116. Rafe
Chapter One Hundred Sixteen
Rafe
T his time, when Mira shows up in my room and silently undresses to climb into bed with me, I’m ready for her.
“I need to talk to you tonight,” I whisper and cup her cheek as she sprawls on top of me. Her heat seeps into me, unknowingly grounding me in this world.
“No talking,” she says, nuzzling her face into my neck. Her hold on me tightens, and I wrap my arms around her, keeping her here even as I continue.
“We’ve done this for the last seven nights.” Easily the best sleep of my entire life. “But something’s happened with my sister.”
For Alice, I will sacrifice this tender moment with Mira and all the moments of comfort she brings me at night. She tenses slightly, pulling back, but only as far as my hold on her will allow. I am not so foolish as to release her.
“How much do you know about Dr?culea?” I whisper, stroking my fingers along her spine.
I know Mira is from Pyrrhos, but there is more to her, far more than she is willing to share with me.
I will wait for her to be ready. Time is something I can give her.
Time for her to fully trust me, to confess where she was these months, why there were shadows in her eyes in Paradis, why she refuses to discuss Pyrrhos now.
She is the only Phoenix I know who has left her source realm, and I have spent the last seven days researching to find another. That realm is even more closed off than Dr?culea. It’s more remote than Paradis, and arguably even more insidious than Hell.
“I know their leader is a misogynistic dickbag, but so are most of them,” she says with a frown. Again, she speaks confidently from personal knowledge, leading to more questions about who exactly Mira is. But that can wait until she is ready.
“Alice was chosen as Dracula’s heir, but she’s reviled by her people,” I say, remembering last year when we spent the day on the beach with Con and the hydra. Alice thought it was another assassination attempt on her. Another one. Meaning there had been many.
“Her father was acting regent while she was at Avalon, and she just found out he’s dead.” My hackles rise. “She has to attend formal rites in a month and then her coronation.”
“Shit,” she curses. “Is she okay?”
I shake my head. Alice is not okay, far from it.
“They didn’t get along. You said before you’ve known a lot of demons.
” I tense a little at what I’m about to ask her.
“I need to be able to fight as a demon.” She frowns, her brows furrowing.
“I train hand-to-hand with Max a lot, but?.?.?. my most buried instincts come out around you.” I need to be able to harness them.
“How can I help?”
So simple. So ready to help, my heart beats harder in my chest.
“I need to be better about darkness in others.” I hold my palm up to hers. She glances at my fingers. “Will you help me get that part of myself ready to fight?”
This side of me came out around Summer, and I hurt her. I couldn’t ask her to do it again, and besides, Alice needs her more right now.
Mira lines her palm up with mine, close but not touching.
A small flame forms, floating between our hands.
Heat flares in her eyes, making them glow in the gloom of my room, and the spark dances, weaving between our fingers.
My palm presses to hers, and I feel the demon lunge forward to take control.
My claws lengthen, and my fangs emerge, filling my mouth.
This is exactly what I need. This is the part that Mira brings out.
Mira groans and rocks her hips against me, grinding the soft heat of her core against my thigh.
“Talk to me,” I whisper brokenly. “Keep me grounded.”
Don’t let the demon take control.
“Did you think about me? After All Souls?” she asks, her body warming as she presses against my side .
My hand tightens on hers, my claws digging into her hand, breaking the skin. “Every night,” I pant, beating the demon back into the cage I’d built in my head for it. “I thought about ways to please you.”
She arches, sliding her thigh over mine. “I thought about that too, ways to make you moan.” More fire flickers between our joined hands. The second it sparks, the flames turn black but don’t extinguish. Hellfire. Is this how it is made? “I still think about it. All the time.”
Possess. Claim, the demon whispers. The demon kept whispering those words the entire time we were in Paradis. I am pretty sure Uncle Lu was lying about demon mates. Maybe only Fallen have them?
“So do I,” I say, my fangs receding. When my vision changes, I know the blackness that flooded my eyes is clearing.
The Hellfire extinguishes, but I don’t release her hand, not for a second.
“I don’t know how to resist you,” she admits.
“Then don’t,” I answer, my heart racing.
“Rafe.” She tries to pull her hand from mine, but I don’t release her.
“Let me be yours,” I say, leaning closer, hovering my lips over hers.
Mira’s eyes flicker, and she seals her lips to mine. We lose ourselves in each other, in the way she burns me, and I writhe in her heat. Hours later, we are both slicked with sweat and ash.
“Mira?” I whisper softly, curling her hair around my fingers, the strands still half flame.
She glances up at me, her freckles glowing on her skin like cinders from a fire.
“Will you come with us?” Her brows furrow.
“To Dr?culea? When it’s time?” I need her with me.
She can help me manage the demon, and I just want her by my side.
She nods, her secrets casting shadows over her sparking eyes.
“Thank you,” I whisper, kissing her softly.
“Goodnight, Rafe,” she says with a smile, cuddling against me.
She drifts off almost immediately, and I whisper back to her sleeping form the words she wasn’t quite ready to hear, “Goodnight, my love.”