"Did you believe it?"

He captured Slake's fingers with his, letting himself play with them as he spoke. The intimacy in such a small thing was stunning, warming him even more than Slake's body plastered against his back.

"I didn't have any reason not to," he said. "Plus, it was kind of cool. All the other kids thought I was a total bada.s.s."

Slake shifted, losing the connection between them, and Raze experienced the strangest twinge of disappointment.

"When did the ball drop?" The mattress bounced as Slake rolled out of it. "Because you know it did."

"Oh yeah. It dropped." Raze salivated at the sight of Slake's muscular a.s.s flexing as he disappeared into the bathroom. "Seminus demons don't have any special powers or abilities until they go through the first of two maturation cycles. So everything was cool until I turned twenty and the first one hit."

f.u.c.k, that had been crazy. He'd graduated from high school at sixteen, so he'd been in his fourth year of college, preparing for a career in medicine like his father, when he'd gotten sick. Real sick.

"My vision started blurring, and I was getting these splitting headaches. They got so bad that I couldn't go to any of my college cla.s.ses, so I went home. My dad ran a free clinic in Los Angeles, so I helped out until the sickness became so debilitating that I couldn't even walk. My mom used her Aegis background to research my symptoms, and she figured out that I was a s.e.x demon of some sort."

Slake spoke over the rush of water in the sink. "She knew you needed s.e.x."

He snorted. "Talk about awkward, huh?" He tucked his arm behind his head and gazed up at the ceiling, not giving a s.h.i.t that he was naked and sprawled out on the bed. "She was cool, though. She and some of her former Aegis buddies crashed a demon brothel and got a female for me. That female was Fayle."

"And she's been with you ever since?"

"Yup."

The water shut off. "What happens if you go too long?"

"Fever. Agony. Death."

"Well, that's not cool," Slake called out. "So where are your parents now?"

A heavy ache centered in Raze's chest, and it took a moment before he could choke out one simple, yet devastating word. "Dead."

Slake appeared in the doorway, his magnificent body still glistening with sweat. "I'm sorry," he said. "What happened?"

Raze studied the ceiling again. It was pretty unremarkable as far as ceilings went. "The apocalypse s.h.i.t that went down a couple of years ago."

"Aw, f.u.c.k." Slake stepped out of the bathroom, and Raze figured he was heading for his clothes, so he was surprised as h.e.l.l when Slake stretched out next to him on the bed again. They weren't touching, but this was still the most private, most intimate moment he'd ever shared with anyone, including Fayle.

The knowledge left him off-balance, would probably have freaked him out if they hadn't been chin-deep in conversation about the worst period in Raze's life. He wasn't used to sharing, not because he was an overly private person, but because, besides Lexi, he'd really not had anyone to talk to. His life was work and s.e.x. s.e.x and work.

Keeping busy kept him from wishing for things he couldn't have. Like a male partner.

Like Slake.

"They were killed during the upheaval. I tried to save them . . ." Raze trailed off, the memory of finding their remains, scattered all over their house, still too fresh to open that wound. He looked over at Slake, who was lying on his side, propped up by one elbow. "What about you? Where's your family?"

Slake's dark eyes iced over. "As far as I know, they're alive and kicking in their special little isolated compound in Sheoul."

"I'm guessing there's a long story and some bad blood there?"

"You could say that."

Yawning, Raze closed his eyes, content to bask in the afterglow of the s.e.x and the surprisingly . . . pleasant conversation. "What do you do for a living, anyway?"

"I work for a law firm."

Raze cracked his lids just enough to eyeball his bedmate. "You're a lawyer?"

Slake barked out a laugh. "h.e.l.l no. My species, Duosos, are weapons specialists. We make and control weapons no one else can, like my handy little sinispheres. I work for Dire & Dyre, using my skills however they need me to. Mainly because, like an idiot, I signed a contract decades ago that ties me to them until the end of next week."

"What happens at the end of next week?"

"I'm a free agent." There was a note of hesitation in his voice, but Raze didn't want to pry. Not into that, anyway. He was too curious about something else.

"So . . . when you say you're a free agent . . ." He trailed off, gave himself a heartbeat to get his head in the right place, the way he always did before making the first cut of a delicate operation. "Does that apply to relationships?"

Slake sucked in a harsh breath, and Raze immediately regretted the question. He wasn't sure why he'd even asked. It wasn't as if he was available, not when Fayle made being with anyone difficult.

"I'm not with anyone," Slake said slowly, "if that's what you mean." He turned his head to stare at Raze. "What about you? I mean, I know you've got this thing with Fayle, but have you ever tried being with a male without her?"

Raze sighed. "Right after I went through the maturation phase I told you about, I tried to come with a guy. It didn't work."

