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I laugh right along with him, and man, does it feel good to be standing here, surrounded by trees and laughing so hard tears are streaming down my face. The guys drift closer, likely wondering what has us cracking up, but I just wave them away. They won’t think it’s as funny as we do. At all.
When we’ve finally stopped with our moment of hilarity. I nod. “Okay, I think I know what I want.”
Cohen doesn’t ask what it is. I guess that’s because he’s going to see it here momentarily. Or at least I hope he will. “Great, so what you’re going to do is feel for the shadow in your body. It should feel like a slightly foreign object, like… a shirt or a piece of jewelry. You know it’s there and you can feel it if you think about it, but mostly you just kind of… ignore it.”
I close my eyes and do a little searching around for it. He’s right. Now that I’m looking for it, feeling for it, the black mass on my arm has some weight to it, like a pendant hanging between my breasts or a watch on my wrist.
“Okay, I feel it.”
“Good,” Cohen’s voice is low and soothing. “Now you’re going to peel it off your skin, just like you’d do with a piece of clothing. As it leaves your skin, use your mind to urge it into the shape you want.”
I know his instructions sound vague. How am I supposed to pull something off my body if I can’t physically touch it? But when he says it, something just clicks in my head and I do exactly as he instructed. The shadow peels up from my skin, and as it does, I ask it to shape into the form I’ve picked.
I know, Cohen said to urge it, but theoretically, the umbra demons should have minds of their own, thoughts and feelings and all that, so I think asking is the more polite thing to do. “So fucking good,” Cohen murmurs. “Damn, wildcard. I knew you were strong, but this is…”
My eyes flicker open and there, standing in front of me, is a man. I frown.
The other guys approach this time, and Hardin wraps an arm around my waist. “You felt you needed to add another dick to this situation, love?”
My elbow connects with his abs, and he lets out a satisfying oof of pain. “Take a closer look, love,” I mock back.
The man is tall, taller than Gideon, and broader than him too, but not bulky. He’s dressed in all black—t-shirt, leather pants, boots. The dark color is in stark contrast to his pure white skin and glowing orange eyes. A pair of sharp canines press into his full lower lip. His long fingers are tipped in dark claws. Peeking out of the top of his curly dark orange hair is a pair of white tipped orange ears, and emerging from the back of his black pants are six fluffy orange tails, also tipped in white.
He’s fucking gorgeous. Absolutely otherworldly, and if I look at him for too long, I might just drool.
“Kitsune,” Gideon murmurs.
The umbra demon inclines his head at me, and I nod back. A show of respect. After all, I summoned him accidentally, and he showed up, eager to help in whatever way he could, even if it was just to blind everyone.
I smile at him. “Hi.”
Cohen snickers and I turn my head to glare at him. He holds up a hand toward me. “Hey, don’t look at me like that, wildcard. It’s just that in my experience, the shadows don’t really talk.”
I’m opening my mouth to say something back, when a deep voice says, “Hi,” back to me. We all whip our heads back to the Kitsune in front of us.
My lips twitch as I glance at Cohen. “See? Maybe your shadows don’t talk to you because you didn’t give them the option of speech.”
He cups one elbow in his hand and taps his chin with one long finger. “You might be right, Ro. Maybe I should have given them the ability to talk.”
I turn my attention back to the Kitsune in front of me and give a wide smile. “I’m Rosalind Sweeney.” My hand darts into the space between us. “You can call me Ro. It’s so nice to meet you. Thank you for coming when I asked.”
The fox man looks between my hand and my eyes for a moment, before he carefully, cautiously slips his clawed fingers into mine. “I could not resist the call, little warrior. I had to fight many to come to you.”
I look down at his hand and then back up at his orange gaze. “Well, I’m glad you came. What can we call you?”
The shadow considers for a moment. “I have no name. What would you desire to call me?”
That almost sounds like… is he flirting with me? That can’t be right. He wouldn’t flirt with me, not after I summoned him and bound him to me without realizing what I was doing. I shake my head.No, Rosalind Juliet. The demon is not flirting with you.
“Oh, um,” I glance at the guys. “I don’t know. I’ve never named someone before.”
“Kit,” Hardin suggests, and the umbra’s lip curls back in a snarl.
“Greg.”
“Foster.”
The boys keep throwing out names that don’t make any sense and the umbra demon just keeps staring at me, waiting for me to utter a name. I get the feeling that as soon as I say something, he’s going to latch onto it, so I don’t want to just throw something out there. I really think about it.
