Page 4 of Wreaking Havoc (Demon Bound #1)

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Sascha

S ascha had been in front of some terrifying men before. Dead-eyed, callous, trigger-happy.

But now he was standing less than two feet away from an actual monster.

Like, in the flesh—all sevensome feet of it, plus whatever extra inches the black horns twisting out of its head added.

Good thing this place has such high ceilings. Sascha let out a hysterical giggle.

As he stood there, his giggle trailing off into a weird, choked gasp and his feet seemingly frozen to the living room floor, the monster blinking at him calmly, Sascha had to eventually admit that it was at least a hot monster.

Its face was human-looking, if you ignored the strange color, and almost eerily beautiful, in a harshly masculine way. Like a statue, all sharp lines cut from stone, with its dark slashes of eyebrows pulled together in a slight frown. The black hair trailing down to the middle of its chest looked unbearably soft and smooth, like a waterfall of silk.

And holy fuck…he—Sascha couldn’t think of him as “it” anymore, not with that face—had clearly never missed a day at the gym. A fact that was made abundantly clear by his weird getup, wherein his broad shoulders were covered with some strange leather armor but his chest and arms were bare.

How the hell is that practical? Sascha had to wonder.

The armor was paired with loose, almost flowy black pants held up with an array of mismatched belts, more than one of which had a wicked-looking dagger sticking out of it.

Sascha frowned at that, his heart catching in his chest. He wasn’t exactly a huge fan of daggers lately.

The monster’s revealing outfit showcased not just his physique but a dark-blue mass of tattoos that ran up his chest and shoulder all the way up the right side of his neck. They weren’t like any tattoos Sascha had seen, mostly because they didn’t stay still, instead swirling like smoke over his skin.

Skin that had a decidedly blue tint to it, although a much paler shade than the dark ink of his markings. And lighter than the blue of his eyes, which were glowing like little monster light bulbs.

Overall, the effect was a tad unsettling, to say the fucking least.

Sascha tried to clear his throat, but all he managed was a strangled cough. How long had they been standing there? The monster was just staring back at Sascha, one dark brow—the same black as his hair—arched as if to say, “Well?”

Rude. It wasn’t like Sascha had invited him, was it?

Eventually the monster seemed to tire of Sascha’s frozen indecision. He opened plush lips. “Human,” he said, his voice so dark and deep it sent a shiver running down Sascha’s spine.

Well, at least he could communicate.

Sascha swallowed hard, grateful when he didn’t cough again. “Yes. Human,” he agreed, pointing to himself in demonstration. He pointed back at the monster. “And you are?”

The monster gave him a deeply unimpressed look. “Explain your purpose, human .”

Explain his…purpose? Sascha’s purpose? “E-Excuse me?” Sascha sputtered. “You just—just appeared in my living room.”

The monster’s glowing blue eyes narrowed. “You summoned me.”

“I did not !” Sascha argued. “I wouldn’t! I don’t make a habit of summoning monsters into my living room.”

The monster gave him a concerned frown, like Sascha was daft. “No monsters here.”

Sascha gaped at him. “What?”

“I’m not a monster, pup. I’m Kai.” He bent his absurdly large torso into a weird half bow. “Kaisyir, at your service.” He said the last part grudgingly, like at Sascha’s service was the last place he wanted to be.

Sascha didn’t know what to say to that except, “Well, I don’t summon Kaisyirs either.”

Oh God, what was happening? Maybe Sascha had never woken up from his stabbing. Maybe he was in the hospital, still comatose, and this whole small-town reverie was just that: a figment of his imagination. That would explain Ivan sending him to Maine, wouldn’t it?

He hadn’t let Sascha leave New York in years.

Except everything felt so…real. The smoky scent in the air, lingering long after the clouds of it were gone. The heat of the room, which had gone up at least ten degrees on Kai’s arrival. The almost palpable weight of Kai’s stare. The way Sascha’s stomach was twisted into knots.

Surely Sascha’s imaginary, comatose self wouldn’t still be having tummy aches, right?

Kai cocked his head toward Sascha’s coffee table, where the bottles of polish and newspaper still lay. “You painted my mark.”

Now that he mentioned it, the design Sascha had traced did bear a remarkable resemblance to Kai’s weird smoke tattoos.

Still. “I was just doodling with nail polish!” Sascha protested.

Kai huffed, like Sascha was the one being unreasonable. “You said the words, did you not?”

“I didn’t know what I was saying!”

“And you spilled your blood upon the symbol.”

