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“I’m not?”
“No. Last night, you didn’t call out to anyone for help. Those people who broke into your home were dead, yes, but that’s what made them the perfect soldiers—they didn’t feel pain, fear, or hesitation. They just did what their master forced them to do. And he’ll send more your way—we both know that. I’d like you to promise me that you’ll call someone. Jolene, your brother, Harper, I don’t care who. I just don’t want you facing Enoch’s puppets alone.” He tugged lightly on one pigtail. “Promise me.”
She snorted. “I’m not promising you shit.” Maybe she should have been touched by his concern, but it rankled that he’d come here acting as if he cared. “You told me, in so many words, that all you wanted from me was a one-time thing. That’s fine. But you don’t get to then demand promises from me—it doesn’t work that way, Keenan. And I can’t imagine why you’d possibly be so worried when all I am to you is the cousin of your Prime, nothing more.”
Keenan’s mouth snapped shut, as if he was biting back words. But then he clipped, “You’re more. That’s the fucking problem.”
“Excuse me?”
“You don’t think you’re important to me, I know that, but you are. I can’t just ignore that there’s a threat hanging over your head. I can’t. That’s not who I am.”
She snorted. “If I was really that important to you, you’d have wanted more than one night. But you don’t. You just wanted ‘some peace.’ Well, you got it.”
His eyes like burning coals, he ate up the space between them in two strides. “Do I look like a man who’s at fucking peace to you? You can’t know how little sleep I’ve had since Enoch first hurt you. Knowing there’s a danger to you … it’s all I can think about. That’s when I’m not thinking about how much I want to be inside you again. Every goddamn train of thought in my head somehow circles back to you, no matter what. So when I say you’re important to me, it’s exactly what I mean.”
Keenan took a breath, inwardly cursing. He’d told himself that he’d remain calm, that he wouldn’t lose his temper—he always said too much when he did that. He always blurted out things that he’d prefer to hold inside him.
It wasn’t easy to keep said temper in check when his demon’s agitation fueled his. And it didn’t help that his body was in chaos—his blood was hot, his skin felt too tight, his dick was rock hard. A ferocious hunger bit and clawed at him, tempting him to steal another taste of her.
She was mere inches away from him. It would be so easy to tag her by her nape, yank her to him, and claim that mouth he’d had far too many fantasies about. So easy to strip them both naked and wrap her pigtails around his fists as he fucked her from behind.
He wasn’t so much angry that she hadn’t called out to him for help. He was angry that she wouldn’t want to—that he wasn’t someone she’d care to turn to. But that was on him, wasn’t it? Which was why he was mostly angry at himself. If he didn’t deliberately hold back from her, he might have been a person she instinctively called out to.
Knowing the little imp didn’t respond well to pressure, Keenan had resisted the urge to push her. He’d moved slow, easy, and tried coaxing her to give him what he wanted.
It hadn’t worked, which he should have anticipated. She was more stubborn than most people he knew.
“But you’re not going to act on just how ‘important’ I am to you, are you?” she asked, taking a step back, retreating.
His demon lunged for her with such strength that it caught Keenan off-guard and managed to force its way to the surface. “You should stop doing that,” it told her.
Her brow pinched. “What?”
“Keeping your distance from us; resisting what you want. He is doing the same to you, but he will lose the fight. And so, my little imp, will you.”
Keenan wrenched back the control, forcing his demon to subside. It didn’t fight him, satisfied that it had delivered its message. He silently spat a curse at the entity. It only shrugged, unbothered.
He couldn’t even deny his demon’s claim. Keenan fought the entity’s desire to own her, fought his own need to indulge in at least one more taste of her, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to hold out much longer.
Khloé eyed him warily. “Did it just use the word ‘my’?”
He shrugged. “You already knew it was possessive of you.”
“No, I knew you felt a little possessive. I didn’t think your demon was in sync with you on that.”
“Now you do.” Flexing his fingers, he backed up a step. “I’ll get going.” Because he could see that she meant to question him on whether the entity had spoken the truth, and Keenan didn’t want to answer.
