Page 46 of Deals and Daggers

My black tank top was covered in dirt. Dark red substances crusted my back where the demon’s blood had seeped onto me.

Alek killed him for touching me.

Good. He deserved to die.

I wasn’t sure when my opinions changed, or maybe I had always been this cold, but seeing Alek kill those demons…

It didn’t bother me at all.

He did that for me. To protect me. To save me.

I used to think that Alek was a killer. A monster. A blood-sucking demon, willing to sacrifice anyone or anything to get what he wanted.

Now, I knew he would sacrifice, yes, but he would do it for me.

He would do all of this for me.

Alek came back, stepping into the space behind me and wrapping me in his warmth. “Let’s wash this blood off you, okay?”

He didn’t try to avoid me, didn’t try to keep his perfect skin free from the bloodstains.

He slid his fingers under my black tank top and waited for me to lift my arms.

I did, letting him pull the wet fabric up and over my head. Then I was lifting my legs, letting Alek kneel before me and pull the boots from my feet. His hands did not shake. They did not quiver.

Mine, though? I was beginning to feel it again: that fear.

“She came for me,” I whispered. Alek quickly stood, meeting my gaze as his fingers hovered over the waist of my jeans. “Theia came for me, but it wasn’t to bring me back to her dungeon. It was to warn me.”

“Don’t listen to a thing she says,” Alek growled. “She wants something from you. She could easily close the veil herself, and yet she put that on your shoulders. This is her way of punishing you; you know it is.”

A sob escaped me, one I couldn’t even begin to hold back. My entire body shook from the force of it, and the tears I had been fighting poured down my cheeks.

“Hands on my shoulders,” Alek ordered. He worked with more urgency as I did what I was told, bracing myself on him as he slid my jeans down my legs, helping me step out of them one foot at a time. “That’s my girl,” he whispered.

He left me in my bra and underwear, peeling off his own shoes and jacket before sliding his hand around my waist and guiding me to the shower.

The tears didn’t stop. Neither did the sobs—the body wracking, earth-shattering cries that came out of me.

This wasn’t me. I knew that. To be this weak? This helpless? This… this pathetic?

I had tried so hard to be anything but this girl. That was all I ever wanted in life, wasn’t it? Freedom? Strength?

What was this?

I was still shattering under Theia’s words, quivering under the weight of her presence.

Alek felt the water with his hand before helping me inside. It was the largest shower I had ever seen, with stone on either side instead of a basic shower curtain. There was easily enough room for both of us to stand under the water that poured like a waterfall from the ceiling, which I was eternally grateful for as soon as that hot water hit my skin.

Alek’s arms were the only thing forcing me to stand.

“It’s okay.” He used his free hand to brush the blood from my skin. “It’s okay, Lyra.”

Those dark, bloodied hands of my demon moved with a soft tenderness, one that I barely felt as they worked through my hair and along my neck, my back.

Alek was strong, but he was soft. He was terrifying, but gentle, and he was mine.

“How am I supposed to close the veil?” I whispered. “I can’t even—I don’t know how to—”

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