Page 39 of Devil May Lie

“Do something,” he demanded, hands tightening into fists at his sides. This was pathetic.

“What do you want me to do?” Madden asked.

“Anything.” Yeah, super pathetic. But he could still make out a speck of pink from the corner of his eye and he was more afraid of that than anything the Mad King could potentially do.

“How much can you feel, exactly?”

He frowned. “What?”

“Your emotional range,” Madden reiterated. “What is it? Because I’ve got to be honest, I’ve never seen you like this before, and it’s sort of turning me on.”

“You’re getting horny over the fact I’m panicking?” He’d judge him for that, but Berga didn’t really have the right to, all things considered.

He spent his free time thinking up new ways to take people apart, after all.

“It’s not that,” Madden corrected. “I was aroused when you were angry earlier, too. And when you were close to tears…Yeah, that was also hot. It’s sexy that you’re frantic right now, baby—”

“Baby?!” Absolutely not.

“—but it’s not that specific emotion that’s doing it for me. It’s the fact you’re emoting at all. Guess you really aren’t a robot, huh?”

Chapter 10:

Firstly, Madden needed to establish something. Quick.

Was this odd sensation he felt about sex, or was it something more?

If it was the first, then bending Berga over the sink and fucking him hard and fast would be satisfactory enough for the both of them. But if it was the latter…

He’d always assumed Berga was a psychopath. There weren’t many of them—at least, not many who were professionally diagnosed—but the guy clearly didn’t experience empathy and was either staring blankly or smirking like a loon. He also was quite out of touch with social norms and frequently said things he shouldn’t. Before today, Madden would have bet his life on the Butcher of the Brumal being a psycho, even.

But not after it.

Sure, psychopaths could experience emotions, but Berga had expressed a massive range of them in only a few short hours, and one of them had most definitely been heartbreak.

Who had he lost to cause that forlorn look on his face earlier? The one that had morphed into sheer terror. That was the expression he was trying—and failing—to hide now, as he stood across from Madden and actively avoided glancing to the right of the small gray-tiled room.

Considering the space of the rest of the place, the bathroom was surprisingly compact. There was a shower stall to the right next to the single sink, the toilet across from that, and the bathtub straight ahead. Even Madden’s bathroom at the Docks was twice as big, and for someone who came off as a neat freak, it was surprising that Berga had settled for such a tiny space.

It seemed like the more he learned about the Butcher, the more he realized he had absolutely no clue who he was.

That was going to change.

Madden took a step back toward the door, pausing when Berga’s hand shot out and grabbed his wrist. “Relax,” he patted his hand and then removed it, “I’m coming right back. Hold on.”

He hadn’t understood a lick of the magazine he’d been thumbing through when Berga had opened the bathroom door, but he figured he could at least correctly pronounce all of the words within. Grabbing that, he returned to the bathroom quickly, smiling comfortingly at the Butcher when he found the man standing exactly where he left him, that stricken expression still painted across his face.

It was a beautiful face, too. All soft edges—even the tips of his gemstone horns were more rounded off than anything. Safe enough they wouldn’t cut anyone while kissing.

Or giving head.

Or—

Madden snapped himself out of it and moved past Berga toward the bathtub. As much as he wanted to feel his tight body cinched around his cock again, now so wasn’t the right opportunity for it. There was a good chance this was about more than mere sex for him, and if that were the case, he had to handle this situation delicately.

“How hot do you like it?” he asked as he started the water, carefully twisting the dials until the water pouring out of the golden faucet was warm.

“Hot,” Berga replied after a brief hesitation, and Madden adjusted it.

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