Chapter 13

“Prepare yourself,”Reynard said, opening Zee’s door.

I entered the room, immediately struck by Zee’s eclectic décor of bright plastics coupled with fluffy cushions and soft furnishings. Reynard had laid him on his side on the four-poster bed, and he didn’t look any better now than he had when I’d found him. Shallow breaths barely moved his chest, and his tail, always so emotive, lay limp.

“What can I do to help him?”

“You found him once before? What did you do then?”

“That was different. He was just beaten up then, not like this.” He didn’t look physically hurt. There wasn’t a mark on him. The damage was demon.

“He needs attention, and he’s been starved of it.” Reynard said, bracing a shoulder against a bedpost. “Post on his social media? You said he feeds on those likes?”

“What do I say? Zee’s dying... like my post?” It felt wrong. Everything felt wrong. I perched on the edge of the bed and laid a hand over his. His purple nails stood out against the pale pink sheets. Seeing Zee like this hurt in ways I didn’t know how to express, or even understand about myself. I wanted to rage, to scream, to tear the world apart, but also wanted to curl into a ball and weep, and make all the hurt go away.

I dug into Zee’s pockets and found his phone, but predictably, the battery was long dead. I didn’t own a phone, didn’t have any social media accounts. This world wasn’t meant for me. With an exasperated sigh, I tossed the phone.

Reynard sighed and pulled his phone from his pocket. “Fine.”

“What are you doing?”

“Making a plea for a lust demon.”

He was... what? On his own socials? But he despised demons. Especially Zee.

“You don’t have to do that?—”

He held up a finger at the same time as holding out his phone, aiming the front facing camera at himself. “How is my appearance?”

I winced. He’d looked better. “Kinda like you’ve been in a fight with an incorporeal beast. Your hair’s a mess, there’s blood on your shirt, and you’re missing some buttons at your collar.”

“Perfect.” He fixed his gaze on me. “You get this one for free. For you, not for him.”

“What?”

“Dear followers,” Reynard began, speaking to the phone, his voice its most smooth and chocolatey timbre. “You may have heard of some commotion at the SOS Hotel, and indeed, there has been. Opening such a hotel was never going to be easy, but some forces have been working to undermine the good work Adam Vex and his colleague, Zodiac, have been doing. Forces with malevolent intent. Several days ago, the popular demon, Zodiac, was taken against his will and used by these nefarious forces, in a bid to destroy both the hotel and everything it stands for. Right now, Zodiac needs your help. I implore you to visit his social accounts, and like his most recent posts. You won’t find anything posted in the past few days, because those were the hours in which he was suffering. Now is the time to come together, and while I know many of you, my followers, may be shocked by Zodiac’s mature content, I urge you to remember, we are all lost and trying to find ourselves in a troubling world. While Zodiac and I do not often see eye to eye, there is one thing we do agree upon—an attack on one of us at the SOS Hotel, is an attack on all.” He ended the message and dropped his phone back into his pocket.

That was quite something. “Thank you.”

“It’s nothing.” He waved. “Just a post.”

“It’s more than that.” He’d told the entire world he was one of us. Lord Victor Reynard, tech billionaire, cared about Zodiac, an ex-porn-star lust demon. I didn’t know much about the internet, but I knew it fed on gossip. Reynard coming out as a Zodiac fan was bound to cause a ruckus. And generate likes.

Reynard smoothed his hair and tugged on his shirt cuffs. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I intend to get cleaned up, visit the bar, then perhaps stalk the streets and ambush an unsuspecting Twilight fan. They’re such easy prey.”

“I’m going to stay with Zee.”

“That’s for the best.” He headed for the door, then stopped. “Oh, Adam, how did you beat the shadowbeast?”

“I talked to it. We came to an agreement. It’s not all that bad.”

“It speaks?” Reynard’s mouth twitched. “I... did not think of that.”

“It was nothing, really. Nobody wants to be in chains. I figured it didn’t have a choice, so I gave it one.”

“You truly are remarkable.”

“Oh, no, not really. I’m just me.”

“Of course you are—just you.”

He left, smiling in that strange all-knowing way he sometimes did, and gently closed Zee’s door behind him.

My own smile soon died when I looked down at Zee again. The shadow realm had almost taken him from me. He must have suffered terribly, alone in the dark, cut off from everything that kept him alive.

I shrugged off my jacket, kicked off my shoes, and laid on the bed next to Zee, keeping his hand in mine so he knew he wasn’t alone. “You have to come back to us,” I told him. “We need you. I need you. I don’t know if you can hear me, but when I found you that night in Demontown, I was so very alone. You think I saved you, but you saved me, Zee. There’s a heat and warmth and light in you that I’d lost. You helped me find it again.” He didn’t respond, just stared through me.

