Demon Moon

was like iron when he looked at her, his frustration apparent in each clipped word. “Do you think to have another vampire attempt to transform you despite the taint in your blood, then return to me to drink my blood? Risking your life doubly?”
    “I don’t know.” She couldn’t catch her breath. “No. That’s not what I’m thinking—I’m just trying to figure out if there’s any way I can keep from dying when I leave you.”
    His lips softened and parted; his eyes darkened before he clutched her to him, his mouth against her ear. “Don’t leave me,” he said roughly.
    “I don’t want to,” she whispered. “But I can’t think of a way—I can’t see how—” She buried her face in his neck; her hands grasped wildly at his shoulders. “Please don’t let me cry. I promised myself I wouldn’t.”
    He gently tilted her chin back; she shivered as his tongue ran the length of her jaw. “Don’t think, Savi,” he said against her throat.
    And for the first time, she didn’t.



CHAPTER 24

    Lucifer rules over Hell, but Belial and his demons have rebelled against him. Whether they follow Lucifer or Belial, however, demons aren’t to be trusted .
    —Savi to Taylor, 2007

    When Savi awoke, the silk beneath her cheek was caramel, not blue. Heavy velvet curtains shadowed the bed. She’d fallen asleep in her room, but Colin had apparently brought her to his.
    A packet of yellowing letters lay on her pillow.
    The acrid odor of smoke clung to them; the string tying them was new. The aging paper felt fragile under her fingers, and despite her curiosity, she hesitated to open them.
    A shaft of light fell across the bed; Colin pulled back a curtain and threw himself onto the mattress beside her. He propped his elbow on his pillow, his indolent smile a match for his posture.
    “I have Lilith to thank for their existence; they’d have burned if not for her scheme to forge Polidori’s letter and deliver it to the detectives. Though some of the credit belongs to me: I was too lazy to carry them back upstairs after copying his handwriting. Which, I’m pained to note, is nearly as illegible as yours. It shall be easier for you if I simply describe the events related therein.”
    Her brows drew together; his manner had not been so insultingly careless since the night she’d attacked him in the parking lot.
    “Are you nervous ?”
    “Don’t be absurd,” he said. “I’m terrified. You will think very ill of me when I’ve finished.”
    “I began falling in love with you when you were a complete ass; I doubt something that happened two hundred years ago will change that.”
    His eyes widened with pleasure, his smile became genuine, and he plucked the letters from her hand. “If you will love me regardless, then I’ll not bother—”
    “You ass!” She tackled him, laughing when he caught her and rolled her beneath him. She was naked, he was clothed; she was becoming wonderfully accustomed to this. “I’m dying to know; you can’t tease me this way.”
    “Oh, but I can—and that is why I shall. Hold still. The sight of you in my bed is enticing on its own; I’ll drain you dry if you squirm. I’ll not tell you if you squirm,” he said, resorting to the greater threat. “Do wrap your legs around me, however, for I like that exceedingly well.”
    As she did, too, she complied. “Why are you telling me? You don’t have to.”
    “You want both my recitation and my reason for giving it?”
    “Yes.”
    “Choose.”
    “Your reason.”
    For a moment she thought he’d refuse. He stared down at her, his amusement fading. He swept his thumb over her right eyebrow, caressing the delicate arch. “So that you know I don’t deny you without cause, or based on flimsy conjecture, and that I truly would transform you if I could. This is the only evidence I have to give you; I cannot provide an explanation, but I can offer a—somewhat—documented history. I doubt your conclusions will differ from mine.”
    She shook her head, her gaze locked with his. “You don’t have to; I trust you.”
    “ And because if anyone on Earth can see something I’ve not, and draw a conclusion different than I have—you are she.”
    She took a slow, painful breath. “I love you.”
    His boyish grin soothed and swelled the ache within her chest, and his mouth pressed against hers in a brief kiss more teeth than lips.
    “Savi, you will soon have me spouting romantic poetry as tortuously wrought as…” A wry