Page 25 of The Dame & the Devil
But he is mine alone.
It’s only because of Gods’ rules those saints have to fear a kiss.
Fear is the last thing I feel when wrapped in my Devil’s arms.
“Do you regret me?” he asks, trailing his fingers over the skin of my shoulder.
Most of my body is stained red or covered in layers of the burned names of sinners beyond redemption—they’re illegible now, but I remember every one.
I answer him the same way I have every year since I caught him in my trap. “Do you regret me?”
“Never.”
The throaty chuckle of his words brush over me, feather light, as if his wings sweep over me.
“Are you sure you don’t want to kiss a sinner and break free of me?”
It’s my turn to look at him like a petulant child. “It’s been six hundred and sixty-six years, my Devil. If I haven’t left you yet, surely I never will.” I reach my red stained hand up to draw my fingers along his furred cheek. “How could I leave the Devil I love?”
He spins me in his arms, pulling me against him, back to front, and tilts my head up to watch as the first halo of dawn blooms on the horizon. “I knew from the start you were a fool. My little fool. My love.”
