Page 75 of Lust

“I'm afraid that's not going to happen,” he says.

I bite back a retort as he spreads out his wings and brings us to a halt. As we reach the floor, he gently drops me down in the center of the atrium.

I hold my knees to quell the queasiness, but as he lets go, all I can think is that after the day I’ve had, I need him. “What are we doing?” I breathe out.

“I'm not going without you,” he says simply, as though this was always some kind of plan. When I furrow my brows, he holds out his hand to me. “It's not safe here.”

“Not going where without me?” I throw my arms up and gesture at the dark atrium. “Here is all there is.” I realize then that he's not holding me at all. It would be very easy for me to run back up the stairs or hop onto the platform. I eye his outstretched hand curiously. “Why are you giving me the choice?”

His eyes burn into mine. “I’m not,” he retorts. “You are coming with me. I'm hoping that you will choose to make it easier on me, though.”

Great! The illusion of choice. I fold my arms. “And if I don’t hold your hand and come with you?”

“Then I will pick you up again and drag you.”

Damn, he’s infuriating.He’s always been infuriating. I don’t know why I’m surprised. Hell, I’m not surprised he’s kidnapped me. I am surprised by how much I like it. I’m intrigued. I’m also tired and irritable. It’s been a really long fucking day.

“And what if I scream?”

He shrugs, as if to dare me to do just that. “A hundred people will be down here in a flash.”

“Then you are endangering the pair of us,” I say wearily. He’s got a hint of mirth in his stare, but I can tell he’s deadly serious. If this was anyone else, I would have thought they were insane, but it isn’t anyone else. It’s Dade.

He’s still holding his hand out to me. I don’t even know why I’m pretending to think about it. Maybe to give him the illusion that I’m putting up a fight.

We both know I’m going wherever he is. I just don’t want to make it too easy.

It takes me less than five seconds to take his hand. His fingers entwine around mine as he pulls me towards the elevators, his injured leg causing him to limp slightly. Inside the elevator, he pulls out the marble and inserts it into the hole.

I pull my brows together as my heart rate increases. “We're going down to the demon level? After what happened last time?”

It’s either admirable or insane at the lack of fear he shows when my insides are turning to mush at the very thought of where we’re going.

“It's the only way out of here,” Dade says, his eyes meeting mine.

I stare at him in disbelief. “Out of here? You mean out, out?”

He nods. It’s almost a challenge. One that I don’t have a hope in hell of winning.

“You know how to get out?” I ask incredulously.

“No,” he grumbles, “but I'm not hanging around here any longer to watch you get killed, Valentine.”

He’s taking me into the very bowels of Hell and he can’t even call me by my first name. If my legs weren’t about to give out beneath me and my heart rate wasn’t dangerously close to light speed, I’d have laughed. “We almost got killed last night when we were down here, or have you forgotten the fucking huge demon that practically pulled your leg off?” I point down at his damaged leg. It looks perfectly normal, covered as it is by his trouser leg, but I know how bad it is. I can practically still hear the crunching of his bones as he twisted them back into position. “You’re still limping, for fuck’s sake.”

He keeps his face ahead. Stoic. Infuriatingly gorgeous and inscrutable and darkly kissable. “I haven’t forgotten,” he says softly. “That’s part of why we are getting out of here. You’re in danger. They are after you.”

Me?

The elevator comes to a stop and dread takes hold. The last time we were here, we had crazed demons with sharp teeth racing to kill us. Talk about jumping out of the frying pan into the fat.

“Who's after me? How do you know?”

“I know because I listen.”

Why does he get to be so calm and exasperating when my heart is threatening escape from my ribcage?It’s not fair. None of this is fair, but this is just galling.

“I have access to places that others don't, thanks to this.” He pulls the marble from the hole and pockets it as the elevator doors open.

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