Chapter Five #2
Atlas smirked as he pushed the glass away. Bel was so sweet. He’d have to thank Cary and Asmos when he finally met the demon for sending Bel in for popcorn. Their need for human junk food changed Atlas’s life.
“Better?” Bel asked.
“Yeah.” He just wanted to get the rest of this out. “I called nine-one-one and sat with my grandma until they arrived.”
“That—” Bel shook his head.
“It was bad. I cried and told her over and over how sorry I was. That I shouldn’t have left them alone. She was already gone but I just continued telling her how sorry I was.”
“Then what happened?”
“The cops thought I was traumatized. I was traumatized! I told them who did this. I begged them for help,” Atlas said. His voice rose and he remembered being frustrated and terrified.
“No one believed you,” Bel stated.
“I had been taken to the hospital. After the cops left, I knew they weren’t going to do anything. I got dressed and walked out.”
“The hospital staff just let you go?”
Atlas shrugged. “No reason to stop me. I hadn’t been injured.”
“You went to the house.” It wasn’t a question.
“I did. I walked across town. Took me over an hour. By the time I arrived I was determined to make them pay.” Atlas had even found a piece of rebar abandoned on the side of the road to use as a weapon. He wasn’t a killer but he would have been that night.
“And?” Bel asked.
“The house was empty,” Atlas told him.
“They were gone?”
“Left in a hurry too. I spent the next two weeks looking for them. I walked around my town a hundred times or more. No flickers. Nothing.”
“That surprises me. If they killed your family and didn’t get you—”
Atlas shrugged. “I can’t explain it. Maybe it was because they didn’t get me? After I was sure they were gone, I went back to work. Tried to move on.”
“Something else happened?”
“The flickers came back. This time they were different. The men were different. The first…shifters had been brothers. In the house were women and children. The new shifters gave me a very bad feeling. More than once I caught them following me. Watching me.”
“Stalking you?” Bel asked.
“Yeah.” Atlas had felt stalked at least.
“That’s why you left?”
“I didn’t want to die.” That was the brutal truth. “The farther I moved from my town, the more flickers I had. I tried to watch as discreetly as I could. To figure out weaknesses.”
“That is quite the task to take on,” Bel said.
“I could never figure out how to take them out by myself,” Atlas admitted. “I moved every few months to keep them from coming after me.”
“Until you followed me to hell,” Bel supplied.
“Pretty much.”
“I’m so sorry for everything you went through,” Bel said.
“Do…do you hate me now?” He had to ask. If Bel sent him away, Atlas couldn’t blame him. Atlas knew that seeking his revenge made him a bad person. Maybe he belonged in hell more than anyone else. Even the demons.
“No! Of course not!” Bel hugged him hard.
“I would have killed those shifters,” Atlas confessed. “If they had been in that house, I was going to kill them.”
“As revenge,” Bel said.
“Yes. Shifters like Gage. And that family you told me about. The pack that everyone talks about.”
“Because of what happened to you and your family. I’m so sorry. I can help you look into it though,” Bel said.
“You…” Was Atlas hearing this right. “You would help me?”
“No paranormal, including shifters, should ever attack and kill. Especially innocent humans,” Bel said. “There are people who will investigate this. Teams that protect humans.”
Atlas couldn’t help the way his body just sort of collapsed into itself.
He didn’t have to do this alone. And maybe, just maybe, those who killed his family would face justice.
It wasn’t the revenge that Atlas had thought he needed.
It was better. Atlas had tried to be brave.
He hadn’t attacked any shifter that had been alone.
Atlas hadn’t kept the promise to his grandma to avenge her. He just didn’t have it inside him.
“We’re about to have company,” Bel told him.
He wanted to move but Bel kept him close. The arm tightening around him was a comfort.
“It’s Lucifer. He just wants to check on you.”
Atlas nodded.
Lucifer materialized behind the couch. “Thank you for letting me visit.”
“Sorry,” Atlas told him. He was a little embarrassed that he’d been carted off like some precious little thing. And Lucifer and his mates had made him feel so welcome. “I wasn’t freaking out or anything. It was more of a relief.”
“I’m very happy to hear that.” He placed his hand on Atlas’s shoulder. “How are you feeling now?”
“Better. So much better.” Atlas grinned. “And kind of hungry. Sorry I messed up the dinner party.”
Lucifer smiled. “You didn’t mess up anything. And…we are more than willing to bring the party to you.”
“Really?” Atlas perked up. He really was starving. Apparently confessing your deepest and darkest secrets made a man want to eat.
Lucifer waved his hand, magically transforming one corner of the office into a much smaller and intimate dining space. A round table with five plates and food placed in the middle.
Cary and Gage appeared, both looking a tad uneasy as if they weren’t sure of their welcome.
Atlas made sure to smile at them, to show that he was happy to see his new friends. “Hey, guys.”
“Hi, Atlas!” Cary waved with the hand not clasped with Gage’s. “Are you okay?”
“I am,” Atlas told him. He climbed off Bel’s lap to face his new friend. It wouldn’t have been his first choice to lose contact with Bel. “Sorry about the drama.”
Gage rolled his eyes. “It’s not a proper dinner party without drama. Am I still good like this?”
Huh, no flickers. “Yes.” He glanced at Lucifer.
“At least for another few hours,” Lucifer said. “Let us know when the magic starts to wear off.”
“Thanks.” Atlas was fine with a few hours without his flickers.
“We postponed with everyone,” Lucifer said.
“I’m so sorry—” Atlas started.
