Page 35 of Demonic Delights

“What makes you think you’re supposed to get anything out of it?” he asks sharply, his eyebrows almost meeting in a deep frown.

“It’s a big ask.” I shrug, encouraged by how pissed off he seems; a heated reaction of any kind is a lot more promising than calm indifference.

“It’s not an ask,” he hisses. “Much as I’m enjoying your sweet, tight cunt, I wouldn’t be fucking it just to give you pleasure. Through your obedience or through your fury, I will have a son by you.”

I feel the corners of my lips stretch to what I hope is an assertive smile.

“Even if you don’t care what I want, you do care what you want. And what you want is me, moaning your name in ecstasy. Me scratching my nails down your back. Me, so wet for you that it’s running down my thighs like tears. There’s no point denying it, Sangrel. You may not be asking me, but you do want me to agree. So, give me a reason to, is all I’m saying.”

He straightens up, his lips curling in reluctant admiration.

“Alright, I’m intrigued. What is it that you want? Please tell me it’s not a promise to have mercy on this world. I would be so disappointed, dark darling.”

“Hah! No!” I scoff. “Only those who see this world as good want to do good in this world. Me, I don’t give a shit.”

He blinks hard in surprise, then tilts his head, examining me with a puzzling frown.

“I learnt just how rotten this world can be when I was only eight.” I swallow more wine and feel my cheeks flood with heat.

“When your father left.”

“Yes,” I confirm grimly through my clenched teeth. “He met this woman, this Bianca, because she was texting while driving and hit his car with her brand-new Mercedes.”

I grimace and roll my eyes.

“Dad divorced my mum to marry Bianca and took all his money with him, paying no more than the court-appointed alimony. Mum and I struggled. Not that we couldn’t afford the roof over our heads, but we could no longer have any fun. Life became so grey and joyless. No eight-year-old should ever feel as depressed as I did.”

I glance over the table, but instead of the uneaten prime cuts of lamb in front of me, I see the plain potatoes with cottage cheese and watery cabbage soup from my memories, recalling how these dishes tasted of nothing but misery.

“I constantly begged my father to let me come live with him in his shiny, modern house with his shiny, modern wife. He always said we couldn’t do that to Mum. But I knew the real reason was that I didn’t fit into his life anymore. Not me, with my habits and my way of speaking all too deeply ingrained into me. I was already ruined by my lower-class mother in his eyes, a reject. It was hurtful, the way he started scolding me for things that used to be normal when he still lived with us. Don’t leave dirty dishes in the sink, Roxana, only pigs do that. Stop watching that cartoon, Roxana, that’s for dumb people. Don’t use this word that you’ve used in front of me a thousand times before, because only peasants speak like that, and I don’t want my new posh wife to think less of me for raising such a little chav.”

I finish what wine’s left in my glass and lose no time in refilling it. Were Silas present, he would have given me a scolding look—and not the sexy kind—and perhaps even told me to pace myself. But not Sangrel.

“I tried my best not to irk him, until I watched everything I said and did in front of him. But it was never enough. I could never be perfect. Still, at least he let me come stay with them every other weekend. Until my baby half-brother was born. After that, it was one excuse after another. Too tired, too busy with the baby, couldn’t do anything fun ...” I bite down the resentful tears that sting at the back of my throat even after all these years. “I felt so ... discarded.”

I take a deep breath.

“I’ve never told anyone what happened next. Not even Silas.”

I open my eyes and take a stock of Sangrel’s expression on my husband’s face, trying to gauge from it whether he may know already. Goodwoman Stubbs said nothing about demons being omniscient, but it’s not like she knew everything either. But he seems eager to hear more, from which I judge that what I’m about to say will be news even for him.

“The next time my father let me visit was for Christmas. Kids from divorced families are so lucky that they get two Christmas days!” I chirp sarcastically, mimicking the tone of my well-meaning schoolteacher, before uttering the next sentence mechanically and without any emotion,

“Bianca walked in on me holding a pillow over my baby brother’s face.”

I force my eyes to stay on his, and I’m endlessly comforted by the fact that his visage doesn’t get contorted by a grimace of outraged horror the way it would have if Silas were still in charge of his own body.

“Bianca pulled me away from the crib, and the baby took a gigantic breath and started crying at the same time as she started shrieking.”

I shake my head, the memory of my father’s outraged face making my skin crawl.

“I was eight years old! I was just a kid, too! I didn’t want to harm him, but they made it him or me! That baby was the reason my daddy didn’t love me anymore. Well, him and Bianca, but not much I could do about her. Babies, on the other hand, they stop breathing in their sleep all the time. I thought no one would know the difference. It all just ... made such sense in my head. I mean, I can see its flaws now, but for an eight-year-old, that logic is solid.”

Out of habit, I’m expecting judgement from him, but it never comes. If anything, he seems mildly entertained.

“Afraid I’d be taken away, Mum never even let Dad take me to a shrink. Thank fuck.”

I chance a small smile, and I feel more reassured than I’d like to admit when it’s generously reciprocated.