For the first time, I was part of that hive mentality that they always seemed to move with. It was like I was in their heads.

  I love you, too.

  Tears were streaming down my face, hot and heavy as I tore my eyes from Lach and Rex for the last time to do the same with Matteo and Damon. It was exactly the same thing that happened, that passed between us.

  The pressure around my heart was so damn much that it felt like the organ was going to explode any second. I just knew it. With one last silent I love you to my guys, my eyes closed and I accepted my fate.

  Then the absolute last thing that I ever expected, happened. It was so bizarre that I wondered for a second if I was already dead and had been sent to some alternate reality.

  The pressure disappeared completely and Luci sank to her knees, bursting into tears so anguished it was like I could feel her pain all the way to my soul.

  “I’m so fucking lonely!”

  Chapter 18

  What.

  The.

  Fuck?

  I honestly couldn’t make a lick of sense of what the hell was happening right in front of my very eyes. Luci was positively weeping, her hands clawing the red carpet and her head bowed.

  “Why can’t I have that?” she wailed. Her spine snapped straight and she threw her arms out towards us. “Why can’t I have what you have?”

  Tears were streaming like a waterfall down her cheeks, her face scrunched in the most spectacular example of outright ugly-crying I’d ever seen.

  I was still being held to the wall, dangling in the air. We all were, but I wasn’t being choked anymore and from a quick glance to either side of me, neither were my guys.

  Shooting them a questioning look, they all just shrugged. They didn’t have a clue what she was talking about either.

  “What’re you talking about?” Damon finally asked.

  If Luci heard the irritation in his tone, she didn’t let on about it. Instead, she rose slowly to her feet and marched over to us, pointing the long, sharp fingernails of her index fingers at where my hands were still joined to Lachlan’s on one side and Matteo’s on the other.

  “That. That’s what I’m talking about.”

  Luci’s breathing quickened and her voice rose until she was practically shrieking at us.

  “You were on the brink of death and not one of you so much as thought about begging me to keep you alive above the others.”

  “What?” I gasped, not able to believe what I was hearing.

  “You heard me. You know how I know that none of you thought about selling the others out? Because you were too concerned about saying goodbye to the others. You were all prepared to die to be together, instead of a single one of you choosing to stay with me instead,” Luci spat.

  “I’m lost,” Matteo mumbled and I could see Lach nodding his agreement in my periphery. It appeared that we were all equally confused about why Luci was suddenly spitting fire at us instead of sending us off to meet our maker.

  “Do you want me to spell it out for you?” Luci screeched. “I want what you have. No one ever wants to stay with me. I want to know what it is that you see in my baby sis here that makes her worth dying for when you’re all so clearly disgusted by me. You couldn't even bring yourselves to spend one damn night with me.”

  “Oh,” Rex breathed, the crease between his eyebrows ironing itself out. “That’s what this is about? You want to know why we’re loyal to Stevie? Because you’re lonely?”

  “I want to know what makes you love her instead of me!” she yelled, stomping her feet like a toddler. A very angry, very dangerous toddler that I had a feeling I was going to have to appease very soon if we had any chance of getting out of this motel alive.

  “They love me because I let them. And I love them back,” I said, blurting out the first explanation that came to mind. Every set of eyes in the room flew onto me.

  “What did you say?” Luci hissed, turning to look at me like she was really seeing me for the first time. And she didn’t like what she saw. In fact, she was looking at me like you might look at a bug you wanted to squash under your heel, but curiosity burned in her eyes too.

  Apparently, she wanted answers more than she wanted to squash me. She must’ve been really fucking lonely for that to be the case.

  Lachlan cleared his throat. “Maybe you should let Stevie down. This sounds like girl talk to me and Stevie’s great at that.”

  I shot him a look. I wasn’t any good at that. We needed Brie for that, but since she wasn’t at the motel, we were stuck with me. It looked like I was going to have to brush up on my having heart-to-hearts-with-hated-strangers skills.

