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“I just want him as a hound.” I feel the lie roll off my tongue. Ledger gets mad when Ryker and I have passing looks when he works, or when I smell like Ozzie. If he only knew I want them all. “The girl… was your girlfriend?”
He sighs, eyes moving around the room. “Yes, and she was my first-choice reaper. She… she was amazing and smart. She was going to be a good reaper.”
I glance at Hazen when he said that. “Was?”
“She pickedhimover me to be her hound. The first mission they went on for a bounty on a vampire… They tortured her and her hounds.”
Sitting up, I remember the scars along Inarian’s body. “Inarian, too?”
He nods. “Her hounds failed to protect her because they were too weak. Inarian was the only one left alive.”
I blink, swallowing. I know reapers run Hell and the Shadow World. We protect demons from being seen with humans, and we stop them from killing humans. Being a reaper is dangerous. They’ve told us this all our life. But I never knew that it could bethatdangerous.
Killian, and eventually Fen, will be a reaper… Who will protect them?
I sigh. “And that’s why Inarian won’t let me be his reaper? He doesn’t want anyone to be hurt. And Jigsaw?”
Ledger grumbles. “He’s a pussy.”
I punch his arm.
“He is. The fucker never wanted to be a hound. He doesn’t want to be a protector.”
“Who really does?” Hazen whispers. “I don’t want to be a hound either… This isn’t the life that I choose to have. Who wants to be a hound when you could have been born a reaper? We use our powers, and we have aftereffects because they are too much. Ledger stays heated for hours and can’t cool down. Inarian get frostbite. Jigsaw gets toxic cracks everywhere. And me? I jolt like someone is electrocuting me.”
I watch his face as he stares off, ranting. His blue eyes meet mine.
“We are used to it, but we shouldn’t have to be. Reaper’s treat us like we are expendable. If we die, they get more. If they die, no one wants us because we can’t protect them. It’s an endless cycle…”
I touch Hazen, feeling his worked-up nerves through a jolt. But I don’t show that I feel it. “I will do everything in my power to make sure you don’t feel like that. You are all just as important to me as my life is. I’d never want to see any of you hurt.”
Hazen lifts my fingers and kisses them.
Ledger pulls me down to lay flat. “No more fucking. Bedtime.” He wraps his arm around my waist before Hazen lays down and lets me lay on his chest.
“I thought you didn’t want to cuddle,” I mutter to Ledger, rubbing my ass against his hips.
“Shut the fuck up before I put your ass to sleep,” he mutters, settling on his arm as an added pillow.
“Oh…”How would he do that? A hard pounding? A spanking?
“Go to bed!” Ledger snaps.
I giggle, snuggling between my two men.
I move down the stairs, going to the kitchen for a drink. Devil, Asura’s dad, and Thatcher, Khazon’s dad, lean against the island, whispering to each other. They stop talking immediately, although I know they aren’t talking about anything special. Just the academy and the first day tomorrow.
I nod at them to say hello.
“Inarian,” the Devil says. “Are you related to Leighann and Micha?”
My eyes look up at him, trying to gage how much he knows about my family. “My parents.” I move to the fridge and grab a bottled water.
“I am sorry for your loss, son.”
Biting my inner cheek, I nod and turn around. “Thank you.” Quickly, I move from the room.
But I don’t make it past the doorway before he decides to speak to me again. “A lot of money, you probably inherited.”
