Page 25

Matty

M atty watched Kai stalk off with Sascha in tow, something heavy sinking in his stomach. Those were his friends. His only friends.

With some effort, Matty loosened Nightmare’s hold across his chest enough to turn around to face his demon. He peered up at Nightmare’s severely handsome human face. “Is everyone mad at me?”

Nightmare’s sharp grin dropped immediately. “No one’s angry with you, sweet.”

“It feels like everyone is.” Matty craned his neck to frown at the open doorway behind him. “Kai definitely is.”

A vaguely sinister rumble left Nightmare’s chest. He set long fingers on Matty’s chin, turning his head back to face him. “I will speak to the warrior.”

“But you won’t hurt him.”

There was a suspicious pause before Nightmare’s answer. “No.”

Matty narrowed his eyes, wishing for the first time for a little less of a height imbalance between them. He felt like maybe he needed to really get into Nightmare’s face for this one. “Or paralyze him,” he pressed. “Or stomp his psyche into mush.”

Nightmare let out a long, put-upon sigh, although his lips twitched up at the corners. “He will remain unharmed.”

“He saved me,” Matty reminded him.

A muscle ticked in Nightmare’s jaw. “I’m aware.”

Matty cocked his head, studying his demon.

He was getting a little more used to this human form of his.

And it was easier to read Nightmare’s expressions this way too, especially without the shadows shrouding his face.

Plus, Matty could feel it through the bond, this vague air of discontent and itch for violence.

“You wish you had saved me?” Matty guessed.

That muscle ticked again. “Yes.”

“You did.” Matty stood on his tiptoes, tugging Nightmare’s face down to his for a kiss, murmuring happily as he was enveloped in the scent of smoke and shadow. His demon smelled the same like this, at least. “You are, all the time.”

Apparently not satisfied with a chaste press of lips, Nightmare pulled Matty off the ground, claiming his mouth more thoroughly. He kissed the same in his human form too. Possessive and heated and hungry, like all his careful restraint left him the moment he had Matty in his clutches.

Matty was panting and a little lightheaded by the time Nightmare let him go.

“We should...head inside?” Matty asked, no longer sure which direction that even was.

“Mm.”

Nightmare set Matty down, and Matty grabbed his demon’s hand. He stood there for a second too long, and Nightmare very thoughtfully turned him by the shoulder toward the house’s porch.

Ah. Right where Matty had left it.

Matty pulled Nightmare through the door, where Sascha was waiting for them inside the entryway. Matty’s friend looked concerned. “Kai’s out back,” he said quietly, his fair brow furrowed as he looked Matty over.

Nightmare released Matty’s hand, turning to presumably head out back after Kai. Matty tugged at his shirt before he could get too far. “A conversation only?” he reminded.

“Mm.”

Sascha sidled up to Matty as Nightmare walked away. “That’s Nightmare?” he whispered. “I didn’t think he’d be so…hot.”

Nightmare whirled in the hallway to face them, twisting back into his demon form. Matty realized why a second later, when Nightmare’s shadows swarmed his way.

Sascha let out a loud yelp as the shadows whirled past him. “Agh! Fucking fuck!” He lowered his voice again as Nightmare stalked out of sight. “Okay, well... Those antlers. Yeah. And—and those eyes. The whole— He just—” Sascha shuddered dramatically. “That’s more what I was expecting.”

Matty didn’t have anything to say to that. He thought Nightmare’s demon form was lovely.

Sacha stared at one of the shadows, which was making a pretty good smoky impression of Nightmare’s skull mask about a foot in front of his face. “Those are his shadows.”

“Yes.” Matty smiled at his little friends. “These are them. But don’t touch.” Matty eyed Sascha’s hands, making sure they stayed right where they were. “They’re cute, but they’re shy.”

Matty might have been lying a little bit. It was more like they were his, and he didn’t want anyone else pawing at them, even if it was his extremely generous and good-hearted friend Sascha. But he didn’t know how to say that to Sascha without sounding unhinged, so he kept it to himself.

Sascha’s gaze tracked the shadows’ swirling movements. He shuffled a little further away from Matty, since the shadows were mostly congregating in front of him. “Chaos said they were incorporeal, but Kai said they can touch things. Hurt people.”

Matty shrugged. “They can be both, I think. Like, they can get inside someone and stir their mind up from the inside. But also I’m pretty sure they can consume a dead body.”

“And you think they’re cute.” Sascha gave him an unreadable look. “And also shy.”

“I do.” The shadows came to wrap around Matty’s neck, settling like a scarf around him in the way they sometimes did, and he grinned. “See?”

