The Price of Possession by Dakota Brown (universal ebook reader txt) 📗

Oh, that was his name. Malak, huh. I realized he also hadn'tknown my name until Darius had said it. It took a great deal of effort to keepfrom laughing.

Something must have shown on my face because Dariusshook his head. "Chris, you're something else."

"What?" I asked innocently.

His gaze flicked between me and Malak for a momentbefore he shook his head again. "I'm well familiar with that flushed, disheveledlook of yours."

"Um, well, to be fair, Sabian's an incubus, andhe's starving, so it wasn't my fault. Or his." I pointed at Malak.

"Right." Darius gave Malak a long hard lookbefore glancing back at Sabian. "Ready to go back?"

Sabian shrugged and glanced between me and Malakbefore returning his attention to Darius. "I'd actually kind of like tostay."

"Of course, you would," Darius grumbled.

"I'm not a crossroads demon where souls areinvolved, or even out to make a deal. I just haven't been up here in at leastan age. Might be fun to look around. I'm not even particularly evil." Hegave Darius a winning smile. "Besides, I might be able to help with your drugcartel."

"How?"

The demon shrugged. "I don't know. I simply mightbe able to help. I'm harmless."

"You had my best friend making out with a totalstranger," Darius pointed out.

"Uh, mate, that's not really so out of character,right? At least he's a hot stranger." I grinned when Darius shot me anannoyed look. Why was I defending the demon, again? "Besides, I wasenjoying myself. Pretty sure Malak was, too."

Malak chuckled.

"See, harmless." Sabian did his bestimpression of a puppy dog, turning his amber eyes fully on Darius.

"You're begging me to release you and let youhang out with my best friend? Seriously?"

"I already gave you my name. What else do youneed? She's basically my master now."

"Naw, you can leave the dungeon mastering toMalak." I snickered at Malak's startled expression.

Darius frowned at the vampire. "What?"

"Role playing." Malak sighed.

The demon purred. "I like whips and chains."

"Why is everyone suddenly going right to whipsand chains?" Malak exclaimed. "Dice, lots of shiny little dice, andbooks, and beer and pizza. No whips and chains."

I doubted Malak was actually consuming pizza, butthen, I had also thought vampires were allergic to sunlight and that wasobviously incorrect. The thoughts didn't stop my laughter.

"You'd like it," Sabian retorted.

"What?" Malak and I blurted at the sametime.

"I can always tell what people will like."He gave us both a lazy wink. "Otherwise, I wouldn't have encouraged you tokiss."

"Learn something new every day. Eh, mate?" Inudged Malak.

He sighed again.

Darius chuckled. "I'm tempted to let your demonout and leave you three alone. Might be good for you to date a nerd instead ofyour normal type."

If he knew Malak wasn't just a nerd... I wasn't aboutto break my promise to Malak though, even to my best friend. Not without areally good reason. Then I got a look at Darius' expression. Was he serious?

"Oh please," Sabian begged. He went so faras to drop to his knees and clasp his hands up in an imploring gesture. "Ipromise to behave."

"Define behave," Darius ordered.

Whoa, he was actually considering it. He must knowsomething I didn't, because I wasn't nearly as convinced as the priest seemedto be. Maybe the investigation really was that desperate.

"Well, I won't harm Chris, or Malak, or you."He hesitated, thinking. "No inciting orgies unless it's in defense of youthree." He sank back on his heels, head tilted. "What do you want meto promise?" he finally asked.

"Incubi are not harmless," Malak offered. "Buthe's nearly got me convinced he is, at least to us. Demons are notoriouslydevious, but he did give us his name. That negates a great deal of his powershould we chose to use it."

Mmmm, Malak was considering an 'us' in this equation.I might get my hands on him, after all. What the fuck was I thinking? He's avampire. My brain did mental yo-yos while I tried to come to terms with myconflicting desires. None of them necessarily involved letting an incubus loosein my life, however.

Darius shook his head. "Here's why I'mconsidering this, demon."

"Sabian," the demon corrected.

Darius hesitated for a moment before shaking his head."Fine, Sabian."

The demon purred when Darius said his name.

What the fuck? Did he actually get off on beingcontrolled? Shit, was he a sub? What on earth were we getting into? I couldalready tell Darius was going to let him stay.

"Here's why I'm considering your request. Wemight actually need your help with the drug cartel. If you'll help us, and theother things you promised, then I'll let you out."

I wanted to object, because obviously Darius wasn'tgoing to take an incubus to church, so he would be staying with me, but thoughI though the words, they didn't cross my lips. What the hell. Might be fun tohave a well-endowed incubus around. My vibrator was only so satisfying. As ifsensing my thoughts, Sabian's gaze wandered over to me and he grinned.

"I agree, I'll help as much as I can." Hebounced to his feet.

I managed to keep my eyes on his chest, but it wastough.

Darius glanced at me.

"You know he'll have to feed off of sex, right?"I pointed out.

"Isn't that what your dungeon master is for?"

That was a little callous, but that was Darius. Whenhe got focused on a mission he tended to forget that people were, well, peopleand not tools.

"I mean..." I shrugged. "That'sprobably up to him."

I glanced at Mal who looked a little shell shocked atthe turn of events, but not exactly unwilling. The demon's influence? Orsomething else?

My brain was so tweaked out by the bizarre turn ofevents that I was having a hard time finding words.

"You've never had a problem with sex with randomguys in the past. That change?"

I narrowed my eyes at Darius.

"Why exactly do you want to keep the incubus?"I ignored his other question.

"Sabian here is the first demon the cops havecome across that they were able to catch, but the increase in activities withthe drug cartel have been immense recently. They're loosely associated withhuman traffickers. If we can't get it stopped before this spills over, it couldget pretty bad for a lot of innocent people."

Huh, maybe he did actually