Page 154 of Black Bird

“Dear, God—” she breathed, biting her lower lip and taking another short breath. Her eyes squeezed shut briefly, and when she opened them again, they were already glazing over in ecstasy. It wouldn’t take much, but he was gonna drag this out … purposely. Feeding on her that night had taken her life—but it was that bloodlust that had kept him from sparing her. No human should ever have been able to survive that. But Sarah St. James wasn’t just any human. He realized that now. Her blood was powerful. After seeing it not only bring her back from certain death but witnessing how just a small amount of it ended Rhaena’s torment … breaking the skin enough to make her bleed wouldn’t hurt her.

“Tell me you still want it, and I’ll give it to you,” he purred, making an agonizingly slow stroke down her slit with the tip of his tongue. “I’ll give you everything.”

Her back bowed and she let go of his hair as she leaned up on her elbows, meeting his eyes again when he looked up at her. “Listen to me,” she said raggedly, “if I need to put ‘eat me’ or ‘drink me’ tags on it for you to understand that I wanna go down this rabbit hole with you, I fucking will. You’re—” Her breath hitched, and her hips bucked when he slid his tongue up through her and closed his mouth around the soft mound of her flesh, the sharp points of his fangs piercing her skin as his tongue bore down over her clit. Blood started to slowly fill his mouth and a deep groan rumbled low in his throat when he tasted her again for the second time. This time more intoxicating than the first. It was like the most delicious sin as he swallowed, slowly retreating and relaxing his mouth against her. Her moan nearly did him in.

Sarah’s head dropped back, and she spread her legs wider while his tongue rolled, and he drank more of her. He couldn’t stop his hands from reaching around her thighs and gripping each one to force them further apart. They were trembling …hewas trembling. Every drop of her made his heart pound faster. He pulled his teeth away and let her blood slowly trickle down between her legs … between her wide-open cunt. There wasn’t a single thing about her that wasn’t positively flawless. He drew back slightly just to admire it—and then made an absolute meal of her. Athan took his time, letting that blood blend itself with every drop of the fuckingheroinethat seeped from her core, and then swallowing her down with deep, ravenous strokes.

Both her hands were in his hair now. Every time she whimpered, he’d lose another part of himself in her. Every time she dragged out a heavy moan, he cowered between her legs like a bloodthirsty savage being ripped from its prey. And when she came … Christ, he almost went right along with her. The sound of his name on her lips when she filled up his mouth was more poetic than anything he’d ever written in that fucking book. More dark and twisted than Poe, himself, could manage to put into words. Especially when she’d pulled him over her by his shoulders and looked at him beneath eyelids that were heavy with satisfaction and raw euphoria, and the smile on her face when she saw her own blood on his mouth … on his chin. Fuck, they were so damaged. So absolutely insane.

“Fuck me …” she whispered, kissing every smear of blood along his mouth. That sadistic smirk was so deranged … so unhinged that his cock twitched as the tip of it dragged across her lower belly. His canines involuntarily slid themselves back out and he kissed her, deep and hard, taking her by the throat and giving the same courtesy to that bloody Nirvana that was still deliciously soaking wet. She yelped when his hips loudly slammed against hers, and he swallowed that too … along with the next one—and the one after that. He pulled one of her knees up with his free hand, kissing down her jaw and splitting her open with each unforgiving thrust until he met the scar he’d left on her neck.

God only knew how badly he wanted to do it again. If it weren’t for her determination in turning herself in tomorrow, he would have. The bite he’d left below her waist was easy to hide from prying speculation, but this … would be hard to explain. He tenderly kissed over it, but how he destroyed everything else was anything but. Her nails dug into his back, and he could scent his own blood. Athan growled, releasing her pale throat, and flipping her over in one smooth movement before slamming back into her from behind. She cried out then, grabbing fistfuls of his sheets as he took her long damp hair and wound it around his hand. He pulled her neck back and leaned against her, bracing himself with his palm over her shoulder and holding nothing back as he drove himself into her. Maybe that first bite had awakened something in her that she hadn’t realized was there … because his mate was just as much a monster inside as he was in this moment. That growl was inhuman … there was no doubt about it.

He remembered Wren telling him about it when he’d gone to talk to her that day at the tattoo shop. Now he’d heard it for himself. He fucked her faster … harder, and Sarah screamed, his name rolling out of her throat hoarsely from the angle of her neck as she violently came a second time. She shook, that milky body slackening as he unwound her hair and grabbed her hips. He slowly pulled himself from her and shot thick ribbons of himself along every crease between her legs, smearing them in with the tip of his cock before sliding it back into her quivering body. “Again?” Athan smirked, breathless and starving for more of her.

