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"Is everything all right?"
His red eyes darkened as they turned to me. His expression was inscrutable, but something in his gaze made my heart stutter. "Bad news?"
He rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand. "Fay, we need to talk."
Uh oh. That didn't sound good. Instinctively I walled off my heart, calling myself a stupid moron for having fallen for his charms, good looks, and let's be honest, his body. I should have known that whatever this was between us was too good to be true. Now would be the moment he would tell me that all this had been just one giant setup to get me to go to bed with him and to pack up and leave.
The funny thing was that not for one second had I thought that leaving should have been my foremost desire, because it would mean leaving this spaceship, a freaking spaceship that should have frightened the hell out of me. It would mean I could go and see my family.
Instead, I only feared losing him.
Stupid, right?
"There are things you don't know," Azazel continued. "Including what I did, had to do, last night."
I tilted my head and managed a weak smile to encourage him to go on.
"I have six brothers. We are called the Princes of Darkness, the sons of the King of Darkness, even though he is not our father."
He got up from the bed and moved to a wall where, to my surprise, built-in drawers opened. His cock was still erect and gave him a hard time when he tried to stuff it into his pants.
"We are here on a… quest. Every seven or so hundred years, theAsphodelreturns to Earth to harvest seven Nayphyllym maidens who are supposed to be married to the seven Princes of Darkness—us."
I grabbed a pillow and, using it like a shield, I pressed it against my chest as if that would protect my heart from being hurt.
"Last night was the choosing ceremony."
Part of me already anticipated what he was going to say, and still my heart hurt as if being pierced by a sharp dagger when he said, "I had to choose a bride."
"But…"What about me? I wanted to scream, but thankfully bit my tongue just in time. Did I really want to know what kind of fucked-up game he and his family were playing? Did I really want to get even more entangled than I already was? I should be happy to be sent on my way. "Are you going to send me back to Earth then?" I asked. My voice didn't waver, but even I could hear the unspoken plea in it and cussed myself.
He rushed to the bed, knelt in front of it, and took my hand. "Never, Fay, never. You are my karamia."
Confused, I looked at him. He took my hand and placed it on his chest. "Do you feel this?"
I nodded. Yes, I felt his beating heart.
"I'm over three hundred and fifty years old, Fay, and in all that time, it has never beat once, not until I met you yesterday."
Astonished, I stared at him. Over three hundred and fifty years old? I swallowed. Yesterday I might have taken a lot in stride, but today seemed to be the day of reckoning, as not only his words, but the entire reality of where I was and what had happened sank in with me.
I should have focused on many other things and questions. Instead, I homed in on one part of his statement. "You never had a heartbeat before?"
"Never." He looked so sincere that I believed him, and that little fact made my heart flutter. It shouldn't have, but it did. I was falling for this alien faster and harder than should have been possible.
"You are my life, Fay, my heartbeat. You are everything. I would do anything for you. I would defy the King of Darkness for you, but I don't want you to meet him. I don't want him to see you and find out about you. This is why I picked a bride yesterday. Only to keep you safe. You don't know Behlial; he is a sadistic monster who thrives on the pain of others."
"So what are you saying?" I was confused. "Are you going to keep your bride," I nearly choked on that word, "and expect me to be your… mistress?"
My hand was still pressed against his chest and picked up on the slow increase of his heartbeat. "Our ship is called theAsphodel." I had never heard that word before and yet, a cold shudder moved through me. "TheAsphodeltravels from Elysian, our home planet, to Adama, what you call Earth, and then to Tartarus." Another shiver moved through me; I had heardthatname before. My mind tried to remember from where, and when I did, my heart stuttered. Tartarus was a sort of hell in Greek legend.
"The journey takes approximately seven hundred years. During that time, the Princes of Darkness are expected to sire seven sons." From hisbride, I thought, and anger rose in me. She was supposed to give him a son. "And kill each other in the meantime."
Wait, what?
I pulled my hand back and stared at him uncomprehendingly. "You and your brothers are supposed to kill each other?"
He nodded. "Yes."
