiled through me. I was on the ground, writhing against the cool grass. Desire shot through my veins like liquid lightning.
“I’m an opportunist. I take what I what when I want because it pleases me.”
I felt the weight of his body on top of mine. His wings wrapped around us both. There was no moonlight or starlight, only the glow of Lucifer’s indigo eyes.
He grazed a finger down my neck, causing me to shiver.
I still wasn’t sure if the desire was mine or completely manufactured by Lucifer. Either way I knew it wasn’t something I wanted to feel. Somewhere deep inside of me, I felt the kernel of rage that had been blasted back, taken over by the onslaught of desire. I nurtured it, summoned it.
It came like a tsunami, obliterating everything in its path.
I no longer felt desire.
I no longer felt like me.
“Lucifer,” I whispered, caressing the back of his neck to pull him closer.
He brushed his lips across my cheek. “Yes?”
With all the force of my anger, I shoved against him. “Not on your life.”
A look of pure bafflement washed over Lucifer’s face as he fell onto his behind.
I would have laughed at the comical expression—but the rage I’d summoned wasn’t going anywhere.
“You were going to rape me,” I said, seething.
His eyes widened. “What? No. I wasn’t going to—that’s not—”
“Then why did you manipulate me into desiring you?” I scrambled up from the ground, needing to put distance between us. We were both immortal. I had my own gifts that came from my parents. If Lucifer and I battled using our own powers, we’d cause serious destruction.
“What?” He stood, graceful, elegant.
I pointed my finger at him. “You turned on the Satan-desire and blasted me with it!”
