Page 77 of Absentia Mori

I nod. “I’m not coming back here after it’s done. You’ll have to come visit me in Raven’s Gate.”

He pulls me to his chest. “You bet your ass I fucking will. Someone’s gotta make sure your guys are behaving themselves.”

Draven honks the horn of his SUV and flashes his headlights through the living room window. Fucking hell. I’m starting to think he wants his grandmother dead more than I do.

Mordecai pulls me away from my brother. “Let’s go, little freak.”

I thank Bones for his help and give Aries one more hug before we hop into the hearse and follow Draven over to Blackwell Manor.

There’s no turning back now.

We drive in silence, each of us lost in our own reveries. I think back to the first day I woke up in the asylum. The first time Gormon put his hands on me. I shudder as that flicker of rage returns. My palms sweat as the memories flood me. From being restrained and fed slop and forced to denounce my own name.

My blood boils when I think about Gorman cornering me in the infirmary. The disgusting feel of his stubby fingers rubbing my freshly pierced nipples with the cotton pad. And then the relief. The pure psychotic relief of stabbing him to death. Knowing he’ll never be able to assault anyone ever again.

Penny Blackwell did that to me. And to others. Never again.

“You okay, doll face?” Fabien asks as we park behind Draven.

My mouth is dry; my adrenaline spiked. “I will be.”

“Only her.” Draven stands in their way.

“Like hell,” Mordecai growls.

Raithe pushes past him to stand by me. “We’re not letting her go in there alone. This could be a fucking trap.”

But I know it’s not.

Our families have codes that we live by. Even as we agree to let one of our own get murdered, there’s still a rule against outsiders.

I plant a kiss on each of their cheeks. “I’ll be fine. This is how it has to be.”

Mordecai wraps a possessive hand around my throat. “We’re the only ones who get to hurt you. If something happens to you, I will follow you in death and drag you back from hell to punish you.”

Fuck. My pussy tingles. “Will you punish me anyway? Please,” I whisper.

He licks his lips, the look in his eyes feral. “Get your ass back to us, and I will spank it so hard you won’t be able to sit for a week.”

I clench my thighs as my juices trickle out. Fuck. Now I’m murderous and horny. Another reason to get this the fuck over with.

Draven looks like he might actually be sick. “Let’s go before I change my mind.”

“Fuck you, Draven.”

“Not in this lifetime, little Thorn.”

I scowl at him before finally tearing myself away from my guys. “Aries is only two minutes older than me,” I mutter as we cross the yard.

Blackwell Manor is surrounded by marshlands—wet, muddy, and covered with small shrubs that scratch at my ankles as we walk. The air is warm and humid with the heady scents of bougainvillea and jasmine. It’s a sweet heat, the kind that clings to your clothes and skin like flypaper.

And this is just the fall weather. Summers here are excruciating with no relief from the unforgiving Melancholia sun. But I remember those early days fondly. Despite all the trauma.

When we were teenagers, Aries and I spent our days splashing in the river, drunk on moonshine and nightshade. We’d catch fireflies in the mason jars we’d licked clean. It wasmy only reprieve from the horrors that awaited me when we returned home.

Sometimes Bones and Draven would go out there with us too. But that was before the family pressures set in.

As we enter the servant’s kitchen of Blackwell Manor, I barely recognize the Draven that I knew when I was a kid. Something broke in him a long time ago. Now he’s just a shell of the sweet boy who used to leave mudpies on our doorstep.

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