“Maybe it did, sweetie. Maybe the planets aligned when you made love. But regardless of what happened between you, he wronged her—and he feels it now. That sin is darkening his soul.”

“How dark?” I asked, my voice almost a whisper now. “If he were a hit by a car right now . . .”

Hugh’s face was both hard and sad. “He’d head right to Hell.”

“Oh my God.” I collapsed back against the counter. “I didn’t think . . . didn’t realize . . .”

Since I hadn’t been a succubus, I hadn’t been thinking like one. I hadn’t worried about shortening his life or exhausting him because there was no need. While I’d known we were both deceiving Maddie and had felt a fair amount of guilt over it, I’d never considered it in terms of damnation. I’d turned off that part of my life, the part of being a succubus that counted and tallied souls—the main part of my job.

Which was stupid of me. Humans didn’t need us to sin. They did it all the time on their own and did just as good a job—if not better—than we could. I didn’t have to be a succubus to make Seth sin. I could have been any woman, any woman he’d had an affair with. Sin was subjective, too, and different people would feel it differently. For someone like Seth, doing what he did would leave a harsh mark—and me making him feel guilty about it hadn’t helped.

“This is worse,” I said. I laughed, but it was the kind of hysterical laughter that could segue to tears at any moment. “It would have been better if we’d had sex when we were dating. I’d have taken years off his life, but his soul would have stayed pure—and that’s what matters in the long run. Instead, I was so adamant about refusing to do it . . . and now look. Look what I did.”

Hugh caught my hand and squeezed it. “I’m sorry.”

“Is there . . . is there any way he can undo it?”

“You know the answer as well as me. Sure, he can eventually swing the pendulum the other way. But it’s hard. Very hard.”

“He’s a good person,” I said stoutly.

“Maybe, but that may not be enough anymore.”

“He’d need a deal with God,” I muttered.

I stared at the floor, studying the tiles absentmindedly. What had I done? How could I have been so stupid? Had I been so blinded by love and lust that I’d been oblivious to the principles that had dictated my immortal vocation these long centuries?