Page 89 of The Devil and His Sparrow

Zagan

I LEANED MY HEAD ON the doorframe, careful to stay quiet as I peered into Iyla’s room. Her hands rested under her cheek, and her lips were slightly parted as she slept soundly. We’d stayed out late into the night, and I’d kept her busy dancing and fucking. By the time we were done, I’d had to carry an exhausted Iyla to the shower and then to bed. She was still asleep, and I wasn’t about to wake her.

This week had been eye-opening. My world had turned upside down with the realization of what Iyla meant to me, and when I looked at her now, I still reeled from the truth of it.

She probably had no idea how I felt—hell, I barely knew—and I wasn’t sure how or if I should say it. I mean, would she want a demon’s affection? She was everything good in the world, and I was the embodiment of sin. For the first time in my long-ass existence, I worried about tainting her with my darkness. But I also wanted to share it with her. I wanted to give all I had to her and do everything I could to make her happy.

If she wanted a piano, I’d get her an entire music hall. If she wanted to travel the world, I’d give her wings to fly. If she wanted a star, I’d soar up to the sky and gather her the whole goddamn galaxy. Anything, if only to see her smile.

The familiar itch in the back of my mind started up, and I straightened, my heart suddenly beating hard. I quickly turned on my heel and raced down both flights of stairs to the recording studio. I couldn’t take in a full breath as my shaky fingers grabbed the blank music sheet and pencil. I ran back up the stairs and made my way to the grand piano, placed the paper and pencil on the music desk, and reached my trembling hands out as the notes and words suddenly poured out of me.

My eyes closed as the slow, romantic melody and lyrics spilled from inside of me like a geyser that finally erupted. I couldn’t even stop to write down the notes and the words. I couldn’t stop singing or playing, not until the song ended and my breathing evened out.

“Holy shit,” I mumbled in the quiet of the ballroom.

The sweet hum of inspiration still lingered in my chest, burning brightly like the sun. It had been so long since I’d felt its presence inside me, and feeling it now as I thought of Iyla made adrenaline rush through my bloodstream.

She was what I’d been missing.

She was what I’d needed to find myself again.

The song was rough around the edges. It needed work and fine-tuning, but it was a start to what I knew I could do. The buzz of life that I’d missed so much but felt now was proof of that.

I’d just finished jotting down the first chord on the music sheet when my phone vibrated in my back pocket. I pulled it out of my jeans and tried to contain my annoyed huff when I saw Leo’s name on the display.

“Yeah?” I answered, rubbing my forehead. I’d just gotten into things, and already, I felt the song slipping away from me again.

“I’m outside your house,” Leo announced, his voice all business. “Let me in.”

My irritation spiked, and I hung up without another word. Getting up, I went to the front door and opened it to find the big bald man in his business-casual shirt and slacks.

“Zagan,” Leo boomed. “Good to see you.” The hulking man swept past me and stood in the center of the room, surveying the expansive living room and kitchen. “I haven’t seen your place yet. Looks good.”

I shut the front door and leaned against it as I leveled my blank stare on my manager. “I’m sure you aren’t here to see what my house looks like. So what? You here to gripe about us going on hiatus?”

Leo raised his brows and placed his hands on his hips. “Hiatus?” He chuckled and shook his head. “I wish that’s what this was about. I can deal with you guys taking a break from releases and concerts. What I can’t deal with is the fans’ outrage over this new rumor going around.”

My brow furrowed. “Rumor? What rumor?”

The guys and I weren’t privy to most gossip that circulated about Sinners Do It Better. We didn’t give two shits about what humans had to say or what they whispered about us, so tuning in to talk about the band wasn’t something we did. We all had social media platforms, because that was the only way to promote yourself these days, but even that was out of our hands. Leo ran our accounts. I didn’t even know what my socials looked like.

Was it smart letting a rapist control our accounts? Sure.

The one time he thought he could revert back to his human ways and be a pervy sleeze with our faces, he learned the hard way how wrong he’d been. He’d been strapped to a bed where Coldin then peeled each layer of skin off his dick, shoving the bloody, flappy pieces into his throat to choke on. And that was just Coldin’s first stage of torture. I didn’t know what else the demon did as punishment. I didn’t want to lose my dinner by asking. To make things even better, Leo was forced to stay awake the entire time, thanks to a little demon magic, and no matter what he endured, he couldn’t die.

Leo sighed at my lack of awareness and pulled out his phone. After tapping away a bit, he held it up for me to see some article with a photo of me and Iyla leaving Bloomings and another of the two of us dancing at the club Addie took us to. I skimmed the article, digesting the anger in the writer’s voice as they accused me of dating in secret and not being available for my fans. They linked my “relationship” to the reason for the lack of new music and our recently announced hiatus.

Even after years of being in the music industry, it blew my mind when people got like this. Humans had a tendency to make claims on things and people they idolized, despite there being no foundation for it. I didn’t know this author or even ninety-eight-percent of my fans, yet they felt some sort of ownership of me, because I was their prized idol. If they couldn’t have me all to themselves, no one could. I’d seen the same scenario play out countless times where a musician or some other celebrity started a relationship and people attacked that significant other for trying to keep the celebrity to themselves.

It was bad rep for the person coming into the relationship, the celebrity, and their success rate. Announcements of a supposed relationship were typically followed by a decrease in viewership and sales.

Meeting Leo’s gaze again, I shrugged. “So?”

Leo gave me an incredulous look. “So? So we need to play clean-up. Now. You’ve been seen multiple times with this girl, and fans are getting pissy about it. Is it true? Are you dating?”

I walked past him to head for the kitchen, sparing a fleeting glance for the stairwell that led to Iyla’s room. I hoped she was still fast asleep and not listening to this bullshit. The relentless bastard was right on my heels.

“It’s no one’s business if I’m dating.” I grabbed a water from the fridge and turned back to Leo whose knuckles had gone white as he gripped his phone. “Let them think what they want.”

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