CHAPTER 139: CHAPTER 139: THE OVERTHINKER

"ELIN..."

Grayson paused, his expression thoughtful. "Elin is healing. Whatever supernatural sensitivity she’s developing, it’s real. Whether that makes her safe or dangerous depends on how she learns to control it."

"You sound like you’re assessing threats rather than friends," Mailah said gently.

"Old habits," Grayson replied, but there was a self-aware edge to his smile. "But you’re right. They’re not threats—they’re family. Our accidentally assembled, deeply chaotic family."

"Family," Mailah repeated, testing the word. It still felt strange to apply it to this collection of supernatural beings and traumatized humans, but also... right somehow. "I like that."

"So do I," Grayson said quietly, his thumb still tracing those absent patterns on her hand. Then, with deliberate casualness that didn’t fool her for a second, he added, "Though I should mention—Liora sent updated venue options while we were watching the sunrise."

Mailah groaned. "You’re checking wedding emails on vacation?"

"Just one," he defended. "And only because she marked it urgent."

"Define urgent in wedding planner terms."

"Apparently one of the venues I’d reserved was recently revealed to be built over a demon burial ground, which violates several supernatural ceremony protocols." He said it so matter-of-factly that it took Mailah a moment to process.

"A demon burial ground," she repeated slowly. "You almost booked our wedding at a demon cemetery."

"In my defense, it wasn’t disclosed in the initial property documents."

"Grayson."

"It had excellent acoustics," he said, and she couldn’t tell if he was joking.

"That’s...," Mailah began to say, but she was laughing despite herself. "What are we going to do with you?"

"Keep me, hopefully," Grayson replied, and the vulnerability beneath the light words made her chest tight.

"Always," she said, and kissed him—quick and sweet and full of promise.

They were interrupted by a crash from inside the villa, followed by Oliver’s voice rising in what sounded like a mixture of exasperation and panic. "Shadow, that was a two-hundred-year-old vase!"

"Was," Lucien’s voice added helpfully.

Mailah and Grayson exchanged glances. "We should probably—"

"Definitely," Grayson agreed, already standing.

They found the scene of destruction in what appeared to be a sitting room they hadn’t explored yet.

Shadow sat atop a bookshelf, looking supremely satisfied with himself, while Oliver stood amid the shattered remains of what had indeed been a very expensive-looking vase. Lucien was examining a piece of the ceramic with genuine interest.

"This was cursed anyway," Lucien announced. "See the markings? Someone in the 1800s bound a minor vengeance spirit to it. Shadow probably just saved us from a haunting."

"Really?" Oliver asked hopefully.

"No," Lucien said cheerfully. "But it makes you feel better about the destruction, doesn’t it?"

"Not particularly," Oliver muttered, already kneeling to collect the pieces.

"Leave it," Grayson said. "I’ll have it cleaned up later. The villa has survived worse than a broken vase."

"But it was an antique—"

"And I’m an antique," Grayson interrupted. "I have perspective on these things. Objects break. It’s fine."

Mailah watched this exchange with growing affection. This was so different from the controlled demon lord who’d first proposed to her like a business merger.

This version of Grayson—relaxed enough to joke about his age, patient with Oliver’s distress, unbothered by Shadow’s chaos—this was the man she was going to marry.

The thought hit her with unexpected force.

She was going to marry him. Really, actually marry him. Not as part of some elaborate pretense, but because she wanted to.

Because she....

loved him.

"You’re doing it again," Grayson said softly, somehow aware despite being several feet away.

"Doing what?"

"Staring at me with that expression that makes me want to abandon everyone and take you somewhere private."

Heat flooded through her, and she was suddenly very aware of Lucien’s knowing smirk and Oliver’s careful focus on the broken vase pieces.

"Grayson," she said warningly.

"Just an observation," he replied innocently, but his eyes were dark with promise.

"I need air," Mailah announced, fleeing toward the terrace before she did something inadvisable in front of witnesses.

She heard Grayson’s low chuckle behind her, followed by Lucien’s stage whisper: "You’re terrible at subtlety."

"I’m not trying to be subtle," Grayson replied, and Mailah felt that declaration all the way to her bones.

The afternoon heat had settled over the countryside like a warm blanket, making the terrace too bright and too hot for comfort.

Mailah found herself wandering toward the gardens instead, seeking shade among the olive trees and the apparently very opinionated roses.

Elin was there, sitting cross-legged beside a fountain, her eyes closed and her hands resting palm-up on her knees. She looked peaceful in a way Mailah had never seen—like someone finally learning to breathe again after being underwater too long.

"Am I interrupting?" Mailah asked softly.

Elin’s eyes opened, and she smiled. "No. I was just... listening."

"To the plants?"

"To everything," Elin clarified. "The land here is so alive. It’s like the whole estate is singing, and I’m finally learning to hear it."

Mailah settled onto the fountain’s edge, trailing her fingers through the cool water. "That sounds beautiful. And terrifying."

"Both," Elin agreed. "Dr. Morrison warned me that developing supernatural sensitivity would change how I experience the world. I didn’t understand what he meant until now." She paused, her expression growing serious. "Mailah, can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Do you ever regret it? Getting involved in all of this? You had a normal life before—or at least, as normal as pretending to be your dead sister allows. Now you’re engaged to a demon, planning supernatural binding ceremonies, making enemies of ancient powers..." She trailed off. "Don’t you ever wish you could go back?"

