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I turned to him. “Did you know?”
Trent was the one who paled now. “I suspected, but I wasn’t sure.”
“He’ll always be able to find my son.” I put a hand on my belly.
“Of course.” Tix had a confused expression on his face, as though he wasn’t seeing the problem. “How else would I be able to serve the youngling? I’m already preparing a nursery and training our staff. Do you know how long it’s been since we have had a child to raise? Everyone is thrilled. It’s precisely why I have to get rid of that chaos demon. They shouldn’t be around fragile halflings. Not that our boy will truly be fragile.”
“Not yours.” I backed away. “Never yours. This child is mine and Trent’s, and he won’t be Gray’s if I find out he understood what he was doing.”
He’d promised me. He’d promised that Hell wouldn’t be able to touch our child, that our son would be protected.
It was the only reason I’d been willing to have a child with him at all. No amount of sweet visions of children would have tempted me if I’d known they could be dragged to Hell at any moment.
“I cannot harm the child.” Tix was back to looking vulnerable. “I serve the child as I serve you and your husband. I don’t understand. You have a demonic butler on this plane. Why wouldn’t you have one in your true home?”
“I will never allow my son to descend,” I vowed. “And you let your master know that. Now, is it true that you must obey me because I’m carrying your master’s child?”
Tix blinked, studying me. “Yes, mistress. You have to understand that demonic pregnancies slightly change the DNA of the mother to allow her to carry the child. That change is permanent. All of my instincts and senses view you as a member of the House of Sloane. Not by marriage but by right of blood.”
No one had mentioned that to me either, though I did know that sometimes pregnancy could make minute but permanent changes to maternal DNA.
Betrayal washed over me. I was pregnant, and now all of Hell would view me as property. I’d known that would happen, but I hadn’t known I was accepting a demonic tracker so they could always bring me back to their master.
I was in shock, and there wasn’t a lot I could do about it. I would have to talk to Hugo. Hugo could help solve this. He could find a legal way out of this, but Hugo was back in Iceland and I was stuck here.
Actually, there was something I could do. “Leave.”
That hand came back to Tix’s chest. “Me? You wish me to leave? But I only just got here. I was hoping you would go over the nursery plans with me.”
It was too much. “Get out. Get out now. If what you say is true, you must obey…”
I was left with the smell of brimstone and no demon in the hallway.
“Kelsey…” Trent began.
“Did he know?”
“Mom, I don’t think it’s all about the baby.” Fenrir stared down at me. “Tix is a tricky fellow, and as nice as he can seem, you have to remember they all like to sow discord. Not Eddie, of course, but that’s part of his nature. Satans seek organization and a version of justice. Tix is a regular old demon, and no matter how reasonable they seem if they can cause harm they will. Don’t forget your arm.”
“Baby, the fact that you get demonic skin and claws when you fight proves that your DNA was already changed,” Trent said quietly. “I don’t know if it occurred to Gray that Tix would be able to find you because of that. He didn’t grow up in a demonic home. He grew up here.”
“Oh, but it would have been in the contracts.” There were always contracts. Always. Even if it’s not on paper, there’s a contract when it comes to a demon, and Gray did know that. When Trent tried to say something else, I held up a hand. “No more. We still have a job to do.”
Trent sighed as though infinitely weary.
I hated that I was the one making him that way. I moved to stand in front of him, wanting to stave off his worries. “I don’t blame you. I don’t blame the baby. Hell, the truth of the matter is I’m sure I won’t blame Gray at the end, but you have to know I’m going to find a way out of this. I’m not going to let them have a connection to my child.”
“Our child,” Trent corrected. “And we’re already working on it.”
I had to be content with that for now. “How long will he stay away?”
“As long as you command, but you didn’t exactly give him a timeline,” Evan pointed out. “And you should know that his connection to Gray holds sway over everything else. You could tell him to do one thing and Gray another and he’ll do what Gray wants. Even telling him to stay away from you won’t keep him from Gray.”
So at least I knew the rules. I had to hope that Gray would keep our son safe. I would still study up on all the laws that bound a demon like Tix, but I had to let it go for now. For now I still had a mystery to solve, and being worried about the future wasn’t going to help me. Tomorrow the primals would be finished with their death rituals and we could focus on the prophecy I’d brought back. I needed to figure out who’d murdered Alvis and what those paintings had to do with it so I could focus on the fact that Myrddin wanted to gift the Earth plane to a bunch of demons and then nothing would matter.
I brushed my lips against Trent’s to let him know we were okay. I wasn’t sure what I would do with Gray, but Trent and I were cool. Then I turned and strode down the hallway toward the apartment that housed Relda and Jade.
“I’ll contact Hugo tomorrow and get him started on the problem with Tix.” Evan rushed to stay at my side.