He'd hoped, had prayed to a hundred different deities he didn't even believe in, but right when his climax had been imminent, so hot it burned, pleasure had abruptly shifted to bone-searing agony. Fayle had been there to help, and she'd never let him forget it.

"But if you found the right guy, could you, I don't know, do a threesome kind of thing? Have you ever tried?"

Raze nearly laughed. Once, he'd been hopeful that somehow he and Fayle could work something out. That somewhere out there was a guy who could accept his arrangement with Fayle, and that she could accept Raze's desire for someone else.

He'd been such a fool.

"We've done the threesome thing a handful of times, but it was all casual. I've never found a male worth trying to break through her jealousy for a real relationship." He glanced at Slake, wondering if maybe, just maybe, he could be the first. Yeah, it was way too soon to start thinking about the future, but d.a.m.n it, he'd never experienced this kind of intimacy with anyone, and while it wasn't like him to share all of this s.h.i.t, it felt . . . right.

Slake scowled. "How can she be jealous if she doesn't want you for more than s.e.x?"

"She says her species focuses on ownership." He was surprised by the bitterness in his voice, but then, he was getting tired of playing her games. "They're possessive of everything they consider theirs. They won't even give a friend a meal if they're starving. Sharing some things is punishable by death."

"Why the h.e.l.l do you put up with it? Why don't you tell her to take a hike?"

"I've tried to leave her," Raze admitted. "I made it a month before I nearly died." His body tightened as if it too remembered being in extraordinary pain and misery. "Most of my kind are natural charmers. They love females and can talk one out of their panties in about ten seconds. But I'm not like that. I spent every waking second trying to figure out how I was going to get s.e.x when I needed it, and I hated f.u.c.king strange females. I hated myself, and the stress was killing me. I'd go too long between releases, and then I'd get violent and sick . . . until I took it too far one night and collapsed in a filthy alley behind a hound-hump." He shuddered at the memory of waking up outside the werewolf brothel, his body burning with fever, his eyes bleeding, and Fayle sucking his c.o.c.k. Somehow, she'd found him and saved his life once again. "My life with Fayle isn't ideal, but it's better than the alternative."

"I guess I can see that." Slake's expression was troubled. "But she's keeping you from being happy."

"Happy?" Raze snorted. "I gave up wishing for that a long time ago. I take what I can get."

Something flickered in Slake's dark eyes. Sadness, maybe? "That doesn't sound like any way to live."

Raze looked up at the ceiling again. "I've accepted my lot in life."

Very slowly, Slake reached over and brushed his knuckle over Raze's personal glyph on his neck. A burst of electric pleasure exploded from the thin raised lines of the mark Raze had never been able to identify.

"Is that why your personal symbol is an ancient Lydian symbol for acceptance?"

Raze jerked his gaze back to Slake. "How do you know that?"

"My people make weapons for species of demons you probably have never heard of. One or two speak ancient Lydian, and they always demand that certain symbols be carved into the weapons they commission." Slake pulled his hand away, but the symbol kept pulsing pleasantly. "So? Are you an accepting person?"

Raze almost said yes. But would it be the truth? He'd accepted the fact that he would never be a normal Sem. He'd never be attracted to females, and he could never be with a male the way he wanted.

But that didn't mean he liked it. And the more time he spent with Slake, the less accepting of his situation he was becoming.

Slake and Raze lay in silence for a long time, long enough that Slake finally realized he wasn't going to get an answer to his question. He wanted to ask more about Raze's relationship with the succubus, partly to gain any information that would help him complete his a.s.signment for Dire & Dyre. But it surprised him to realize that most of his curiosity had more to do with wanting to know how Raze would be affected by losing Fayle.

It sounded like Raze truly needed her. For his life. For his sanity.

f.u.c.k.

Slake shouldn't care. He shouldn't. After being rejected for who he was by his family and the one male he'd loved, a male he'd had been weak enough to let back into his life three f.u.c.king times, he should have been immune to tender feelings.

But here he was, impressed by Raze's medical skills and in awe of his ability to care for complete strangers, let alone a succubus who was too jealous to let him be happy.

Slake definitely needed to shift the subject to something less . . . Fayle.

"Raze?"

Raze's response was a sleepy grunt.

"I'm guessing I was onto something at the hospital when I asked if your buddies know the truth about you?"

Swallowing, Raze kept looking at the ceiling, clearly reluctant to go there.

"You don't have to answer," Slake said, but Raze shook his head.

"Nah, it's okay. It's just weird to talk about it." He crossed his legs at the ankles, and the sheet lying over his hips shifted, revealing a glorious hint of that firm length Slake had loved with his mouth. "They don't know. I don't think they'd be a.s.sholes about it, but I couldn't deal with the pity, you know?"

Slake reached out and traced a swirly glyph on Raze's arm as it rested across his washboard abs, loving how the dark lines seemed to vibrate at his touch. "Pity that you're gay, or pity that you can't be with males the way you want to be?"

