Page 54 of Infernal Bindings

There’s not a chance in hell I’m stepping into their line of sight until he’s gone. Never in my life would I have imagined hiding in a Septem witch’s house, being protected by one of them. But here I am.

Minerva laughs, but it’s without any humor. “As if you’re any better. You gave them a lecture. I gave them something pragmatic.”

“No, you gave your son blanket permission to fuck my daughter after he nearly killed her.”

“They’re twenty-one,” Minerva says. “They don’t need permission to do anything. Newsflash, forbidding them isn’t going to make them stop.”

“She has a mate.”

“Yeah, one the angels forced on her like they did with you. Tell me, Peter, do you think he’ll make her happy—”

I tune them out. I don’t want to think about Christopher, who hasn’t returned a single phone call or text all day. Part of me is worried Dad told him what happened at the accounting office, and the other is afraid Mom caught him investigating their coven and is punishing him for it.

Neither option is a good one.

Thankfully, Daemon appears a moment later, ready to distract me. A steaming mug of coffee is clasped tightly in his hands as he sits across from me at the table. He must’ve returned and poured it when I wasn’t looking.

“How long has your dad been here?” Daemon asks.

I reach into my pocket and peek at my cellphone. “Five minutes.”

It feels like forever.

“I’ve never seen them fight like this,” Daemon says, and I narrow my gaze at him because I’ve never seen them fight at all. Until this week, I had no clue they knew each other.

“How often does my dad come to your house?” I ask, not wanting to know the answer, but also needing to. “Why didn’t you tell me about them?”

Daemon stares into his mug as if the secrets of the universe are hidden there. “Once every few months,” he says eventually. “When your mom leaves town for coven business. It’s been like that for as long as I can remember.”

“And you didn’t tell me because...?”

“Because it violates the treaty, Annie. Septem witches and light witches aren’t supposed to mix. After your aunt left her spellbook for you to find, the rules have been stricter than ever. They could both be killed for it.”

My aunt.

My dad’s sister—not Mom’s.

“My aunt was never a light witch, was she?”

Daemon shakes his head. “Your mom bent the rules for a long time so Peter didn’t have to lose his family, but then you cast that spell…”

I swallow, my fingers instinctively tracing along the infernal tattoo. Dad lost everything because of me. Well, because of me and the angels who gave him that mating bond. After my failed baptism, Daemon tried to warn me about the bond—about why it happened and what it meant—and I ignored him. But I was wrong.

Whether I like it or not, it is a tool to make us more complicit. Our perceived happiness is a lucky consequence, but not a reason.

“How do they know each other?” I ask, already guessing the answer.

Daemon smiles. “The Septem has summer camps for their kids. It’s viciously competitive, where all seven factions fight each other for trophies. They were co-captains of their team.”

The irony of my father being an accountant and in the greed faction is not lost on me.

“So they weren’t…” I let the implication hang in the air, and Daemon shrugs.

“I always thought they were,” he admits. “But they never talk about it, and it’s not my business to ask. Anything between them has been over since he met your mom.”

The front door slams shut, and I jump when I hear angry footsteps come inside. Minerva’s high heels click across the floor, while Dad’s leave heavy thuds. Shit. Daemon has the same wide-eyed expression as me, but he simply puts a finger over his mouth and offers me his hand. Just as my red-faced Dad enters the kitchen, I take it. A second later, mist surrounds us, and we vanish into nothing.

A bed bounces beneath me as Daemon and I fall onto it.