Evie nodded and set Jezebel on the leather sofa. “I’ll be in the waiting room.”
On those words, she walked out of the room. After the door closed, Jezebel sighed and muttered, “That witch gets on my last nerve sometimes, but I love her.”
Chapter 67
Lucifer
“Where is she?” Rainer demanded.
There was no reason to ask who he was referring to. I had two choices: pretend I had no idea who he was talking about or answer his question. I decided to go with the first option. With any luck, I could stall him until Evangalina was out of the demon realm. If it weren’t for Beatrice, I’d simply tell him where to find his witch. Rainer needed to handle this situation with Evangalina soon. It had gone on far too long. Beatrice would be angry if I caused problems for her patients, even though I suspected Jezebel would prefer I send Rainer over to interfere with her appointment.
“Beatrice is in my home,” I told him.
“You know that’s not who I’m looking for,” he snapped.
“There is a reason why people don’t use pronouns in situations like this,” I remarked. Without giving him time to respond, I continued. “If you’d said you were looking for Persephone, I could have told you right away that she’s at Bliss. You should already know that. You escorted her there this morning, as I recall. Or was this Xavier’s day to see Persephone to her office? Let me check my schedule.”
“Are you done stalling me?” he asked.
“Yes,” I replied with a sigh. “I’m not in the mood to fight you, and that’s all I have left.”
“Where is my witch?” Rainer asked.
“Do you think it’s a good idea to see Evangalina?” I asked.
“I do,” he replied. “I’ve been patient. My plan was to wait until after you found someone and then go after Evangalina. You have Beatrice, and unless you screw things up, she’s not going to leave you.”
His confidence in my situation with Beatrice made me smile. Things were going well. As well as can be expected, at least. Her brother still needed to be dealt with. I was certain I could take care of Beatrice while she was with me, but she wasn’t always with me. I’d been teaching her to fight, and I was impressed with her natural skills. She had good instincts, but I didn’t know if she could hold her own against her brother.
“It would be wise to hold off on making any moves with Evangalina,” I advised, even knowing Rainer wasn’t likely to listen to me. “Out of respect for Beatrice,” I added.
“She’s here with Jezebel,” Rainer stated. “Jezebel is one of Beatrice’s patients.” He wasn’t asking me.
“Do not cause a scene in Beatrice’s office,” I warned. “Her career is very important to her. If you fuck this up, I will put you in the nightmare room for a month.” Friend or not, I wasn’t going to put up with Rainer causing problems for Beatrice.
Rainer nodded, not bothering to deny he’d been considering causing a scene. “I’ll keep things civil,” he assured me before stalking off.
“That didn’t go well,” I muttered. Rainer had better behave himself.
Chapter 68
Beatrice
“Do you think Evie’s mad at me?” Jezebel asked near the end of her session. She’d been complaining about Evie as she scratched up the new sofa for the last forty-five minutes. This was the first time she’d shown any concern about Evie’s reaction to her outburst.
“I don’t think she’s mad,” I assured her. “You did the right thing. You need to let her know what’s bothering you. How else can you find a solution? Maybe now she’ll consider letting you visit Rainer more often.”
“I shouldn’t have to see him without Evie,” she complained. “They belong together. The only way I can make them see that is if they spend time together. We all need to be together.”
“You can’t force that on someone,” I told her.
“Why not?” she demanded. “If she didn’t love Rainer, I might agree with your argument, but she does love him. They bonded, and they belong together.”
“Maybe you should give them time to work it out on their own,” I suggested.
“I’ve given them plenty of time,” Jezebel argued. “They’re both too stubborn to do the right thing. I need to take charge of this situation and make them work things out.”
“They may not work things out,” I pointed out. “I’m not saying you shouldn’t continue to work on this, but you also need to make sure your needs are being met. Think about what you need from Evie and Rainer separately rather than what you need from them as a couple.”
She tapped her claws on the sofa as she considered what I’d said. “You may have a point. Besides, if I spend more time around Rainer, I can tell Evie all the wonderful things he does, and I can tell Rainer about all the men Evie is seeing. He’s sure to come after her if I make him jealous enough.”
“You told me Evie isn’t dating,” I reminded her.
“She’s not, but she sees men all the time,” Jezebel replied. “I can’t help it if Rainer mistakes my meaning.”
I shook my head and laughed. “You are something else, Jezi.”
“I know,” she replied as she leapt off my sofa and headed toward the door.
“I guess it’s a good thing Rainer can’t understand you unless Evie is around,” I added, almost laughing when she turned to hiss at me.
“That stubborn witch had better do a witch bonding ceremony with our warlock soon,” she muttered. “I’m tired of this stupid limitation.”
When I opened the door to the waiting room, I stopped and blinked twice. Even Jezebel seemed too stunned to move. Evie and Rainer were sitting at opposite ends of the room, not speaking.
Jezebel recovered first and raced across the room to leap onto Rainer’s lap.
“You came for me,” she said around a purr.
Rainer smiled, looking more relaxed than I’d ever seen him. “Of course, I did. How have you been, Jezebel?”