Sascha pinched the bridge of his nose, a move Matty had seen Ivan make when he was getting overwhelmed with the idiocy of the masses. “I’m starting to understand Kai’s concern.”

The front door burst open, and it was Matty’s turn to yelp, the shadows sliding off his neck and rushing to the door to fend off whoever was arriving.

But it was only Chaos and Cooper.

Chaos bounded through the shadows like they were nothing, tugging Cooper with him, completely ignoring Matty’s scowl at their disregard for the shadows’ personal space.

“Was there violence?” the chaos demon asked eagerly. “Did I miss it? How many arms does Kai still have? Or did Nightmare rip off one of his wings instead? Do you think he’d let me keep it?”

“Congratulations on the bonding,” Cooper said when neither Sascha nor Matty answered Chaos’s questions. He gave Matty a smile that was a little awkward but seemed kind enough.

Sascha’s brow furrowed as he looked between the three of them, his gaze lingering especially long on Chaos, who was now snapping his teeth at the stray shadows that kept trying to cover his eyes.

“This whole time I’ve been worried about my own family, but I didn’t quite understand the family I was marrying into. ”

“Aw,” Chaos crooned, his eyes flashing through different colors before settling on a painfully bright pink. “Please let me be in the room when you tell Kai you consider us his brothers.”

By the time Nightmare came back inside the house to lurk in the living room doorway, the four of them—Matty, Chaos, Cooper, and Sascha—were crowded on the couch, oohing over photos of Alexei’s vampire den.

“Why’s the pretty one wearing a fur coat in summertime?” Chaos asked, pressing his face to Sascha’s phone.

“Oh, Soren? I think just because he can.” Sascha shrugged. “You know. Fashion.”

Chaos’s eyes gleamed. “Fashion,” he mused, straightening and giving Cooper a glance.

Cooper flushed, tugging on his hoodie strings. “I’ll stick to my sweatshirts, menace.”

“But don’t you think I’d look good in a fur coat?” Chaos asked, snuggling into him and rubbing his head against Cooper’s shoulder like a cat asking for scratches.

“You would,” Cooper agreed, patting at Chaos’s head. “You can wear whatever you want, in whatever season you want to wear it.”

“A tiara? I saw a woman wear one at the ballet that one time. It looked ridiculous. I loved it.”

“Ten tiaras.” Cooper pressed a kiss to Chaos’s shimmering hair, which had gone kind of rainbow at some point. “Go nuts.”

Matty beckoned to Nightmare, and his demon left the doorway, stalking over to the couch. He didn’t exactly look happy, but he wasn’t covered in blood either, and nothing too murderous was coming down the bond. His white eyes were flat too, and not glowing with any sinister intent.

“You talked?” Matty asked when Nightmare was in front of him.

“We talked.”

Matty grabbed hold of Nightmare’s outstretched hand and used it to stand from the couch. Nightmare didn’t move back when he did, so Matty ended up with his face basically pressed into Nightmare’s chest. He tilted his head back. “I’m going to chat with him too.”

“Mm.”

“Scary?”

“Yes, sweet?”

“You’re holding my hand very tightly.”

“Yes.”

Matty wiggled back and used his free hand to tug on Nightmare’s shirt until he was bent low enough to press their foreheads together. “A little conversation,” Matty murmured, staring kind of cross-eyed into Nightmare’s white gaze. “Because he kept me alive long enough for you to find me.”

A low rumble left Nightmare’s chest. He pressed a hard kiss to Matty’s lips, and then he straightened, his shadows rushing out to drape over Matty’s neck, shoulders, and arms, all the way down to his wrists.

There sure were a lot of them.

Matty grinned. “Thank you, Scary.” He pushed Nightmare toward the couch. “Why don’t you take a seat and look at Sascha’s pictures. I’ll be right back.”

Sascha made a little strangled sound as Nightmare sat next to him, but he didn’t move away. He didn’t move at all, really. He seemed kind of frozen.

He’d probably warm up to Nightmare eventually, right?

Matty made his way through the back of the house and into the backyard.

It was lovely in the summertime, with its lush grass and the big tree in the corner and the overgrown flowers left behind from the previous owner.

Matty didn’t spend nearly enough time in it—he’d been too busy hiding on the couch under his blankets.

And there was Kai, standing with his arms crossed, kind of glowering at the tree trunk. He turned at Matty’s arrival, his scowl deepening at the sight of the shadows swirling over Matty.

“Possessive bastard,” he growled.

Matty kept going until he was right next to the demon. He crossed his arms in solidarity, and they both stared at the tree.

“You’re angry with me,” Matty finally said, eyes locked onto the bark in front of him.

Kai made a vague grumbling noise. “Not with you, little chick.”

With Nightmare, then.