Page 83 of Infernium

“Are the chains really necessary?”

Vaszhago smirked and peeked into the room. “If you had any idea what things he really wanted to do to you, it’d probably terrify the good and righteous baroness.”

Baroness. I’d hated when Remy called me Princess, but somehow baroness didn’t bother as much.

“I’ve had to send away three maids wanting to give him release.”

I snapped my attention back to Vaszhago. “Who?”

“Does it matter? He’d have rejected all of them. He wants you. Anyone else is … generic.”

Perhaps it should’ve terrified me to think of what he’d might do to me without those chains, but a much deeper instinct had taken over. One that urged me to ease him. “The chains are tied to a wooden bedpost? Seems he could break that pretty easily.”

“Diablisz steel has its own tensile strength. It doesn’t rely on the object to which it is tethered. Every link creates its own resistance. The longer the chain, the stronger it is.”

Strange, how many rules of this world defied the laws of physics in mine. “Is there nothing else besides enslavement?”

“You could give him some relief, and perhaps he might settle. It is your scent and your touch he craves.”

“You’re certain he won’t hurt me?”

“I’m certain he could. But would he with you?” He gave an insouciant shrug. “That would be an interesting hypothesis to test, wouldn’t you agree?”

A gut-wrenching moan bounced off the walls, and I flinched at the intense pitch of it, as guttural as if Jericho had just been stabbed. “Farryn! Come to me!”

“I can’t watch him in pain. If he were to try to enchainsz me, how would he do it?”

“He would bite the artery which supplies blood to the brain.” He touched a finger to the carotid artery in my neck, which had to have been hammering right then. “It’s the venom he produces right now that will make you complacent. Once it’s in your blood, you are nothing but a helpless little moth in a spider’s web.”

“Okay, so avoid putting my neck by his mouth.”

Lowering his finger from my neck, Vaszhago chuckled. “We would not be demons if it were that easy. In his state, he produces a particular pheromone, the effect of which is so strong, even you may find yourself less concerned aboutlove.”

“You make him sound like a sexual weapon of mass destruction.”

“For you, he could be quite dangerous. But should he try anything–”

“I don’t need you standing outside the door.”

“I don’t need to stand outside the door to know when you are in distress.”

I recoiled, frowning back at the demon. “What? Why?”

“I’m bound to you.”

Stupid binding. Not only did the guy shadow me, but he could feel my distress? For a split second, I wondered if he could feel everything else going on inside of me.

“Fine. But I don’t need an audience, so whatever little perception thing you have going, you need to shut it off for a little while.” The truth was, sometimes Jericho did scare me during sex. Not in a bad way. Ordinarily, it sent a strange thrill through me, but even as savage as he could be, he’d always maintained a small bit of chivalry about him. However, that gentleman charm had clearly exited his body, the way he thrusted his hips and moaned my name.

“As you wish,” Vaszhago said beside me. With that, he strode back down the hallway, and once he rounded the corner, I swung my attention back toward Jericho.

Avoid the teeth.

With a nervous step inside the room, I closed the door behind me on a quiet click. Light from the hallway withered to the soft glow coming in through the window. The tired creak of floorboards marked my cautious steps, as I crossed the room toward him.

His bellows died to heavy panting and grunts, and the rattle of chains told me he hadn’t given up his fight for escape. “Farryn.” Over the course of months, he’d said my name a number of times, but there was a deep, provocative quality to the way he said it right then that rolled off his tongue like a command.

I came to a stop at the end of the bed. The light from the window illuminated every carved line of muscle in his body, and the frantic pulse of blood which created a map of veins across his arms and legs. The silk pants he wore stuck up at his groin in a bulge, the size of which I’d not seen before. Twice as big as the last time we’d had sex, which sent another shudder down my spine.

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