“My blood, my cum.” I smirked. “My soul. For whatever it’s worth.”
At the mention of my soul, his dick twitched inside me and began to harden again. “I’ll take it. I’ll take everything you have to give me, Lorelei Brooks.”
Titus brought his lips down over mine in a claiming kiss. “I want to make all of you mine. But first, there’s something I have to do.”
I broke the kiss, frowning at the dark inflection lacing his tone. “What?”
“I can let go of my obsession for giving my father the perfect death. I’ve imagined it so many damn times. I thought it would be during a Ritual. I’d stab him in front of his flock and the Elder One. I’d stab him in a spot where he’d survive long enough to see me become the new Keeper. Then, I’d finish the job by throwing him into the bonfire.”
He nipped at my bottom lip, sending his low cackle shooting through my body and down to my core where we were still connected. “But you’re crazy if you think I’m going to leave Bishop while his heart still beats. I’m going to kill him. Tonight.”
I gasped. “Tonight?”
“Yes, little lamb. And you’re going to help me.”
Chapter Twelve
Lore
I’dneverkilledanyonebefore. Obviously. But, for whatever reason, the thought of killing Titus’s dad didn’t turn my stomach. Instead, it sent a surge of adrenaline slamming through my veins. Probably because Ezra Leeds had it coming.
After pulling our clothes on, we packed our bags, and I watched from the window of my bedroom as Titus carried my still-packed boxes down to the Ford truck in the garage across the street.
This was really happening. I was leaving Bishop, almost as quickly as I’d come, with my new stepbrother. Or devil. Or stepdevil. Whatever the hell he was—he was mine.
But first, a little retribution was in order.
Titus moved soundlessly. I hadn’t heard him come back up the stairs. When his shadow from the lit hallway stretched across my room, I turned around. He’d shifted back into his human form and was wearing dark jeans, a leather jacket and a dark flannel shift.
“Come on, little lamb. I want to show you something.”
Taking a tentative breath, I followed him down the hall and into his bedroom. It smelled like him. Like leather, testosterone and faintly of motor oil. The walls were painted black and covered in various posters of classic cars. He walked over to his desk, then handed me a set of white robes and a mask that looked like it had been made from an antelope’s skull, horns and all. His cultist uniform.
“Put that on. I don’t want you to be the last thing he sees. Fucker doesn’t deserve that.”
I did as he instructed, all while watching him rustle around in his desk drawer to extract a large hunting knife.
“That’s what you’re going to use?” I whispered, voice almost a croak. “You don’t need to kill a devil some other way?”
“You’ve been reading too many monster books,” Titus said with a chuckle, stuffing the knife into his backpack with a few other odds and ends. “He’ll die like any other man. He’d be harder to kill if he owned any human souls, but for his entire life he’s given everything to the Elder. So he’ll be weakened.”
He hurried out of the room, and I followed after him, my heart in my throat. Going downstairs, he turned to face me just outside our parents' room and struck me with a soft look that caught me off guard. “You don’t have to come inside. You can wait in the truck.”
“No,” I replied without a second’s hesitation. “I’m coming with you.”
He nodded, then his dark brows furrowed. “And your mom?”
“We’ll leave her. I don’t want to hurt her…but…” My lower lip trembled. My mom didn’t deserve to die, not like Ezra did. Sure, she was a shitty mom who didn’t give two fucks about me. But she didn’t deserve to die.
“Saving her from my father is more than she deserves,” Titus said, hiking the strap of his backpack higher over his shoulder. “Don’t feel guilt. Not after what she’s done.”
“The funny thing is, I don’t…”
“Good.” His lips feathered over my brow in a whisper of a kiss before he grasped the door handle to our parents’ bedroom, then cocked a brow at me. “Ready?”
“Ready.”
The door swung open with a quiet creak. We crept inside, and my heart caught in my chest when I caught my reflection in the mirror mounted over their dresser. You couldn’t even tell it was me behind the bone mask and cult robes.
