“I do have a few questions, though,” he said, and to her annoyance, some of the softness left his face, a more serious expression highlighting the sharpness of his features. So much for spending the day in bed, basking in the glow of having finally put words to her feelings.

“You said your new power is caused by my love for you. What exactly did you mean?”

“Oh.” Selma frowned, thinking back to everything Bealtih had told her that night in Colorado. It seemed like an eternity ago. “The goddess talked to me about what I am—I mean, what my kind were before we became Breeders.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You cannot trust the words of a goddess, Selma. They lie and deceive as easily as you and I breathe.”

A wry smile pulled on the corner of her mouth. “Yeah? Says the demon who’s some sort of crime lord back home. I’m not just taking her word for it, Kain. I can feel it inside of me. She didn’t lie, not about that at least.”

Keeping her tone calm, she told him what the goddess had said, but despite her best efforts, the demon holding her didn’t exactly take the revelation of the depth of the gods’ deceit well.

“They used you?” he hissed. “They are the reason for every Breeder who has ever been forced to bear a demon child! And this Bealith has the audacity to claim that we are the ones who need to be controlled. By the fucking stars—”

Selma placed a hand over his mouth, interrupting what was undoubtedly about to end with some form of violence. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t care about the gods’ plans—I care about you and our child. Does anything else really matter? Let them scheme and plan. I am taking no part in it, whether they want me to or not.”

His enraged expression softened minimally at the reminder of the life in her womb, but dark determination was still etched into every line of his face. “I am going to make you Queen, and when I do, you and your kind will no longer be mere pawns in their twisted game.”

29

Selma

“Exactly how did you get Kain to agree to this ridiculous idea?”

Selma sighed and glanced out the dark window. Nothing but the faint light of the street lamps on the other side of the metal gates cast any illumination over the deserted warehouse’s grounds. If someone was hiding in the shadows, she would never be able to tell.

“We talked about it like adults. He agrees that it’s the best way to lure out the Prince.”

Kesh scoffed by her side and readjusted his grip on what looked like some form of a rocket launcher. “You cried until he caved, didn’t you?”