The Demon's Song - By Kendra Leigh Castle Page 0,35
emotion at all.
“Nothing. I just got real,” he said, and pushed back from the table, grabbing his own empty plate. He didn’t bother looking at her when he changed the subject.
“Let me know when you want to go. I’m ready whenever,” Phenex said, brushing past her and then busying himself cleaning up the pans he’d used. Sofia leaned against the post at the end of the breakfast bar for a moment, watching him as he neatly shut her out. He was such an odd mix of traits so far—unexpectedly thoughtful, frighteningly determined, fierce, moody…and sometimes, like now, a snotty pain in the ass.
Sofia considered telling him to shove it, then discarded the idea. It wouldn’t make any difference to him, and he’d made his disinterest in leaving very clear, though given what he’d just said about humans, she was even more curious about why he was bothering with her. He was beautiful. He could have sex with almost any woman he chose, she was sure, so she didn’t see how it could just be that. What was his deal? She was pretty, but no supermodel. Just a working-class daughter of immigrants, busting her ass to be financially secure someday in the distant future.
She was a garden variety human. But here he was, washing her dishes with that mulish expression on his face, even after telling her how little he thought of her kind in general.
And that, Sofia thought, was why she couldn’t just throw up her hands and ignore him until he found some other job to do. Her life had been mostly pleasant, mostly ordinary. Phenex was neither. And she couldn’t get him out of her head. She wanted to prove him wrong. She wanted to see him smile.
She wanted him to let her get to know him, even though she knew she couldn’t lose sight of the fact that whatever they were doing here, it would be over before long.
Sofia gave Phenex’s rigid back one more lingering look, then went to get her things.
…
Finding out that Sofia liked dinosaurs wasn’t a huge shock. She was a nurse, liked science, dinos were a bunch of bones, whatever. It made sense. What he hadn’t expected was that going to a museum full of rocks, bones, and a vast collection of dead, stuffed animals would turn her into a five-year-old on crack.
“Look!” she said, dragging him to a display that was centered on a model of an enormous snake. “Titanoboa! I read about this! This is a full-scale model of the largest snake in history!”
Phenex allowed himself to be pulled along, bemused as he watched Sofia do everything but press her nose against the glass while she devoured every scrap of information offered about what was, from what he could see, a snake from the Paleocene that was almost, but not quite, as large as Gadreel’s better-looking form.
Sofia watched a snippet of a Discovery Channel documentary. Phenex watched her. That seemed to be the story of the day so far, and he found he didn’t mind at all.
“Can you imagine?” she asked him, eyes wide as she examined the enormous fake snake. “I don’t think I’d want to share space with something like this.”
“Then don’t let Gadreel back in your apartment,” Phenex replied. “Though you’ve probably guessed that’s easier said than done.”
She laughed, a sweet sound that had him smiling for what felt like the hundredth time today. His face was starting to hurt. Good humor wasn’t normally his thing, but it was surprisingly hard to avoid around Sofia.
“You’re making me think of Hell as some kind of fiery version of Wild Kingdom. Snakes, birds...did you live in a house or a tree?”
“A house. A manor.” He hesitated, then added, “I was a composer for a long time. Even...in the beginning.”
Phenex didn’t know why he said it. He should have no need to impress her, this little human who had devoted her life to helping instead of harming, a foolish and futile pursuit. And yet he couldn’t help himself. He needed her to know that he, too, had been devoted to something once. He’d had a purpose, a meaning. And even he had been able to create rather than destroy.
Sofia stopped, tilting her head, watching him as though she’d just seen something new and fascinating. Phenex found himself holding his breath, waiting for her response. Would she ridicule him?
Finally, she said, “A composer. I can see that. Your music is beautiful. The most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard.”