I had his complete focus on me, underlaid with sensual hunger.
“Let’s go,” he said, and it wasn’t just my imagination that his voice had dropped lower, rougher than before.
I felt like a snack dangled in front of a starved lion.
A thought struck me as we walked out into the sitting room, and I halted in my tracks, my stomach dropping to my feet.
“Wait,” I rasped, cleared my throat. “Wait.”
Azazel swung around, his voice sharp and impatient. “What?”
“Will I have to...serve Zaquiel?”
It had occurred to me that we hadn’t specified this in our bargain. Azazel hadn’t said a word about the scope of our play, whether I’d be expected, as his “pet,” to be of service to his...friends as well.
Azazel regarded me with an inscrutable expression, and I resorted to nervous babbling, damn my anxiety.
“Will I have to—you know—with him?”
I shifted on the spot, my breath suddenly much too fast. Because while playing with Azazel was one thing—I’d enjoy that enough all right, and it felt like a natural continuation of our interactions so far, not to mention I’d turn it into my own sly method of revenge against him—being intimate with someone else, a complete stranger, was another thing altogether.
I wasn’t at all sure I could pull that off, and just the thought of it already let unease coil in my stomach.
And damn it all to Hell, now I’d given him all the ammunition he’d need to truly put me in my place. Fuck, fuck, fuck. There’d been no hiding the tremor in my voice, the fidgeting of my hands, and I was sure my apprehension was written all over my face. I might as well have given him a roadmap for how to embarrass me, with a big x right next to “Zoe’s weakness, exploit here.”
With his goal being to make me uncomfortable and teach me a lesson, he could take this huge vulnerability I’d just stupidly revealed in front of him, and slice right into it.
He still stared at me with quiet intensity, and I could already feel the blood welling from the cut he was about to deliver. He’d pass me off to Zaquiel and silently revel in my discomfort, relish his punishment of the recalcitrant human woman who’d dared trap him in this embarrassing contract.
He blinked as the lightning outside the barred window flashed over his face, casting his features in harsh relief. “I don’t share what’s mine.”
A second later, before I could even catch my breath, he’d scooped me up and carried me out into the hallway again, his pace quick as before.
I exhaled with such force, it almost came out as a gasp. The knot in my chest unraveled swiftly, painfully, making me dizzy, and I clung to him, in more ways than I wanted to admit.
It took me several minutes to scrounge up the courage to speak again, but the silence as he carried me was becoming unbearable.
“What kind of party is this?” I finally asked.
“I have business to discuss with Zaquiel. I invited him here to renegotiate a deal we have.”
A business meeting. All right. Okay. A bit strange that I’d be there provocatively dressed and playing Azazel’s pet, but—demons, right?
Azazel set me down in front of a set of huge double doors, intricately carved with scenes depicting winged demons battling some kind of beasts. I smoothed down my dress, checked that the flowing skirt fell naturally from my hips to just above my knees, covering what needed to be covered.
A pop in my head, and then Azazel’s mental voice, strong and deep and sliding over my senses like a caress. Walk behind me. Lower your gaze in front of Zaquiel and bow deeply when you greet him. Don’t talk unless spoken to. Don’t babble. No snarky comebacks or quipped defiance. He cast me a sidelong glance. In fact, maybe it’s better if you don’t speak at all.
But then how will I praise my master Azazel’s glory to the high heavens? I fluttered my lashes.
The tiniest twitch of his mouth, humor sparking in his eyes. Lucifer, he said smoothly. We praise to Lucifer, not Heaven.
Duly noted. I faced the doors. I’ll make sure to change my standard-issue sexclamation to, Oh, Devil!
He made a noise that sounded awfully like a choked-back laugh. When he spoke in my head, though, his voice was all breath-taking sensuality and self-assured challenge. I promise you, the only name you’ll moan will be mine.
Before I could shoot something back, he pushed the doors open and strolled in, fully