“I’ve been fine,” she replied. Her ears flattened against her head. “You think I’m here because I’m crazy, don’t you?”
“Not at all,” Rainer assured her. “I assume you’re helping Beatrice get a start in this business.”
“Liar,” Jezebel accused, purring louder when he scratched behind her ears. “Oh! You do that so well. I love it when you touch me.”
I could have sworn I heard Evie whimper.
Rainer must have heard it, too, because he asked, “Are you okay, Evangalina?”
“Fine,” she squeaked before clearing her throat and trying again. “I’m fine.”
She looked at Jezebel and smiled.
“Why are you smiling?” Rainer asked, eyeing her warily. “You aren’t fantasizing about causing me bodily injury, are you?”
“Not this time,” she assured him. “I like seeing you with Jezi. It would be nice if you got to see her more.”
“I’d like that,” he replied softly. “It’s great that you’ve been letting me see her lately.”
“It would be good for him to have me around more often,” Jezebel agreed. “Of course, you’ll have to come with me for my extra visits, Evie. It will make our time together even better.”
“Why?” Evie practically shouted.
“Rainer can’t understand what she says when you aren’t around,” I reminded Evie.
“Of course,” Evie said softly. “I’ll think about it. For now, maybe we can find a way to make weekly visits work.”
“Tonight, when you slide into your bed, I want you to think about all the reasons you should come along for visits,” Rainer began with a wicked grin. “If you have trouble remembering all the reasons you enjoy spending time around me, you can always call me. I’ll be happy to remind you.”
“I should go,” Evie said quickly before pressing the elevator call button, snatching Jezebel from Rainer’s lap, and racing into the elevator to make her escape.
“You scared her off,” I remarked.
“I think she likes me,” Ra
iner added with a grin.
I snorted. “Don’t pretend you didn’t already know that.”
“I was beginning to think I was wrong about her feelings,” he admitted. “She likes me, and she wants me. That’s a start.”
“Do I need to smack Lucifer for telling you Evie was here?” I asked.
“No,” he replied with a laugh. “Xavier was busy, so he asked me to check the entrance logs for this part of the demon realm.”
I nodded. “All right. Get out of my office before my next patient gets here. I don’t want you scaring them off.”
He nodded and headed out the door with a determined stride.
Something told me Evie would be living in the demon realm soon.
Chapter 69
Lucifer
“Turn the stupid thing off!” Beatrice shouted angrily as the training spell knocked her on her ass for the fourth time.
At my nod, Rainer paused the spell. Xavier had created the spell to train demons. At first, I’d worried it would be too much for Beatrice, but she’d been doing fine. The current level seemed to be a bit too much for her.
“You’re doing great,” I assured her.
If her glare was anything to go by, she wasn’t interested in my praise. Her reaction had the usual effect of getting me hard. Now wasn’t the time to think about getting Beatrice naked, but my dick disagreed.
Rainer chuckled. “I think we should call it a night before Beatrice starts practicing with you instead of the spell.”
“Is that what you’re considering?” I asked my witch. “Are you going to fight me?”
She shook her head and laughed. “I’m not stupid enough to pick a fight with the devil.”
I regarded her with raised eyebrows. “Since when have you ever been the least bit afraid to stand your ground with me?”
“Fine,” she admitted after taking a drink from her water bottle. “I’m not as terrified of you as I’d expected to be.”
“He’s not trying to intimidate you,” Rainer added. “Lucifer can be terrifying when he wants to. Hell, he’s often frightening when he’s not trying.”
“I’m sure he is,” Beatrice agreed. “Are you sure Persephone will be okay with Lucy for the evening?”
“Lucy won’t hurt her,” I insisted.
“I’m more worried Persephone will drive Lucy crazy with her questions,” Beatrice explained.
“They’ll be fine,” I assured her before turning to Rainer. “That’s it for training today. Thank you again for coming to help.”
“Yes,” Beatrice muttered. “Thank you for bringing that awful spell to make me black and blue.”
Rainer grinned at her. “Promise you won’t tell Evie about this.”
“I talk to Jezebel more than Evie,” Beatrice told him. “You should be more worried about me telling her. What am I saying? She’d laugh her furry ass off if I told her about this.”
“That she would,” Rainer agreed with a chuckle. “I’m off to meet Hades for drinks.”
Everyone was doing their best to keep Hades busy so he wouldn’t have too much time to think about kidnapping Persephone. Since he hadn’t kidnapped her yet, I assumed it was working. We were taking it one day at a time.
When I was alone with Beatrice, I asked. “Are you hungry? Or would you like to do something before dinner?”
“Like what?” she asked with a seductive smile.
“I thought we could fly somewhere together,” I suggested.
Her face lit up at the suggestion. “That would be great. I usually fly once a week. It’s been too long. My last flight was when I was trying to get away from you, and it was far from relaxing.”
“Then we should go now,” I told her. “Would you like me to take the form of a bird, or use my wings?”
“You can change forms?” she asked in surprise.
“Yes, I can take on almost any form,” I explained.
“Almost any form?” she asked.
