She didn’t need to fret, though. For her, I would take my time. Move at her pace.
Because Isadora was nothing like the other women I’d bedded. Those women had known my limits and what little time I could offer them. And afterward, none had ever begged me to stick around. They’d gotten what they’d wanted: a night with me.
And not because I was this amazing creature in bed. Hardly. I was arrogant, but not that arrogant.
They’d simply wanted a story. To be able to tell people they’d slept with the St. Germain heir. It’d bothered me at first, back in my younger days. But I’d eventually learned to brush the sting aside and simply enjoy what they had to offer. We’d both had needs and fulfilled them for each other.
But Isadora wasn’t interested in that. She wanted more than the St. Germain heir. She wanted me, or so I hoped.
Thanks to Thorne, Isadora had likely heard a hundred reasons why she shouldn’t enter into a relationship with me. And yet, here she was, still holding my hand.
The last stair creaked under my weight as we reached the loft. I paused at the threshold, giving Isadora time to make her choice. Would she stay or would she retreat back downstairs?
After a long moment, her fingers slipped free from mine, and she entered her loft. I followed slowly, taking in the changes since my last visit. She’d cleaned up the shattered glass and the dust. She’d removed the shredded garments and ruined suitcase. Her shredded mattress still sat in the room, though she’d had the sense to flip it over, hiding the damage. She’d need a new one eventually, but I imagined there was nothing she could do about that for the time being.
Her loft resembled a home now. Imperfect, but comfortable.
I caught sight of her open closet, now brimming with actual clothing. A small smile rose to my lips. I loathed the Wolfe family on principle, but seeing how Thorne cared for Isadora soothed a bit of my vitriol. Not that I’d ever admit that aloud. I’d rather someone drove a stake through my chest.
“I’m hoping to buy a new bed soon,” Isadora said.
The second she spoke, the bathroom door exploded open with a bang that had me stepping in front of Isadora, then whirling around.
A deep, guttural growl rumbled from inside a dark, attached bathroom—low, wet, and decidedly unholy. The snarl continued, and it sounded like someone was forcing a demon down a sewer drain.
“Oh, for crying out loud,” Isadora murmured behind me.
“What,” I asked carefully, “was that?”
When she didn’t immediately respond, I glanced over my shoulder.
Isadora crossed her arms and sighed, as though the hair-raising noises coming from what appeared to be a bathroom were merely an inconvenient draft and not the howling of some ancient, pipe-dwelling entity.
“That would be the toilet,” she said, sighing.
“The…toilet?”
“Yes. I have a toilet demon,” she stated matter-of-factly.
I blinked. A what?
She said nothing further.
A second groan rattled the entire upper floor plumbing, louder this time. Almost petulant. Something dark whisked across the room. I couldn’t tell if it was a shadow or mist or something worse. But no way I would allow Isadora to share a room with…whatever that was.
“Izzy?” Thorne called up.
“It’s fine!” she shouted down. “It’s just the toilet. Again.”
“Aha,” Thorne murmured. Clearly, she knew all about this situation. I retracted my inner statement of how well she took care of Isadora. No one who cared about her would allow her to cohabitate with such a creature.
“Guess all the sage burning didn’t work,” Isadora commented.
Sage burnings. Compliments of the Ravenspells, I was sure.
Another sound echoed—this time a gurgle, like a sea monster gargling in Latin.
“I think…is it trying to say something?” I asked.
