Page 26 of Ex-Mas
Adrian grips my hand and starts walking. “Yup. Every decade that passes makes this world less relatable for us, and by now it seems pointless. Even the food has gone downhill.”
All that work and what did it get me? As it turns out, there’s more than one way to become a demon, and I chose the easy way to speed things up a bit. We just wanted to have a little fun topside, fucking with people, setting a few fires, taking out the bastards who were trying to ruin the world behindthe scenes. But to do that, I needed to be like him. Willpower is a hell of a thing, and in my case, it might’ve been more powerful than trauma — and had less side effects, too. I was never stuck in a forever-Christmas Hell, didn’t experience any of the pain or suffering he did, and my abilities still manifested.
But when you’re staring at eternity, a few hundred years is just a blink. “Do you think it’s better anywhere else? The world is a big place.”
Shrugging, he glances over at me and flicks out his gorgeous wings. “Let’s go find out.”
Grinning, I take off to get a head start on him and head toward the ocean. Thankfully, humans are so fucking scared of whatever’s down there that even now, they stay away from it — I’m sure we’ll see a ship or two, but no one will ever believe their stories. Video quit being a reliable source of truth a long time ago.
And the freedom I feel right now with the wind gliding under my wings is more than enough to stop me from giving a shit about what a few humans claim to see.
He lets me pull ahead for a while, the fluttering of his wings hitting my ears beforeI see his huge grin. “I still can’t get over how beautiful you are as a demon.”
He reaches his hand out for mine, pulling me in and wrapping his wings around me as he spiral dives toward the water. Shrieking a laugh, I hang on tightly and blink us over land.
It makes him pull back and spin us around so he’s below me, and when his teeth nip at my jaw, I know I’m going to pay for that later.
Oh, what a shame.
We end up not far from shore on a cloudy island that hasn’t seen a human in a thousand years or more, landing softly on wet sand. “This is better,” I muse, spinning around and slapping his ass with my tail. “No one to mess with, but we can make it our own. What do you think?”
“Yeah, it’s got good vibes. You know I love it when it’s just you and me anyway. I can mess with you just fine.”
Adrian reaches out to grip my throat and tug me in for a kiss, and I get butterflies all over again. I expected them to fade after a hundred years or so, but I think they might be worse now. “Do you think it’ll ever stop feeling like this?”
“Nope. Not with us,” he says without any trace of doubt. “We were made for each other for a thousand lifetimes, and nothing will ever change that. To this day, I only choose you, and if we decide to leave all of this behind we’ll do that together too.”
Grinning, I take a step back from him and slide my shirt off, dropping it onto the sand as I blink my pants away. “Let’s break it in right then.”
Taking off on foot, I leave the beach for the treeline beyond and laugh as I hear him following. He’ll never stop chasing me, never stop loving me, and maybe one day I’ll quit making him prove it — but that day is not today.
I like it too much when he catches me, and that?
That’ll never stop either.