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“Kitten,” he huffed. “The only time he ever has to worry about me is if he hurts you. I’ve already whipped my eighteen-inch sword out for him. If I’d wanted His Lordship hurt, I’d have done it the first time he stepped from the hotel wards.”

“Speaking of the wards.” I twisted in his arms again to face him, nose to nose. Oh my stars, his honest eyes, his sassy smirk, his handsome face. My heart swelled, and my dick too, but snuggling right now was more important than sex. He was gorgeous and silly and powerful and mine. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

“Your eyes are beautiful, Zee. And your horns, the way they sweep. Your hair always smells amazing. And you feel… You feel like there’s nowhere else I’d rather be than here, right now, with you. I know you know you’re amazing, but you really are.”

Warmth colored his cheeks. “You’re cute. Half the time I don’t know if I want to squish you or fuck you.”

“Erm, thanks?” I snorted a laugh and propped myself against his bare chest. “So, anyway, the wards? Every time we’ve been intimate⁠—”

“You can say fucked, say it?” He pinched my cheeks, pouting my lips. “Ffffffuuhh⁠—”

I laughed, and pulled my head free, ruining his puppeting, and flopped down, tucked against his shoulder where I always seemed to fit, as though we were made for each other. “As I was saying. Every time we’ve been intimate, the power you’ve produced has boosted the hotel wards.”

“My what now?”

I shrugged. “Power, I guess? I don’t know. It’s not like there’s an instruction manual on demon and, uh, human relations.”

“There is, actually. It’s called the Wilson’s Guide. But you tore the D’s out.” He booped my nose. “Demons were on those pages.”

Ah. He’d suspected I’d been the one to remove a few offending pages. “You know, you’re not as silly as you look.”

“Don’t let my exquisitely fuckable appearance and enormous dick fool you. I have an above average IQ.”

“Right.” I fought not to grin. I loved this fool. Loved him so much it hurt my heart. “When we’re together, you and me, it boosts the wards. That’s all I know. Madame Matase has noticed, but she doesn’t know it’s you. You’re really powerful, Zee. The probably-should-be-registered kinda powerful.”

“Nah.” Zee rolled onto his back, and pulled me onto his chest. “You know what I know?”

“Hm?” I circled a fingertip around his nipple.

“I know whenever I’ve fucked other humans, it doesn’t feel like it does with you.”

“You must not have had relations with the right humans before.”

“Uh-huh. You know what else I know?”

“Hm?”

“Not many humans can take on three demons outside Razoresdge and walk away unscathed, except for some bloody clothes in his laundry basket.”

I stopped circling his nipple. He’d known about those demons I’d dispatched then. Had he known immediately, or had he worked it out after?

“And then there’s the missing vampire duke,” he went on. “The same duke the suckers got all bent out of shape about when we went to get Daddy Vampire back. Vampires are hard to kill. I know, I’ve killed a lot of ’em. You ever seen a rabbit kill a wolf? No, because it doesn’t happen, Kitten. I don’t think you’re the prey in any of these scenarios. I think you’re a wolf trying really hard to be a rabbit so nobody notices you’ve got teeth.”

Tilting my head up, I caught him looking down his chest at me. “I’m just me.”

He smiled, not buying it. “I’m just sayin’, if the time comes when you need my help, the real you I mean, I’m here. I’ll always be here for you. Rabbit or wolf.”

“Okay.” I snuggled against his chest, my heart and head wrapped in post-sex fluffiness. Usually, after having Reynard’s fangs in me, I woke drained, but not this time. Maybe there was something important in the three of us and how it made us stronger? I’d think about it later. “Where did Victor go?”

“To set up a meeting with Kris’s contact, Agatha de La Cour. Reynard Technologies is branching out into the illegal beauty business. I told him it won’t fucking work. The fae didn’t get to be San Francisco’s number one crime syndicate by being dumb fucks. But Lord Fuck-Hard never listens because I think with my dick.”

“Did he say that?” I assumed he had, since Zee had donned his Reynard voice, but it didn’t sound like something Reynard would say.

“No, but he was thinking it the whole time behind his resting bitch face.”

“So . . .” I finger-walked up his chest. “You two talked?”