Page 90 of Inflamed By an Incubus

“Can’t you just teleport us to the bottom of the shaft?” She wasn’t a fan of dark, cramped spaces, or of getting squashed by a lift when someone else called it.

He shook his head. “I can only teleport where I can see. You could probably manage it.”

Crawling into a dark, dangerous place it was then. She wasn’t going to risk her life, and his, by attempting to teleport somewhere she had never seen. She had read enough research papers on species that could teleport to know that it was possible to teleport into a solid space and suffocate before escaping.

No, thank you.

She placed her right foot onto Fenix’s hand, gripped his shoulders and drew down a steadying breath as he lifted her, quickly sending her towards the hole that was already looking too small. It was panic talking. The square hole was plenty big enough for someone twice her size.

It didn’t stop her arms from trembling so much that she found it hard to pull herself up as she gripped the edges of the hole. Maybe she wasn’t as strong as she had thought. Or the idea of getting on top of a lift frightened her more than she had realised. She hung there, breathing through a wave of panic as images of a black space filled her mind together with a long drop to the bottom of the elevator shaft.

She gasped as Fenix planted his hands against her backside and shoved, heat rolling through her to have her cheeks burning and heart racing for another reason as his fingers dug into her bottom.

And he lingered.

“Are you going to help me here or what?” he snapped.

It hit her that he wasn’t lingering, taking advantage and enjoying holding her backside—he was waiting for her to pull herself onto the top of the lift. Only she had frozen the second his warm hands had pressed into her flesh, stirring wicked needs in her that were startling in their intensity.

She shook off those needs and grabbed the first two things that looked solid enough to bear her weight, and hauled herself up, tilting forwards onto her belly at the same time.

Fenix grunted as her boot hit him in the face.

She pushed up off her stomach and scrambled to face the hole, peered into it and whispered, “Sorry.”

He rubbed a spot on his chin and scowled at her.

Evelyn offered her hand, feeling like she was extending an olive branch to him as he huffed and reluctantly took it. She expected to struggle to lift his weight, but it was impossibly easy to pull him up towards the hole. Incredible. She scratched her previous thought. She was strong. It just disappeared whenever she let fear get the better of her.

She sat back to give him room as he grabbed the sides of the hole and hauled himself up, her eyebrows pinned high on her forehead as she marvelled at how strong she was.

“How come I’m suddenly like Supergirl? Surely I should have noticed how strong I was before?” She kept her voice low, not wanting to rouse suspicion.

Fenix quietly closed the access panel and everything went dark.

For a few seconds.

Her eyes adjusted, revealing him again.

Another perk? She could see in the dark. At least enough to make out details. It made the thought of being in an elevator shaft far less terrifying.

“Not sure,” Fenix grunted as he stood and gripped the mass of thick metal cables attached to the centre of the lift car. “Might be that Archer was feeding you something laced with a potion to suppress your abilities. Might be a spell he needed to periodically renew.”

Either way, Fenix thought Archer had something to do with it and he didn’t sound happy about it, had that growl to his voice again, the one that made her feel he wanted to kill Archer.

Evelyn still wasn’t sure how she felt about him. Archer had done terrible things, but he had been good to her too. He had brought her back from death, and in the last few minutes she had seen him, he had looked as if he genuinely regretted how things had turned out.

“You’re awfully quiet. Thinking about your lover?” Fenix snarled those words.

She ignored him, because in her heart she knew he was only saying it to rile her and make her hate him a little, which was pointless. She was starting to feel more and more certain that she had already fallen for him, and her death in the Fifth Realm had been thanks to the curse.

Which meant she was responsible for the death of her teammates. She had fallen for Fenix and fate had set her on the path to being captured just so it could kill her as the curse dictated. She had gotten everyone killed with her. Not quite everyone. Archer had survived, and he had saved her. But still, there was so much blood on her hands. Many in her team had been her friends. Not as close to her as Archer, but she had cared about them. She rubbed her stomach through her T-shirt as she felt queasy and her heart felt heavy.

“Hey now, love,” Fenix murmured and brushed his hand down her arm, the light caress soothing her. “What’s with the shift in mood?”

The soft look he gave her made her feel he was worried he had caused it.

She wasn’t sure whether she liked or hated the fact he could feel it whenever her mood changed course. In a way, it made her feel as if she wasn’t alone, and it always revealed that for all his bark and bite, Fenix cared deeply about her.

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