Page 19 of Prince of Demons
“Move, Breeder.” The command was quiet. A dark warning.
“Please. Please don’t hurt her,” Georgia whispered. “Please, oh God, you can’t… please!”
His eyes narrowed. “I can’t?”
She swallowed thickly, realizing the challenge he took from her words. And that she wouldn’t win a battle of wills. Not with this beast. “Please.”
The demon huffed a sigh—an irritated sound, but it gave her a surge of hope. He could have easily removed her and murdered this helpless woman if he wanted to, no matter how much Georgia protested. But so far, he hadn’t.
“Your brother took a lot of my power. I need to refill. If not from this useless pile of flesh, then who, little Breeder?” He stared at her, the darkness of his eyes making her shiver as she clung to the passed-out woman underneath her. “Who would you like me to take the energy I need from? Give me a name. Who deserves to live less than this pitiful stain on humanity?”
Georgia breathed shallowly as the horror curdled in her stomach and turned inward. It hadn’t so much as crossed her mind before—that there would be a cost to what she’d asked of him, beyond their agreement. That his power didn’t come from nothing, that it would need replenishment. And that for a demon, that meant… this.
The challenge in his inhuman black eyes was clear. Someone was going to give him what he needed, and she had gotten in the way of his feeding. He knew she couldn’t name someone to die. He likely read it on her soul as she huddled over this nameless woman whom no one would ever miss, if she just let him take what he wanted.
There was no winning, not with him. She felt it in the pit of her stomach as he stared her down, challenging her to either give up the woman she was currently protecting or naming someone more deserving of dying.
She was the reason he was here. She’d made the bargain with him, she was why he needed to refill.
“Me,” she said softly. “Take your energy from me.”
His brow ridges arched high on his scaly forehead, arms crossing over his massive chest. “You? Are you so much of a martyr that you’ll throw your life away for anyone you stumble across? First your brother, and now this wretch?”
Georgia forced her throat to swallow the lump lodged there. She was gambling with true darkness; she understood that much as she stared into the voids of his eyes. Perhaps it was everything she’d already seen today, perhaps it was sheer exhaustion, or a full psychotic break, but she knew the only way to save this woman was to bank on the fact the prince seemed to want her not-dead. For now.
“You can take energy without killing. Right?” She remembered Jimmy’s words about how demons went about obtaining human life force. How it could be done in so many horrible ways.
And how, for women, there was one universally preferred source.
She forced herself to remain silent as she waited for his answer. Rape at his hands would unquestionably lead to mutilation and death—he was just too big for any other outcome from a violent encounter.
But he wanted her alive. However he went about taking what he needed from her, she’d be better off than the poor woman in here with them. She clung to that thought as she stared up at the huge beast.
The horned monster drew in a deep breath as he stared down at her, seemingly evaluating her offer. Then he nodded once, but the dark look in those void-like eyes had her skin break into goosebumps. “If you are so determined to sacrifice yourself, fine. Stand.”
He watched her impassively as she scrambled to get up from her prone position, arms never leaving his chest. Once she was on her feet, he nodded toward the door. “Move.”
Shakily, she obeyed, feeling his looming presence behind her like a stalking beast as they made their way down the filthy stairs, out the door and all the way to his bike.
Only then did he move from behind her, straddling the vehicle before he turned to look at her over his shoulder. “On.”
“Where are you taking me?” she asked, though she did as she was told, not wanting him to change his mind and return to the building and the unconscious woman in that awful bathroom.
“Home.” Without another word, he kicked the bike into gear, the engine roaring to life between her thighs.
Georgia clung to his leather clad waist as he drove them through the city, the aching pulse in her heart reminding her that she would likely never see anything she could call home ever again.
10
Kesh
There were many ways for demons to feed, few of them pleasant for the human providing the meal.
Kesh went over them all as he drove Georgia through the city to his private residence. He usually wasn’t too particular about how he extracted the human life force he needed to sustain himself, but he couldn’t exactly kill the girl to get his fix—which left out most of the more filling options.
I could terrorize her, he thought sourly as an image flickered for his mind’s eye. One of her tear-stricken face when she’d protected that worthless female. Why she would care about some random human she didn't know, one who clearly didn't care much about herself, he couldn't understand. And to care enough to take a stand… Against him. It irritated him to the bone.
He’d known the girl for a few hours, and twice in the span of that time, she’d sacrificed herself for the benefit of someone else. Disgusting.