Mailah considered the question carefully. "Sometimes I miss the simplicity. Not having to worry about demon collectives or pain-feeders or whether my wedding dress will survive magical energy discharge."

That earned a small laugh from Elin.

"But go back? No. Because going back would mean not knowing Grayson. Not having this strange, chaotic family. Not understanding that there’s so much more to the world than I ever imagined."

"Even though it’s dangerous?"

"Especially because it’s dangerous," Mailah said. "Safe and boring and slowly dying inside? I spent too many years like that already. At least now I’m living. Really living, not just surviving."

Elin was quiet for a moment, her gaze distant. "I think I understand that. With Varrow, I was just existing—each day measured by how much pain I could endure, how much of myself I could give up and still technically be alive. But here..." She gestured at the garden, the villa, the whole impossible reality they’d stumbled into. "Here I’m starting to remember what it feels like to be whole."

"You were always whole," Mailah said gently. "He just tried to convince you otherwise."

Elin’s eyes filled with tears, but she was smiling. "Thank you. For saving me. For giving me a chance to figure out who I am beyond the trauma."

"You saved yourself," Mailah corrected. "We just provided the escape route."

They sat together in comfortable silence, the garden humming around them with that strange awareness Elin had described.

Mailah could almost feel it too—a sense of being watched by something ancient and benevolent, something that approved of their presence.

"The roses want me to tell you something," Elin said suddenly.

"The roses have opinions about me?"

"The roses have opinions about everything," Elin replied. "But specifically, they think you should stop overthinking and just enjoy this time with Grayson. They’re very insistent about it."

"The roses are giving me relationship advice," Mailah said flatly.

"Sentient plants are surprisingly wise about human emotions," Elin said with complete seriousness. "Also, the wisteria agrees with them."

Despite herself, Mailah laughed. "Fine. I’ll take advice from the garden. Tell them thank you."

"They know," Elin said. "They’re quite smug about it now."

Mailah made her way back toward the villa as the afternoon stretched into evening, the heat finally beginning to ease.

She found Grayson in the library—a room they’d barely explored yet, lined with books in multiple languages and smelling of old leather and centuries.

He was standing by the window, reading something that looked ancient and important, his profile sharp against the golden light.

He’d changed at some point, trading his casual morning clothes for dark slacks and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up—somehow managing to look both relaxed and devastatingly attractive.

"The roses told me to stop overthinking," Mailah announced from the doorway.

Grayson looked up, one eyebrow rising. "The roses are very wise."

"Elin seems to think so." Mailah crossed the room to join him by the window. "What are you reading?"

"Property records," Grayson said. "I wanted to verify the villa’s history, make sure there weren’t any other surprises like demon burial grounds in our future."

"And?"

"And apparently I own three other estates in Tuscany that I’d completely forgotten about," he admitted. "Plus a vineyard in Piedmont and what appears to be a castle in Scotland."

"You forgot about a castle," Mailah said. "An entire castle."

"It was a complicated century," Grayson defended. "I was very busy avoiding my brothers and accumulating real estate."

"Normal demon problems," Mailah agreed, moving closer until she could read over his shoulder. The records were in Italian, but she could make out enough to see that Grayson’s property portfolio was genuinely absurd. "Do you actually visit any of these places?"

"I haven’t been to the Scottish castle in two hundred years," Grayson admitted. "I should probably check if it’s still standing."

"Or you could just keep forgetting about it and maintain the mystery," Mailah suggested. "Adds character."

He smiled, setting the records aside to face her properly. "The roses were right, you know. You do overthink."

"I’m a chronic overthinker engaged to a demon with commitment issues and an extensive property portfolio," Mailah replied. "Overthinking is my survival mechanism."

"Reformed commitment issues," Grayson corrected, pulling her closer. "I’m very committed now. Ask anyone."

"Anyone?" Mailah teased. "Or just the people you’ve invited to our wedding?"

"Especially them," he said, and kissed her.

It started slow—sweet and gentle, just the two of them in a library full of forgotten books and centuries of history.

But it shifted quickly, heat building between them with the kind of intensity that made Mailah forget they were supposed to be taking things slow, that there were other people in the villa who might interrupt at any moment.

Grayson’s hands were in her hair, his mouth moving from her lips to her jaw to the sensitive spot below her ear that made her gasp.

"We should—" she tried to say, but the words dissolved into a soft sound when his teeth grazed her neck.

"Should what?" he murmured against her skin, and she could feel his smile.

"Stop," she managed. "Before someone—"

"I locked the door," Grayson said, and the casual admission sent heat pooling low in her stomach.

"You locked the door," she repeated, pulling back to look at him. "When?"

"When you were talking to Elin," he replied, completely unrepentant. "I had a feeling we might need privacy later."

"That’s presumptuous," Mailah said, but her hands were already working at the buttons of his shirt.

"That’s optimistic," Grayson corrected, his own hands sliding under her shirt, warm against her skin. "There’s a difference."

Whatever response she might have made was lost when he kissed her again, deeper this time, with the kind of focused attention that made her wonder how she’d survived this long without knowing what it felt like to be the complete focus of a demon’s desire.

They made it as far as the leather couch before clothing became an impediment they couldn’t ignore. Mailah’s shirt disappeared, followed by Grayson’s, and suddenly there was so much skin, so much heat, so much want that it felt almost overwhelming.

"Wait," Grayson said suddenly, his hands stilling on her waist.