Chapter 8
Transgressions? Something in his tone made my stomach drop. The hope that had been building all day suddenly felt fragile again, like spun glass about to shatter.
“What transgressions?”
“I will tell you once you sit down.”
“I don’t want to sit down.” I crossed my arms and glared at him, but he only looked amused. At least I thought it was amusement.
“Do you really want to add to your list of punishments, little human?” He gestured to the armchair near the bay window that had been my grandmother’s favorite.
Defiance was not getting me anywhere. I stomped over to the chair and sat, sinking into the familiar cushions that still smelled faintly of my grandmother’s lavender perfume.
“Now what? Are you going to tell me I’ve been naughty?”
“You were dishonest. Repeatedly.”
“I had to be! What was I supposed to say? ‘Hello, welcome to my shop. This is Bastian, the ancient punisher of the wicked, whom I summoned from the netherworld because I was desperate and a little bit drunk’?”
“That would be an acceptable start,” he said, and I swear one corner of his mouth twitched. “But it is not the dishonesty that concerns me most. It is your generosity. You give away too much.”
“Generosity isn’t a bad thing!”
“It is costing you profit.” He moved closer, and I had to tilt my head back to maintain eye contact. “I have calculated the revenue you lost today through such gestures. Would you like to know the sum?”
“Not particularly.”
“Forty-seven dollars and sixty-three cents. In a single day. Multiply that across a year—”
“This shop isn’t just about profit,” I said, standing up so I didn’t feel quite so small. “It’s about community. About making people feel welcome and valued. My grandmother understood that. She knew that the money would come if people felt cared for.”
“And yet the shop is failing.” He took another step towards me, and his scent surrounded me, frost and smoke and spice. Despite the lecture, my stomach hitched at his closeness.
“So what am I supposed to do?” I asked, hating how my voice cracked.
“I am suggesting you learn the difference between generosity and martyrdom.” He moved away again. “Generosity comes from abundance. Martyrdom comes from fear—fear that you are not enough unless you are giving everything away.”
“You don’t know me,” I whispered.
“The binding ensures that I do. I know you better than you know yourself, little human. I know that you undercharged Mr. Bumble because you know his daughter is sick and medical bills are mounting. I know you spent time helping Mrs. Taylor with her coat because she mentioned her arthritis and you worried she might struggle. I know you give away candy canes because a child’s smile makes you feel like you are doing something meaningful in a world that often feels meaningless. ”
Each word made me wince. He did know. The binding had given him access to my thoughts, my motivations, my desperate need to matter.
“You cannot save your shop by bankrupting yourself emotionally and financially,” he continued. “You cannot pour from an empty cup.”
“So what do I do?” I slumped back down into the chair. “How do I balance it? How do I care without drowning?”
“That,” he said, “is what I intend to teach you.”
“By punishing me?”
“I have many ways of teaching.”
Which wasn’t exactly a no. My heart fluttered with a terrifying mixture of fear and something I absolutely refused to name. Silence filled the shop for a long moment, the twinkling lights casting shifting shadows across his face, making
“There is another matter,” he said, breaking the quiet. “Your antagonist. Grinchly.”
“What about him?”
“He is disrupting the balance of this town. He is creating despair, profiting from it. This is a transgression against the natural order.”
“He’s a businessman, not a demon.”
“Are you so certain?” He walked to the window, looking out at the dark street.
The few shop lights that were on cast long shadows across the pavement.
“The world is filled with those who take without giving. Those who thrive on others’ misery.
I have met princes and paupers, gods and mortals.
The face changes, but the nature remains. ”
“He offered to buy the building.”
“At a price calculated to break your spirit. To make you feel like a failure. There is no generosity in that offer. Only acquisition.” He turned back to me, and the fire in his eyes seemed to burn brighter. “This will be your task. You will defeat him.”
My jaw dropped. “What? How? I can’t even pay my electric bill, and you want me to take down a predatory developer?”
“You will find a way.” He walked back to the armchair and placed one massive hand on the back, right above my head.
“You want my help? You want the aid you called for? Then you will prove your worth. You will save this shop. You will save this street. You will show me that your spirit is not just a flicker, but a fire.”
“You’re insane.”
“I am ancient,” he corrected. “There is a difference.”
I sat there, trapped by the weight of his presence and the impossible demand he’d just made. How was I supposed to defeat Mr. Grinchly? I couldn’t even defeat my own mounting pile of bills. I sighed and rose to my feet.
“Can I at least have dinner first?”
“You may. Though I have notes about your nutritional choices as well. Peppermint schnapps is not a meal.”
“It was one time!”
“It was the night you summoned me. First impressions matter.”
I shook my head, trying not to smile and failing. “You’re going to be impossible, aren’t you?”
