Total pages in book: 42
Estimated words: 39245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 196(@200wpm)___ 157(@250wpm)___ 131(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 39245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 196(@200wpm)___ 157(@250wpm)___ 131(@300wpm)
That didn’t sound like his Finn. He’d been so serious with him. That and affectionate. Passionate. “He thought he was going to ruin my life,” Ajax admitted softly. “Make me give up my fame because I can’t be in the public eye and not age.”
“Oh,” the guy said, voice low. “That would be a problem.”
“You could maybe use glamours,” Dax interrupted. “Xavier can probably manipulate them to work on a human. At least I think so.”
“What?” He stared up at the huge ogre.
“I’m sure Finn must have explained about the magic we use to blend into the human world. You could have Xavier work glamours to make you age and then later you could reinvent yourself with one that changes your looks. Preternaturals would know but they’d understand. Soulmates are priceless to us.”
Finn coughed, pulling Ajax’s gaze back to him. Those glittering brown eyes, barely visible in the darkness, stared up at him. “You were going to give up your fame for me?”
“Oh my god, Finn, are you okay?”
He sat up slowly, still covered in blood but alert and watching Ajax closely. “I’d decided I couldn’t do that to you. Was about to tell you when the hounds showed up.”
“You had? You just decided something that affects us both?”
The others moved away from them and Ajax barely paid them attention.
“I love you, too, which means your happiness comes first.”
“Well, I’d decided I want to be with you. I still planned to create music, and I’m sure I would have figured out what to do with it. Did you hear what Dax suggested?”
“I heard. That solution hadn’t even occurred to me. It’s possible Xavier could make that work. I’m not sure glamours would work on humans, though.”
Ajax shrugged. “If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. If that’s the case, I still choose you. I will always choose you, Finn.”
“Music is who you are.”
“Yes, and I will always make it. But I will also always be a soulmate. Your soulmate.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Ajax
The fans had called the cops, so they’d had to hustle Finn into the house to wash off all the blood. Ajax told the police that some dogs had somehow gotten into the compound, but they’d chased them away. He had no idea what the preternaturals had done with the hell hounds’ bodies. The whole time he answered questions, he burned to be inside with Finn. To see for himself that clear, healed skin when all the blood was washed away.
Once everyone was gone and Dax was on patrol duty, Ajax crawled into his bed with Finn where he inspected the jinn thoroughly, which led to them making love long into the early morning hours.
He was about to finally drift off when his phone started up a persistent buzzing. He tried to ignore it, but it kept going on and he snatched it up off the table to squint at the screen.
It was Matt.
“What’s so important you’re calling me at”—he glanced at the clock on the phone—“two in the morning?”
“I’m at the gate. Let me in. It’s important.”
“Okay,” he agreed before hanging up. He glanced over at Finn who was tugging on a pair of jeans beside the bed.
“I heard. I’ll let Dax know he’s coming.”
Ajax pulled on his sweatpants and padded into the living room to open the front doors. What he wasn’t expecting was for Matt to shove Thorn through the doorway and kick him to the hardwood floor.
“Tell him,” he growled. “Tell Ajax what you did.”
Thorn rubbed the knee that had hit the floor and glared at Matt.
“Okay, I will,” Matt said. “Thorn here set hellhounds on you. His measly little mind somehow came to the conclusion that your death would earn the rest of the band publicity and sympathy. That then, bringing in a new vocalist would be accepted.”
Utter shock made his breath freeze. “You tried to have me killed, Thorn? Killed?”
Thorn scowled up at him. “Better that than you leaving us. Humiliating us.”
Matt shook his head. “It’s because you’re good, Ajax. The new stuff will hit, and he knows it. We were all worried, but damn, to me and Barry, you’re a best friend.”
“Some friend,” Thorn snarled.
Matt slapped him upside the head, then looked at Ajax. “What do you want to do?”
Finn couldn’t wrap his mind around this. He’d known out of all of them, Thorn had taken his sabbatical the worst, but to actually try and have him killed! The betrayal was like a knife through the chest. Thorn had been in the band since close to the beginning. They’d had their differences over the years, but he’d thought him a friend. “We’ll call the police yet again, though I don’t know how we’ll explain hellhounds. How did you even do that? Or know about them?”
“You’re the one who told me about the monsters. You pretend all the songs about them are metaphors, but I could tell there was more to it. All it took was some digging online.”