(Continued from the previous chapter The Devil’s in the Details, Chapter 3 of the Devil series)

“Who is Clotilde?”

Eric swallows, and suddenly he’s…nervous. He’s a fucking demon, a fiend from Hell, he doesn’t get nervous.

And yet…

“Clotilde?” Eric can’t help but ask, mostly because he never thought that name would ever leave Tabby’s mouth.

“Yes…she was someone to you, wasn’t she?”

Tabby has that adorable puckered brow thing going on, and Eric wants to smooth the wrinkles.

He clears his throat. “Yeah, a really long time ago.”

Tabby sweeps her wild mane of dark waves out of her face, and he hates that her skin is damp from sweat, from whatever nightmare she’d been having. She looks resolved—the furrowed brow turns into some other emotion. Frustration?

“I was attacked in an alley and almost killed. I think I deserve to know something. Like why I keep having these dreams about her…and you…”

Eric scrubs a hand down his face, feeling the scrape of stubble on his palm. He should have known better, should have known never to appear to her in that crossroads. He vowed a long time ago, when she was born, he would stay away until their paths crossed on her terms. Eric had resigned himself to it never happening, and then that dumb fuck stole her work.

“Clotilde…. Centuries ago, she was someone I cared for very much.”

Tabby’s brow arches, urging him on.

“You have to understand, Tabby. I’m, well, to put it simply… millennia old. As old as time itself. I have known and corrupted many humans. None of them had ever made me feel anything but disdain…until her. Until you.”

Tabby’s head shakes side to side slightly. “I don’t understand.”

“There’s a lot about the universe that’s hidden from humans. Some are born with the gift of knowing that there is more to existence than the physical plane they see every day. Every single soul on this earth right now has existed for almost as long as I have. They are the embodiment of the universe itself, a piece of the Maker. The soul can’t die. So, a physical body runs its course, exhausts its lifespan, and at death the soul goes into a sort of…limbo…until it is reborn again into a new body.”

“Reincarnation?” Tabby asks softly. Eric nods.

“You are the reincarnation of Clotilde. Normally, if humans have any sort of memory from previous lives it's simply a dream they pass off as random, a wild story your subconscious brain came up with.”

Tabby’s lips part, somewhere between shock and confusion. “Have you known this whole time that I’m her?”

Eric looks away. He can’t find it in himself to look her in the eye.

“I’ve known, yes.”

“Since before that night at the crossroads?”

“... Yes.”

“Did you lure me there to make that deal?”

Eric shakes his head vehemently. “Fuck no. In fact, I almost didn’t even show up when you performed the summoning spell. I didn’t want...

Devil May Care, Chapter 4