Demonic Pornstar System novel Chapter 1034

Chapter 1034: No More Patience

Aria pressed her lips to his shoulder. Above him, Alice’s halo dipped until its lower edge brushed his hair.

<We weren’t going to let them have you, Big Brother.>

"I promised your mother I’d protect you... But to think that my own guards... How shameful. I don’t even have the face to ask for forgiveness." Yunohana spoke with extreme dejection. She was visibly ridden with guilt.

The woman flexed the fingers of her left hand, and Alexandra smiled with visible relief when they moved.

"You’re speaking pure nonsense. Would you try your arm? Carefully, please."

The High Shrine Maiden lifted it from her lap. Her ruined sleeve shifted over skin that had closed beneath the gold, and Kaiden felt another part of the fear in his chest loosen.

"Thank you, Alexandra."

"I’m glad you let me help this time."

Yunohana accepted the gentle reproach with a tired smile, then looked up at Kaiden.

"My lord, I am deeply sorry that your family was attacked while under my protection. Again. I’d like to ask you to return to your mother, for I have proven to be unable-"

He crouched beside her, with Luna lowering herself at his side and keeping hold of his arm.

Smiling, Kaiden placed a finger on her lips.

"You’re mistaken, Yunohana Tsukikage."

Her eyes widened as she looked at the finger that silenced her.

"It isn’t that you’re a terrible host who can’t stop things from happening to me. Things happen to me no matter what, whether I’m alone, with my mother, or with you. That’s just how my life is. But you kept me alive. I’m in your debt, yet you’re making it sound like it’s the other way around."

"...May I speak now?" she asked from behind his finger.

"Oh." Kaiden pulled it away. "My apologies. Got a bit too familiar."

"I do not mind. As for what you said, I cannot accept such logic. I have failed."

Kaiden looked at the blood on the silver cord around his wrist. She had made it for him with such tenderness, and he’d watched her take a lance through the shoulder rather than stop feeding it.

"I won’t debate logic with you. I believe what I believe. I saw you choose to stay," he said. "You could have moved, and you stayed because I was still trapped. I’ll remember that for the rest of my life."

Yunohana’s gaze softened as he offered her his unarmored hand. She rested her newly healed fingers in it.

"Thank you for protecting us," Kaiden decreed, closing the argument once and for all.

Her composure faltered at the warmth in his voice. "...I am a hopeless woman."

She closed her hand around his and bowed her head toward him, accepting the gratitude and all that he said.

Sonoda approached with a phone held against her chest.

"Lord Grey. May I? Your mother is calling."

Kaiden reached for it.

...

Vespera Ashborn sat in her office at Eclipse’s headquarters while her son tried to find an angle at which his face looked less injured.

"Keep the phone still, Kaiden."

He stopped moving it. Behind his shoulder, Aria held a bloodied cloth, and Luna was sitting so close to him that Vespera could see only part of her face.

She had been crying.

"We’re all here, Mom. Alexandra’s taking care of everyone."

"Good. Alice?"

The dark halo above his head bobbed into view.

"I’m here too, Mom. Big Brother didn’t let them take him."

Vespera’s hand tightened around the phone.

Her daughter said it with fierce pride, and Vespera wanted to reach through the screen and gather them both against her. She wanted to examine every wound herself, to have Kaiden within reach when she asked him whether anything still hurt.

An ocean separated them. And more than that, a world of duty.

"Tell me what happened."

Kaiden did, with the others adding what he’d missed while trapped. Vespera listened to the account of the prison, the portal, and the vampire who’d turned their guards against them.

When Yunohana described the mark feeding power into Viktor’s body, Vespera asked her to repeat it.

"Someone was supplying him from the other side?"

"Yes. Lord Grey suppressed the connection, but Thorne restored it long enough to escape."

Vespera had gone deathly cold.

"Mom?"

"I have to go. Yunohana. Thank you."

The screen went dark. Vespera remained seated with the phone in her hand.

The Blood Pact.

She knew the name, the criminal organization skulking around America, buying desperate people and hiding behind businesses that changed their names whenever someone looked too closely. There were always people like them, and she had never cared enough to make finding them her personal occupation.

Now they had attacked her children in Japan.

They had people abroad, vampires controlling an escort, a prepared extraction spell, and someone powerful enough to intervene through a portal. Whatever she’d thought of their reach, it had been insufficient.

Vespera set the phone down beside the federal correspondence awaiting her attention.

Her son had endured their inspections. Her people had answered questions, produced records, accommodated officials who kept finding another reason to remain on his property. They had treated his patience as permission to continue.

Then he had gone where he was wanted, and terrorists had tried to carry him away.

Its driver opened the rear door when he saw her approach. 𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢

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