  Yay, me, I cheered sarcastically. But if it meant that we could be getting out of here alive, I could do it.

  Luci sniffed. “You are?”

  I nodded solemnly. “So good.”

  Suddenly, I dropped from the wall to my knees with a dull thud. Pain shot up my legs, but I shook it off. It was minor compared to everything else I’d had inflicted on me today.

  “Talk, then,” Luci demanded the second I stood, dusting off my knees as I went.

  “Okay, it’s like this. The guys were assigned to me, so we were thrown together, sure. But I never forced them to stay with me, I didn’t force them to fall in love with me. It just kind of happened the more time we spent together.” I was trying to explain the best I could, but Luci— and hell, even the guys— still looked confused.

  I shook the cobwebs and panic of the day from my mind. I had to focus, no matter how fucking bizarre this situation was. I was going to have to give this a real shot. Taking a deep breath, I pressed my fingers to my temples and tried to come up with the best way to explain it.

  “Let me try again. Let’s use these guys as an example, because I’m assuming that they’re included in the ‘no one’ you mentioned who wanted to stay with you?”

  Luci sighed as if she was pained by the reminder, but nodded.

  “Okay, they’re the perfect example then. When they were with me, I didn’t force them to do anything. I let them open themselves up to me on their own time. Sure, we still have a lot to learn about each other, but we’re all willing to wait for the other to be ready to share those parts of themselves. They had to spend time with me because they were my protectors, yes.”

  “I sense a but coming,” Matteo chimed in. Luci silenced him with a sharp look, but there was still amusement glinting in his eyes despite our insane circumstances. The exchange gave me an idea, though.

  “See, exactly that, Luci. Exactly what you did there, you expect people to obey you.” I motioned around the room, the obnoxious throne in particular. “You want people to be in your servitude, that’s why they leave. You don’t bond with people, you want them bonded to you. How do you expect people to love you when they don’t have a choice in the matter? Everyone is going to leave if they feel enslaved by you.”

  “But if I give them a choice, they leave,” Luci pouted, shaking her head.

  “Yes, but that’s because you never gave them the choice to come to you willingly in the first place,” I said gently. “That’s the difference between servitude and love, Luci. I hate to be the one to break it to you.”

  “I hate it too,” Luci admitted with a grimace.

  What is happening? my mind screamed at me, especially when I actually felt a tiny pang of sadness for Luci and the grief that was now shining so clearly in her eyes.

  Lachlan shrugged, adding, “Those are the breaks.”

  I shot him a glance and then shrugged. The guys were who they were, unapologetically so. It was one of the many reasons why I loved them.

  Luci glanced at Lach, but she didn’t reprimand him this time. I wanted to reach out and pat her on the head, but I was afraid that she would literally bite my hand off. I didn’t think that we were quite at the physical comfort stage yet.

  My proof? The fact that the guys were still being held against the wall.

  I needed to get her to let them loose, too.

  “Luci, why don’t you let the guys go while you and I talk?”

  She glared at me like I was crazy, or like I had grown antlers or something. “Because they’ll leave.”

  “Yes, they will, but only later. Once I leave too, because they love me, so they will wait for me,” I told her, wondering whether shit was about to go in either the very right direction or in the very wrong one after that comment.

  Luci seemed torn herself, but a minute of quiet contemplation later, she flicked her wrists and they were free. Instead of leaving me behind with Luci, the guys rounded to where I’d lowered myself into one of the supremely uncomfortable chaise lounges in the center of Luci’s chambers. It was as if they had silently agreed to help me prove my point.

  “You’re not leaving?” Luci asked disbelievingly.

  Damon came to sit at my feet and draped an arm over my thigh like we were about to watch a movie or something, instead of trying to talk ourselves out of dying today. “You heard her. We leave when Stevie does.”

  Luci’s eyes darted to mine, wide and demanding. “How did you get them to do that?”

