Unchained Beauty (The Deadly Beauties Live On 5)

“Fine. The torture Lokie warned me that Hannah was growing her armies—”

“I’m kidding,” he says, rolling his eyes. “I’ve been reading all your texts over your shoulder all night.”

I relax beside him, and he arches an eyebrow at me.

“What? I didn’t want this to end because of a new piece of information that really doesn’t actually help us find Hannah.”

“Even if we found Hannah, I wouldn’t be able to kill her tonight. I can’t kill her until the stars are in line for the portal. There has to be a cosmic burst.”

“Cosmic burst?” I ask, confused. “We’ve killed spirits before. Ghosts too. All without a cosmic burst.”

He nods absently, sitting up to grab the bottle of water from the bedside table, then moves back into position behind me.

“You’ve killed them and sent them to another plane. Or you had a cosmic burst you weren’t aware of when you killed them, something like the gates of purgatory being opened,” he points out. “I’m talking about obliterating a demon while it’s in transition on this surface. It’s something entirely different and never before truly accomplished. But if sent to hell or another plane, she’d claw her way back again.”

“You’re worried she’d come back and restart the rings,” I say softly, running a hand over his chest like I’m trying to soothe him. “She’ll never take you or touch you again, if that’s something you’re worried about. We’re not going to lose.”

He laughs. Actually laughs.

“I wasn’t joking,” I decide to point out, looking up into his eyes that are even laughing at me.

“Hannah was mild compared to her predecessors,” he says through his chuckles. “I’m not worried about her torture. I know she’ll never take me again,” he goes on.

My eyes stay fixed on his, and he continues to stare down at me.

“Because you still plan to die?”

He looks away and clears his throat, tugging me toward him as he heaves out a breath. My cheek goes to his chest as he wraps his arm around me.

“I’ll let Alton die,” he states quietly, and my eyes slowly close as a tear leaks out.

I’m almost scared to believe him, because now that he’s said it so easily, it doesn’t seem real.

“I really do need to find my journal,” he says as he stands, clearing his throat again like he has emotion he’s covering.

My heart thumps faster as I watch him walk to the table, and he tosses books around until he finds the journal he’s apparently looking for. It looks identical to all the ledgers.

“Will those weird vampire zombie things be an issue again? We’re just getting rid of that infestation,” I say as he reads his journal with a blank expression.

“They’ll be an issue again,” he says quietly. “Everything will be an issue again.”

He slowly lowers his eyelids as he closes his journal, and he exhales harshly while scrubbing a hand over his face.

“Okay, if we’re not going to talk about that, then how about talking about the thousand and one ways you thought we’d end up having sex together.”

He glances over, giving me a small smirk as he moves in closer to me, opening his journal. I’m terrified of what I might see on those pages.

Fortunately, it’s a language I don’t know.

He lies flat on his back beside me, one arm coming out to pillow my head.

“The first time I envisioned it, it was about as hard and volatile as what just happened. That’s what happens when you’re suppressing the urge to fantasize and finally give up.”

“Why were you suppressing the urge to fantasize?” I ask, smiling for no reason.

“Mostly because I was actually raised a gentleman who respected the female intended for him,” he says, his voice dropping an octave and taking this way more seriously than expected.

His accent is a little thicker, richer. I can’t really place the unique sound of it. It’s not so much of a where-is-he-from question as it is a when-is-he-from question.