Demon's Delight Read Online Free PDF

strength; he had two hands clamped around her wrists, barely holding her off. She might work out like a fiend, but her hands were small, and she couldn’t get them all the way around his neck. And it wouldn’t be long before she figured that out and starting beating the living shit out of him in earnest. “You should listen to Violet, a kindhearted but slightly disturbed third-grader.”
    â€œDon’t talk about my sister,” she said through gritted teeth, her face going even redder from her strangulation efforts.
    Throttle? Bottle? Strangle? What rhymed with strangle? Maybe he could turn her hands into flippers. Flipper, slipper?
    Oh, to hell with it. He tightened his grip on her wrists and abruptly rolled over. Thank you, Mother Nature, for making me a guy.
    Now he was on top, still encircling her wrists with his fingers, and she glared up at him with such malevolence that he almost let go of her. Which would have been a disaster.
    â€œOkay,” he said, and coughed, politely turning his face away. He hated to think how his throat would feel if she’d had bigger hands. “Okay. Listen. I just came here to—”
    â€œGet the hell off me!”
    â€œâ€”talk and try to convince you that this is a dance we don’t have to do—”
    â€œI am going to kill you a lot .”
    â€œâ€”because after all, this is the twenty-first century, and don’t you think witch-hunting should have been left behind with slavery?”
    â€œNot as long as any de Mere descendants are running around on the planet now let go !”
    â€œOh, shut up,” he said, and bent down and kissed her.
    She went rigid with astonishment, which was a relief, because he didn’t care to be bitten at the moment. He’d just meant to give her a peck, but the taste of her soft, sweet mouth worked on him like a hormone shot, and he slid his tongue between her lips, tasting her, relishing her the way he relished a ripe piece of fruit in the summertime.
    She didn’t make a sound. Just laid there like a board. An amazed, totally shocked board. So he let go of her wrists and cupped her face and deepened the kiss, and he thought he felt her respond, and then—
    â€”and then her face shot out of his line of sight, and he realized she’d slapped him so hard he’d flown off her.
    â€œOw,” he groaned, once again face down in the dust.
    â€œWhat did you think you were doing?” He rolled over in time to see her spring to her feet. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
    â€œWell, at the moment, I’ve got dust all over me and a piece of gravel up my nose and maybe a nosebleed, too.”
    She stood over him, jabbing her finger in the air for emphasis. He tried not to flinch. “We are supposed to be killing each other, not kissing. So cool your gonads and get your head in the game.”
    â€œThat’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” he said patiently, staring up at her. “I’m not in the game. I’m not going to play. I think our families have been killing each other long enough, don’t you?”
    â€œAs long as a de Mere is around, a Goodman has to kill him.”
    â€œWho says?”
    Her mouth popped open, and she appeared to be struggling for words, then burst out with, “Everybody! My parents and tradition and—everybody. All the way back to the first Goodman and the first de Mere.”
    â€œYawn,” he said.
    â€œIt’s my duty to kill you and be killed doing it. Just like it’s your family duty to try to kill me and be killed doing it.”
    â€œDon’t you think that’s just about the dumbest fucking thing in the world?”
    â€œWell. Yes,” she admitted. “But who are we to break from tradition?”
    â€œAnd that’s the second dumbest thing. Oooof!” She had dropped to her knees—right on his chest. “Gkkk! Air!”
    â€œYou listen to me, de