The next morning, Emily woke with a pounding headache and the flimsy, desperate hope that it had all been a stress-induced hallucination. A nightmare brought on by too much caffeine and arcane texts. She lay still for a long moment, listening. The apartment was silent, save for the distant groan of city traffic. Maybe he was gone. Maybe the spell had failed entirely and her mind had simply filled in the blanks with the most terrifying thing it could conjure.

She pushed herself out of bed, her body aching with a tension she hadn't realized she was holding. She crept to her bedroom door and opened it a crack. The living room was empty. The chalk circle was still there, a faint white scar on the floorboards, but the oppressive presence from last night seemed to have lifted. Relief, so potent it was dizzying, washed over her.

Then she smelled it. That same impossible scent of ozone, hot stone, and something else—a dark, musky sweetness that clung to the air like a film. Her stomach plummeted. She pushed the door open fully.

He was standing by the window, staring down at the street below. He was still completely naked, his back to her. The pale morning light traced the inhuman perfection of his form: the sharp ridges of his shoulder blades, the elegant tapering of his waist, the taut, sculpted curves of his ass. He was a statue carved from moonlight and sin, utterly out of place against the backdrop of her peeling window frame and dusty blinds.

Trying to ignore the primal part of her brain that was screaming in a mixture of terror and awe, Emily forced herself to move. She needed normalcy. She needed coffee. She stumbled into her tiny kitchen alcove, her eyes fixed on the familiar, comforting shape of her coffeemaker. She scooped grounds into the filter, filled the carafe, and slammed it into place. She hit the 'On' button.

POP.

A shower of blue sparks erupted from the back of the machine, followed by the acrid smell of burnt plastic. The single red power light flickered once, then died. The apartment fell silent again.

"Fuck," she breathed.

"The decay begins," Bael's voice rumbled from the living room, startling her so badly she nearly dropped the now-useless carafe. He hadn't even turned around. "Small things first. Electronics. Perishables. The energy that binds me here is unstable. It leeches life from its surroundings."

His words sent a fresh spike of ice through her veins. She yanked open the refrigerator door, her hand trembling. The carton of milk she'd bought two days ago was swollen. She unscrewed the cap and a wave of putrid, sour stench hit her so hard she gagged. Inside, the milk had separated into chunky, yellowed curds and watery whey. It was the kind of rot that should have taken weeks, not hours.

She slammed the fridge shut, her breath coming in ragged bursts. This was real. This was happening. He was a cancer in her home, and she was trapped here with him.

"You have to put some clothes on," she snapped, the words coming out harsher than she intended. It was a pathetic grasp for control, for some semblance of human decency in this insane situation.

He finally turned from the window. His movements were fluid, deliberate. He faced her fully, his golden eyes scanning her with lazy amusement. Her gaze was dragged down against her will. His body was a masterpiece of masculine power, his chest broad, his stomach etched with muscle. And there, hanging heavy and thick between his powerful legs, was his cock. It was semi-aroused now, longer and fuller than it had been last night, the dark purple head glistening faintly in the morning light.

"Why?" he asked, his voice a silken challenge. He took a slow step toward her, closing the distance between the living room and the kitchen. "This is my true form. Does it offend your mortal sensibilities?" He took another step, and she was forced to retreat until her back was pressed against the kitchen counter. "Or," he murmured, his voice dropping lower, "does it distract you?"

He was so close now she could feel the heat rolling off his skin, see the almost imperceptible black markings that swirled over his collarbones. The air was thick with his scent, filling her lungs, her head. It was intoxicating, making her feel dizzy and hot. Her body was betraying her, a slow, shameful wetness beginning to gather between her legs.

"I can't... I can't think when you're just... standing there," she stammered, hating the weakness in her voice.

A slow, cruel smile spread across his perfect lips. "Good," he whispered. "That's the point."

He didn't move. Emily's heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic, trapped bird. She was cornered. The cold edge of the counter dug into her spine, and the heat of his body was a furnace in front of her. She had to get out.

"Move," she gritted out, her voice barely a whisper.

His smile widened, showing the faintest hint of teeth. "Make me."

For a wild, insane second, she considered it. Shoving him. What would it feel like to put her hands on that hot, solid chest? Would he feel like stone? Would he even budge? The thought was so suicidal it was almost funny. Instead, she ducked, a clumsy, desperate movement, sliding sideways along the counter. Her hip brushed against his thigh. The contact was electric, a jolt of pure heat that shot straight to her core. His skin was smooth and impossibly hot, his muscle hard as rock beneath it. She gasped, scrambling away from him, her body screaming with conflicting signals.