“Undoubtedly.” He moved towards the stairs leading back to my apartment. “Come. You will cook something that contains actual sustenance, and I will begin your lessons.”
The way his voice dropped on the last word made my stomach flutter again as I followed him upstairs and into my apartment, absently noticing that he hadn’t required a key to open the door.
The fairy lights twinkled, casting a warm glow over my overstuffed furniture and chaotic collection of Christmas-themed everything.
It should have felt cozy and safe. With him in it, it felt charged, like the air before a lightning strike.
Jingle Bells took one look at him, let out a pathetic meow, and retreated under the bed again. Smart cat.
“Your kitchen is an abomination,” Bastian announced, surveying the small space with the same critical eye he used on my shop.
“It’s not an abomination. It’s… quaint.”
“It is inefficient. You lack essential tools. You have three different cookie cutters shaped like Santa Claus and no decent chef’s knife.”
“You can’t have Christmas without Santa cookie cutters,” I muttered, opening the fridge. “Besides, I like baking. Making dinner, on the other hand…”
“Is necessary,” he said firmly. I was acutely aware of the way my tiny kitchen shrunk around him, the way the soft light from my fairy lights caught the horns curling from his brow.
He was terrifying, yes, but he was also magnificent, like some ancient god who’d accidentally stumbled into a dollhouse.
“You like to bake because you share the results with others. You do not like cooking dinner because you do not like to eat alone.”
“That’s not true,” I protested automatically, and suddenly the air was charged with something heavy and dangerous. He took a step closer, and I instinctively stepped back, my shoulders hitting the refrigerator.
“I told you that lying to me is a transgression.”
“I wasn’t lying.”
“You were.” The words were soft. Dangerous. “I can feel your lies. Just as I can feel every flutter of fear. Every spike of curiosity. Every…” He leaned in, his voice dropping to a rumble that I felt more than heard. “…pulse of attraction.”
“I’m not attracted to you!”
The denial burst out too loud, too fast. Too obviously false. His expression shifted. Amusement flickered across his features, sharp and knowing.
“The bond doesn’t lie,” he said. “Even when you do.”
“I’m not lying,” I stammered. “You’re not even… I don’t…”
“Shall we test that denial?”
He moved even closer. He didn’t touch me but he was so close that I could feel the heat of him, the scent of him, overwhelming every sense.
He braced one clawed hand against the fridge beside my head, the other on the opposite side, caging me without making contact.
The chains across his chest hung between us, close enough to touch if I breathed too deeply.
His horns cast shadows across my face. His eyes burned.
“Tell me, little human.” His voice was low, intimate, the kind of tone that shouldn’t have been allowed to exist. “If you feel nothing, why does your pulse race?”
“Fear.”
“Liar.”
He leaned in, his mouth near my ear, close enough that I felt his breath against my skin.
“Why do you tremble?”
“Because you’re terrifying!”
“Am I?” A dark chuckle, rich and amused. “Or am I exactly what you’ve been craving? Something that sees past your brightness to the desperation beneath.”
He inhaled, slow and deliberate, drawing my scent into his lungs.
“You smell like winter,” he murmured. “Like cinnamon and snow and something sweeter. Something alive.” Another breath. “And underneath it all… want.”
The bond flared.
He was right. Damn him, he was right. Every nerve in my body was screaming awareness, desire, a need that I absolutely should not be feeling for a literal Christmas demon who had materialized in my attic less than a day ago.
But God help me, I wanted to close the distance between us. Wanted to know what that fur felt like under my fingers. Wanted to see if those glowing eyes would darken with pleasure the way they’d darkened with amusement.
Wanted—
No. No, no, no.
“I don’t know you,” I managed, my voice barely above a whisper. “You’re not… You’re not even human.”
He pulled back just enough to meet my eyes, and the heat in his gaze nearly undid me.
“The bond doesn’t care about species, little human. It cares about truth. And the truth is, you called me because some part of you wanted this. You wanted to stop pretending. You wanted to be seen by something that cannot be fooled by your cheerful masks.”
“That’s not—”
“Admit it.”
“No.”
“Admit it, and I’ll step away.”
“Fine!” The word exploded out of me. “Fine, yes, okay? You’re attractive in a terrifying monster sort of way, and yes, some deeply questionable part of my brain finds that appealing, and yes, the bond makes me too aware of you, and I don’t like it!”
He stared down at me for a moment, his expression unreadable. Then, slowly, a smile curved his lips. Not a gentle smile, a predatory one.
“Good.”
“Good?”
“Honesty suits you better than denial.” He finally stepped back, giving me space, and I immediately felt cold. “We are bound, little human. Fighting the bond only makes it worse. Accept it, and it becomes bearable. Now about your dinner…”