Page 31 of Try As I Smite
Nothing.
“Mom? Dad?” Delilah called again, trying to breathe through a well of panic. They’d been together. Together.
“Delilah.”
She and Alasdair both spun around to find Naiobe standing in the doorway, a paleness underlying her mahogany skin that gave her an ashen hue.
Delilah rushed to her friend, checking her over as she did. “Are you okay?”
“I’m unharmed.” Naiobe laid a hand over Delilah’s, stopping her inspection.
“Don’t lie to me,” Delilah said softly. “It makes your nose twitch.”
Naiobe sighed. “Just a small scratch, easily healed.” She held up an arm with a welt that looked close to a week old.
Thank the heavens for small mercies.
“The demon?”
“Gone. Your parents sent it back to hell.”
“Holy shit.” The words burst from her before she could stop them. It must have been worse than even she’d imagined.
“Your father is safe. Your mother is unharmed as well.” Naiobe grimaced. “Or at least, she will be able to heal from the wounds she sustained.”
It had been that bad? The fact that thing had managed to wound her powerful mother said a lot.
“In here,” Naiobe said.
Her friend pressed her palm against a hidden spot on the wall. A scanner beeped and turned green, then a click and a large section of dragonsteel disguised to appear like wood paneling swung open, revealing a hidden panic room—supernaturally warded, of course.
Inside, her mother lay on the floor, her back propped against the steel wall. Delilah’s father, no longer in armor, instead in jeans and a white cable-knit sweater of all things, knelt at her side, his blond hair a disheveled mess, which spoke volumes.
They were still together? Goddess above.
Delilah hurried over and dropped to her knees on her mother’s other side. Her father reached out to squeeze her arm, and Hazah cupped her face with her hand. “I’m all right.”
But Delilah could only shake her head. “You’re both here,” she whispered. If she hadn’t sent Alasdair to her mother…
“Why is that bad?” Alasdair asked from where he stood in the open doorway.
The question sent her muscles into spasming tension all the way up her back. Holding herself stiffly, composing her features, she angled her face toward him.
Were this any other man, she wouldn’t bother to explain. But this was Alasdair, and she’d surrendered too much to him to hold back now. Besides, deep down she wanted him to know the truth. Though no doubt it would do little to alter his opinions. The way he stepped back as soon as they’d arrived… The man could hardly stand to be near her.
“They are forbidden to see each other.”
“Because of you.” A statement rather than a question.
“Watch it,” her father, usually so reticent, growled.
Except Delilah blinked, her gaze on Alasdair’s face. She knew this man in full sarcastic dick mode. That hadn’t been accusation. More like…acceptance. Didn’t he hate her? Hate what she was?
He tipped his head, ignoring her angel father and demon mother to look directly back at her. What was he saying with that silent, steady stare?
Delilah glanced away, at Naiobe, to cover the confusion racing through her heart. “Get yourself somewhere safe.”
Her assistant, and one of the three people who knew everything about her, part of the deal for Delilah releasing her from her bottle, hesitated. “But—”
