Page 79 of Infernal Bindings

You have to. Are Daemon’s unspoken words. Exhaustion settles into my bones, energy draining from me more and more—from his feeding, from the orgasm, from how little I’ve slept in the past few days. Despite Daemon inside me, my eyelids drift close. Faintly, I’m aware of him fumbling through my cloak, the fabric rubbing up against me.

It’s so strange, him sifting through it at a time like this.

Eyebrows furrowed, I tense when something hard presses against my lips. The vial of ambrosia. Daemon doesn’t ask before forcing it down my throat, the sweet and syrupy liquid sliding into my stomach. Instantly, my energy returns, the soreness vanishes, and the tiredness fades away.

My eyelids pop open, staring into Daemon’s glowing red ones. “I’m not going to lose you,” he whispers. “Stay with me a little while longer.”

When I glance over Daemon’s shoulder, the hourglass reads half-full, the glittering sand trickling faster and faster as it reaches the bottom half. I don’t know if I’ll survive another orgasm, even if he gives me all the ambrosia in that cloak. When Daemon stares at the sand, then me, I can tell he’s thinking the same thing.

“Was it real?” I ask, ignoring the way he’s still moving inside me. If I’m going to die, I think I deserve to die knowing the truth.

“It was real, Annie,” Daemon promises, punctuating the sentence with a powerful thrust. “I’ve never used my magic to manipulate your feelings.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not lying. I’ve never glamoured you, or spelled you, or did anything that would take away your choice. If you refused me in the dream, I would have walked away. Please, believe me.”

And like an idiot, I do. For now.

It’s easier that way. I’d rather die in his arms, believing our love wasn’t some incubus-designed lie, than die believing this was all for nothing. Nodding, I pull his face to mine and kiss him with all the strength I have. His forked tongue slips between my lips and tangles with mine. In his demon form, it’s as awkward as the first time. But that doesn’t matter. As he moves inside me, I claim his mouth, not caring that the other demons are watching me do it. Moaning into him, I flip the audience off. And damn, it feels good.

“That’s enough of that,” Salios says. He snaps his fingers, and a gag appears around my mouth—not just around, but in. The taste of silicone fills my tongue, pressing down on it. This long, thick thing spears into the back of my throat, and I gag on it, gasping for breath but unable to find any. My hands fly toward the strap pinning the phallus-shaped gag in place. A metal lock greets me.

I gag again.

Tears burn my eyes as I choke on this giant thing lodged inside my throat, panic causing me to buck and thrash and squirm against Daemon, who can see the gag, but not the dildo on the other side of it.

I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe. I can’t—

“Mmmph,” I groan around it.

“Breathe through your nose, sweetheart,” Salios says, voice smooth and cruel. “You keep panicking like that and you’ll never make it.”

I force myself to obey him, fighting every instinct not to. With great effort, I focus only on the warm air entering my nose rather than the cocks between my thighs or the sex toy I’m being forced to suck on.

“Look at you,” Salios says, loud enough for everyone to hear. “You’re so fucking wet right now. You must really like being stuffed. I think Daemon can do a better job though, don’t you guys think so, too?”

“Fuck her ass,” someone shouts.

And then they’re all shouting it—chanting it is more like it.

They stomp their feet and hooves against the stonework as they scream out their demands.

“You heard them,” Salios says to me, to Daemon. “We should give the demons what they want.” Their cheering nearly bursts my eardrums as they realize they’ve won.

I shake my head in a desperate ploy to change Salios’s mind. I’ve never done anal before, and I have no interest in doing it here, now, in front of a live audience. But one of Daemon’s cocks slips free of me, the pressure in my pussy easing as he angles it lower. Scooping the moisture between my thighs, Daemon spreads it between my ass cheeks, getting me all slick for him. I grunt beyond the gag, then choke again.

“I’ll go slow,” he promises, his voice so faint I can hardly hear it. Staring into my eyes, his cockhead pushes up against my tight ring and I suck in a breath, only to cough and sputter on the silicone. “I think the eye drops have worn off,” Daemon says, moist breath tickling my ear. And I don’t think Salios realizes he’s speaking. “If you want, I can glamour you through it. You’ll like it, and you won’t remember anything.”

According to Sylrin, Daemon has never glamoured anyone before. And I know him well enough to realize that’s because he genuinely doesn’t want to. Daemon is many things, but he isn’t a rapist. This offer goes against everything that he believes in, but he’s made it anyway—to save me from pain, from remembering it later.

Butterflies twist my stomach into knots, and I shake my head because if this is something Daemon has to remember and live with, then so should I. It isn’t fair to make him bear the cost of it alone.

Grimly, he nods, and then he pushes.

My ass burns against the intrusion, clenching to keep him out.

“Relax. It’ll hurt worse if you tighten up,” he says.