Chapter 3

Three

C ody couldn't see anymore. The light had burned straight through everything that he had. Being bound the way that he was, he couldn't even cover his eyes.

So he didn't try.

He stayed still.

Perfectly still.

He told himself stories. He recounted hundreds and hundreds of tales. He spoke to Thack. He spoke to Raven. He spoke to Denver at length.

Most of all, he talked to Phillip.

He knew without question that Phillip hadn't been behind this.

It never even was an option.

Phillip didn't hate him. The demon didn't care enough about him to hate him. Basically, the best Cody had made Phillip was tired.

He wanted passion and heat and excitement.

And love.

There were those who would say that demons were incapable of love, but he knew better. Even if he hadn't experienced it himself, he knew better.

Thack loved Uri. Loved him enough to sacrifice everything, in fact, but more than that—or in addition to that perhaps?—Thack loved the rodeo. He loved Denver. He loved January. And in his own weird way, he loved every rider that came through.

So he knew that demons could love.

Phillip had loved him once.

But time had passed, and Phillip had decided that it was more important to be the demon than it was to be Cody's mate.

"I can't play cowboy forever," Phillip had said.

Cody had rolled his eyes. "I've been a cowboy forever."

"We have business dealings. We have status. Come home with me, and we can run the important part of the business together."

"Phillip, Darque and Knight is our business."

"Yes, well, I meant a demon business. One that spans dimensions. Eons. Darque and Knight will fizzle someday, love."

And that was why they had broken up.

When it came right back to brass tacks, which it always did, the rodeo wasn't real to Phillip. And in one of those vast demon-held halls that Phillip did business in, Cody would be nothing but a plaything.

Just a silly little toy to be left behind in some room while demons did their work.

He'd be well-fed, well-clothed, and trotted out to be shown off. To be the ornament and the oddity. An embarrassment, maybe.

But he would never be an equal. He'd been human once, before he was turned.

So he would never be a partner.

Phillip would never be his.

And didn't that fact hurt his soul?

And all that nonsense about how vampires didn't have souls was smoke and mirrors bullshit from books written by repressed little men and from television shows that had more charm than substance.

He had his soul. It was just a really old one.

He'd been saving his strength to make an attack when they released him, but he was beginning to understand that they had no intention of letting him go. That wasn't the real end game here. And if they did let him leave, what did it matter?

He had lost time and space. He'd even stopped being hungry.

The last words he'd ever spoken to Phillip were, "I'll take care of it."

Those words were the last thing he said to Phillip on the phone every time they spoke.

Because they only spoke about business. Phillip only called when he wanted something.

Lower food costs.

Replace the tires on the semi that carries the bulls.

It's time to renew the bullfighters' contracts.

The wards are slipping. I keep seeing stuff on the dark web.

There was always something, ticked off of someone's list, that somehow couldn't be dealt with by e-mail.

Cody would listen. He would record everything Phillip wanted done in memory. Then he would say, "I'll take care of it."

Then, once he hung up the phone, he decided whether not he'd actually do it. It was kind of a fifty-fifty thing. Sometimes, he didn't do stuff just to piss Phillip off and see what he could get away with.

"I still love you," he told Imaginary Phillip. "Even though I've been waiting for you for years, and you'll never come. Even though your family are the ones who came between us, and they're going to actually kill me. I still love you. That's probably crazy. I know it's stupid, but I still love you. I hope you miss me, son of a bitch. I hope it burns, and I hope when I come back to this existence, I'm gorgeous and stunning and absolutely uninterested in your happy ass so that when you ask me if I wanna knock boots, I say no."

That last thought would have made him smile, if he could smile. But he couldn't.

Not anymore.

Anything he had left was cracked and dried, and his face didn't want to move at all.

But man, if he could, he so would.

"I am disappointed in my nephew, I must say."

Okay, that was new. Cody tried to blink, but nothing happened. He made a gurgling sort of noise, because that was what he had, but he figured it sounded like a big old question mark, just as he meant it.

"My nephew, you see, has something I want. So I took something of his."

Suddenly he could smell blood. Pig maybe, but blood, nonetheless. And it was coming close. The man who was talking pushed a bag of the stuff up to his mouth.

Cody wanted to refuse it, but he tore into it with fangs that felt loose and sore, the rush of it in his mouth almost making him spit it right back up.

It wasn't enough. But it was a start, and his lips started to work again. So did his tongue.

"Jean-Luc, huh?"

"Yes. Yes, and I am waiting for Phillip to contact me, but perhaps he's not as intelligent as I think he is." The dickhead paced back and forth in front of him, his slick shoes ringing on… what? Boards set on metal?

"Maybe he just don't care, asshole."

"Oh, my dear. He cares. I know this. And I imagine he's trying to figure out how to come get you without having to deal with me. But you see, I need what he stole from me."

"You just here to monologue? 'Cause I'm having trouble focusing."

"Mmm. Do you need more blood, little toy?"

"Fuck you." His body strained, trying to get out of the bonds that held him.

"No, thank you. I prefer females, frankly, and I like my partners quite submissive."

"I just bet you do. Like dead submissive."

"Tell me how to get him to call. Should I send a pinky finger?" The growl told him he'd annoyed the guy.

He tried to move his fingers. Did he still have them? "Knock yourself out. He doesn't give a shit."

"Oh, my dear Mr. Knight. Phillip has lived on the mortal plane for a very long time so he can maintain a connection to you. He could have severed the business contract decades ago if he just didn't care. No, I will use you to get him here, and then I will destroy you both."

"Well, you be careful what you wish for, motherfucker." But a cold chill went through him. This demon knew Phillp as well as anyone ever had, he reckoned.

What if Jean-Luc was right?

As much as Cody wanted to punch Phillip in his smug damn face, the last thing he wanted the man to do was die. For him. For coming to get him.

Fuck a goddamn duck.