Summoning Heat #3
The demon went still. For a heartbeat, the only sound was the wind clawing at the shattered windows and the distant crackle of the failing fire.
Then the demon laughed—soft at first, then growing, dark amusement rolling off the stone.
“With what feckin’ power?” he asked, voice dropping, echo shivering faintly along the walls.
The demigod didn’t answer.
Instead, his hand slid from my chest, fingers tracing a brief, reassuring line along my collarbone before he straightened to his full height at my side. The loss of his touch was immediate, but the protection wasn’t—if anything, it sharpened.
He reached to his hip as if drawing from a hidden pouch, then brought his hand back into view, palm open to reveal a small sling bullet resting there. Smooth. Pale stone. Etched with faint spirals that caught and held the candlelight.
I was certain it hadn’t been there a heartbeat ago.
He rolled it between his fingers like it weighed nothing at all.
The demon snorted. “What is this, a child’s game? You plan to flick a pebble at me and hope I vanish in a puff of smoke?”
“You never asked for my name,” the demigod said mildly.
“Seems as unimportant now as it did when you arrived,” the demon replied.
The demigod’s mouth tugged up at one corner. “Suit yourself.”
He moved so fast I didn’t actually see the shot—just a blur of his arm and then the sharp snap of air parting. The stone whistled past the demon’s head and slammed into the far wall.
The explosion rattled the castle.
Stone detonated like glass under a hammer. A section of wall cracked outward in a spiderweb, dust and grit raining down in a choking curtain. I stumbled, throwing an arm over my face as pebbles skittered and bounced across the floor.
Heat and power rolled back in a wave.
When the sound finally died, a jagged crater yawned in the ancient masonry. Dust fell between us. For a moment, the only sound was grit skittering across stone. My ears rang with the echo of it.
Lugh stayed planted beside me, close enough that his boot nearly touched my knee. The demon stood just off-center, a few stray bits of rubble clinging to the shoulder of his coat.
Lugh’s stance was loose but balanced, hand slowly lowering from the throw.
“It’s Lugh,” he said, his voice carrying a faint reverb. “Demigod of the Sun.”
The name rang somewhere deep in the back of my mind, tugging at half-remembered myths—of a warrior-king with too many gifts, of battles won with both blade and brilliance, of a god who never missed his mark. A slayer of evil everywhere.
The demon brushed a smear of dust from his shoulder, then looked from the crater back to Lugh. Slowly, a grin spread across his face.
“All right, fine,” he said, sounding genuinely entertained. “You’ve got some tricks. I’ll give you that.” He considered Lugh for a moment longer. “I mean, I really don’t want to like you…but that was actually kind of cool.”
Lugh’s answering chuckle slid warm down my spine. “I killed my own grandfather with a throw like that,” he said conversationally. “And I’ve got a bigger weapon that’s even more unstoppable than this. Would you like me to take that out next, or have I driven the point home?”
I was almost certain he meant a spear or a sword. My traitorous brain, however, chose a different interpretation entirely and promptly stopped behaving.
The demon barked a laugh. “For the love of the pit, you’re so full of yourself.” His gaze cut to me, sharp again. “Just let our delusional little plaything speak for herself.”
Lugh’s jaw flexed. “Fine,” he murmured. “Let’s see what our leadin’ lady wants.”
He took a step closer, making everything else feel far away. He moved into my space and lowered in front of me, so I had to look at him instead of the demon. “Look at me,” he said, softer than a command and somehow more unyielding. I tipped my face up until my back arched for him.
From this angle he had an unimpeded view straight down, and the way his gaze dipped—lingering for a heartbeat before finding my eyes again, darker and heavier—told me he noticed.
“Angel,” he said softly, “d’ye want me to get rid of him?”
The demon hissed, affronted.
Lugh ignored him. He leaned in until his breath washed warm over my mouth and jaw. “You want to be used and degraded?” he asked, voice a low rumble that settled in my bones. “Are you sure that’s what you want?”
The demon’s earlier words still clung to me—filthy and mocking, all sharp edges and promises of being taken apart piece by piece.
Part of me wanted to sink straight through the floor, to escape the intensity of both their gazes.
Part of me wanted exactly what he’d threatened.
Part of me wanted to be held so gently it hurt.
All of me wanted both of them at once.
My pulse turned urgent at the thought, heat unfurling through my chest and lower still, my body responding with a certainty I couldn’t deny.
