A shiver shot down my spine at the nickname. “We can outrun them, right?”
“You mean the flock? It’s notthemI’m worried about. You can bet your pretty little ass they’re coming for us. It’s the Jersey Devil that I’m worried about, baby. He rises from his slumber once a month on the full moon for the Ritual. That’s in two nights. If we’re not out of here by then, he’ll find us.”
“What will he do to us?”
“I don’t know what he’ll do to me. But I know exactly what he’ll do to you.” There was a menacing bend in his tone that sent goosebumps pricking over my flesh.
“And what is that?”
“You’ll know soon enough, because it’s what I plan on doing to you. Only he would have had the flock throw your body into the woods to rot. I plan on keeping your body and soul so I can use them both as much as I fucking please.”
I chewed my lip, dark excitement quickening my pulse. “When?”
“I don’t know. The Elder can claim a soul by ripping an offering open. I have to tear you open in a different way.” The glow of his one white eye illuminated his sinful smirk. “And I’m going to take my time doing it.”
On the next ragged breath, his mouth claimed mine in a bruising kiss. I gasped against his searing heat as he stole all the air from my lungs.
I couldn’t breathe when my stepbrother kissed me, but I didn’t care.
Titus Leeds was better than air.
There was a crack of thunder overhead, and, a beat later, raindrops slipped through the trees. I closed my eyes and tipped my face toward the sky, enjoying the cold water on my burning cheeks.
The sensation stopped, and the sound that started up reminded me of a time I went camping with my dad, the rain drumming a beat over the camping tent.
I opened my eyes to find a leathery material covering my head. With the moon peeking through the clouds and treetops, the leather glowed a deep violet.
“Y-You have wings?”
I’d seen Titus shift twice tonight, though he didn’t have wings either time. I reached up to touch them, and stopped when his hand closed around my throat. “Don’t touch them. I fucking hate them.”
My eyes began to water, and not from the fact that his hand was squeezing my windpipe.
Titus was repulsed by the monster inside him. My heart shattered into pieces all over again, this time for somebody who was worth the pain.
Ignoring his command, I reached over my head to brush my fingertips over the velvety-smooth wings. “I think they’re beautiful.”
His white eye flashed with a blink, and the air between us buzzed. “You do?”
“I do.”
He kissed me again, this time his lips soft and gentle.
“You’re perfect for me in every way, little lamb,” he murmured against my mouth. “I just pray to whatever god that bothers listening to me that I don’t ruin you.”
“You won’t.”
“You’re stranded in the middle of the Pine Barrens with a monster you barely know.”
“I don’t care if we just met a couple of days ago. I know you.”
“No you don’t,” he sneered, his sharp teeth flashing in the dark.
“You like to pretend you’re a fucking dick, but that’s just your way of protecting yourself. You’ve had to hide who you truly are all these years. But you don’t have to with me. I see you. And I want you more than anything else.”
He stared at me with a thunderstruck expression. His face was eerily gorgeous bathed in the subtle light of his devil’s eye.
On the next beat of my heart, he was kissing me again. His hands slipped under my thighs to lift me up. Bark bit into my back as he slid me up the tree, but I didn’t care. The pain was chased away by the searing pleasure his mouth delivered to my lips, my throat, my chest.