She didn't stop until she was at the front door, fumbling with the deadbolt, her hands shaking so badly it took three tries to turn the lock. She grabbed her worn messenger bag from the floor, not bothering to change out of her jeans or the t-shirt she'd slept in. She didn't look back. She couldn't. She wrenched the door open and fled, slamming it shut behind her, the sound echoing in the hallway like a gunshot.

The university library became her sanctuary and her prison. For the next week, her life fell into a miserable, terrifying routine. She would wake up early, choked by the cloying, sweet scent of his presence that now saturated her sheets, her clothes, everything. She would force herself to walk through the living room where he would be lounging on her sofa or standing by the window, always naked, always watching her with those predatory, knowing eyes. He never spoke in the mornings, but his gaze followed her every move, a silent commentary on her frayed nerves and the dark circles under her eyes. Some mornings his cock would be fully, magnificently hard, jutting from his lap as he read one of her textbooks with an expression of bored disdain. She tried not to look, but her eyes were traitors, always snagging on the sight of him, the image burning itself into her brain for the rest of the day.

Then she would escape to the library's special collections, a hushed, climate-controlled room that smelled of old paper and leather. It was the only place she felt a shred of her old self. Here, she was a scholar, not a terrified roommate to a creature from Hell. She surrounded herself with towering stacks of grimoires and codices, her fingers tracing diagrams that made her blood run cold. She cross-referenced texts in dead languages, her brain aching with the effort of translating archaic dialects and obscure demonic genealogies.

But the books were failing her. They were full of warnings, of hubris, of rituals for binding and commanding. They spoke of imps and minor spirits, of wards and circles to contain them. There was nothing—not a single footnote, not one damned addendum—about how to reverse a botched summoning of a high-ranking Duke of Hell. It was like reading a manual on how to build a cage for a lion, only to find you'd accidentally trapped a god and had no idea how to ask it to leave.

Her stress mounted with every failed search. It was a physical weight in her chest, a constant thrum of anxiety that made it hard to breathe. The librarians started giving her worried looks. She was losing weight, her skin was pale, and her hands had a permanent tremor. Sleep offered no relief, her dreams filled with suffocating heat and the phantom touch of his skin against hers. More than once, she woke up gasping, her own hand between her legs, her body slick with sweat and arousal, the memory of his naked form more vivid than any dream. The intrusive thoughts were relentless, hitting her at the most inopportune times. She'd be deciphering a line of Enochian script, and suddenly her mind would conjure the image of his back, the way the muscles shifted under his skin as he turned from the window, the perfect, tight curve of his ass. She'd feel a jolt of pure, shameful lust, her panties growing damp as she sat in the sterile silence of the library. It was humiliating. It was exhausting. She was coming apart at the seams, and with every passing day, the hope of finding a solution dwindled, replaced by the terrifying certainty that she was well and truly fucked.

She returned late one evening, the weight of another fruitless day pressing down on her shoulders. The library had felt like a tomb today, the ancient texts mocking her with their silence. The moment she stepped back into her apartment, the change was immediate. The air was different. It was always thick with his presence, a scent of ozone, warm skin, and something else she couldn't name—something like burnt sugar and sin. But tonight, it was heavier, clinging to her like humidity before a storm. It coated her tongue, filled her lungs, a tangible substance that made the short walk from the door to her bedroom feel like wading through syrup.

He was on the sofa, one of her demonology textbooks open on his lap. He was, as always, naked, his long legs propped up on her battered coffee table. He didn't look up as she entered, but she felt his awareness of her like a physical touch. She tried to ignore him, to slip past into the relative safety of her room, but her feet felt leaden. Her senses were screaming.

It started with the sound. The whisper-soft rustle of the page as he turned it was unnaturally loud in the quiet room, a crisp, intimate sound that seemed to happen right next to her ear. She could hear the faint rasp of his thumb against the dry paper. Her gaze was dragged to his hands. They were elegant, long-fingered, but with a latent strength that was terrifying. She watched, mesmerized, as he lazily traced a line of text, his fingertip leaving a faint, shimmering trail of heat in its wake that only she could see.

Then came the scent. It wasn't just in the air anymore; it was a targeted assault. The musky, masculine scent of his skin, the faint, metallic tang of his demonic nature—it zeroed in on her, bypassing the stale air of the apartment and flooding her system directly. It was intoxicating, primal. Her nostrils flared without her permission. She could almost taste him. Deep in her belly, a familiar, shameful heat coiled and spread, slicking the insides of her thighs.

He still hadn't moved, hadn't acknowledged her beyond that initial wave of awareness. He was just… existing. But his existence was an act of aggression. Every minute shift of his weight on the cushions, the slow, even rise and fall of his chest, the way the lamplight gleamed on the hard muscle of his abdomen—it was all amplified, magnified until it was the only thing she could perceive. Her own heartbeat thudded in her ears, a frantic counterpoint to his utter stillness.

