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“That’s not what I said.”

“If she wasn’t teaching you control, then why would she…? She wanted you tobring outthe monster?”

“Yes, she would try all manner of ways to get me to shift. Just like you did. I don’t want to deal with it again.”

“Why?”

I worry that he won’t answer or that my question was too vague.

Eventually, he looks up.

“My mother raised me for a single purpose. Sheconceivedme for a single purpose, and everything in my life was predetermined by her until we were separated while I served in the army. Even my enlisting was due to her insistence.”

“What did she want from you?”

After a pause, he says, “Vengeance. I was to be her means of exacting vengeance.”

He turns around, heading back for his bed, having said his piece.

My eyes travel to his ass.

Or just above it, rather, where a little triangle of black-violet peaks above the comforter.

The tip of his tail.

My mouth falls open. “Why is it purple?”

Eryx freezes and looks over his shoulder. As soon as his eyes land on it, it winks out of sight. He ignores me as he crawls back into bed.

“No more verbal assaults to get you to shift,” I say. “I can work with that.”

“How do you plan to work with that?”

“You’ve said it before. Angering you isn’t the only way to get you to shift.”

Those amber eyes look at me in surprise as I force myself to wake up.

Let him stew on that thought. Let him toss and turn on his mattress as he thinks on how I intend to make him impassioned and force him to shift.

A large smile stretches across my lips as I return to my room. Next time, I’m not going to seek him out. Oh, no. Eryx is coming to me. I’ve just ensured it.

Feeling proud of myself, I drift off to sleep in my own bed this time.

I’m unsure how long I’m out before a thundering crack echoes in my dreams, but when I shred my eyes open, another loud crash sounds, followed by my door swinging off its hinges and smacking into the ground. At first, I assume it’s Eryx. Who else would have the strength to do such a thing? And he’s so fresh in my mind after yet another visit.

But it is not Eryx filling the hole where my door once stood.

CHAPTER 20

Dozens of men slosh into the room, like an unsteady tide. I hear one of them hiccup, and another laughs and smacks him on the arm.

“Don’t see no monster in here,” one of them says.

Another turns on his heel to properly inspect the whole of the room. When his face catches the moonlight, I recoil.

He’s harsher-looking than Argus. Apelike arms, full scraggly beard, stern face.

“Sarkis, does this look like the master suite to you?”