Sascha’s stomach roiled. He held up a hand. “Please don’t say that word right now.”

“What?” Kai crossed his arms, biceps bulging, a smirk on his face. “Blood? If you mean to master me, you can’t be squeamish, pup.”

“I don’t mean to master anything!” Sascha shook his head, irritated that all his statements were coming out as screeches. “And I’m not a pup,” he said, his voice a little more even. “I’m a grown man.”

Kai looked him up and down, the act of which made Sascha terribly aware that while he may have been a respectably average five foot ten, he was a little speck compared to this massive brute, especially considering Sascha had missed quite a few days at the gym. Like, all of them. Which had never bothered him before—he was naturally thin, and he had no interest in being all muscly—but he was suddenly feeling very…inadequate.

What if this thing wanted to fight him?

His assessment finished, Kai’s smirk only deepened. “You’re barely grown, pup . Have you even held a sword?”

Something about Kai’s piss-poor attitude had at least a bit of Sascha’s fear dissipating. Monsters were one thing, but he was no stranger to toxic masculinity. He sniffed haughtily. “I wasn’t aware that was a criterion for manhood. Where would I even find one in this day and age?”

Kai’s smirk turned into a frown. He glanced around Sascha’s living room. “What century is this?”

“Um. The twenty-first?”

“Mm.” Kai hummed thoughtfully. “I lost track, I suppose.” He caught Sascha back in that alarming gaze. “Now, about our contract.”

Sascha resisted the urge to step back. “Contract?”

Kai nodded. “You can’t summon without a contract.”

Sascha threw his hands up, giving in to the urge to screech again. “I didn’t mean to summon you in the first place!”

“You really didn’t?” Kai shook his horned head skeptically. “Well, I’m here now, aren’t I? Any enemies in need of vanquishing? Havoc in need of wreaking?”

“No, I—” Sascha paused. Truthfully, he did have enemies. Although, he wasn’t sure if throwing a gigantic, horned, supposed non-monster at them was the way to vanquish them.

He peered up at said gigantic, horned non-monster. “If you’re not a monster, what are you?”

Kai flashed a smile at him, revealing two rows of bright white, pearly, pointed teeth. “I’m a demon.”

Oh. A demon. Of course.

Sascha leaned into the wall, suddenly feeling like standing solely on the strength of his own two feet wasn’t such a good idea. “From—from hell?” he asked faintly.

“From—” Kai said a word that sounded an awful lot like “Muck-lake.” At Sascha’s confused look, he clarified, “The demon realm.”

Right, right. The demon realm. Not hell, then. That was a plus, right?

Sascha noted for the first time that Kai was standing in a circular ring, one that looked almost painted onto the floor, the same swirling blue of his tattoos. And that he hadn’t stepped out of it—not to walk toward Sascha or around the room or anything else.

Sascha peered up at him. “Am I right in thinking you can’t leave that circle?”

Kai eyed him warily. “Not until our contract is finalized.”

“Oh! I see.” Sasha nodded frantically. “Okay, cool. Perfect.”

And then Sascha did the only sensible thing he could do.

He straightened from the wall. He took a deep breath.

And he ran right the fuck out of the house.

Sascha shivered as he speed-walked, putting as much distance between himself and his cursed residence as possible. He missed having a driver at his service. And why hadn’t he thought to bring a jacket during his dramatic exit? Compared to the extra warmth Kai had brought with his arrival, it was practically the arctic outside.

He did an abrupt about-face, turning in the direction of downtown. Sascha would go to the bar, warm up, and call Ivan to get him the fuck out of here. He’d beg if he needed to.

Because surely a little Mafia squabble was nothing in comparison to a literal demon summoned from some hell dimension, right?

But there was someone else Sascha wanted to speak to first.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket—giving a quick little prayer of thanks to the technology gods that he’d had it on him when he’d run out—and dialed the only number other than Ivan’s he actually had memorized.

“Sascha?”

A wave of relief ran through Sascha at the sound of his brother’s voice. “Alexei,” he sighed. “Alyosha,” he amended, switching to the rarely-used Russian diminutive of his brother’s name, weirdly comforted just saying it.

He should have known that would be a dead giveaway.

“What’s wrong?” Alexei asked, alarm in his voice. “What’s happened? Where’s this area code you’re calling from?”

There was so much Sascha wanted to say that he didn’t even know where to begin.

Everything’s wrong. I was stabbed. I’m in a strange place. Someone’s after me, and I didn’t even do anything. There’s an honest-to-God demon waiting for me in my living room.

