Page 39 of Mate of a Monster

“Legend,” she says, her lyrical tone cutting through.

My gaze drops to her eyes, fog sliding across my mind as her presence presses against the surge still coursing through me. I force her face closer, trying to make sense of what’s happening.

“Legend.”

My head snaps toward my brother’s voice, finding him staring at Arabella.

I sigh. “What is it?”

Slowly, Knight turns to me. “He’s awake.”

Chapter Seven

Haide

“We have to go get him, Beast.”

The Nightkin’s chest rumbles. “And we will.”

I bite my lower lip. “If the royals find Zev, Creed will recognize him from my memories. Who knows what they’ll do to him, an exile?”

“Something tells me Creed will have bigger concerns.”

“Like what?” I reach up, my fingers skimming the ragged edge of the torn flesh around the beast’s horn. He hisses, the sound scraping against his throat. His breath is hot as he bares his teeth. Fuck, what am I doing? This isn’t some stray dog I can pet. He’s a monster. Pure and simple.

But he said he’s mine, right? And I do whatever I want with what’s mine.

“Soon, Hellpet, you must trust this process.”

My fingers linger for a second, feeling the pulse of that dark tar-blood oozing out, sticky and warm as it coats my skin. A shiver races through me. Something reckless, like poking a wound to see how deep it goes.

“Now, unless you’d rather I eat you”—he cuts through my thoughts—“I have an appetite to feed.”

My heart pounds wildly, matching the thunder outside. Bile rises in my throat, mixing with that hungry rumble in my belly.

Eat me? Yeah, right. Part of me dares him to try. What would all that chaos feel like? His eyes, glowing faintly in the shadows, lock onto mine and I feel exposed. Like he’s peeling back something I didn’t know was there.

His long claws clack across the table. “You’re remarkably calm for someone who has been told she’s fated to a beast.”

“Who says I too am not a Beast?” I tease, flashing him a bright smile. “Besides, I’m most likely going to kill you after I find out why the demon king of Exile Island, who I had no fucking idea existed, is suddenly here.”

He laughs. “You believe I orchestrated this? That I chose to be bound to a feral little thing who’d sooner slit my throat than submit?”

“Didn’t you?”

I force myself to maintain eye contact, even as his words pull at all of my senses. He’s right—I can feel him. Shit. I probably always have. I’ve just been too fucked up by Legend to notice. Why else can I hear him in my head? Feel his claws down my spine if I think hard enough?

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t swoon at the prospect of being mystically bound to someone who hides his evil behind a mask.”

Not mask, he corrects, voice almost gentle. “I am the darkness that has to be chosen to be received. It is concealment until claimed. His claws trace patterns in the condensation on his goblet. Just as you wear your violence like armor, little mate.

“Stop calling me that.”

Does it remind you of something, or perhaps someone, Little Monster? There’s amusement in his tone now.

My hand clenches around the knife.

How does he even know that stupid nickname? “If you’re trying to piss me off, congratulations. It’s working.”