Page 123 of Her Blood Revenge

She straightens as he steps forward, and she staggers back, seeing his dark eyes and the fresh blood dripping from his hands and chin. A low rumbling emanates from his chest, and she shudders. The scent of his dream powers seeps into the air. That scent of lavender and sulphur all mixed together.

The whore starts to gasp and yelp, looking at the floor and backing away as dozens upon dozens of black spiders crawl out from behind Shaw. Her foot slams repeatedly into the hardwood as she begins to panic.

‘Spiders!’ she cries. ‘There are spiders!’

She begins swatting at her skirts and then her bodice as they crawl all over her. She opens her mouth to scream. I slam my hand over it, not wanting to draw any more attention to us up here. The spiders aren’t real. Just an image. One made solely for her.

When she spots the corpses of the two girls I procured before her lying beyond the bed, her screams fill my palm.

Now,they’rereal.

The girl is terrified as she thrashes in my arms, fighting off the spiders Shaw is making her see.

I drag her towards him, and he sinks his teeth into her shoulder.

Her heart hammers in her chest as he feeds from her. She doesn’t know what to do first.

Fight me off? An impossible task as holding her is like holding one of my dolls.

Rid herself of the spiders that aren’t even there?

Her greatest fear. The subject of her nightmares.

The girl before was terrified of her father, who staggered drunkenly towards her with clenched fists. The one beforethat was heights. She fell to her knees, screaming as if at a cliff’s edge as the ground around her fell away.

Shaw’s strength is growing. With access to Ashe’s blood, we’re all getting stronger with powers thought long gone resurfacing.

Shaw’s ability to see another’s greatest nightmare and make it manifest has only been with him for a couple of days, but he hasn’t lost any of his skills over the decades he has been without it.

Shaw tears at her flesh and drinks deeply, gripping her waist so hard I hear her hip bone crack in his palm.

Her flailing slows, as does her heart rate. She falls limp, and as she falls to the floor, he pulls her into his lap. Stepping over her sprawled-out legs, I sit on the bed, waiting for him to finish his feed.

The squelching and gulping drown out her soft whimpers, and I watch the coins she held in her hand roll across the floor, coming to a stop when they hit one of the other girls he killed.

I feel her again. A swell of emotion. I close my eyes and feel my poppet doll.

Alive and with Archie. He’s a fool at times but lethal when needed. She’s in safe hands.

‘Are you ok?’ Shaw asks, his hand resting on my shoulder as he sits beside me.

‘Fine. You feeling better?’

‘A bit. It will help until I get what I really need.’

He lifts his shirt and pulls away the makeshift bandage. The wound still bleeds and looks angry.

‘I needher blood to heal properly. Whatever Neve hit me with is nasty. Human blood isn’t enough. Even charged up with fear.’

He covers himself and picks up the bottle of whiskey, drinking from it deeply and leaving a smear of blood on the opening. He watches me rub my heart and shift uncomfortably.

‘Is it you? Or is it her? Is she okay?’

‘She’s okay. She’s been getting bursts of anger. And then dread. Then she’s happy. I think that’s what she’s feeling. Her emotions are a little erratic.’

He scoffs, applying another layer of bandage to his side. ‘I never struggle to tell when she’s angry. I usually find myself ducking for cover.’

‘She is also sad.’ I rub my chest. ‘She’s utterly heartbroken that the coven was killed. I just need to get used to this feeling of… well. Her. Of emotions I’m not used to feeling. I don’t give a damn the coven is dead, but she’s really torn up about it.’

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