“Deep in thought, are you?” Came Cassius’ familiar voice. His purple feathers wrapped themselves around his massive body as he walked toward me like he wasn’t intimidating as hell.
Part archangel, part fallen, part, who the hell knew? He was the King of the immortals while Mason was King of the actual earth, the soil.
Alex, well he was the King of sex and himself and something else that none of us ever discussed because it was too painful to imagine how much power he had surging through his body.
Stephanie, mated to Cassius, was the last remaining true Dark One, a mixture of human and archangel with dangerous powers.
And a few weeks ago, we had discovered that Mason’s mate was part goddess.
Basically it was as if the supernatural world had shit all over us in the span of a year just to see what we would do when they changed the game.
Another shiver ran over me.
The goddess.
She’d said she wanted to be entertained.
Well, what else could she possibly want? We were a complete shit show now!
“My tattoo seems permanent,” I finally found myself saying as Cassius tucked his wings away until they disappeared into thin air like they were never there to begin with. “So that’s a fun development.”
“Fun.” Cassius grinned. He rarely grinned. I narrowed my eyes just waiting for a feather to drop from his body and incinerate anything near my feet.
“Don’t say fun, it sounds strange coming from someone who glares more than he smiles.”
“You should talk,” he fired back.
I sighed. “This again?”
“You’ve been different ever since Mason reclaimed his throne… you flew back to Seattle with your tail tucked between your legs—”
“Demons don’t have tails.”
“And you’ve been moping in that dark dungeon you call a house. Stephanie says she brings you food, you don’t eat. Mason offered to hunt for pinecones, I told him no.”
“Thanks for that.”
“Small favors.” Cassius folded his bulky arms across his chest. His pitch-black hair hung down his back, shining like the night sky. Blue eyes seemed to penetrate to my souls, both of them, the good and the bad. At least the good had tam
ped down the borrowed one. “It will be time to choose… soon, Timber.”
“Choose?” My eyebrows arched. “I hope you’re not under the assumption that because I’ve been helping the council that I need to mate like everyone else… I’m fine by myself. I like it that way.”
Lies. Lies. Lies.
I was so damn good at lying I scared myself.
Centuries of practice.
Something I shouldn’t be proud of but, meh, demon, cut me some slack.
“We all have journeys. Rarely are they easy,” he said cryptically. “You’ve been running away from yours for a long time.”
A vision of stumbling through the desert assaulted me before I shoved it away and snorted out a laugh. “This again? Look at me?” I spread my arms wide. “I’m the Demon King for shit’s sake. I’ve been alive longer than half the people in that house. I’ve murdered, I’ve stolen. Don’t for one second think that a little elf with the power to restore demonic souls saved me. I’m beyond saving.” I didn’t realize how much I meant it until I said it out loud.
A soul didn’t forgive sins of the past.
It only saved you from a damned future.