“I don’t like being called a demon.” I glare at him. I’m nothing like them. Not that all demons are bad. Leo is the nicest, sweetest person I’ve ever met. But it’s very rare you find someone like that.
“Sorry. I don’t mean it in a bad way. Just because of who your father is, I understand that you can have multiple mates.”
I hope not. Two is enough for me. When I first found out Leo was my mate, I thought one day Leo and I would take things to the next level, give in to our bond and be together. Then the more I thought about it, the more I didn’t want to hold him back, because of what my life would be like when I turned twenty-one. And I don’t want that for Zed, either.
“Fuck.” I squeeze my eyes shut, placing my head back against the stone wall.
“What's wrong?” he asks, lightly gripping my chin, lowering my head to look at him. The skin where he’s touching hums, sending a shiver down my spine.
“I don’t think this is going to work,” I say, surprised by the tears building in my eyes. These emotions are so strong, and I don’t know how to control them.
“Why not?” he asks softly, looking at me like I’m something precious to him. I could get lost in his eyes, it's hard to look away.
“Because I’m only here for three years. After that, I have to go back to Hell and rule alongside my dad.”
“Then I’ll come with you,” he says without skipping a beat. My eyes widen.
“You would go to Hell for the rest of your life with a girl you just met?”Is he crazy? Did I end up with a nutty mate?
He grins. “No, I would go to Hell to spend the rest of my life with my mate. By then, we would have known each other for a few years. There's plenty of time between then and now.”
He does have a point.
“This is a lot to wrap my head around. I need time to process all of this. Between my first day at school being awful and then having to walk home in the rain, my brain hurts. I need sleep.”
“Let me walk you home?” he asks, but something tells me he would just follow me there anyway to make sure I got home safe.
“I’d like that.” I smile, moving away from the wall, ready to leave the graveyard.
“Wait,” he takes off his leather jacket, draping it over my shoulders. “I don’t want anyone seeing my mate in her bra,” he growls, making me shiver. I’m not totally hating him being possessive of me.
He takes my bag from me, slinging it over his shoulder. I grin at this dark and mysterious man with my lavender backpack.
Snuggling his jacket closer to my body, I sigh at the warmth, inhaling his spicy scent.
His chest rumbles, and I look over to see his eyes burning with lust, liking what I’m doing. Blushing, I exit the graveyard and start heading towards my place.
“So, tell me about yourself.” I prompt as we walk side by side.
“Well, I’m twenty-three. I live in Dark Night. I don’t go past the graveyard much, so this is new to me.” He grins. “I live with my mom, helping her pay bills to get by, and I have a younger sister,” he shrugs. “I graduated high school a few years ago, and I’ve been working at a local mechanic shop ever since.”
A sexy older guy is my mate. I’m not mad. “You didn’t go to college?” Not that I care. I wouldn’t be going to Angelic Academy if I had much of a choice.
“We’re not offered that opportunity,” he states, casting a glance over at me.
“Really?” My brow furrows. “How come?”
“Dark angels don’t live like these prim and proper ass kissers,” he scoffs. “They have all the money, power, and everything they could want and need, while the other side of the island, for the most part, lives in rundown dumps. We don’t have access to higher education past high school. Even then, I’d hardly call it an education. We have the basic essentials, but it's not much.”
“That’s bullshit. They have so much more than they would ever need. It’s not hard to share,” I grumble. I don’t really come from money, that’s not a thing when your father owns all of Hell, but I do come from power. Although, I’d never abused my power, and would do what I could to help demons who had little to nothing. They didn’t always appreciate it, but I did it anyway.
“It's because they see us as lower beings. We’re tainted. We came from the men who fell from Heaven, while they are God’s ‘favorites’. They love to remind you, any chance they get. So we stay on our own side and survive. It wouldn’t be a big deal for the dark angels, but the nephilim are part human. They need healthcare, food, and a lot of things humans do. So we often sacrifice what we have to them.”
“That's really sweet.” I smile up at him. I like him already, and the more I talk to him, the more I’m finding being mated to him might not be all that bad.
He shrugs like it's no big deal, that it's just the way of life for them. “They like to act as if they are perfect, like they can do no wrong, but yet, they sit by and watch people suffer just because they don’t have prime quality blood pumping through their veins.”
“I saw that all too well, today,” I say as we round the corner to my street.