  Rex chuckled behind me, then fell onto the uncomfortable couch with me, his arm winding around my shoulders. “I think that’s the point that Stevie’s trying to make. She didn’t get us to do anything, we’re staying with her because we want to.”

  “There’s no fucking way I’m going anywhere near that door without her,” Lachlan agreed, leaning over to plant a soft kiss at the very top of my head.

  Luci watched them with me in the same way that I imagined people would watch if the local zoo opened an alien display— with an expression of complete incredulity and like she thought her eyes were playing tricks on her.

  She opened her mouth to speak a few times, closing it again. Her eyes were on me now and they stayed pinned there while she tried to formulate her words. “You know, even our father likes you better.”

  What? That was the very last thing that I was expecting her to say. Again. My eyes were rolling before I could stop them and Damon squeezed my knee with an unspoken warning.

  Right, Luci’s Daddy’s girl. “He’s met me once, for all of about five minutes. I’m sure that he doesn’t like me better.”

  “No,” Luci insisted. “The last time I spoke to him, he asked me why I couldn't be more like you. He said that your protectors respected you and I can see that he was right.”

  “Okay?”

  “He’s always been impossible to please, which was why I started killing off the others. The last thing I needed was for him to have someone to compare me to and yet somehow, the one that I haven’t been able to kill is the one who finally pleases him.”

  Luci looked so depressed by the thought that I felt genuinely sorry for.

  She looked as lost as I’d been after I’d lost the guys and before Brie had turned. Back when I had no one.

  Because of her, my subconscious warned me, but I pushed it out of my head. Weren’t Brie and I just saying a couple of days ago that life would be perfect if not for the Luci situation?

  But in the weirdest twist off all, the fact was, if it hadn’t been for Luci’s craziness, I wouldn’t have been assigned demon protectors in the first place.

  I was at a crossroads here. And the path I was thinking of following was as insane as it was viable— if I had the root of Luci’s feelings right. I was pretty sure that I did, but I still crossed my fingers mentally before I took the plunge.

  “I have an idea,” I said. Damon looked up at me quizzically and Rex’s hand tightened on my shoulder. I looked at them each in turn and they nodded.

  They trusted me. I just had to hope to all hell that I could earn it. I took a deep breath and faced Luci dead on.

  “How about we actually try to be sisters going forward? You want to please your father and have people in your life who won’t walk out on you? Trying to actually be sisters achieves both of those aims.”

  The guys gaped at me, but Luci’s eyes stretched to the size of saucers. She didn’t respond right away. Instead, she seemed to be giving my proposal serious consideration before she answered.

  “You won’t leave me?”

  Her question was asked so softly that I nearly missed it, but I didn’t and I answered her without hesitation. It was the only chance we had. “No. But you have to shred that contract. And if you threaten us, hurt us, try to kill us or any combination of the above again…”

  “Then you guys will be my family?” she asked, looking painfully hopeful. “This isn't another trick? You swear it?”

  I shook my head as I made an x over my chest. “Cross my heart.”

  She started plaiting her white hair absently, nodding eventually. “Okay, I’m willing to give it a trial run. See if it works. If this is a trick, though…”

  “Then you can just go back to trying to smote me again. Smite?” I shook my head and waved a hand. “Kill me.”

  Matteo glanced between us with a look of utter shock on his face. “We’re taking her home with us? Is this a joke?”

  I nodded, my lips curling into a wide smile because I was almost a hundred percent sure that her answer meant that we would be leaving here alive after all. “Please can we keep her?”

  The guys all blinked, but then they nodded slowly. Luci even managed a weak smile.

  Lachlan reached for my head and patted it. “Only if you promise to pick up after her. I foresee piles of bodies in your future.”

  I stuck my tongue out at him. “Not anymore, right, Luci?”

  She looked aghast, but then she agreed with a low sigh. “Fine. So long as you don’t make me want to turn you into a pile of bodies.”