Alexei had always been the one Sascha had turned to, growing up. Seven years older, Alexei was the only one in their family who’d looked after him without asking for complete subservience in return. He’d been a safe space. A haven.

But then he’d left.

He’d left.

Sascha hesitated. “Nothing’s wrong. I—” He paused. He remembered, just then, something that had happened shortly after Alexei had left. Sergei had gone after him and had come back with his tail between his legs, claiming that Alexei was a monster and that his boyfriend was too. He’d clearly meant it literally but wouldn’t say anything beyond that.

“The eyes,” he’d kept saying.

Glowing, freaky blue demon eyes, perhaps?

Sascha nibbled on his lower lip. “Hey, Alexei. Is your boyfriend by any chance a demon?”

“Excuse me?” All the warmth and concern left Alexei’s voice in an instant, leaving it cold and eerily similar to Ivan’s.

Sascha pressed on. If he’d let himself be intimidated by cold, eerie voices, he’d never have done anything remotely fun in his entire life. “You know, a demon. Giant dude with horns and smoke and weird, moving tattoos? Possibly summoned from an old book you found? Ring any bells?”

“I’ve sent you photos of Jay. Does that description really fit?”

Oh, right. Sascha let out a sigh. “I seem to have summoned one accidentally. A demon, that is. He’s waiting for me at my house. Says he needs a contract. Do you think he means, like, my soul?”

There was a long pause. When Alexei spoke again, he no longer sounded cold. Just…tired. “Listen, I’m sorry I haven’t been checking in more. I did try calling your old number last week, but it didn’t go through.”

Of course. Alexei thought this was just a cry for attention. What else was he supposed to think? Sascha tried to keep his voice light, even as his heart sank. “Oh, that’s okay. You know me. Always landing on my feet, with the help of Papa’s money. Or Ivan’s, now, since Papa’s dead and all. Which you know!” He let out a laugh. “You were at the funeral and everything.”

“Sascha…”

“Anyway, got to go! Demon in my living room and all. Ta-ta.”

He dropped the call, mortified to find he was holding back tears. What had he really expected? For Alexei to drop everything and run back to him because Sascha was spouting deranged nonsense about demons?

He was a grown man, for fuck’s sake. He shouldn’t be asking for Alexei to clean up his messes in the first place. And more than that, he knew better. People left—left Sascha—and they never, ever came back. Not his mother. Not any of his dozens of nannies. Not Alexei.

Ivan would probably do the same someday, most likely by way of a bullet through his head.

“Hey, you all right?”

Sascha took his eyes off the ground and looked up to find he’d made his way downtown after all, his feet apparently on autopilot. There was a handsome buff dude standing in front of the door to the town’s one and only gay bar.

Sascha cleared his throat, blinking back his traitorous tears. “I’m fine.”

“You don’t have a coat on,” Buff Dude pointed out.

“I…dropped it.”

“Oh. Bummer.” The guy nodded, apparently convinced. Maybe not the brightest crayon in the tool shed. Sascha knew the type—it was one of his favorite types, actually—good-looking and built and dumb as rocks.

No matter that Buff Dude didn’t hold a candle to Kai’s unearthly beauty.

Sascha would have to be twelve kinds of crazy to lust after a literal demon.

Buff Dude tilted his head toward the inside of the bar. “You going in? It’s cold out. Especially if you dropped your coat.”

Sascha glanced at the door. The place didn’t have any windows, at least not on the front side. But he could imagine it would be, at the very minimum, warm inside. He could pick this himbo up, get him to take Sascha home, leave the worrying about the demon for another day.

That would be the familiar, cowardly way out. Push it aside. Pretend not to see it. Leave it for someone else to deal with. He’d continue hiding out, Ivan would clean up his mess eventually, and Sascha would get to go home.

Until the next time Ivan pissed off someone powerful, that was.

Sascha held up a finger to the nice, muscled man. “One sec, champ.”

He fished out his phone and sent a text.

I’ve summoned a demon.

Ivan’s reply was prompt and predictable.

I don’t have time for your games right now.

Sascha didn’t have to bite back any tears this time. Of course Ivan wouldn’t take him seriously. No one did. No one ever had. But with Kai at his disposal…

Sascha sent one last, longing look at the hottie in front of the bar.

And then he turned around.

This demon wanted to be at Sascha’s beck and call, form a contract, wreak havoc on Sascha’s enemies?

Then maybe it was finally time for Sascha to start doing things a little differently.