After a few moments, a grin broke out on his face, and he grabbed my hand, leading me back toward the party.We lingered at the door, watching the people inside go crazy.
Dani still sat at the bar with Biast, his hand tightly gripping her chin, her pretty pink cheeks flushed.She had a lustful glint in her eyes, one that told me she had complete control of the conversation—however it was going.
Biast pushed her chin to the side, hand sliding around her neck, and pulled her closer to him until she was standing between his legs, the front of his pants rubbing against her thigh.From here, I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but Dani seemed to be enjoying how rough he was with her.
“What do you think of that?”Eros asked me, surprisingly not as tense as I’d thought he’d be.
“What doIthink of it?”I asked him.“Are you okay with it?”
Eros gave me a half shrug.“Yeah, I knew it was coming.Even with you, Dani nearly drains me.She’s getting stronger by the day, and I can’t keep up with it.And, besides”—he cracked a smile—“I know she loves me.It’s just sex with him, and I get to watch.”
I chuckled.“You’ve watched them together?”
Eros smirk widened, and he walked with me to the Fervor Crisps.“Of course I’ve watched.Dani asked me to watch the first time they did it.She’s nervous about trying out new partners, and she thinks I’m going to take it badly.But with her, I know who I am.I know I’m enough emotionally.”
“Biast?”I asked.
He shrugged his shoulders.“I let Dani know who I think she’s safe with.If I think someone will hurt her—physically or emotionally—I tell her not to sleep with them, and she listens to me.”
“But Biast?”I repeated, brow raised.“He just killed his father.”
“He can’t kill her, and she can’t kill him.They’re not attached emotionally.”
“You never feel the urge to … you know, sleep with other people?”
He picked up a crisp and broke it in half.“Sounds like you’re jealous.”
“Curious,” I corrected, snatching one side from him.
After stuffing the sweet in his mouth and swallowing it whole, he shook his head.“No.I don’t need to, and I don’t feel the need to with anyone else.I can’t without an emotional connection—you know that.”
A wave of guilt washed over me.I did know that.That was how Eros always had been, and I had taken advantage of it as soon as we got down here—it was the shittiest thing to do to him.And I was afraid that Dani might slip into the same behaviors.
“She always tells me before it happens,” he said, nudging me, as if he knew exactly what I was worried about.“Don’t worry.She’s not fucking anyone and everyone.She has standards.So far, it’s been you, me, Biast, Tonia, and a couple others.”
“Tonia?”I asked.“Nearly forgot about that.”
Eros chuckled and grabbed another Fervor Crisp.“Tonia was a onetime thing.Can’t see that ever happening again.She’s a Lust now, but … I don’t think Dani felt it with her.Said she didn’t seem that passionate about it.”
Forty-Five
We walkedover to the bar, passing Raphaela and the Envies.At least, Everi wasn’t there with her.Raphaela wouldn’t be able to tolerate someone as desperate as her.
Raphaela looked at me, and I eyed her, then looked away.Raphaela didn’t belong here.She wasn’t one of us.She wasn’t a Lust or a Pride or an Envy.Wouldn’t fit in with the Wraths, Sloths, or Gluttons.And Greed … Greed was way out of the picture for her.
She was a misfit.She should’ve stayed in Heaven.
I could feel her reaching out for me, begging me to look back at her, to take her back, to love her back.But I didn’t turn back, I wouldn’t take her back, and I couldn’t feel anything toward her.She would be a fallen angel without a home, cast out into the Pits of Tartarus.
When Eros and I reached Dani and Biast, Dani jumped into Eros’s lap and curled her fingers into his chest.“Did you have fun?”she purred into his ear, loud enough for me to hear it.There were red marks where Biast’s fingers had been.
“We did,” Eros said, glancing up at me.
She smiled.“Good,” she said.Then she waved her hand toward Biast.“You can go now.”
I snorted and sat down in the seat Dani had been in, between Eros and Biast, placing my hands on their shoulders and squeezing tightly.“Leaders of the three strongest kingdoms in all of Hell.”I nodded toward the rest of the party and smirked.“Look at them all.”
“Fucking bulls,” Biast said under his breath, staring out at the crowd.
