Released (Eternal Balance) by Jus Accardo

I wheezed. Greedily, I pulled in a series of long, frantic breaths. Every part of me was tapped out. My pulse was a barely-there patter, almost as though it was about to come to a standstill, and my legs shook beneath the weight of my body—fucking hysterical when you thought about it. This wasn’t even a physical form. “What the—” I pulled in another deep breath. “What the hell is wrong with me?”
    The shadowy figure seemed to shake its head slowly. “It truly is a pity. You are so much less inferior than your fellow man.”
    “Fuck you.” My fists curled, and it took all the self-control I had not to lunge forward despite my weakened state. Sure, it wouldn’t have done jack shit. Even if I could have crossed to the other side, you couldn’t beat the crap out of smoke. But it might have made me feel better.
    The demon didn’t respond. It stood in the corner, next to the pencil, and made a sound that was almost like a sigh. After a few minutes, it said, “I have lived a thousand lives, and not once have I felt regret.”
    “Regret? What you almost did goes way fucking beyond that!”
    “My regret has nothing to do with Samantha Merrick.”
    “What then?”
    Silence…and the longer it went on, the more I feared the answer.

Chapter Six
    Sam
    Jax stirred and, after a moment, opened his eyes. They were the same stormy gray I knew and loved, but that didn’t mean a thing. Since Azi had taken over, Jax’s eyes had remained the right color. Still, I had to be sure.
    I swallowed and took a deep breath, but when I tried to push the question out, the words wouldn’t come. Really though, was there any point in asking? If it were Jax back in control, he wouldn’t be across the room. He wouldn’t be staring at me with that cold, clinical glare.
    “It was you,” I said softly, tamping down the tidal wave of disappointment—disappointment that was followed closely by fury. “When I woke up.”
    “I told you,” it said, sitting up on the bed. There was a smallest hint of a grin on Jax’s lips. “I can be him.”
    Yeah, it could. A flash of guilt went through me. How could I have not known I wasn’t kissing Jax? What kind of a person did that make me? “You can act like Jax, I’ll give you that. But you can’t be him.”
    It tilted Jax’s head and a small chunk of dark hair slipped into his eyes. I had to remind myself it wasn’t him, that moving to the other side of the room to brush it away, to feel its soft texture, wasn’t right. “You are angry.”
    I bit down hard on my tongue and clenched my fists. My nails had grown a bit over the past few weeks and they dug tiny craters into my skin. “Angry? Why the hell would I be angry? You tried to rape me!”
    It swung Jax’s legs over the edge of the bed, pausing for a moment before standing. In three long strides, the demon was standing in front of me, an imposing shadow blotting out what little light filtered in from the hallway. It sank to my level and crouched in front of my chair.
    “I am a demon. A royal, no less. I take what I want when I want it.” It licked Jax’s lips, eyes raking over me from head to toe. The action was undoubtedly sexy as hell—which I was damn sure the demon knew. “And right now, I want you. As I recall, you were a more than willing participant. We could finish what we started.”
    My heart stammered several times before kicking into overdrive. My muscles tensed, and I found myself involuntarily pushing back against the chair. “That’s not going to happen.”
    “I do not understand why. Is it not his body you crave? His touch?” Azi rose and followed me. It placed a hand on either side of my head, against the wall, and leaned closer.
    “What I crave is the person inside that body.”
    The demon withdrew one of Jax’s hands from the wall and traced the outline of my bottom lip with his thumb. “That person is still inside this body. Besides…” The grin that never failed to melt me—inside and out—slid