Lucifer held up his hand. “This gives my boys a chance to prepare another dinner party.”
“Party!” Cary announced.
“Everyone understood. They can’t wait to meet you. Seb and Ari are already anxious to get to work over what I was able to tell them,” Lucifer said. “I’m pretty sure they will be putting Ash and Atom to work tonight.”
“I didn’t mean for anyone to stop what they’re doing,” Atlas said. Why would they even be willing to do that when they hadn’t met Atlas yet?
“They live for this,” Gage told him. “I spent one afternoon with them in the archives, and it was so boring. It was just talk and talk and talk. About everything. And the books! There were so many books.”
“Don’t let them hear you say that. Seb will pull out the spreadsheets again,” Cary whined.
“And Adam said for us to give you his number,” Gage said. “He’ll call you tomorrow. Plus, he offered to show you around the core. That’s where he and Mal live. It’s hot there.”
“I can’t thank you all enough for all this,” Atlas said sincerely.
Bel rubbed his back. “That’s what friends, family, does.”
“It is,” Cary agreed with a wide smile.
“Welcome to the chaos,” Gage offered.
“Who’s ready to eat?” Lucifer asked. “We can visit as we share a meal.”
That sounded like a wonderful idea to Atlas. He didn’t know how long he’d be able to sit at the table with the shifter so he wanted to take advantage of this opportunity.
Bel pulled out a chair, ushering Atlas to sit.
Atlas sat, with Bel taking the chair beside him. Gage on the other side with Cary across from Atlas and Lucifer next to Bel. The round table allowed Atlas to see all his new friends easily.
It was easier to sit with his new friends without the guilt at what he’d been trying to do. Bel had forgiven him. He’d tell the others eventually. It was only fair.
Platters began to be passed around the table and everyone’s attention went to food. Well, everyone’s attention except for Bel’s. Bel was like Atlas’s own demon prince. He served Atlas, offered more options, and spoke gently. Atlas had never had someone dote on him this way.
Atlas wasn’t the only one being catered to. Lucifer did the same for his boyfriends.
It made Atlas feel special. Important.
Now Atlas might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but he was beginning to put a few pieces together. Like Bel’s reaction to Atlas since Atlas had literally landed in Bel’s office.
From the first moment, Bel just seemed to accept that Atlas belonged.
In almost every conversation they’d had, one word had been front and center.
Mate.
Seeing how important mates were to one another in this new world that Atlas found himself part of tickled something in the back of his mind.
Mate.
Could he? What if? Atlas was almost afraid to even think about the possibility.
Was he Bel’s mate?
Would it be weird to ask? Atlas really needed to get Cary and maybe Adam alone. Those two seemed like the most likely not to hide things and tell him the truth. Stuffing a perfect piece of steak in his mouth, he watched Bel from the corner of his eye.
Bel would tell him the truth. Atlas didn’t know how he knew but he was certain about that one fact.
However, Atlas didn’t know if he was ready for that conversation.
Or the implications of what being Bel’s mate might mean.
Yeah, he really needed to talk to someone who wasn’t Bel and that left someone in the group.
Catching Gage’s gaze across the table, Atlas smirked. He cut his eyes toward Bel and back. Gage followed his eyes then gave just the smallest nod of his head and winked. Cool. Gage got him.
“That’s not true,” Cary argued. “Seb already has most of the database created from tracking mates. He showed off those spreadsheets with pride. It should be easy enough.”
“We need to follow all the bloodlines,” Lucifer told him. “That may be more complicated than we think.”
Focusing back on the conversation at hand, Atlas cocked his head. “Bloodlines?”
“Demon blood,” Lucifer said. “It’s powerful. You’re a quarter demon. That means it must be a grandparent that…”
“That?” Atlas pressed.
“Who banged a demon?” Gage asked.
“What?” The fork slipped through Atlas’s fingers.
“Gage!” Lucifer exclaimed.
Cary looked over at him. “If we determine which demon line you come from, that might help us figure out how to get rid of the flickers. Or what caused them. If I’ve learned anything about magic from my studies, it’s that magic likes being used. Your demon blood is trying to work for you.”
“Demons don’t normally father a child with human women that aren’t their mate,” Bel said.
“Why does it have to be the father that’s the demon?” Gage asked. “Why couldn’t it be the mother?”
“The chances of a child being born from sex between a demon and a human is extremely rare. Less than a hundred in centuries. Even between mates, pregnancy is difficult. It would take a very powerful demon to impregnate a human. I doubt they had a relationship or the demon would know about the child. And if the demon was the mother, they would never have left the child in the human realm. They might not have another child. The demon has to be the father,” Lucifer explained.
“So my grandmother,” Atlas said.
“You’ve only mentioned one grandmother,” Bel said gently.
“My mom’s mom,” Atlas agreed. “I never met my dad’s parents. They died before I was born.”
But his grandma…she had always believed him. “My grandma,” Atlas said. “It had to be my grandma. Why else would she have believed me when no one else had?”
“Can I have your blood?” Cary asked.
Atlas jerked in his chair. Bel growled.
“Cary!” Lucifer sounded exasperated.
“What?” Cary shrugged. “It might help.”
“You can’t have his blood.” Bel’s voice was low. Dark.
“Why do you want it?” Atlas asked as he placed his hand on Bel’s arm.
“Blood,” Cary said. “It’s used in summons.”
“What are you thinking?” Lucifer questioned.
Cary grinned. “Blood summoning blood.”
“No!” Several voices rose.