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“Also,” Khloé went on, “the hours you work aren’t going to bother me because I’m not a person who needs company twenty-four/seven. And if I do want company or I get bored, I have an endless number of family members who will keep me occupied.”
“In ways that are legal and moral?”
“I’m not comfortable answering that question. Back to your original one … I know how important your position is to you; I know you wouldn’t feel whole or happy without it. If something’s important to you, it’s important to me.”
Hearing the ring of sincerity in her tone, Keenan swallowed, and the knots in his stomach unraveled. He splayed a possessive hand on her thigh and gave it a little squeeze. “Thank you for understanding.”
If she’d asked him to choose between her and his position, he would have chosen her—he didn’t want to live a life that didn’t have her in it. He’d tried that, and it hadn’t worked. But it would have destroyed something inside him to have walked away from his lair, Knox, and the other sentinels.
“Does that mean you won’t ask me to join your lair?” he asked.
“Yes, that’s what it means.”
“You’ll join mine?”
She set her mug down, a pained look briefly shaping her face. “I’ll have to, I know that. But I won’t lie, it’s going to be super hard.”
His chest squeezed. He hated the thought of her hurting, especially when she was being so fucking understanding and supportive of him. He could do no less for her.
Keenan picked up her hand and stroked her palm with his thumb. “What if we live at your place instead of mine? Would that make moving lairs less difficult for you?”
Straightening, she studied his face carefully. “You’d really do that? You’d really leave your swanky apartment and live among imps?”
“I want you to be happy, just as you want me to be happy. If being close to your family is important to you, then it’s important to me,” he said, paraphrasing something she’d said. Her face brightened, and everything inside him settled in an instant.
“Really?”
“Really.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Surprised she hadn’t choked on the knot of emotion clogging her throat—God, he was turning her into such a girl—Khloé bit her lip. “Thank you.” She would never have expected him to make such a concession. Even her demon was touched.
He rubbed her thigh and looked as though he was about to speak again, but then his eyes clouded, and that Keenan’s not home right now expression took over his face.
She waited for him to finish his telepathic conversation, praying that he was receiving some good news. But when his eyes cleared and his face darkened, her stomach sank. “Something wrong?”
Grinding his teeth, he set down his mug. “That was Knox. He spoke with the vampires.”
“They can’t help,” she guessed. Fuck.
“They have a vampire in the ranks of their army who can heal, but she does it by taking a wound and transferring it to another person. You have no wound. Even if you did, she’d be unable to help you. Apparently, she’s come up against death essence before, and she couldn’t combat it.”
Any other time, Khloé might have commented on what a pretty cool gift that was. But right then, her devastation was too great. Especially since … “I spoke to Grams half an hour ago—something I meant to tell you once our conversation was over. Vivian consulted the practitioners she knows. Their response, well, it’s not good news.”
“Tell me.”
“They claim that it’s possible that blood magick would help me, but that someone would have to die in order for me to live. And, considering we’d be fighting pure death, we’d need pure innocence to truly have a chance against it. In other words, we’d have to sacrifice a newborn baby—they’re the only beings that are without sin. I wouldn’t even consider that shit.”
He closed his eyes and cursed. “It makes me an evil bastard that my mind didn’t immediately recoil at that idea. I just—”
“You don’t want me to die, I know. There’s a lot of things I’d be willing to try in the hope of combating the death essence, but never the sacrifice of a newborn baby. You’d never be able to go through with it either.”
He bit out another curse. “Blood magick can often backfire anyway.”
Very true. “Vivian also managed to speak with the angel who frequents the hospital where she works. He claimed that only an archangel could heal me. Grams is having no luck getting in touch with one.”
“Levi’s had no success with that either.” Keenan squeezed her hand. “There are other preternatural creatures out there with various gifts—dragons, elementals, fey. The list goes on and on. I’m not buying that the only being in existence that can fight death essence is an archangel.”
“Same here.” She twisted her mouth. “Do you think it’s possible that Enoch could somehow undo what he did to me? That he could call the death essence out of my system or something?”
