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Dammit. She’d assumed he’d seen it through the slice in her shirt the last time they’d sparred, but she’d hoped he would think it was something less personal. Like the Cookie Monster, or Mickey Mouse, or the name of an ex.
“And you just happened to know what it was?”
A sheepish flush of pink spread across his cheeks. “I might have searched through DART’s database this morning.” He sank down cross-legged on the mat in front of her, his knees brushing her sweatpants. “What happened?”
“It’s not a big deal.” She really didn’t want to talk about this. The bottle in her hand started shaking, so she steadied it on her thigh. “It was a long time ago.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “When I was twelve, I went with some friends to a sleepover at Draven’s house. One particular breed of nightmare demon is attracted to groups of people sleeping. I guess we won the lottery that night. The demon linked all our dreams together and tried to make us fight to the death.”
“Holy crap.” She gripped the bottle so fiercely it crinkled under her fingers. “What happened? Obviously, you’re not dead.”
“Before any of us were killed, my, ah, dog broke in and woke us.”
He broke in? “You mean he barked and woke you?”
“What?” Logan blinked. “Oh. Yeah. He barked.” He reached out and gathered the loose laces on one of her shoes. “It was all kinds of fucked up, but it only happened that once.” He looked up at her as he tied a neat bow. “But you? It must have happened more than once if you got inked to protect yourself.” When she nodded, he gave her foot a gentle squeeze. “How old?”
“I was in first grade.”
He swore softly. “I’m sorry.”
She wanted to hate his pity. Pity was one of the reasons she never told anyone about the nightmares or the demon that had haunted her since shortly before her sixth birthday. But he was the first person she’d met who could relate even a little to what she’d gone through.
And, truthfully, it felt good to have someone attempt to comfort her. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had done that. She’d been raised by a mother and father who were from the buck-up-and-stop-whining school of parenting. And she was pretty sure The Aegis invented it, because you could get your arm bitten off by a demon, and the response would be, “That must have hurt, but you have another arm to fight with, so get back out there.”
So, yeah, for the first time, she wasn’t tempted to change the subject.
“Thank you,” she said. “The ward keeps the demon from entering my dreams, but it doesn’t keep it away.”
He scowled. “What do you mean? You see it?”
“No.” She shivered. “But I can feel it when I’m sleeping. It’s like it’s tapping on the walls of my dreams, trying to get in. Wakes me up a lot, and sometimes I have night terrors. I kind of hate sleeping.” She spent a fortune on undereye concealer, eye masks, and cucumbers.
Toying idly with her laces, he contemplated that for a moment. “Has anyone watched you sleep? To see if the demon is physically nearby?”
She looked up sharply. “What do you mean? It could be standing by my bed all night?” Holy shit, she was never sleeping again.
“It’s pretty unlikely,” he said. “Most species haunt their victims through a psychic link from inside Sheoul.”
Okay, that calmed her pulse down a little. “When my parents first began suspecting that I was being stalked by some sort of evil entity, they contacted The Aegis, and they said a demon’s spirit was haunting me, not a physical demon. They sent one of their people to tattoo the ward around my navel.”
It had been terrifying and painful, and she’d kept her eyes closed the entire time. Afterward, though, her parents had taken her for pizza and ice cream, and it had been one of the few times they’d showered her in cuddles instead of buck-up bullshit.
He nodded. “That’s where a lot of demons enter and exit. But if it was a spirit, why didn’t they contact DART? We could have trapped it and saved you a tattoo.”
Huh. “You know, I didn’t think of that. I’ll have to ask my parents.” She snorted. “Not looking forward to that conversation. They don’t like being reminded that their lives were disrupted for ten months, even though the whole thing is how they ended up partnering their law firm with The Aegis.”
“They’re upset about the inconvenience tothem? You’re the one who was probably so tormented you couldn’t sleep. It only happened to me that one time, and it was a month before I could sleep a full night through.”
“Did your parents think you were nuts?” Like hers had, until she began to get up in the mornings with cuts, bruises, and even a broken wrist. At that point, they finally set up a camera to catch whatever was going on.
His fond smile gave him a boyish charm, but there was nothing boyish about the deep rumble of his voice when he spoke.
“They took turns staying up with me. Mom would make cookies or popcorn and we’d watch old movies. Dad liked to drag me to the gym and make me work out until I fell asleep on the mat. Then he’d sit there all night while I slept.”
“Your parents sound really cool.”
“They’re good together. My sister and I had happy childhoods. Lots of travel and big events with the extended family. What about you? Do you have a big family?”
