Page 89 of Bad Demon

“This is my room.” I opened the door.

He walked in after me and shut it behind us, taking it all in. “It’s nice. Big.”

“Sutton and Phoebe have been teaching me magic,” I said, unable to hold in my excitement. “I can only do a few simple spells, but I feel this … power inside me. It’s big, Relic. I just don’t know how to reach it yet. Sutton said a lot of us struggle with our magic for a lot of different reasons. Mainly due to emotional blocks.”

This was hard, but I wanted to share this with Relic. I wanted him to know I wasn’t just the broken, frightened female he’d been forced to look after or the abused creature he’d rescued, that I was sorting my shit out.

“For me, I developed the block when I was a child. I was rejected by my family and my coven. They despised me so much for what I was, believed I was so below them that they sold me to a monster, not caring what happened to me. They rejected me in every way they could, so I rejected them the only way I could—by locking down my powers without even realizing I was doing it.”

“They fucking sold you to that monster?” Relic asked, and I didn’t miss that every vein and tendon I could see strained under his tattooed skin.

He’d seen me in that place after The Chemist did what he did best—torture me, so there was no reason to hide it, not anymore.

Still, I was scared. I hated talking about this part of my life. I realized I was tapping my fingers against my thigh, and took a steadying breath.

“When I was seven years old, my grandfather drove me out of the city and took me to a big building and handed me over to The Chemist.”

“The Chemist?”

“That’s what he calls himself. He does experiments. He’d make us sick, but I was the only one who didn’t die. No matter what he did to me, I survived. So when I got older, he’d let Ghoul feed on me until I couldn’t move, then pump me full of his newest poison, hoping that in my weakened state, his viruses would win out—”

“Who the fuck is Ghoul, Fern?” he snarled. “What do you mean, he fed on you?”

I swallowed thickly. “A blood drinker he kept in a hole in the basement. He’d starve him, then take me down there and he’d … drink from me. That’s why I didn’t want to drink from you, from anyone, why I was so scared I’d hurt you—”

Relic’s chest was rising and falling rapidly. “Because you’d been hurt.”

I nodded, licking my dry lips. “The Chemist couldn’t understand why I survived, why I recovered from everything he did to me. If his viruses were strong enough to kill full-blooded demons, immortals, then why not me? He wanted to create the ultimate demon-killing virus, and I guess he decided that I was the ultimate demon.”

“That’s why you were so sick when I found you—one of his viruses?” he growled, not waiting for an answer. “What else did he do? Did he force himself on you, Fern?”

Humiliation burned my face, even though I knew it wasn’t my fault and that I had nothing to be humiliated about. The thought of Relic finding me like that killed me. He’d probably thought he’d already seen me at my lowest, and then he’d walked in on an experiment, on my punishment.

“No, The Chemist never did that, but he’s been trying to develop a virus since I was a child, one that’s transmitted through bodily fluid. So, he injected his viruses—sometimes directly into my bloodstream, and sometimes, he put them inside me … in other ways.” Nausea churned in my stomach.

Relic’s eyes turned red, and his fingers were in tight fists. “I’m going to kill him, Fern. I need you to know that, to believe it. Whatever it takes, I will hunt that fucking sick fuck down, and I will make him scream until his throat is raw and he’s choking on his own blood. I’ll tear his limbs from his body one at a time before I gut him and force-feed him his own organs.”

I blinked over at him, my heart slamming in my chest. “That was very, um … creative.”

“I’m seriously fucking motivated.”

My lips curled up, and warmth filled me. Would he still care once I released him? Once I released his soul? “I appreciate it.”

“I need you to stay safe. If anything happens to you—”

“I haven’t left the house, and I don’t plan to, not until we know …” I slid my hands into my pockets. “Not until I know it’s safe.”

“Good. That’s good.” His gaze held mine, and his Adam’s apple slid up and down his throat. “I’ve missed you, sweetness.”

I wrapped my arms around myself. “I’ve missed you too,” I said, even though I knew I shouldn’t. Even though I knew it was pointless, that there was no future here. But for the first time in my life, it felt safe to open myself up to someone else. Relic was a good male; no matter what happened after all of this, I knew that with everything in me. “You have no idea how much.”

“I think I might,” he said.

I needed him to stop, or I couldn’t be held responsible for my actions. His scent filled my lungs, his warmth somehow reaching out and wrapping itself around me. When I was close to him, the numbness dissolved, exposing all my raw edges, and it was terrifying. He made me feel so goddamn strong, but also so incredibly weak. Everything about him terrified me and enticed me.

The silence of the room enveloped us.

“You make me feel warm,” I said, unable to keep the words in.

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