  The guys turned pale and my heart skipped a beat, then she let out a low giggle.

  “Kidding, jeez. Too soon?”

  “Way too soon,” Rex told her.

  Luci saluted him. “Aye aye, Captain. And to prove it, here.” She snapped her fingers and a familiar-looking piece of paper fluttered in her hand. “Null and void,” she murmured as the paper caught fire and burned to ash.

  My jaw nearly hit the floor, seeing Luci being normal was… something else, to say the least. It was going to take me awhile to get used to it. Maybe eternity. It was a good thing I was immortal.

  “So,” Damon said, rising from the floor and taking my hand to tug me up along with him. “You said something about going home?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Well, cabin home anyway.”

  “Cabin home?” Luci asked as she stood from her sofa and followed us to the door.

  “It’s a long story,” I started, but Lachlan interrupted me.

  “It’s not really a long story.” He flashed Luci a cocky grin. “There was this crazy bitch out to kill Stevie and she blew up her house and then we had to go hide out in a cabin where all of our stuff is until we could go back to the m—”

  “Okay, I get it,” Luci said, having the good sense to look just a little bit chagrined. “I guess I should apologize for all that, huh?”

  “I think it’s going to take more than an apology,” Matteo chimed in, apparently ready to jump on Lach’s bandwagon. “It might take several months of you being the designated drinks-pourer. Surviving today calls for a monster of a celebration.”

  “Now that’s something I can agree with,” Rex said. We wound down the long hallways of the motel, back past the packed club and finally out onto the sidewalk.

  I took a deep breath of the freezing night air as soon as we stepped through the motel’s outer doors, beyond grateful that the war could finally be over. This truce we had with Luci might well have meant that we were all finally able to just live our lives in peace.

  Rex hit unlock on the key fob and we all piled into the SUV. I was crawling into Matteo’s lap to make space for Luci, but she shook her head.

  “I’ll follow you there. I need some time to think.”

  Luci’s car, when it finally appeared behind us, turned out to be exactly what I would’ve expected from her: a low slung, bright pink sports convertible.

  “I’d better text Brie,” I told the guys as soon as we pulled onto the road. “She’s never going to believe this.”

  Brie and her protectors stumbled out of the cabin as soon as our headlights hit the windows a while later, but they stopped short when they noticed the car behind us and sure enough, they stood there gaping as Luci pulled up. Parker kept Brie shielded behind his body, clearly not trusting that she really wasn’t there to kill us all. Hell, I wasn’t entirely sure that she wasn’t either.

  Parker spoke up as soon as we exited the car, looking at Damon with questioning eyes. “What the hell happened?”

  “Nutshell?” Damon asked, his dark eyebrow arched.

  Parker nodded. “Sure.”

  “Turns out, Luci was just...” Damon trailed off, clearly trying to find a way of putting it that wasn’t going to get us all smited right there and then.

  “In need of a few friends,” Lach suggested.

  Parker frowned, but accepted the brief explanation. I had no doubt that he would be all over us later.

  Brie shot me a look, but then sighed and stuck her hand out to Luci. “I’m Brie, I wish I could say that it’s nice to meet you, but I’m a little confused and terrified here.”

  Luci walked up to her, her eyes widening when realization dawned that Brie was another succubus. She went on to ignore Brie’s hand and pulled her into a hug instead. “Another baby sister! Why didn’t I sense it when you turned?”

  Brie was so surprised by the hug that she just shrugged. “Dunno.”

  “This is Parker, Asher and Kason. Boys, Luci.” I made the introductions quickly. I was starting to freeze my ass off standing outside in the snow, and while I understood why they’d come to meet us out here, I was desperate for the fire I hoped that they had going inside. “Can we please get out of the cold now? We’ll explain everything inside.”

  There was a general murmur of assent and we all trudged through the snow, making for the rickety steps that led into the cabin.

 

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