Touched by Fire (Demons of New Chicago #1) - Kel Carpenter Page 0,57
reach. Or so he thought.
I shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you.” My heartbeat was picking up the more power he funneled into me.
“How did you meet her? Tell me everything.”
I shuddered under the growing pressure. Words forced themselves up my throat and past my lips. “There was a summoning,” I said. “A different coven than this one. I was the sacrifice. Or I was supposed to be.”
“What happened?” he asked, dark emotion entering his voice. He came to kneel in front of me.
“We tore a rift between the worlds and put out a call. The demon that answered—” I tried to fight it. To halt the words. To not spill my secrets at his feet. Lucifer’s eyes narrowed, and he placed his hands on either side of my face. Power slammed into me. My heartbeat thrummed, then raced. Adrenaline was flooding my system. I didn’t have long. His eyes shined so bright I had to close my own against the glare.
“Who answered?” he asked, his tenor ten times deeper than it had been before. All other sound was muted outside his voice, and my heartbeat raced toward that dreadful stop.
“Aeshma,” I bit out. “She came to me. To bargain.”
“What did you ask for?”
Water built behind my eyelids and a single tear dripped down my cheek in the face of such immense strength. “Power,” I admitted. Shame filled me.
“Why?” he demanded. “Anders said you hate magic.”
“I didn’t always.” My voice trembled. “I was five when the president was killed on TV. Magic became known when I was just a child, and I wanted it more than anything. For years, I searched for a way.”
“Then you found one,” he surmised. “You joined the circle to call her for the promise of power.” I sensed something in his voice. Like something had occurred to him that hadn’t before. “She gave it to you?” he asked.
Faster. Faster. Faster.
I had moments at most.
“Yes,” I said.
Lucifer released me. The power that had been flooding my system drained away. I opened my eyes.
He leaned away, assessing me carefully.
“Then that’s why you smell like her. You carry a piece of her in you. I’m going to use that to find her.”
In that moment, two things hit me, and they were absolutely vital to my survival.
The first was that I was not his atma. Aeshma was.
The second was that I lied. Somehow.
Aeshma didn’t give me this power. I took it.
And now Aeshma was dead.
21
Lucifer eased back, giving me space. My heartbeat slowed. Adrenaline drained away. He sat back on his haunches.
“You’re a curious creature, Piper Fallon,” he said. “I’m tempted to taste you. Can you imagine her ire at me for defiling her servant?” he said softly. He reached out, letting his fingers trail up my jaw. His hand went behind my head and fisted in my hair. “It might be enough to bring her to me. I wouldn’t even have to look.” He licked his lips. Desire that wasn’t my own thickened the air. “Or I could just have you in other ways. Your scent alone is enough to get me off.”
“You would do that? Even when you have an atma?” I said. I hoped that reminding him of that might keep him at bay. It’s not like his atma would ever show. But if she were his soulmate, wouldn’t he feel something toward her?
“Aeshma rejected me. If she’s on this plane, that means she must have realized her own folly. She might be my atma and the center of my desire, but that doesn’t mean she’s the only one. You have some of her blood. You’d be more durable than the others. A fun toy to break . . .” He pulled me toward him, and I couldn’t resist. Our foreheads touched and his eyes closed, inhaling deeply. “You were her first blood servant, and she’s only been here ten years. She would feel a connection to you. Your pain . . . it would incite her.”
What little my heart had eased was starting to rise once more. My blood pulsed through my veins, pounding in my ears.
He was wrong. I didn’t have any of Aeshma’s blood. She never gave me any.
Would I still taste like her? Or would he be able to tell?
His lips slanted toward mine. Their velvety softness briefly brushed over my own, eliciting a groan from him.
A knock came at the door.
Lucifer paused.
“What?” he demanded, pulling back. The door opened, but he didn’t look away from my lips.