My heart thrummed faster. “Like what, exactly?”
Eros buried his hand in his palm, expelling a soft and sabulous growl. “Sterling’s going to kill me.”
“Sterling trusts me. I want you to do the same.”
Eros peeked at me from between his fingers, and the look I caught made my whole body heat. “I do... I... Shit. Okay. Fairie has its own kind of vampires. Vampyres, at least that’s what the Guild calls them. They aren’t like us, exactly. They still feed on blood, but they’re a biological species in the sense that their form of vampirism is genetic. You can’t catch it. If you become their prey, you're…”
Eros swore under his breath. “Fucked. If you’re male, they eat you. If you’re a female, they can breed with you. They’ll try to mate you. Like our kind, their own females are infertile. Either way, you’ll be dead, eventually.”
Dread clawed at my insides, making me squirm. “That’s horrible.”
Eros shrugged. “It’s Fairie. Pretty much every creature there is a flesh-eating rapist.”
“Great.”
“They are sensitive to the sun, but they can survive during daylight hours because the jungle canopy there is so thick that the sunlight doesn’t reach the forest floor,” Eros continued. “Remember, Doll, I learned all this from the Guild. No mortal slayer has actually been to Fairie, so I’m not sure how accurate all this is. But they’re supposed to go feral on even just a drop of blood. What takes a vampire from this world several quarts to go unhinged takes a vampyre only a few drops. You can’t reason with them. They’re like bees or ants in a way. They only listen to their queen.”
My gut dropped. “Wait. Are you saying...?” Cold sweat trickled down my back. Could he really be suggesting that I take down the vamprye queen to gain the respect of Vincent’s monster?
“I’m not saying anything,” he said with a scowl. “I don’t want you to do this. You know what plan has my vote. But I know you can handle your shit. I wouldn’t even be telling you about Fairie vamps if I didn’t know for a fact that you’re stronger than all of them combined. That said, I still don’t like it.”
I chewed on my bottom lip. “Even if I locate a vampyre den and take down the queen, how could I possibly do it in two days?”
Eros’ brows shot up. “Time works differently in Fairie, Doll. Two days here is like a week there. Maybe even a little longer. Same with the dream world. Every night you sleep, we’re going to be here. We’re taking hour-long shifts, so you’ll always have someone to check in with. Sterling’s taking over for me in about an hour from now. By the time you fall asleep tomorrow, he’ll be here.”
“I... I’m not sure if I can do this.”
He came forward, caging me against his workbench. He took my chin in his firm grip to level me with a fierce look that turned me to putty against him. “Not onlycanyou do this, youhaveto. We need you. You can’t expect us to live without you. Not now. Not after you’ve gone and gotten us hooked on your light. We can’t go back to the darkness now, Ruby.”
Bitter tears pricked my eyes. “Damn Vincent. He’s totally fucked me.”
“If you won’t make him pay in real life, then do it here.” Eros stepped back and gestured to his coffin, where Vincent’s likeness lay shackled, with the sheers still sticking out below his navel like some disturbing Excalibur.
“It might not be real, but it will sure as hell feel like it. Then once you’ve had your fun, I’m going to show you how our queen deserves to be fucked.”
Chapter six
Hybrid Moments
Likehowaqueendeserves to be fucked.
Eros’ words had my cheeks flushing with infernal heat.
It wasn’t just talk. Spread beneath him, I’d feel like a queen. Maybe not so much a typical queen who’d be handled with care and respect. Nah. That wasn’t our speed.
Not only was I the future queen of the vampires, but I was practically a youngblood with an insatiable curiosity for bloody, messy-as-fuck sex. Not to mention that I was a Helsing-Knight hybrid with a penchant for pain.
Eros was aware of all this. So when the coven’s resident torture master promised to fuck me like I deserved, I had it on good faith that it was going to be good. Especially when his vast collection of torture tools held no long-term consequences in the realm of dreams.
Even just the thought of me perched on his workbench with him looming over me as he carefully considered which device to use on me made my whole body blush.
Bloody hell. I needed to get laid. And not by Vincent. That asshole would be lucky if I didn’t employ the use of a chastity belt whenever I was around him for the duration of his immortality.
Eros’ words had my sex throbbing with need, but thoughts of Vin filled my heart with a fire that made me squirm in discomfort.
I didn’t even know how to begin unpacking the complicated tangle of emotions that revolved around the alpha dark fae. My human side had me craving a typical cure for heartbreak, where I’d slink to my room with a gallon of ice cream, blast loud punk music, and binge trashy comfort shows with Corry tucked in bed beside me.
The monster part of me wanted to make the stupid male pay in blood. And judging by the way my pussy clenched and ached at his bare, masculine form drenched in his own life force, it was almost considering making him pay his debt in dick.
