Page 77 of Two Sides of Sin

I needed to know she was real.

Sage let out a sharp, startled gasp, but before she could formulate a word, I brought my hands up to frame her face, my thumbs digging into her cheekbones, and crashed my mouth down onto hers.

It was a savage reclamation, a collision of teeth and tongue that tasted of years of suppressed hunger. Decades of deprivation, of empty graves and blood-soaked nightmares, poured into the wild desperation with which I took her mouth. She tasted exactly the same—a dark, intoxicating sweetness that made my blood roar in my ears.

For a terrifying second, I thought I had pushed too far. I waited for her to shove against my chest, to realise she had made a catastrophic mistake daring a man who had forgotten how to be human.

Instead, she melted into me.

A soft, desperate sound slipped from her throat, and her hands flew up, her fingers tangling frantically in my dark hair to pull me even closer. The reality of her kissing me back—of her choosing this, choosing me in this new life—was a chemical explosive in my veins.

“June,” I groaned against her lips, barely an audible whisper, the name slipping out as a broken, muffled prayer.

I deepened the kiss, my tongue sweeping past her parted lips, tasting her, claiming her with a ruthless hunger that had been caged for a lifetime. My hands dropped from her face, one sliding around to grip the back of her neck to anchor her, while the other dragged down her side. My palm slid under the hem of her top, my fingers splaying wide across her bare, feverishly hot skin.

My thumb brushed directly over the raised, delicate ink of her nevermore tattoo.

She arched into my touch, her nails scraping lightly down the back of my neck, driving me entirely out of my mind. I angled her head, my lips trailing aggressively down her jaw to the soft, pulse-beating skin of her neck. I breathed her in, my hips pressing heavily against hers, entirely ready to drag her into the shadows and claim her again, here and now.

Then, the world exploded around us.

An ear-splitting shriek tore the night apart. The compound’s perimeter alarm.

Simultaneously, the massive, blinding halogen floodlights mounted high on the cathedral’s iron scaffolding blared to life, bathing the ancient stone courtyard in a harsh, glaring white light that sliced through the misty night air.

The conditioning of the last ten years slammed me immediately into action, instantly overriding the dark, starving man of the Manor.

I tore myself away from her, my chest heaving, my lungs burning as if I had just breached the surface of the ocean. The transition from immortal lover back to lethal soldier was wild and jarring. I spun around, instinctively putting my massive body between Sage and the open expanse of the cobblestone courtyard, my eyes scanning the blindingly lit darkness for threats.

Over the radio strapped to my chest, the comms exploded with static and shouting.

“Command to all units! Perimeter breach, sector seven! Multiple unidentified hostiles coming through the western plaza!”

“Julian,” Sage gasped, her voice trembling slightly. She was pressed flat against the stone wall of the cloisters, her lips bruised red and swollen from my mouth, her eyes wide with a sudden, jarring fear that had nothing to do with me.

The sight of her like that—thoroughly kissed but terrified, and so vulnerable in this madness—revived a cold, lethality in my blood to protect her.

“Get inside,” I ordered, my voice stripping away every bit of softness. I reached down, snatched her fallen sketchbook from the pavement, and shoved it into her chest. “Get inside the annex right now. Lock the heavy deadbolt. Turn off the lights, get on the floor away from the windows, and do not open that door for anyone except me or Noah. Do you understand?”

“What’s happening?” she asked, her hands shaking as she clutched the book.

“Sage. Do you understand me?” I barked, the command leaving zero room for argument.

“Yes,” she breathed, nodding quickly. “Yes. I understand.”

“Go.”

I watched her yank the reinforced door open and slip inside. Only when I was certain she was secured did I turn my back to the building. I unholstered my sidearm, the safety clicking off in my hand, and sprinted full-speed into the blinding nightmare of the plaza.

The glare of the security lights turned the swirling fog and dust into a haze of pale ghost-light.

I sprinted into the chaos, the roar of automatic gunfire echoing through the perimeter. My mind, usually a disciplined, tactical vault in the middle of a firefight, was frozen in a single, repetitive loop: Keep her safe. Keep her safe. Keep her safe.

This urban sector had been classified as a safe zone for the last six months, a fragile pocket of peace for the civil asset teams to operate in. But nothing stayed safe in this world for long. The world she and I used to know—a world of quiet manors, untouched forests, and slow, predictable decades—was gone. The modern era was a devastating, crumbling war land. Wars over borders, over resources, over nothing at all. There was danger around every single stone corner, and she was right in the middle of it.

I hated it. I hated that her fragile, mortal body was in the crosshairs of a conflict she had nothing to do with. But I couldn’t command a grown woman to stop doing the only job that made her feel alive.

I rounded the corner of the cathedral's main plaza, passing the guarded transport trucks, and slammed directly into the mayhem.