Demon ∞ l.h.

∞ Chapter Thirty-One ∞

∞

"Oh, thank fuck. Oh, thank fuck," I can barely hear Luke repeating his mantra over and over, my gasping breaths blocking out all noises- except for one that I didn't realise I had missed until now. I could felt Luke's heartbeat thrumming underneath my ear, pressed tightly against him. Neither one of us wanted to let go it seemed, like if we did I would slip back into the nothingness I had lived in for God knows how long.

I was seated in Luke's lap, tightly pressed to his front as my legs straddled his waist. At any other time, I would most likely have blushed from the compromising position I was in, but in this moment I couldn't bring myself to care. I was back in Luke's arms and conscious, and that was all I cared about.

Eventually, my blubbering slowed enough for me to gasp out his name brokenly, my fingers now beginning to claw at the thin black cotton t-shirt he was wearing. Even in my shattered mental state, my mind still managed to register the fact that this was one of the first times I had seen him outside a smart and well-fitted suit – it made Luke look much more... human. It was almost like I could imagine him walking around a college campus, backpack slung loosely over his shoulder, ruffling a hand through his hair in the special way he does- focus, Eve, get some fucking answers.

Luke pulled away from me slightly, staring intently, his wide blue eyes the lightest of sky blues I had seen on him yet. "Eve, darling, I've been so worried-" I cut him off before he could finish.

"W-what happened to me? How long have I been unconscious for? Have you been here the whole time?" Questions were flowing out of me faster than I could comprehend what I was asking; only stopping when I felt Luke's chuckles rumbling around me.

"Slow down, doll, you'll go blue in the face if you don't take a breath sometime soon." It seemed as if my waking had unearthed a newer side to Luke, cheekiness I had yet to uncover. "Eve, please breathe, don't want you passing out again, do we?"

I puff out a breath and feel the tension in my muscles leak away, the rigidity that fear had induced eventually fading. "Okay, now tell me what happened, I don't remember much," I demand. Luke's eyebrow arches and I silently chastise myself for the lack of manners. "Please, Luke?" I add quickly, dragging my fingers across his chest lightly.

"There isn't much to tell, darling if I speak truthfully." His eyes had left mine, and he stared at the hands that I had moved from his chest to my lap. "I was in the middle of my usual meetings and you began to feel feverish. I asked for Ashton, but by the time he got there you were unresponsive, a-and you were so pale and clammy, I thought you were dead- you surely looked it." Luke's voice was small, like a scared child. Affection rushed through me as I heard the worry and pain in his voice; surely this proved that he cared about me, more than I had realised before.

"What happened after that?" I prompted, my voice as soft as his. His head turned away from mine, and I reached up to drag my fingers across the sharp cut of his jawline. Sliding my fingers from his temple to his chin, I grab it and tilted his head up to meet my eyes. "I want to know, Luke, I need to know."

His voice was softer again once he spoke, verging on a whisper. "Ashton said to move you, that you couldn't be comfortable where you were. So I carried you to here, to your room, and the sounds, oh God, the sounds you were making – it was like every little whimper and cry you made forged another crack in my heart, Eve."

"And then you screamed. Never, in all my years of existence have I heard someone scream the way you did in that moment." He gulped down a breath, and his eyes closed pitifully. His voice was softer than a whisper now. "I'll never forget it, not if I live forever."

"You have to understand something, Eve. I am no saint, I have murdered, maimed, Hell, I've tortured people to the point that they didn't even beg for death, they were past the point of sanity. Never, not once, did they scream with the absolute agony that you did in that moment."

I'm sure that my mouth was hanging agape, understanding filling my expression. "Luke... I'm sorry, I never meant to hurt you..." Luke's eyes flicked to mine in surprise.

"Why are apologising, Eve? It's not like you asked for this, it's not like you asked to die." He spat the last word, like it disgusted him. I flinched back in shock.

"Luke, what do you mean? I died?" He nodded gently, dragging a hand over his face tiredly.

"Eve, you've been clinically dead for the past three days. I thought you were gone. I thought you'd left me." I blink dumbly at him, before looking at down at my hands. Turning then over, I inspect them quickly. Nothing about me reeked of death the way I had expected. My skin was it's usual olive complexion, nothing rotting or pale about it. And then the horror of what had followed hit me.

"Luke, I was dead and you did nothing with my body for three whole days?!" The last words almost screech out of me. Luke manages to have the decency to look away in shame. "When were you going to bury me, cremate me, whatever the fuck you do when you need to get rid of dead people? Did you not think that I was going to start stinking up this place eventually?"

"Eve, I couldn't just leave you! I just couldn't, okay! You should be fucking grateful that I didn't have you bloody buried because otherwise right now you'd be stuck six feet underground with no way to escape unless you planned to claw your way out of a coffin back to the surface! God, imagine if I had cremated you... No, I made the right decision, I regret nothing, I did nothing wrong." It sounded like he wasn't trying to convince me anymore.

"Do not think that I am ungrateful for you keeping me here, I am, truly. But you kept talking to me almost the whole time...You read me poetry... You weren't planning on ever putting me to rest, were you?"

Luke remained quiet, his slender fingers pulling one of my hands securely between both of his. "I couldn't just let you rot, not when we were finally- wait. How did you know that I read you poetry?"

Now it was my turn to avoid his gaze. I hadn't meant for that to slip out, but I couldn't help it. Luke whispered my name again, prompting me to speak. "I was in there the whole time. I don't know how, if you said that I was technically dead then I don't understand how I could have possibly heard what you were saying, but I did. I heard everything. I was just...trapped inside my own head, not able to speak, to move, to let you know that I was in there. You say that hearing me scream is something etched into your brain? It's the same for me; I'll never forget the way you begged for me to be alive, and it worse now, knowing you had thought I was dead."

Luke's face twisted into a scowl- he clearly hadn't betted on anyone knowing he had begged- unhappy that the King of Hell had his private moments of weakness. But I only felt pride for him, for allowing the humanness that resided so deep inside of him to seep through.

I had understood from Bible studies at school, that God had modelled humans after the Angels, that he believed he had created the perfect creature. Luke had only further confirmed this for me; but in this moment, as I watched the raw emotions flitting across Luke's expression, I knew that Angels and humans were not so different. Emotions are intense and unforgiving in how they are felt no matter the creature, no matter their mortality or power.

"We're together now, that's what truly matters," I whisper, sliding my hands to circle around the back of his neck. Pulling him gently to me, my lips brush his in a feather-light kiss.

"You're never leaving my side again." He murmurs back, the words breathing across my lips in the most tempting of ways.

"Of course, my King." And with those words, I pressed myself closer to him to finally connect our lips in the way I had been craving for far too long.

∞

not gonna lie the delay in the update is bc im a lazy piece of shit who is obsessed with netflix and procrastination. to be fair, i did have final exams for year 11 (junior year?) and i'm starting my final year at school now so the updates will probably be a bit more delayed now than in the past.

i promise that i will try to update when I can though, I'm in no way done with writing this book :)

Morgan