Days passed and when I didn’t hear from Tensley I decided to swing by the townhouse. He made it his hobby to text me every day and when my phone had been silent the last three days, I grew anxious. He was like an annoying big brother who was too paranoid about something bad happening to me.
He knew I could handle myself, but it obviously didn’t shake away the worry.
The townhouse was a beckon of hope and a symbol of my past. Its pristine white bricks and Roman columns proudly standing on either side of the large black doors had intimidated me as a young girl.
Now I just saw a townhouse filled with power hungry Scorpios. Each member came from a line of high middle class. No one below, with a ranking like me, could truly call themselves a member. But the bellboy who stood at the entrance recognized me immediately. He simply nodded. As a guest to the Knights and Tensley’s friend, no one ever questioned my presence.
I sauntered down the long hallway and tapped on Tensley’s office door. Or what was Mr. Knight’s old office.
Nothing.
Just as I was about to enter, a soft voice made me jolt.
“Alexandra,” Daphne, Tensley and Beau’s mother said, her lips tipping up into a warm smile.
It was rare to have someone welcome me with warmth and I fidgeted with my hair, thrown up in a loose ponytail. Compared to her dressed in a white dress suit, pristine and elegant, I looked like a street rat.
“Where’s Tensley?” I asked.
Her smile twisted. “He and Molly were summoned to High Court by the king to deal with urgent matters.”
My stomach dropped. Tensley must have hated that. Being in a foreign place, surrounded by dukes and ladies well above his status. But he had Molly, the daemon, a weapon that made him more powerful than any of them.
Including the king Fallen.
I let my shoulders drop. “When should he be back?”
Daphne hummed. “I’m not quite sure. He’s been gone for a week and a half now. Hopefully in a week or so. But you know, no one ever leaves the king’s court until he allows it,” she said, and her voice held a clear note of worry.
I nodded and tried to think of a way to politely excuse myself. Over the years, Mrs. Knight had always been kind and generous to me.
“I’m glad he had someone to care for. It made him a better man,” Daphne said.
I froze, my eyes widening at her words. For a woman married to Salvatore Knight, a powerful demon who had never been known to offer mercy to his enemies, she’d always been surprisingly soft and caring. Much more than any demon should be. “I’m the one who’s lucky to have him, Mrs. Knight. Lucky your family welcomed me and took care of me.”
Daphne grinned, and I noted Beau had her deep brown eyes. Hers were lighter though, more gentle. “My husband was a bit wary of you two spending so much time together, but I insisted we let you spend time together. After what happened to Beau…” Her eyes dropped to the floor, trying to find the proper words. My stomach twisted at the mention of Beau, the man my soul craved. “I knew I didn’t want Tensley to suffer the same fate. We were so hard on Beau growing up, always insisting he not mingle with those below his ranking. We kept any meaningful relationships outside of our family away from him, but he sought it out because we had robbed him of that.”
My throat grew tight and hot and Daphne paused again, the softness of her vanishing behind her composed expression. She had said too much…
“I didn’t want to rob Tensley the same way,” she said, softly.
I nodded, unable to speak.
“I would say…it proved correct,” she said, nodding her head at me, that faint smile playing on her lips. “I only wish I could have saved Beau.”
My back straightened. Saved Beau?
I wanted to argue with her. To say Beau didn’t need saving. But… he did.
He needed—I swallowed, remembering the palpable loneliness I’d tasted coming off of him that first night at the Pit.
Beau needed someone to accept him, to care for him and only him. Not his past, not his bloodline, not only the best parts of him. All of him. The good and the bad.
I could see behind his eyes, behind his glares how he held onto the past, lived in the past of his regrets and sorrows, reliving those harsh moments over and over again. Not allowing himself to move on, to…forgive himself.
“Excuse me, Mrs. Knight,” I said, dropping my head in respect. “I need to get back home. Can you tell Tensley once he’s back to call me?”
She nodded, and I walked down the hallway and back out onto the street.
