Page 4 of Our Sins in Shadows (Coven of Sin 2)

“You can’t be sure of that. And Lord Dagon won’t be pleased to discover you deviated from the plan. He won’t be pleased at all, Sharpe.”

A small yelp tripped from me when Erik plunged his hand into the pocket of my jeans to retrieve my cell phone. With one squeeze of his fist, the device disintegrated. He sent a bone-grating chuckle into my ear. “You won’t be needing this anymore, Princess. Besides, we’ll want all your focus on your brother’s impending arrival. And what a sweet family reunion it will be.”

Before I could do or say anything more, a crack of pain split down the back of my skull. My vision went dark, and I crumpled to the floor, sagging against Vincent’s warmth.

The last thing I heard was his voice in my ear, whispering my name, telling me everything was going to be alright.

He always was a good liar.

Chapter two

Shifting Realities

Erraticdreamstauntedme.Horrifying images flashed through my mind as fast as a flipbook. One moment I was lying in a pool of blood, the next, Lexi was thrusting my head into the toilet. I barely had time to discern the scene before it changed again.

Next, I was in the attic with Sterling. My clothes lay in a heap on the floor, my back on the table with my legs wrapped around my silver prince’s waist. It was all some bastardized version of that euphoric night. Here I was begging for him to mark me, and he refused as he used my body, sneering as he watched me writhe from the pain of his rejection.

Knowing this was all a nightmare brought on by my subconscious, I begged my mind for mercy.

Sterling’s frame dissolved into the black that crowded my vision, his moonstone eyes the last part of him to disappear, blowing away like stardust in the darkness of my mind before everything faded.

It wasn’t much of a surprise when my relief fizzled away as a new nightmare took shape. I was a glutton for pain and punishment, after all. This new scene was all too fresh and familiar. I stood against the cage, watching as Vincent smashed Eros’ face into the metal fencing of the ring again and again.

So much blood.

The dark liquid soaked my shoes, warm against the cold flesh of my toes. I meant to beg Vincent to stop hurting Eros, but my voice wouldn’t work. I opened my mouth, and nothing came out.

Then, when I tried to open the door to the cage, it wouldn’t budge, forcing me to stand there and watch Vincent as he beat my mate to death.

The scene changed yet again. Another memory, but this one was far older. Sitting on my bed back in my bedroom in Quincy, I’m small, no older than five, staring up at a strange man with dark hair and beady eyes. With hands as cold as death, he poked and prodded me as I cried for my mother. She hid behind the door, watching through the flap she had installed.

I recalled the thud of her heartbeat hammering hard and fast, as if she was afraid of the strange man she’d invited into our home.

In the dream, someone called out to me. My mother, my actual mother. The voice morphed, changing to a man’s. My brother? My father? No, it was a deep and booming baritone that soothed me as it reached through my nightmares, swaddling me like a blanket.

Then, rough hands found me, touching me in ways that made me melt.

Vincent’s face appeared next. His hands explored, caressing, tracing my curves with his fingertips, his tongue, his eyes. I let out a swollen moan, and his mouth came down over mine to devour the noise. I drowned in the crimson pools of his eyes as he dined on my pleasure-laced whimpers.

He let loose a guttural moan of his own into the hollow of my mouth as he nudged my thighs open and fed his manhood slowly past my folds, filling me so perfectly.

“BleedingGods, you take it so well, little monster,” he groaned in a masculine sound that made my thighs quiver. He pumped into me, his thrusts starting slowly and building up speed. Pleasure and pain intertwined as his strokes grew brutal. The tingling ache turned into fireworks of blinding sensation that lit up every nerve in my body as hegrew. He fed on my carnal pain to assume his titan form, growing inside me, stretching me, splitting me apart in the most glorious agony. All the while, I cried for more. And Vincent gave it, pounding into me like I’d been made to take his brutality.

“You’re able to sheath all of me. You’re fucking perfect,” he said in a voice that was as deep as Hell and burned just as hot.

As the feral creature took me with every inch of his monstrous endowment, I now felt the presence of Corry, Sterling, and Eros. Blue, white, and brown eyes watched as I conquered the beast between my thighs. I didn’t care that they were watching us as we fucked with reckless abandon. Actually, I wanted them to see, to look at me as I shook with ecstasy around my lover’s cock, sweating and moaning and screaming my release.

Vincent called to me again. This time the voice was clearer, an urgent quaver in his cadence. Dream Vincent stopped pumping into me and started shaking me.

“Ruby.”

“Don’t stop,” I begged. “Don’t pull out. Mark me first.” I angled my head back to expose the length of my throat to the vampire. ”Please.”

A grating chuckle that wasn’t Vincent’s sunk through my core. “It sounds like the princess is having a filthy dream. Don’t wake her. I love it when she begs,” Eros said.

“Ruby, wake up,” Vincent said louder, ignoring his brother.

I bolted upright into a sitting position, my eyelids flying open. A thin sheen of sweat covered my body, and my chest heaved with my uneven breathing. I was inside a cheaply made coffin with a threadbare blanket wrapped around my shoulders.

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