Page 10 of Red Ruin

But a bestial growl reminds me there’s at least one Sentinel who needs me.

Right here, right now.

I’m never going back.

“I’ll take care of you,” I promise, meaning every word as I carefully kiss his mouth.

Heat coils in my belly as his tangled silks surge around me, through me, inside me.

I take it all.

His hurt and his madness.

The rampaging magic slices my soul with molten blades. As I accept the Sentinel’s worst, I finally reach him deep enough to read the disaster underneath his skin.

His soul-silks clump together in complicated knots weighed down by years of accumulated poison. The charred sludge clogs his meridians so thickly, I can’t understand how he’s alive.

I untangle a few silks, soothing as best I can, but I’m barely scraping the surface of the Sentinel’s damage.

It’s better than nothing, butholy fucking stars.

He needs help.

Being the one to give it to him andfeelinghim respond puffs me up with soul-deep satisfaction.

The electric feeling buzzes, waking up pieces of myself that I meant to leave behind with the rest of my baggage.

The hum gets addictive.

So does the feeling of being so needed.

I watch in fascination as the last of his devil form melts under my care.

The man beneath the flames is hauntingly beautiful.

Built like a war machine, all muscle slicked in sweat and ash. His abs have abs, and his arms are as coiled as bridge cables.

As his red claws retract, the blade-pricks at my shoulders disappear. But his grip doesn’t loosen. He gripsharder, feeding me an emotion that buckles my knees.

Yearning.

Grabbing the back of my neck with strong, human fingers, he crushes our mouths together.

His tongue spears between my lips.

I gasp.

I can soothe his raging magic, but I can’t stop the wildness of this kiss.

He devours me, licking my teeth, my tongue, the roof of my mouth. His desperation screams.

He wants to be closer.

He wants to be inside me in every way.

Groaning into my throat, he grinds his searing cock against my stomach. “My Guide.”

He’s wrong.

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