Chapter seven
Unequivocally Fucked
ThoughtglazedEros’eyes.Then he shook his head with an apologetic look. “Sorry, Doll. I know almost nothing about your adoptive mother. I never met her. None of us did except for Sharpe and your father.”
My heart sank a little. Though I wasn’t exactly surprised. Her poster had been one among dozens on the Guild’s wanted board. The dangerous supernatural creatures terrorizing Boston would have taken priority for anyone in the Helsing guild, especially an adept slayer like Eros.
“Well. It doesn’t matter,” I huffed. “I have my real mom to worry about.”
My mate’s pierced brows plucked together in a gentle scowl. “Was your adopted mother not kind to you? I mean, aside from the bars on the window and the locks on the door.”
“No. She was just distant. But then there were times she wasn’t. I’d play music, and I’d catch her sitting on the floor on the other side of my door, singing along. She’d show interest in the books I was reading, casually ask about the next ones in the series and surprise me with them later. She’d ask about my online courses and seemed proud whenever I got good grades. Sometimes she’d even buy me little presents to celebrate. Things to make me feel normal.” The ache in my heart turned sharp. “She acted like a mother, like I was more than just a burden forced on her.”
When tears stung my eyes, Eros pressed a kiss to my temple. “Maybe you were.”
“I... I’m not sure. Maybe. It’s a mystery for later. I have other shit to worry about.” Unease lanced my chest. “Like getting my Helsing abilities crossed with my Knight magic, and I try to kill myself.”
Eros’ expression darkened at the terse bend in my tone. “Of all the things to burden that beautiful mind of yours, the fear of killing yourself shouldn’t be one of them.”
Rising up on my elbow, I flung him a bewildered look. “How can you say that when I almost staked myself just now?”
He gave a shrug, seemingly unfazed. “It’s not like you were going to die. You’d just wake up. That wouldn’t happen when you’re awake.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“In the waking world, you’re stronger than you think. Your control is pretty impressive. Especially for a young hybrid.” His lips thinned with disapproval. “Better than Feral, and he’s much older than you.”
Catching my expression, he rose into a sitting position with his back lounged against the bed’s headboard and scooped me into his lap. “You don’t need to beat yourself up for staking him in your dreams, Ruby. You didn’t kill Feral. I don’t have to tell you that, right?”
“I know.” That lump was in the back of my throat again. “It justfeltreal. If I knew it was going to make me feel like this, I wouldn’t have done it. But after everything that’s happened between us, I thought it would be cathartic.”
The fresh mating mark Vincent made in the graveyard seared painfully over my hipbone. Was I imagining the pain, or was he getting closer to my corporeal form in Fairie?
I buried my face in the juncture of Eros’ neck. “It wasn’t. It just sucked. I hate him. I hate this.”
Eros kissed his mark over my shoulder, and the pleasure of it drowned out the sting of Vin’s.
Deathwish’s delicious aroma of spiced cloves, blood, and smoke invaded my lungs like a drug. I couldn’t stop breathing him in, breath after breath, inhaling his scent, which contained hints of my own.
His fingers skimmed my shoulder blades, tracing them a few times before they wandered a path over the back of my neck and threaded into my hair to caress the back of my head. “You really do love that Feral, don’t you?”
I did. But I couldn’t say the words out loud. I didn’t feel like Vin deserved that from me, even if he wasn’t around to hear it. And a part of me didn’t feel like I deserved to say them, not after living out a fantasy of slaying him in a sad and desperate attempt to relieve my monster’s thirst for payback.
“I can’t think about him right now.” I swallowed. “I don’t want to think about meeting more of his kind. Or how I have to kill something more vicious than his monster to get him to agree to take me home. Or how a part of me hates myself for loving him too much to be okay with using my father’s fucked up magic. Even if it guarantees my ride home before hell breaks loose on the coven.”
I shook my head, pushing out a dry laugh. Anxiety, fear, and a fat cornucopia of other emotions I didn’t have the time or the capacity to sort out sat heavy in my stomach. It was almost funny how fucked this all was.
“And I sure as hell can’t think about how appealing to Feral’s fae side instead of just bending him over and magically forcing him to take me home might fuck everyone over. The coven. You, Corry, and Sterling. The entire world. All because I’m too much of an idiot to not give my heart to a monster like Vincent Feral.”
Eros’ fingertips skimmed over my nape and paused over one of my shoulders. He plucked one of Vin’s raven feathers from my dress and examined it before tucking it into my hair, along with my tiara.
“If I had the power to travel to Fairie, rip you right out of his arms, sucker-punch some sense into him, and bring you both home, I would.”
“I can bring us home.” My voice quaked with nerves. So much for sounding sure of myself. I mean, I was almost sure I could fight my way out of this mess. Almost.
“What can I do for you, then? Ask me anything. I’ll do it if it’s in my power, and I’ll die trying if it isn’t.”
“Be here for me every night when I go to sleep.”