“There it is,” the demon crooned beside me. “The na?ve little summoner wants to play.”
My tongue felt thick. I couldn’t make my mouth form an answer. My head was a tangle of shame and hunger and the stubborn, defiant spark that whispered I was allowed to want something that was only for me.
“Give me those filthy words from those delicious lips of yours, lass,” Lugh said, his mouth tipping at the corner as if he could see every frantic thought racing through my head. “I want to give you everything you crave… even if it means you choose me and this soulless nyaff.”
“Says the feckin’ wet wipe,” the demon said cheerfully. I felt him circle behind me, a dark presence dragging fingers along the edge of my awareness. He paced a loose half-circle behind my shoulders, staying just out of Lugh’s reach, close enough that I felt him without turning.
“Look at her. So perfect. So pretty and innocent. But she’s aching to know what it feels like when I fill her. When I use her. You want that, don’t you baby?”
“Demons ask for consent now?” Lugh shot back, but there was a dangerous note under the dry bite. The demon stayed behind my shoulder line, standing over us like an audience member who couldn’t resist heckling.
The demon huffed. “What makes you think I ever need to force anyone?” He paced to my side as he spoke, words gaining speed, bright with unholy glee. “Have you seen what mortal women are reading these days? What things these authors are writin’ about us?”
He spread his hands, including me in the gesture. “You devour stories about monsters and men who should terrify you. Shifters, vampires, hot priests with fangs, assassin fae, demons with vibrating cocks—
Lugh cut in, dry as hell. “ —And demigods, aye. Believe me, I’m well aware.”
“Oh, but it’s more than creatures of fantasy, isn’t it?” he went on, voice thick with satisfaction. “They fantasize about bein’ taken apart.”
He moved as he spoke, closing the distance between us in a slow prowl before bending, bringing himself down until we were almost nose to nose.
He slid to my left side and crouched, so I had to turn my head toward him—while Lugh stayed kneeling directly in front of me.
Candlelight caught in his eyes, turning them molten.
“They want men who could destroy them,” he murmured, “but choose to ruin them in much more pleasurable ways instead.”
His hand came up, fingers sliding from my jaw to wrap around the front of my throat—not cutting off air, just a firm, deliberate band of heat that tipped my head back and held me exactly where he wanted me. My breath stuttered. Every part of me went tight and aware.
“You call the dark because you’re tired of thinkin’,” the demon said, his grip flexing just enough to remind me it was there. “You want to feel. You don’t want gentle. You want obsession. Possession. You want the edges of your agency to blur until all that’s left is sensation and surrender.”
Every sentence landed with humiliating, perfect accuracy.
His thumb stroked once along the hollow of my throat, a mockery of comfort. “And that’s exactly why you summoned me, isn’t it,” he purred, “my little cock-craving slut?”
Beside me, Lugh made a low sound—half warning, half the growl of a man fighting the urge to intervene. He didn’t move, though. I felt the restraint in him, the way he was watching to see if I’d pull away. I didn’t.
A dark, amused chuckle rumbled out of the demon. “Look at the way your precious demigod’s jaw ticks when I call you names.”
Lugh’s answer came out as a low scrape of sound, rough with something he wasn’t bothering to hide anymore.
“I’m not here to like it, am I?” he said, gaze fixed on the demon but weight angled toward me. Then his eyes slid back to my face, softer, darker. “I’m here to give her exactly what she wants.”
“I think there’s far more temptation,” Lugh went on, voice dropping, “in findin’ a man with steadfast devotion to bringin’ you pleasure. Ye’re forgettin’ things from my side of the market.”
As he spoke, he unfolded to his full height in one smooth motion, never breaking eye contact.
With a gentle, unmistakable pull, he drew me up off my knees.
He brought me to my feet right in front of him, keeping one hand at my waist. My legs wobbled, muscles protesting, and I swayed instinctively toward him.
The demon’s low growl rumbled through the air the moment my body left the level of his reach, a dark, possessive sound at my side—as if the loss of my nearness to his touch offended him on principle.
Lugh’s hands brushed up my arms, barely there, but it lit up my nerves like kindling. He moved slowly, deliberately, as if memorizing every part of me.
“The fierce protector,” he murmured, voice dark silk, “her shield against the world.” He caught my wrist, lifted it, and mouthed the pulse there—unhurried yet somehow possessive. The simple intimacy of it stole my composure, a small, unguarded sound escaping before I could stop it.