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“Can I ask you something personal?” she asked.
He dragged himself away from the images playing in his mind of her naked, sprawled out before him with her legs spread wide, showing off her damp pussy. “Depends.”
Nibbling her lip, she stared up at him with beautiful crystal-blue eyes, which were presently full of suspicion. “On?”
He couldn’t quite tell if her nerves around him were from his demonic heritage or if she fought against her earlier heated reaction to him. He hadn’t been blind to her long study of him, nor the sizzle in her gaze that appeared thereafter, and he would definitely use her interest in him to his advantage.
At his regard of her, her eyes widened—a bit scared and a little intimidated—and that reaction fed his demonic needs. Leaning down toward her, he grinned. “Bryanna, I’ll answer any question as long as I’ll continue to look good after I answer it.”
She stared at him for a long moment as if he shocked her, then she laughed, shaking her head. “Hearing a demon say anything about being good is funny. You do know that, right?”
He nodded in agreement. “It is unusual, yes.”
She appeared to want to ask more and gazed at him with interest, but she drew in a long breath and focused back on the street. As they passed by the Spellbound Spa, she stayed silent and smiled at the witch exiting the spa. When they approached the Blessed Be Bakery, she looked back up at him. “I’m curious about you being a demon and, well, living in Charmstone.”
He arched a playful eyebrow, placing a hand over his chest. “You think the town should banish me?”
She stopped dead, turning to him and folding her arms under incredibly delectable breasts. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
Well now, the little witch did have some strength in her sexy-as-hell body. “Ah, you mean why am I not out stealing souls and doing Satan’s work?”
“Precisely.” She once again strode forward. “Why aren’t you doing that?”
Perhaps he made her as curious as she made him. He regarded her, considering how to answer such an important question, and he chose his words carefully, hoping she could relate. “Just because I’m a demon doesn’t mean I have to live by rules that others set out for me.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Seriously? You woke up one day and said, ‘Hmm, I’m done with this whole soul eatin’ bit’.” At his nod, since it had been much like that, she gazed at him as if he had horns growing out of his head. “Why?”
Along the sidewalk, a warlock approached and Zeke inclined his head in greeting before he glanced at her and shrugged. “I grew tired of creating fear and causing death.”
Her examination of him was long and slightly awkward, then she finally asked, “So, just like that you up and quit?”
He chuckled. “It’s not really something you can quit.”
She gave a firm nod, now looking at him as if those horns she imagined were on fire. “Yes, well, I figured as much. So, what happened?”
While normally he wouldn’t dive so deep into his past, he couldn’t help enjoying how she asked questions about him and wanted to know who he was. Maybe it meant she was trying to see past what scared her. He liked that thought. “My assignment brought me to a young woman in her early twenties. She wanted to make herself better, be prettier and smarter—just be more. For all of that, she was willing to sell her soul to get it.”
He paused to let her process, but she urged him on with a wave of her hand. “And…”
On a deep breath, he looked at the ground, avoiding her gaze. “I went to the woman, offered her the choice and she accepted. From there, it all went as it usually did and the woman received everything she asked for.” The painful memory he had held close to his heart. He never wanted to forget the impact it had on him. “But it was that woman who changed it all for me.”
“Things changed after you stole her soul?”
He nodded at the sidewalk. “The woman had everything anyone could have dreamed of: a powerful life, beauty and anything she could ever want.”
“Well, that’s the point, isn’t it?” Bryanna laughed softly. “So, what’s the problem? It sounds like it all worked out for her.”
“Sadly, it didn’t.” He glanced sideways at her and suspected the pain burned into him from the past showed on his expression, because Bryanna’s eyes saddened. “She might have had it all and had the life she dreamed of, but it didn’t give her happiness. That loneliness—emptiness—never went away.”
Bryanna hesitated, her eyes searching his. “But why would that make you deny your demonic roots?”
He stopped and turned to face her, drawing in a deep breath. “I’m not sure I can explain what happened that night. Why I suddenly awakened to the reality of what I’d done.” He exhaled. “But after that night, I couldn’t make the offer for the exchange anymore. To do so seemed wrong and my loyalty to Satan ceased to exist. As my punishment, Satan banished me to walk this realm forever, not realizing that was what I wanted anyway.”
“Zeke, that’s…” her head tilted, sending those long locks over her bare arm, “incredible.”
There, in her gaze, he witnessed confusion and a hint of sympathy. Perhaps even a little warmth in her features toward him now. That pleased him far more than anything else. “Enough about my past. Let’s get you dry.” Even if he would rather get her wet instead. With a smile, he gestured to the store behind her. “This is where you’ll want to go.”
The sign above the old wooden door had Dragon’s Whips carved into the dark cherry wood. Bryanna’s fists clenched, as the name alone was indication enough of what this place was. Only further confirming her suspicions was the female mannequin in the window dressed in a leather bra and a string thong.
