Page 18 of The Demon Prince's Accidental Mate
Belial
“What have I done?” she said, the surprise I felt in her fading as anger rose to match my own. “I didn’t do anything. I signed your contract. Your stupid contract that you said was legitimate. I didn’t do anything.Youlied tome!”
Part of me wanted to drop her to the floor. Instead, I lifted her up. Up and up, pinning her to the wall with ease, my fury sucking the light from the shop, draping us in shadow.
“I did not lie!” I roared in her face.
She slapped me.
Recoiling in shock, I was stunned by the action, so I let go. She dropped to a crouch and scurried away. I let her, instead reaching for the contract and staring at the bottom.
There, written through a smudged red spot, was her signature. Her blood signature.
“Sonofabitch.” I stared at it, waves of fear still pulsing into my mind from the other side of the wall. “Will you quit that!”
“Quit what?” she shouted back.
“Being afraid,” I snarled, going after her with the contract clenched tightly in one hand. “I’m not going to kill you, and I really would prefer not to have to feel your fear like this.”
“How do you think I feel with your anger trying to break down the doors into my mind!” she shouted back. “You calm down, and then I’ll calm down. It isn’t gonna work the other way!”
I looked around the kitchen for her, finding her hiding next to an oven near the back door. Ready to keep running.
Taking a deep breath in, I held it for a count of five and then exhaled slowly, letting my anger reduce to a simmer instead of boiling over.
“You changed the entire contract,” I told her. “By signing it with your blood.”
“I did?”
I nodded. “Blood is a powerful thing. It is not to be trifled with, not like this.”
Lilith glared at me, and irritation replaced some of her fear. “I didn’t trifle with it, okay? I didn’t mean to.”
“Just like you didn’tmeanto touch my mind. Just like you didn’tmeanto try to bind me to you.” I scratched my jaw. “That’s a lot of ‘I didn’t mean to.’ And now, you’ve linked us. Not one under another, but bound together.”
“How? All I did was sign my name.”
“Yes. Blood can be fickle. I’m not sure how the magic bound me to you, though. We were not linked like that.”
Lilith shrugged. “Maybe because you’d already broken into my mind. Maybe that was still lingering?”
“Perhaps.” It was actually an entirely reasonable guess.
“So, what happens now?” she asked nervously.
Some of my frustration must have slipped through because a fresh spike of worry hammered itself into my mind through our newfound link.
“Now, we’re joined,” I told her. “One to the other. Neither with control. We will feel what the other feels.”
Which meant I could no longer punish her. No longer torture her how she deserved. Not until the bond was cut. If I did, I would also be punishing myself, which held no appeal.
At that moment, Lilith stood up, lifting an arm to examine the papercut that had caused so much trouble. Truly loathsome things. As she did, her sleeve fell back, and she hissed in alarm.
“What is it?” I moved to her side swiftly, snatching her arm and holding it up.
There, on the underside of her forearm, magic glowed yellow against her skin.
“Care to explain?” she asked, reaching out and running her finger over the marking.