His cock lay thick and heavy against his thigh, semi-erect and pulsing with a slow, hypnotic rhythm she could feel in her own blood. The sight of it was both terrifying and utterly riveting. She wanted to look away, to run, to scream, but her body was frozen, her mind held captive by the sensory onslaught. She was prey, pinned by the gaze of a predator who wasn't even looking at her.

"Find anything interesting today, little scholar?" his voice finally cut through the charged silence.

The sound vibrated through the floorboards, up her legs, and settled deep in her pelvis. It wasn't just a question; it was a caress and a mockery all at once. Her throat was too tight to answer. She could only stand there, trembling in the doorway, trapped in a web of sensation he had woven just for her. The air crackled, and she knew, with a certainty that chilled her to the bone, that he was enjoying this. He was bored, and she was his new favorite toy. The tension in the room stretched taut, a wire humming with power, lust, and fear. It was only a matter of time before it snapped.

Her control finally shattered. "Stop it," she rasped, the words tearing from her raw throat.

Bael’s eyes, black and bottomless, finally lifted from the book. He raised a single, perfect eyebrow. "Stop what, precisely? Reading your rather rudimentary academic texts?"

"Don't play dumb with me, you bastard," she spat, her voice shaking with a week's worth of suppressed rage and fear. "Stop this… this thing you're doing. In my head. With the air. I can't even fucking think straight in my own home anymore!" Her hands balled into fists at her sides. "And for the love of God, would you put some fucking clothes on? I am sick of seeing you lounging around with your cock out like it's a goddamn centerpiece."

The amusement vanished from his face, replaced by a chilling stillness. He closed the book with a soft thump that sounded like a gavel falling. Slowly, languidly, he rose from the sofa. The movement was liquid grace, a predator uncoiling. His cock, already thick and half-hard, bobbed with the motion, its engorged head a deep, angry purple.

"This is my nature, little scholar," he said, his voice a low, dangerous purr. "And this," he gestured around the small apartment, "is my cage. You seem to be forgetting that. You also seem to be forgetting your place."

Before she could process the threat, he moved. It wasn't human speed. One moment he was across the room, the next he was on her, a blur of heat and hard muscle. The air rushed from her lungs as her back slammed into the wall. The impact rattled her teeth. His body was a wall of heat, pressing her into the plaster, stealing her breath. One of his hands clamped onto the wall next to her head, fingers digging into the drywall. The other arm barred her chest, pinning her arms. His thigh shoved between hers, forcing her legs apart, and she gasped as the hot, rigid length of his erection pressed insistently against the thin denim over her cunt.

She was utterly, completely trapped. His scent enveloped her—burnt sugar, ozone, and hot, musky male sweat. It was suffocating. She tilted her head back, trying to get away, but her head just hit the wall. His face was inches from hers. And his eyes… they weren't just black anymore. They were burning. Deep within the obsidian pools, embers of orange and red light swirled like dying galaxies. A pressure built behind her eyes, a crushing weight on her very soul. This was power. True, ancient, terrifying power. It wasn't just physical strength; it was an aura of pure malevolence and dominion that promised to unmake her.

"Let's be clear," he whispered, his breath hot against her lips, the vibration of his voice traveling from his chest directly into hers. "You don't give me orders. You don't tell me what to do. You exist in this space because I allow it. You breathe because I haven't yet decided to stop you." His hips gave a slight, almost imperceptible push, and the head of his cock ground against her pubic bone.

A strangled noise, half-sob, half-moan, escaped her. The terror was absolute, a cold flood that should have frozen her. But a treacherous, filthy heat bloomed low in her belly. The sheer force of him, the undeniable masculine dominance, the feeling of his hard cock against her—it was sparking a disgusting, thrilling current straight to her core. Her clit throbbed, and she felt a slick, shameful wetness begin to soak her panties.

His eyes flared brighter, and a slow, cruel smile spread across his lips. He knew. He could feel her body's betrayal. He could probably smell her arousal over the scent of her fear.

Then, as suddenly as it began, it was over. He pulled back, releasing her. The sudden absence of his heat and weight was a physical shock. Her legs gave out, and she slid down the wall to a crumpled heap on the floor, gasping for air, her body trembling uncontrollably. He stood over her for a moment, a magnificent, terrifying silhouette against the lamplight, his erection still jutting proudly from his groin. He didn't say another word. He simply turned and walked back to the sofa, leaving her shaking on the floor, drenched in a cold sweat and the hot, humiliating evidence of her own desire.