“Celestial beings are beyond my capabilities,” I explained. “Once I lost my pristine white wings, they were gone for good. I can’t even create the illusion of those wings.”
“That’s strange,” she mused.
“Most magic is,” I pointed out.
“True,” she agreed. “My powers are similar to my family’s but not the same. I’ve never understood why that is. When I was in witch school, there were a lot of things that didn’t make sense to me. Like, how is it even possible for the magic between two witches to be so compatible that they are drawn to each other before they’ve even spoken? I guess demons and fallen angels have something like that, too.”
“Not exactly the same,” I told her. “We have a bonding to join our powers. When we bond, you’ll be much stronger. You’ll be able to feed off my power as well as your own.”
As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew I’d said too much.
Chapter 70
Beatrice
I wasn’t sure how to respond to what Lucifer said. When he mentioned bonding with me as if it was a foregone conclusion, I stared at him like he’d lost his mind. We’d only recently met, and the man hadn’t even asked me to bond with him. There’d been no mention of it before now. I didn’t even know what something like that would involve, not that I needed to know now. It was just too soon to assume we would bond. We weren’t even going to discuss this. That seemed like the best way to handle the topic.
“Where should we fly?” I asked.
“So, you’re going to pretend I didn’t mention us bonding?” he asked.
“I thought that would be best,” I replied.
“You thought wrong,” he told me. “It’s too early to have said it that casually, but I already know what I want.”
“How can you possibly know already?” I asked. A man his age should be more cautious. “Are you having a midlife crisis?”
“Midlife crisis?” he asked.
“You know, when a middle-aged man starts to act young and irresponsible because he feels like he’s getting old,” I explained.
He chuckled before responding. “To have a midlife crisis, I’m assuming I would have to be at the middle of my life. Since I’m a timeless being, that’s impossible.”
My face fell at his words. I hadn’t even considered that Lucifer was truly immortal. I’d live a very long time, but it was a drop in the bucket compared to him.
“What’s wrong?” he asked gently, reaching out to stroke my cheek. “You look upset.”
“I was thinking that you’re looking for someone to share eternity with you,” I began.
“I am,” he replied. “Why does that upset you?”
“I’m not immortal,” I stated.
“You will be once we’re bound together,” he assured me.
“I will?” I asked before quickly adding, “That is to say, I will if I agree to any bonding. Bonding is something we both need to agree on.”
“You’re going to agree,” was his arrogant response.
“Oh, really?” I asked with a laugh. “Why do you say that?”
“You’re falling madly in love with me,” he stated. “I’ve already told you that.”
“Arrogant ass,” I muttered. “Let’s fly.”
“What form should I use?” he asked again.
“I like your wings, so that would be my preference,” I replied.
“Will you be a falcon again?” he asked.
“I thought I’d try something different,” I told him. “I’m not sure I can pull it off, but I’d like to try.”
“What did you have in mind?” he asked.
“You’ll see,” was my response. “First, I need to shower.”
Chapter 71
Lucifer
When Beatrice met me in the entryway of my home, I nearly swallowed my tongue. She had on nothing but a pair of shorts. Her breasts were bare, but they weren’t what held my attention. On her back was a stunning set of black wings. Any doubts I’d had about how powerful she was before were gone. It was
one thing for a shapeshifter to mimic the form of something they’d seen. Doing that was difficult, but it wasn’t on the same level as altering your own form.
“That is amazing,” I praised.
I’d already stripped down to my pants and had my wings resting against my back. As I moved closer to Beatrice, I noticed that her wings weren’t completely black; the tips were a green as vivid as her amazing eyes.
“Have you ever done anything like this before?” I asked.
“I’ve altered my own form, but I haven’t done anything on this level before,” she admitted. “I wasn’t even sure I could do this. Hopefully, they work.”
“Well, there’s only one way to find out,” I told her, reaching out a hand to her. I led her out the door of my home, feeling a great swelling of pride at the powerful creature beside me. She was mine.
The sky was a hazy shade of purple at this hour. We only had about two hours to fly before it was too dark to be safe. “Are you ready?” I asked.
She nodded and released my hand, taking a step to the side. Her wings spread out, and she moved them slowly.
“Show me how it’s done,” she told me.
I nodded and spread my wings before leaping from the ground and taking flight. I made a circle and hovered above her. Watching with bated breath, I waited for her to move. It was crazy how much I wanted this, wanted her to fly with me this way.
When she leapt into the air, her wings fluttered, and she looked nervous. She went up about twenty feet and then nearly fell to the ground. Just as I was rushing to her aid, she righted herself and moved higher into the sky.
Her laughter echoed through the air. “This is amazing! It’s harder than flying as a bird, but I love it.”
She had to fall in love with me, because I was already falling in love with her.
We flew across the skies, over the ice falls, and up to one of my favorite spots. It was a mountain few in the demon realm ever visited. At the outer reaches, it was as close to Heaven as a fallen angel could get. I mean that literally. The spot bordered Heaven. The water in the river was a clear blue and filled with fish of every color. At dusk, it still looked like midday. I’d have to be mindful of the time to avoid flying back in the dark. The trees and grass were lush and green. Everything looked alive.
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