My chest felt heavy and I kept wondering…if I could save Beau’s soul.
BEAU
My fists were red and tender by the time the other fighters came in to train. Most days I came in later than the others, but I hadn’t been able to sleep. Lex haunted my mind and body and soul, and I played over and over again how close I came to giving in to my primal desires. How I’d push her back up against the alleyway and lift up her skirt, push her panties to the side and devour her.
Fuck me.
I punched the bag again and wiped the sweat from my brow.
She was playing me. Playing games to get under my skin. Why the fuck she wanted me, I didn’t know. She hadn’t had an easy life, but she didn’t need to be attracted to someone as damaged as me.
Lex disturbed my control, my world, and everything inside of me.
I wanted to scare her that night in the alleyway, but instead she had enjoyed my roughness.
Frustrated with myself, I moved to the changing rooms. Laughter coming from other fighters bounced around the room, and I ignored them, walking around the lockers so they didn’t bother me. I kept my distance from most people.
I wasn’t here to make friends and chit-chat. I was here to bleed and make others bleed along with me.
I shook my fists out, unwrapping the bandages and washed my hands in one of the sinks.
“She’s legal,” I heard one of the fighters say and my interest moved to them despite myself.
A guy I recognized as Wesley snickered. “Do you think she’d be a screamer or the silent type?”
Quinn, a guy I’d fought once or twice before, hummed, pulling his shirt over his head. He shook his hair like a wet dog, droplets of water from his recent shower flying around him. “A screamer. But I’d shut her up with my thick cock.” He grabbed himself over his sweatpants and thrust suggestively.
“Would you let her taste your soul?”
My shoulders tensed at that and I gripped the sink. There was only one souleater at the Pit because most found it too overwhelming to their senses. They had to be talking about Lex.
“I heard the sex is intense if she does,” Quinn added. “Fuck, maybe I’ll corner her tonight and find out.”
“We could do it together,” Wesley said and my jaw almost snapped from the pressure of my gritted teeth. “She seems feisty. Might need to hold her down.”
That was the final cord in my strength. I spun, and the laughter instantly stopped as I appeared around the lockers in front of them.
Before any of them could speak, I gripped Quinn’s collar and shoved him into the lockers—the thud of metal silencing them all.
“Savage,” he choked out, his hands gripping my wrist.
All the men in the change room grew deadly quiet.
“You touch her, you so much as look in her direction,” I hissed lowly, but it was the only sound in the room besides Quinn’s gasping. “I’ll rip out your spine and feed it to you, then I’ll rip it out of your ass on its way out. Are we fucking clear?”
Quinn paled, his eyes bulging as he stared back at me. He nodded violently. Too purple to speak.
I let go despite the raging beast in me telling me to kill, kill, kill, and stepped back. I swept my gaze across the group of fighters. Men born in blood and rage and violence.
There was only one way they’d understand the threat and back the fuck off.
“I’m saying this now,” I said, and I knew my eyes had bled to black. “The souleater is mine. She’s my property. And you don’t wanna be fucking with the property of a man like me.”
The men stayed silent. It was their form of approval, of acceptance.
I turned, my hands rolled into fists and marched out of the changing room and back into the bottom level of the Pit.
Tegan stood in the ring and when she saw me appear, she froze, tilting her head to the side.
“Who pissed you off?” she asked, her brow wrinkling.
“No one,” I said and moved into the ring next to her.
She laughed. “Someone pissed you off and you look like you want to destroy them.”
I ignored her, but my thoughts went to the men, to their comments of taking Lex. And then I thought of last night. I did. I did want to destroy Lex.
Slowly.
Because fuck me, I wanted her to taste me while I fucked her.
I needed her to go away. I needed her to understand this wasn’t happening. I needed to be the adult, the responsible one to push her away. Tonight, when the little souleater tried to tempt me again, I’d show her I wasn’t interested.
When, I thought to myself, not if.
Because I knew she’d come back. I knew she wouldn’t listen.
Lex loved looking for trouble.