As welcome as Reynard’s social media post was, I wasn’t sure it would be enough. “I think Reynard likes you, although he’ll never admit it. He’s... well... I know you said we can’t trust him, but he’s helped a lot. Maybe he wants something, or maybe he’s just had enough of being who he is, and he wants to be someone different. I know how that feels. He said we’re all lost. And I know you’re probably laughing at me inside right now, you think I just want to jump his bones, and well... there’s a bit of that, admittedly, but I honestly think he’s going to be good for the hotel. Also, the shadowbeast lives in your attic now. Sorry. That was kinda the deal for getting you out of there. Gideon is still a dick, and uh... well... I think I might have to kill him.” I blinked, checking Zee’s face for any reaction, but there wasn’t one. I sighed. “I don’t like to kill people, but some people just need to die. You know?” I was pretty sure he’d agree, since Gideon had been the one who’d hurt him.

I touched his face and the corner of his mouth, missing its permanent smile. “If I tell you something, will you promise to come back to me?” Could he hear me, wherever he was? “I’m not human, not at all, not even a tiny bit. So you can’t bespell me, and I kind of maybe like you, a lot, in ways I shouldn’t, because it’s really, really dangerous. There’s this prophecy... It’s been chasing me my whole life. Everyone around me dies because of it, and I don’t want that to happen to you.” I glanced down at the chains around his neck. “You deserve to be free, Zee.” I ran my fingers across his lip. “You’re flashy and showy and sassy, and you flick your wings and tail like nothing can hurt you to hide the hurt of a thousand cuts. After a while, you start believing the pain is all you’re worth.” I laughed at my own idiocy. “I guess what I’m saying is, we’re both really good at pretending.”

He didn’t respond, which was probably for the best.

I drifted into a half-sleep, dreaming of liquid shadows, Reynard’s teeth in my neck, and Zee belting out “House of the Rising Sun.” Flashes of the past came back to me too, images of raging fires, and the people I’d once called family dying in those flames. I snapped open my eyes and stayed frozen, staring at the ceiling, unsure where I was, but then Zee’s hand came down on my chest, over my heart, and his lips brushed my ear.

“This is not the way I want to do this,” he whispered, stroking his hand down toward my belt. “But there’s something I need, and if you don’t get out of my bed in the next five seconds, I’m going to take it.”

I turned my head, and found him so close, his eyes bright and somehow furious as well as hungry. He was back! But also plastered against me and trembling, or shivering from restraint. I knew what he wanted. Any man would.

“I want—” He cut himself off. “You need to go.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“Leave.” His top lip rippled, bearing sharp teeth.

“No.” I laid my hand on his chest, and rolled him back, trapping his wings under him. We were both still dressed, too many layers of clothes between us, but I knew what he craved, and I wanted it too. Like Tom Collins had said, we were both consenting adults, plus I’d nearly lost him. I needed more, needed to feel, needed to lose myself in him. It had been so long.

“Adam—”

I smothered his mouth with a hand. “If you truly don’t want me, then say so now.”

His eyes widened in panic, then softened, turning sly and his entire body relaxed under me.

I lifted my hand, and there was his smile, all crooked and delicious. If he said no, then this would be over. But Zee wasn’t going to say no, not when he was starving and I could feed him. If nothing else, this could just be another one of those mutual agreements.

Straddling his hips, I whipped off my shirt, and watched his smile fall away, turning his face serious. His hands gripped my thighs, long nails digging in while his eyes drank me down.

He’d warmed since waking, and the sickly pallor had gone. Reynard’s post must have worked, and now I could top him off in more ways than one. Although, I wasn’t a natural top. But I would be now, for him.

There was only one way this was going to end, but we were going to need some help.

I leaned over the side of the bed and opened the bedside drawer, revealing a brightly colored selection of bottles and curiously shaped rubber dicks that all jiggled as one. Mercy, there were some interesting shapes in there—multiple dicks in one, forked dicks, ribbed dicks, knotted dicks, short dicks, long, curved dicks. Dicks with extra extensions, to get to those hard-to-reach places.

“Kitten, there’s one eager dick right here, so unless you want to experiment with those, can we focus on the hardest cock in the room?”

I snatched a random bottle of lube—hoped it was lube, couldn’t imagine it would be anything else in a drawer of jiggling dildos—and straightened on my knees, straddling his thighs. Mercy, he was gorgeous, and I hadn’t even unwrapped him yet. All lean muscle and golden skin.

“If you’re lost, there’s an arrow.” He pointed to his tattoo.

“Are you suggesting your cock is so small I can’t find it?”

He gasped. “You wound me on my deathbed.” Then looked down at the proud length of dick bulging against his zipper. “Don’t listen to Adam. He hasn’t seen a dick in a very long time.”

“You talk to your dick?”

He arched an eyebrow. “Who doesn’t?”

“I don’t . . . No.”

“Are you going to lather me up and jump on, or can I switch us up? Because on most days I like to chat, but today Kitten, you’re literally killing me.”

