My Demon Husband novel · Chapter 2 of 32

Chapter 2: A Hundred Feet

The bond won't let them more than a hundred feet apart, and at midnight it pulls them onto the same mattress, until her alarm goes off and she tells him he's coming to work.

"Married," I said.

"Bound," he said. "Your word is uglier."

"Your word has blood on it."

He set the lease on the kitchen counter, very carefully.

"For fifteen nights the bond tests itself," he said. "At sunrise on the sixteenth day, it seals for life or it breaks."

"And until then?"

"Until then, we stay close."

"How close?"

"A hundred feet. Farther hurts. Past a mile, it kills."

I laughed, because it was nine-thirty at night and I'd been evicted that morning.

He didn't laugh.

"I'm going to the roof," he said. "Stay here."

He walked out the front door.

I heard his steps on the stairs, then nothing.

I opened the fridge. It was empty except for a jar of olives and a lemon that had given up.

I was reaching for the olives when the pain hit.

It started under my ribs, then twisted.

I dropped to my knees on the kitchen floor.

The biggest hound came over and lay down against my back, warm as a radiator.

Then the front door banged open.

He was breathing hard, one hand pressed to his own chest.

"Sixty-eight steps," he said. "The roof is too far."

"Good to know," I said from the floor.

The pain let go the second he crossed the room.

He looked down at me. I looked up at him.

"What's your name?" I said. "I'm not calling my husband 'hey.'"

"Malphas."

"That's a lot of name."

"It's an old one."

"How old?"

"I was old when Rome was a rumor."

"So you won't mind if I sit on the counter."

I sat on the counter.

He looked pained in a whole new way.

"Rules," I said. "You said I have to follow yours. I want to hear them."

"You'll stay out of my study."

"Fine."

"You won't feed the hounds from the table."

The biggest one sighed, loud and heavy.

"Fine. What else?"

"You won't touch my things."

"Then here are mine," I said. "You don't come in my room without knocking. You don't stand in corners and turn into furniture. And you don't call me Ms. Kimball like I owe you money."

"What should I call you?"

"Dorrie."

He tried it out.

"Dorrie."

It sounded like he'd never said a short word before.

"What are their names?" I asked, pointing at the hounds.

"You couldn't say them."

"Try me."

He said something that sounded like gravel in a dryer.

"Okay," I said. "The big one, the middle one and the runt."

The runt was the size of a pony. He wagged his whole back half anyway.

"They have names," Malphas said.

"So do I. You took a while to use it."

I found the sheets in the hall closet and made my bed myself.

The mattress was better than any I'd ever had.

I lay down at eleven and stared at the ceiling.

He was somewhere in the hall. I could feel him.

At midnight, it started.

It wasn't pain this time.

It was a pull, low in my stomach.

I sat up.

The tug got harder.

My skin felt too tight, and every breath came out shaky.

There was a knock on my door.

"Dorrie."

"Is this the bond?"

"Yes. At midnight it wants us nearer."

"How much nearer?"

There was a pause on the other side of the door.

"Touching," he said.

I pressed my palms to my eyes.

"You knocked," I said. "Points for that. Come in."

He came in and stood at the foot of the bed in his coat.

The pull eased a little just from that. Not enough.

"I'll sit on the floor," he said. "If I hold your hand, it should be enough."

He sat on the floor beside the bed.

I hung my arm over the side, and he took my hand.

His skin was cold. Not cool. Cold like a window in January.

It helped for ten minutes.

Then the rope yanked so hard I gasped.

He hissed through his teeth at the same moment.

"It's not enough," I said.

"No."

"Get up here. Keep your coat on. Lie on top of the blanket."

"Dorrie."

"I'm not going to bite you. I'm too tired."

The mattress dipped under his weight.

He lay behind me, on top of the blanket, stiff as a board.

I was under it in an old T-shirt and shorts.

The pull didn't stop.

"It's still pulling," I said.

"I know."

"So do something."

His hand came over my side, slow, giving me time to say no.

I didn't.

He slid his palm under the blanket and laid it flat on my ribs, over my T-shirt.

The cold of it went straight through the cotton.

My whole body jumped.

The pull went quiet.

I lay there with my heart pounding against his hand.

He could feel it. I knew he could.

His breath was cool on the back of my neck.

His thumb moved once, along one rib, and stopped.

My stomach went tight in a way that had nothing to do with any bond.

"This is the bond," I whispered. "Right? That's all this is."

"The bond pulls," he said, low against my hair. "It doesn't want."

I didn't know what to do with that.

So I didn't do anything.

I lay very still and felt every one of his fingers until I fell asleep.

When I woke up, the sky was gray, and his hand was still on my ribs.

He was awake. He had been, I think, all night.

My phone alarm went off on the floor.

Six a.m.

I slapped it quiet and rolled over to face him.

"I have work at seven-thirty," I said.

"Then go."

"I can't go. The courthouse is two miles from here."

He closed his eyes.

"Which means," I said, "you're coming to court with me."

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