Chapter Twenty-One
He didn’t follow her into the bathroom in the end.
Just give me a fighting chance , he’d said.
Let me revert to human form and take a second and then get some of whatever magic you’re going to do to keep me from going monstrous all over me, and then maybe we’ll see what I can do.
We’ll see how far I can go, if you want to go far with me.
Though she couldn’t help noticing the way he watched her go. Or how hard he clenched his fists.
It replayed over and over in her head as she showered.
And so much so that she barely even registered what she was showering off herself.
Blackish-red stuff formed a whirlpool around her feet.
She streaked his flimsy little shower curtain with god knows what, and all she could think about was what might happen when she went to him.
What might happen if she really did stay here with him.
How far things were going, how deep they were getting.
How much pleasure she might feel again.
You’re just helping him, you’re just helping him, you’re just trying to get him and everyone he cares about out of a hole , she told herself. But it didn’t seem to be working. She couldn’t even shake off this unholy amount of desire by thinking about magic. About what she’d gained.
Though she knew that part of the reason for that was how tied the two things were.
She was going to go in there and do actual spells on a real demon.
Sexy spells, that made her hum even harder at the thought of them.
She caught a glimpse of herself in the bathroom mirror as she wrapped herself in a massive but paper-thin towel, and that silvery glow was now almost blinding.
She squinted behind her glasses at the sight of it.
It took a full minute to stop seeing stars.
And she didn’t even stop to think about how she was going to dry her curly hair. Usually she needed a diffuser, at least, if she was going to get it into some kind of manageable state. In fact, even with one she usually wound up with a big tangle.
But here she had nothing. He didn’t even have a hairdryer at all, of course he didn’t. Yet she ended up with the softest, smoothest, bounciest curls anyway, courtesy of her pen. Dry , she wrote on the air. And that was all it took.
It’s coming easier now , her giddy brain said, as she bounced out of the bathroom. No waiting, no hesitation.
Straight to him to get started. She even had it all set in her head, how she was going to go about it.
Not with the pen this time, no. The pen wasn’t quite right for this particular job.
She needed something softer, something silkier, something that fit the vibe.
And she snatched two things from the purse she’d left in his kitchen on the way:
A makeup brush, and a tube of mascara.
He’s not going to like that , she told herself once she was in front of him with them clutched in her fists.
She even braced herself for it, arguments at the ready.
Only to find him not even paying attention.
He was staring at the wall to the right of the bed he was sitting on the end of, as if something had recently sprouted there.
Something fascinating that he simply could not look away from.
She had to prompt him with a throat clear.
“Don’t you cough at me, you little nightmare.
Coming in here in just a towel—where are your clothes ?
And don’t give me oh, they’re all covered in mess, Jack, what was I supposed to do.
If you can dry your hair like that you’ve reached clothes-cleaning level.
I’ve seen witches reverse burn holes. Now get back in there and put them all on, up to and including your shoes. ”
“Jack, I’m not going to wear shoes to do sexy things to you.”
“This isn’t supposed to be sexy things. This is supposed to be scientific.”
“Pretty sure magic that makes you not turn into a demon when you doink someone is the opposite of science. And even if it wasn’t, you’ve seen my whole downstairs business, Jack. You’ve had your whole face in it.”
“Yeah and I shouldn’t have done that. Because doing it has apparently escalated things to the point where I have to look at a wall just to come down from the sight of your naked shoulders.
And your naked arms. And your naked thighs, oh man, your thighs were very naked.
Very naked and so soft and sweet. Even just that glimpse of them over the top of those stockings—”
He cut himself off, jaw clenching. Clearly annoyed that he’d gone there, and now didn’t know how to get back out.
He was stuck in a cul-de-sac of liking what he’d seen and enjoying it still, so deeply that she couldn’t deny it.
Somehow, he did want her. Not just her advice, but her .
And that made everything both dangerous and utterly thrilling.
So thrilling in fact that she stepped forward, tools raised.