“Oh, right, yes.” I’d forgotten this was something of a life and death scenario for him. But how did I do this? Did I oil him up first, then me, which would mean I’d have to get my trousers off.

“You’re overthinking it.”

“I just... How do we...” I circle the lube bottle in the air. “Am I, you know...” I gestured a finger in a hole. “Or are you... with me?”

“Alright, you’re out of time.” He twitched his hips, shifting sideways, then in a blur he’d grabbed me, switched our positions, and whipped off my trousers in one swift yanking motion that left me breathless and panting. Zee knelt over me, his enormous wings spread, horns gleaming in the low light, and all at once a desperate need to have him surged through me. I moaned, long and low, and caught his all-over quiver through slitted eyes.

“Fuck, you’re a buzz,” he growled.

He spread my knees, and wasted no time in bowing between my legs. In the next breath, he had my cock between his lips, and down his throat. I gurgled something unmanly, gripped the sheets and tried not to hammer my hips, but it had been forever since I’d buried my dick in something tight and wet and warm, and Zee wasn’t giving me any time to mentally prepare. And dayam, it felt good.

His tail looped around my right leg, snaking up my calf, warm and firm, but also making sure I wasn’t about to escape—not that I wanted to. There was nowhere else I’d rather have been than rocking my hips, and driving my cock between Zee’s sweet lips.

Just as I began to lose myself in the moment, he pulled off and braced over me, and all at once I was struck again by how stunning he was. His waistcoat hung open now, unlaced at some point, and the thin chains around his neck swung forward, skimming my chest. His wings blotted out the world, so there was nothing else in this moment, just him and me.

“Your lust is so bright, Adam, I can’t see around it. You’re the most beautiful creature I’ve ever fucked.”

“Erm . . . So are you.”

He swallowed, and his face came over all pained. “I don’t... We don’t have to do this. Your lust is enough. We can stop right now, if you want, if you think that would be best for our business relationship?”

I flung my arms around his shoulders, locking him in place. “Now who is overthinking?”

“I just . . . I don’t doubt, I don’t second-guess, but you . . . you’re special to me.”

“And I’m hard and hungry, and so are you, and I need this right now, need you. Please.” I wasn’t above begging, and to stop now would have been cruel, for the both of us.

A growl rumbled up from his depths. He tore from my arms, grabbed a pillow and shoved it under my hips, tipping my ass up, then spread my cheeks, and after some brief fumbling, he pushed in, widening and filling me. And there was a whole lot of him to adjust around.

My eyes rolled. Pressure built, then eased with the stroke of his cock. He had hold of my thighs, captured in both arms, holding on as his hips pumped a powerful rhythm. And that would have been enough. But his tail came around, encircled my dick, and jerked me off in time with his thrusts.

Zee tipped his head back. His chains rattled, clanging against his chest. His wings pulsed behind him, veins beginning to glow. His whole body gleamed, muscles in motion. It was beautiful, he was beautiful, we were beautiful—and my glamor wobbled.

Zee gasped, jolting. His eyes flew open, and it was only from the shock on his face that I realized my mistake.

I hastily, mentally rebuilt the wall between the truth and lies, but it was too late, he’d gotten a taste of the real me. He slumped forward, coming close, chest to chest, face to face, and that question was in his blazing eyes—the same question everyone asked when they saw too much. The question that got them killed. What are you? But then he was rocking, filling me, climbing toward ecstasy, our bodies moving as one, locked together in lovemaking, his breaths sawing at my neck.

“I can’t—” He reared up, clutched my thighs and hammered my hole, skin slapping skin. His eyes were wild, his tail pumped, his cock plunged deep, and by the stars, I was going to unravel altogether. Then the cresting wave smashed over me, and I came hard with a shout, spilling warm cum over my abs, until each drop was wrung out by his tail.

Zee shuddered, flung his head back, wings stretched out as far as their tips would reach, and he came, buried so deep I felt every tremor and pulse as though they were my own. “Fuck.” He slumped forward, braced over me, breathing hard, eyes shining in the shadows of his wings. “You might be the best fuck of my life, and I’ve fucked a great many and varied things.”

I snorted, still buzzing, coming down from the high.

He withdrew, wringing a hiss from me, then dealt with a condom I hadn’t seen him slip on, wiped the cum from my belly, and flopped onto the bed alongside me. “I haven’t felt this good since my first time.” He blinked, eyes peering up, and opened his mouth to ask that question.

I pressed a finger to his soft lips. “No.”

“You just saved my life, Adam,” he mumbled from behind my finger. “Again.”

I snuggled against him, draped an arm over his chest and a leg over his thigh, and breathed him in, enjoying the after-sex glow. I didn’t want to talk, or answer any questions, or admit this was anything more than what we’d both needed in the moment.

Because one thing was very clear, it could never happen again.