Page 13 of The Demon Prince's Accidental Mate
Chapter Seven
Belial
The continued arrogance of the tiny mortal continued to stun me.
“An apology?” I worked my jaw back and forth, trying to contain my anger.
Why am I bothering with this effort for someone like her? She doesn’t deserve leniency, not after what she did to me!
“But—”
“No.” I cut her off sharply enough that she flinched away from me.
I should have grinned at the sign of fear, a proper first step in putting things right. But I didn’t. My fingers curled into a fist, anger at myself beginning to burgeon in my chest.
No. Stop this. She is the one at fault. She deserves what’s coming to her. Remember what you told yourself you were going to do to her. It’s time she learned her fate.
Right.
“Words cannot undo the actions you already took,” I growled, slapping both hands flat on the counter hard enough to rattle it, producing a terrifiedeepfrom the woman.
The rest of the words died on my tongue. A fiery speech about how I was there to punish her for her misdeeds. To show her true pain and torment so that she would never again try to toy with her betters. I would rip the arrogance from her delicious body before I was done, a right and proper lesson on respect she clearly needed to learn.
Only I said nothing. Instead, I stared down at her quivering form with disgust. She wasn’t a threat to me. She wasn’t a threat to anyone.
My teeth ground together. Shewasa threat. She needed to atone for her sins. I would take that from her body, her mind, and her life so that she would never eventhinkof trying again.
That was what I knew Ishouldbe doing.
Yet the longer I looked into those eyes, so similar to my own with their golden flecks amid a sea of brown, I knew I couldn’t do any such thing. Not to her. The hurt in her gaze I had seen from across the street had been no deception. She was in pain long before I entered her life.
And so I, Belial, fifth son of Lucifer, demon prince of the Underworld, stood there and did nothing.
I couldn’t. All the wrath, pain, torture and humiliation, shame, agony, and delightful screams, the things I knew intimately well, they left me. Abandoned me, leaving me standing in the bakery of a tiny human and doingnothing.
In short, I hesitated. For a long time.
I did not freeze. It was a hesitation. That was it. But it was long enough that Lilith recovered some of her nerves.
“A-are you okay?” she asked.
My response should have been to lunge forward until I was well over the edge of the counter and snarl in her face. Show her that she should never question those superior to her. Make her quiver and quail in my presence.
Yet the words and show of my power never came. Icouldn’tinflict them on her. Internally, I was blazing hot with rage, to the point that I would have gladly burned the entire building down to make a point, something I had done for far less offense than someone trying to control my mind.
So, I forced out a snarl. It was half-hearted, nothing like my true potential, but it wassomething, and it sent Lilith scurrying away toward the door to the back of her shop with a wail of fear.
And my insides turned on themselves as I watched her run from me.
It was a simple exercise to beat her to the door. I moved like the wind, interposing myself between her and safety. She skidded to a halt, eyes opening wide before she slammed into my chest and bounced off, recoiling away from me.
She fell to her knees, her head craning up at me as if she feared I would reach down and snap her neck. That, of course, would be letting her off far too easy, but as I stared down at her, my cock stirred. She was on her knees in front of me. And I was getting aroused.
For a human!
I turned away, adjusting my dick in my pants as she scrambled to her feet. No human was good enough to suck my cock, that was for sure, and I didn’t want her to know otherwise. Angry at her for provoking such a response in me, I advanced on her, sending her back step by step across the shop.
“What are you going to do to me?” she asked meekly.
