Sinners' Kingdom #1: The Book of Lust (Complete)

12

I lost all feeling in my legs. The only reason I didn't crash to the floor was because an arm wrapped around my waist, holding on with almost bruising tightness. The flex of muscle in the forearm as it slid across my lower back made my entire body shudder. In an instant, it had understood the sheer strength in that touch and that there was no fighting it.

He had moved so fast I never saw it, only a blur as he slipped out of the mirror and caught me before I fell. But I saw him now. White hair. Rippling muscles. The body of a god — with red eyes so familiar they made my heart stop.

No. This was another dream. There was no way this was happening, no way he was here. Wasn't possible.

"Step away from the witch, demon," one of the hunters ordered, though the quietness of his voice softened the blow of what should have been a firm command. Fear. I recognized it, because I felt the same way.

"Step away...?" the strangely echoing, liquid-solid tone of his voice remained. It was like he was speaking in a grand, empty hall instead of a cramped foyer. "You can have that witch. I'm keeping this one."

Something moved in the corner of my eye. I glanced at it, only my eyes moving since I didn't dare move any other part of my body. Was that his tail? Arrow-tipped, flexible, waving — though the end remained pointed firmly at Juliet, who stared openmouthed.

The hunters' hands were on their weapons already, thick batons at their hips. They could draw them. Should be drawing them. But there was only one thought going through all of our heads in that moment.

If they moved, they were going to die. They would die like flies smashed into the wall, no chance of fighting back, no chance of survival.

It was the sheer power he exuded. The demon. The nightmare. The thing that haunted all my dreams.

The Seventh Prince of Demons.

Asmodeus, Prince of Lust.

Here, in the flesh.

His arms tightened around me, fingers caressing the small of my back through my shirt. He didn't even face the hunters or Juliet anymore, all but ignoring them as he pressed his nose into my hair and inhaled deeply, as if he were breathing for the first time in his life. He held it, too, absorbing it all before letting out a gentle exhale that drove a shiver down my spine. With it, he murmured something against my hair, the foreign words unknowable to me but full of power, aching with it, swelling. I shivered again.

"I won't say it again," the hunter warned, his voice even lower this time. "Step away from her. Right now."

He still paid them no attention, keeping his face against mine as he stroked my back, each caress going microscopically lower. That is, until he replied. "Step away? From my woman? Why, so you can take her? I heard it all. You won't take her anywhere."

"The Coven doesn't listen to demons like you—"

His voice transformed, still echoing but now deadly keen, the hiss of a thousand knives being sharpened whispering underneath:

"Touch her and you die."

That should have been warning enough. Every instinct warned me that if they didn't listen to him, it was over — how could they not see that? Why did those two men still stare at him in obstinate determination? Did they think they were going to be heroes, facing down something a hundred thousand times stronger than them? How could they not sense the deadly intent pouring from him even when he wasn't trying—

The hunters drew their batons. Or tried, anyway.

If I didn't do something, it was the last thing they would ever do.

It happened in slow motion. Their hands, tightening around the black batons on their belt, the most minute first movement of pulling them out. Juliet, her mouth open in a silent scream as she pressed herself to the wall, about to cast a defensive spell. The demon, his tail whipping around and extending, becoming long enough to slice across the six feet of space separating us from everyone else and going for the hunters' throats—

And me. Me, yanking on the demon with no sense of self-preservation to throw off his aim.

Because I just had to be a big damn hero about everything, didn't I?

But you know what? To hell with it. Because it worked.

Kind of.

I braced both feet for maximum leverage and pulled on his arm with all my strength. He was far bigger and heavier than me, but it wasn't always the size that counted, right? I told myself that over and over as time slowed even more, my brain working overtime to squeeze every drop of possible survivability out of this disaster. I had to save them, those dunces who didn't even realize what they were up against. It was a Prince! A Prince! What chance did they have if I didn't do something to save them!

And like a miracle, the resistance that met my grip slackened suddenly. The demon... folded, bending to my will.

Oh, my God. I was doing it. I was doing it — I was going to take him and drive him to the ground in a judo flip, save the day—

He slammed me into the wall. Not hard enough to hurt, but it took the wind out of me... because he pressed himself against my thigh and ground something hard into it with a groan.

"Those two are getting away with their lives because of Sable," he said after a beat. "You should take them and go before I change my mind about you, too."

Scattered and frozen, I didn't realize who he was talking to at first. But Juliet's shadow on the wall hurried away, and the sound of the door opening broke the silence, along with the howling wind blasting in from the outside. Then dragging noises, the crunching of snow, like she had grabbed the fallen, bleeding hunters and taken them with her out into the storm.

"Close the door behind you, witch," the demon whispered, loud enough for her to hear. "Sable and I are going to have a long, private talk."

The door closed.