doubt at the sight of the lion-sized, three-headed canine from Hell bounding in my direction, and I probably would have backed up if Azazel’s hand on my lower back had given me an inch to do so.
A moment later, I had three large snouts sniffing all over my body, and when I say all over, I really mean all over—one of her heads was between my legs, taking a good sniff of my privates.
I squeaked and pushed the offending snout away, only to have another one check out my left armpit. Wet breath on my ear, a tongue on my right hand. I flailed.
“Sit!” I yelped.
All three heads retreated as Vengeance sat down—or intended to. She kind of toppled over. Only for a second, then she bounced back up and parked her butt on the floor, her tail thumping, her six eyes fixed on me.
“Good girl,” I said.
The tail thumped harder. One of the ears that had been normal now flopped in the other direction, showing the pink inside.
Grinning, I stepped up to her. “Who’s a good girl?”
Thump, thump, thump.
“Who’s a good girrrrrrrl?” I reached out and scratched her middle head.
Her butt wiggled, and her other two heads tried to bump the middle one away to get to my hand, which resulted in her toppling over again. I went to rub her belly, and she rolled right over to give me better access, all four legs in the air, twitching.
“You are,” I crooned, scratching the soft fur on her belly. “Yes, you are. Good girl, such a good girl. Look at you. Oh! You’re so sweet. You like them belly wubs? Yes, you do!”
Azazel cleared his throat.
I glanced up at him. He looked like he’d just sucked on a lemon.
Hael coughed in his hand. “She, uh, she has a perfect kill record, my lord. Her shred time is under a minute.”
One of her heads tried to bite her tail while the other two did their best to lick me.
“I want her,” I said to Azazel.
He seemed to be in pain. “Are you sure?”
“She’s the one.”
“She just fell over again while trying to get up.”
“She’s spatially challenged, so what?”
He tilted his head back and glanced at the ceiling, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like, “Hell give me patience.”
I grinned all the way out of the kennel building. Hael would deliver Vengeance to me shortly, after a few last preparations. Azazel’s sour expression notwithstanding, he hadn’t protested my choice further, his only comment being, “Of course you would pick the dorkiest runt of the litter.”
Despite his mood, the flight back to his balcony featured another toe-curling, you need a distraction kiss—not that I was complaining.
Once in his suite, he led me to the lobby room thingy with the fountain in the middle...and Hekesha patiently waiting, her hands clasped behind her back.
“My lord.” She bowed her head.
Azazel nodded at her. “Wait outside.”
She immediately left, closing the door behind her.
“Hekesha will escort you to your rooms,” Azazel said to me. “I have business to take care of, but I’ll come to see you later.”
I squinted at him. “As in...a date?”
He seemed to consider that. “I am,” he finally said, stepping so close that his power pressed against my skin, a thousand tiny stamps of his energy marking me, claiming me cell by cell, “making an effort to engage with you.” He leaned down, his mouth only an inch from my ear, his breath tingling on my neck. “Wasn’t that what you wanted?”
I didn’t dare move for fear of my body turning liquid. “I did.”
He shifted so our gazes met, his eyes flaring with lightning, boring into me. I felt those damned, unruly layers of myself unfolding under his intense regard.
“I still do,” I added in a whisper.
A smile that promised bliss. “Good.”
He turned and strode back through the door to his sitting room, presumably to take off from that balcony of his. To Hell knew where.
Given the size of his mansion and his rank—clearly not too low on the hierarchy, as evidenced by the fact he had so many subordinates—he probably held a lot of responsibilities. Not that I knew much about duties of lords in feudal systems, which Hell seemed to be, but I imagined the workload to be similar to that of CEOs of large corporations. Which meant it was likely he had a full schedule of shit to deal with every day.
I stared after him for a minute, then turned to relieve poor Hekesha from waiting on me out in the