Page 30 of A Study of Blood and Ichor

When I returned to the truck, I held up a singular room key and Ava narrowed her eyes on it.

“Where’s the other one?” she asked.

“What do you mean?” I bit back the playful smirk at her confused expression.

“I thought you would get adjoining rooms.”

“Well, they’re booked, sweetheart. And a few hours stuck together in the same room isn’t going to kill you.” I raised my wrist and pointed at the angry red mark stamped around it. “Besides, I thought you didn’t want me out of your sight.”

Her eyes flared, and she muttered a string of colorful curses under her breath as she rolled the window back up. She slammed the door shut and walked behind me until we reached our room.

The overwhelming stench of stale cigarette smoke washed over us as soon as I opened the door. Ava wrinkled her nose as she brushed past me and gave the singular queen size bed a half-glance, then threw her bag onto the small coffee table in front of the couch and shut herself in the bathroom with another slam of the door.

This couldn’t have worked out better if I had tried, Vain said, sounding more than pleased.

Let’s just hope she doesn’t end up killing us in our sleep.

I can see the way she looks at you, Rory. She wouldn’t risk hurting you. Me, on the other hand…

Vain’s curiosity dragged my eyes to Ava’s bag.

You’re the worst, you know that?

I tore it open and rifled through the contents. There wasn’t anything in there I hadn’t already expected, books and papers, some white chalk, and a few blades—all pretty standard, I assumed, for a demonologist.

When I heard rushing water from the bathroom sink, I shoved her bag back into place on the table and sat on the edge of the bed. Ava strode out with her arms crossed over her chest, still sporting that same scowl that appeared to be permanently etched onto her face. She jutted her hip out to one side as she glared.

Let me have a turn, Vain purred.

He crept into the forefront, and through Vain’s eyes, I watched Ava’s facial features twinge at the switch.

It was almost funny how hard she tried to hide her emotions from us, even though by this point I was familiar with most of her tells. I'd even grown particularly fond of the little nose wrinkles that appeared whenever she tried to hide a grimace.

“You still look angry with me,” Vain said.

Even after all these years, it was still jarring sometimes to hear Vain speak through me. It was my voice, but not. When Vain spoke, his tone had a velvety-smooth dark edge to it that I didn’t possess. And I could admit that hearing it sometimes scared me a little.

“I thought you might be a bit more frightened.”

Ava squared her shoulders and said, “You don’t scare me, Vain.”

“You don’t sound very sure of that, mellilla.”

“You won’t hurt me.”

Vain tsked once and rose off the bed. His smirk grew wider when he took a predatory step toward Ava and she backed away. “You don’t know the half of what I’m capable of.”

Vain halted once she had backed herself into the wall. It would have been so easy for him to take her right then and there. His desire to claim her burned in my chest, yet there was a hesitation keeping him restrained that I couldn’t place. Vain was a demon who took what he wanted, however and whenever he wanted it, so why the hell was he holding back?

What are you doing? I asked.

Playing.

She’s not a toy.

He reached out and rested his knuckles under Ava’s chin to tip it up delicately so she was forced to look up into our eyes. She was trying not to shake or show anything that would betray her fear.

She was strong. I’d give her that.

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