Much to his horror. He held up a hand, shifted back on the bed. “Whoa, whoa, hold on there, you’re gonna paint on me? With a brush? And something slick?” he gasped. And what was she gonna say? No?
“Well, I just thought that would work best. That it would get results.”
“Sure, if you want to kill me. I thought you were gonna use a pen. That scratchy, cheap pen. The one that’ll feel like Hell. And I should know what Hell feels like, because I actually lived there for eons.”
That stopped her in her tracks.
Or, at least, it stopped her conversationally.
She didn’t stop slyly moving toward him as she answered.
“So it was bad for you there, then.”
“I mean, it wasn’t great. Lotta metaphysically hard beds to lie on.
Lotta torture going on. You don’t live up to your quota, you’re getting some kind of lashing.
And it’s not hot like people think. It’s cold, and not in the glacial way.
In the way that creeps into your soul. Swear to gosh when I first got to stay here, I fell in love with electric blankets and bonfires and big cable-knit sweaters. ”
“Is that why you always wear an undershirt?”
“You bet it is. I’d wear ten of them if I could get away with it.”
“But you can get away with it with me. I want you to be comfy. I want you to feel good. I want you to have all the things you never did, and enjoy every one, and not ever feel bad about that,” she said, now so close to him she could easily reach out and touch him.
He didn’t even seem to notice when she did.
He glanced away, just as she lowered the brush to the bared nape of his neck.
He started speaking a moment before it touched.
“That’s nice of you to say, honey, bu—oh dear lord, that’s unbelievable .
Oh, you sneaky thing, holy shit, I felt that right to the roots of my hair.
What was that? What did you write? Because there is no way it could possibly be stay human .
Come on, confess, you wrote make his spine melt right out his back ,” he groaned, slapping at the place she’d brushed as he did.
But he was being ridiculous.
She’d barely done a thing.
“Even though nothing happened.”
“Except me losing all feeling in my knees.”
“It can’t possibly be that intense. Here, let me just try ag—” she started to say, brush going to the place where she’d only so far made a single stroke. But this time he didn’t just put up his hands. He stood up. He backed away.
“Hey, whoa. Let’s just talk about this,” he said.
“It’s not a gun, Jack. It’s just a brush. And it didn’t make you hulk out.”
“I don’t care if it did or not. I want to just take a second here. Just a second.”
Why , she went to say, baffled. Because if he wasn’t reverting to demon form, and they’d agreed this was a good idea, and he obviously wanted her, it didn’t seem like there should be a problem.
Especially when this was so much less than all the things they’d done before.
He had touched her in her most intimate places.
He had licked her there.
He had done things to her th—
She stopped dead, mid-thought. That one word suddenly looming in her mind.
Her, her, her , he had done things to her .
But she had never done things to him . She had never done more than put a hand on his.
Or clutch his shoulder. Or rub his back.
And none of those things had been particularly sensuous.
They’d been rough. Or almost friendly.
Or he’d been focused on other things at the time.
And now the focus was on him, and the touch was so gentle, and he clearly did not know how to process any of those things.
He isn’t used to them, he isn’t used to being treated softly and kindly , her mind suggested, and when it did her heart seemed to squeeze.
She didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to reassure him.
Her words felt plain and weak in the face of something so utterly gut-wrenching. “You can take all the time you want. I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to,” she tried, and she could see that got him halfway there. It made him stop, and his hands almost dropped.
But then he tried to play it off.
“There’s nothing I don’t want to do. I’m a demon, I can handle anything.”
“Yeah, that might convince you. But I’m not sure it’s gonna convince me.”
“Well, why the hell not?”
“Because I know that being used to pain can make pleasure take its place.”
That makes no sense , she thought. But apparently it made enough that he dropped his hands entirely, all at once.
And he seemed stunned. She actually heard him swallow, thickly, in a way that really had her wondering which way this was going to go.
It felt like she’d just pushed him to the edge of a nervous breakdown. Like he was going to crumble, somehow.
But that just made it more shocking when he started unbuttoning his shirt.