Sarah pressed her cheek against his bed and reached back to hold herself open, smiling as her eyes fluttered closed. “Fuck, yes …”

CHAPTER 27

AMNESTY

He had nearly told her to go fuck herself when she’d called him out of the blue, but when Gretchen told him to get to the community hospital as fast as he could, Brent had tested his skill in weaving through Boston traffic. His mother had been transported by ambulance, and while severe nosebleeds were common with her type of cancer … she wasn’t doing very well at all. Gretchen made it a point to mention that his father wasn’t coming, and that he’d be in no danger of violating the restraining order. Patricia had requested that Brent be the only person allowed to visit her. The gray of morning was beginning to lighten the sky beyond the blinds of her hospital room window, and he peered out of them sadly.

“You better not do that when I’m gone, boy,” Pat’s voice was weak and raspy. He turned his head to look at her and went straight to her side, taking her chilled fingers into his hands. “Promise me you won’t.”

“Stop talking like that, Mom. You’re not going anywhere.”

Her head rested against the incline of the hospital bed, and she smiled softly at him. “The only reason I’m not already gone is because none of my hospice paperwork had been done yet when this happened. Once it’s finished, there won’t be any more care, Brent. I need to know you’ll be alright.”

He couldn’t meet her eyes when he answered, instead he looked down at her hand, caressing it in his own. “I’m fine, Mom.”

“You’ve always been a horrible liar. I think that makes you a better lawyer than the rest of those crooked snakes.”

He huffed through his nose and forced a weak smile, shaking his head. “You don’t have to lie to win cases. You just have to be very good at chess.”

Pat chuckled warmly. “You’re horrible at that, too.”

He grinned, but his heart felt like it was slowly cracking in half. “If I told you that there was a way to fix it … would you?” He forced himself to look into her eyes, knowing that even though she would never lie to him, those eyes would bleed truth.

“Now you sound like your father.” She smirked, grasping his hand. “Why do you ask?”

“I need to know. I need to know what you’d choose, and I’d rather hear it from you, than just assume that I already know the answer.”

“There is no answer, Brent. I already told you … there won’t be any more care.”

Brent loosed a frustrated sigh and leaned closer. “I’m not talking about care. I’m talking about acure. Would you take it if it would save your life, Mom?”

Her eyes narrowed, and then slowly softened. “No, baby … no.” She let go of his hand and raised it to cup his face. “If there were ever such a thing … I’d be grateful that someone else could find their hope in it. I don’t need hope anymore, Brent. I’ve lived a beautiful life.” Tears started to well in her eyes, and he felt his sting too. “I’m happy. I’m very happy, and I’m ready to rest my head … hang my hat. Can you accept that?”

Brent swallowed hard, staring at her for a long moment before nodding as a tear crept down his cheek and into her hand. She wiped it away with her thumb and pulled his face forward until their heads touched. “I’m gonna miss you, Mom.”

“I’ll never be far. You be good … and honest. Be better than this world, Brent. Sometimes the right things are the hardest things. But that’s what makes us strong. That’s where you’ll always find me. Right beside you … every step.” She leaned up and kissed his forehead. “I love you.”

He knew that it could be the last time he’d ever hear it. Knew it could very well be the last time he’d ever hug her. Brent finally let go of the tight grip he had on his emotions and buried his face into her fragile shoulder to weep. “I love you too.”

Waking up this early was a testament of sheer will. Especially with the way Athan was looking at her right now … or just the way he looked in general. He had bitten her last night. Sarah had tried several times—and failed—to think of one possible reason to feel anything but enamored by it. Somehow it just feltso incredibly right. The minute those pointed teeth sank into her skin … the moment she watched him drink the very essence of her, she remembered the way a perfect combination of pain, peace, and an indescribable rush of pleasure took over every part of her body. It was like she’d had this small flame burning all along, that so many had tried to snuff out, and this man dumped an entire bucket of fuel over it. It burned so hot that it could have taken this entire building down with them, and had they not needed to be up to surrender themselves at the precinct this morning, it would have undoubtedly continued to rage until neither of them had a damned thing left.

Anything she thought she’d felt the first night they’d been together was child’s play compared to what they’d done last night. There was no judgment or strange looks. There was no hint of shame or misunderstanding. Just the harmony and completeness of finally being so perfectly matched with someone else, that everything before him just seemed as ridiculous as it had always madeherfeel. He had taken her two more times in this bed. Then, she’d sworn she caught an accent that he’d somehow managed to mask the entire time she’d known him when she rode him like a stallion and drew some blood of her own right over themark that wickedbitchhad left on him over two-hundred years ago. The way he had so impressively cursed when he spilled every drop inside of her while her teeth were still in his neck let her know he was hers now—without any shadow of a doubt. She would erase that demon from his existence if it killed her.

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