"The latter. Probably." He jerked his arm out from under Slake's touch and jammed his hand through his hair. Slake experienced an odd twinge of hurt at the abrupt withdrawal, and it p.i.s.sed him off. He wasn't ready to let anyone get into his heart enough to hurt him. "f.u.c.k. I don't know." He gave Slake a sidelong glance. "What about you? I've never even heard of your species. Are you considered . . . normal?"

Slake barked out a bitter laugh and settled against the pillows. "Not by a long shot." He clenched his fists as if he could fight back against the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds in his community-in his own family-who had not only rejected him, but who had called for his execution. "They accepted me until I turned into something they couldn't understand: a male who was attracted to other males."

The worst part about it was that he'd actually tried to change. And as long as he faked finding females desirable, his family was okay with it. Because yep, lying about who you were was okay, but being honest . . . well, that'd get you dead.

"I guess I was lucky," Raze said, a hint of an impish smile on his perfect lips. "My family only had to accept that I was a demon."

Slake laughed. "I guess being gay would be the least of your parents' concerns."

"They never knew, but they wouldn't have cared. They loved me no matter what."

Something inside Slake ached for that kind of acceptance, and for a brief moment, he was tempted to tell Raze the whole story, the truth about what he used to be before he was a male who wanted other males. Would Raze understand the choice he'd made?

Gunther hadn't understood, and Slake had never gotten over the rejection. Oh, Gunther popped back into Slake's life every decade or so, begging for forgiveness, insisting that this time, it would be different. This time, he could love Slake for who he was on the outside and the inside.

It was bulls.h.i.t. It was always bulls.h.i.t.

But Raze . . . he seemed different. Open-minded. Compa.s.sionate. Patient. h.e.l.l, the guy put up with Fayle, and as far as Slake could tell, the wench was a controlling, intolerant user. The fact that Slake had gone through a life-changing transformation shouldn't be an issue.

Should it?

Inhaling deeply, as if doing so would infuse him with courage, he decided to go for it. If Raze hated him, taking Fayle to Dire & Dyre would be that much simpler. If Raze didn't hate him . . . well, he'd have some serious thinking to do.

"Ah . . . Raze?"

When Raze didn't reply, Slake looked over, only to find the guy sound asleep, and d.a.m.n, he was adorable like that. He was so peaceful, his handsome face relaxed, as if he didn't have a care in the world.

Slake wasn't going to ruin that. Soon enough, Raze would wake, remember that Fayle was a b.i.t.c.h who wouldn't let him have a relationship, and that his friends had died in a horrible explosion.

It was time for Slake to go anyway, and maybe this was the universe's way of telling him that he shouldn't get more involved. Shouldn't reveal secrets best left buried.

Quietly, he showered and dressed . . . and Raze didn't move a muscle. Clearly, he was secure in his sense of safety, something Slake had never known. He always slept with one eye open and a hand on a weapon.

Even when he and Raze had f.u.c.ked, he'd always known exactly where each of his weapons was and how fast he could get to them.

Feeling only slightly intrusive, he went through Raze's pants in search of his cell phone. Once he found it, he plugged in his own number and then typed out a note on the screen. Nothing special, just a simple, Call Me.

As he stuffed the phone back into the pocket where he'd found it, he hesitated. He was going to have to grab Fayle at some point, and that wasn't going to go well. Sure, he could do it so Raze would never know he was involved, but d.a.m.n it, now that Slake knew how badly Raze needed her, he actually felt p.r.i.c.ked by a shard of guilt.

Suck it the f.u.c.k up. Your d.a.m.ned soul is on the line.

And Raze's life might be on the line.

Cursing himself and his situation, he slipped out of the bedroom and stepped into the kitchen where, lo and behold, Fayle was sitting at the dining room table, idly stirring creamer into a cup of tea. She wore a blazingly bright tie-dyed tank top, but the glare she gave him was all black.

"Sneaking out?" she asked. And rather b.i.t.c.hily, he might add.

"I left a note and my number."

"Hmm." She locked her gaze with his. "I don't expect to see you again."

Oh, she'd be seeing him again. Soon. If he hadn't used the rope he'd procured specifically for apprehending her, he could take her right now.

The guilt p.r.i.c.ked him again, but instead of dwelling on it, he moved toward her, slowly, gauging her reaction. Aside from a slight tightening in her jaw, she was as cool as the frost on an ice viper's belly.

"I don't expect you to have any say in that."

A sinister smile ruffled the corners of her mouth. "I won't let anyone hurt him."

"From what I can tell, you won't let anyone near enough for that to happen."

She stirred her tea faster, the spoon clinking angrily against the side of the cup. "He can't be with males, so it's pointless for him to try."