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Chapter One

Elliot

I wanted to eat the new guy.

And by ‘eat,’ I of course meant… you know. Find out what his dick tasted like. Run my tongue over every inch of that sun-kissed skin. Maybe make him have a steak and drink a beer so his mouth tasted like all-American dude when I kissed the shit out of him.

I also meant I literally wanted to eat the new guy.

I contained multitudes.

Look, being a ghoul was tricky. We literally needed to eat human flesh to live. It wasn’t about fighting baser instincts by ‘denying’ ourselves. It was about survival.

All of us in our small community knew someone who knew someone whose cousin had tried to go ‘clean’ and ended up breaking into a graveyard when they let themselves get too hungry, digging up and consuming someone who’d been pumped full of chemicals or was well past their expiration date, then getting sick as a dog or losing their mind permanently. We stopped thinking all that well when we were starving. We kinda stopped thinking altogether.

But I prided myself on being an ethical ghoul. No eating humans willy-nilly. It was the main reason I’d started working at Broth with a Bite, a proudly independent eating establishment located in the food court of Creepy Court Mall, and still hadn’t left—free meals that I didn’t have to do anything abhorrent to eat.

I had no idea how our ‘special meat’ supplier obtained their… goods. The manager, Liz, assured us that we used a reputable business that swore all the humans had died naturally, but ghouls didn’t exactly have the luxury of being picky. Not when the alternative was roaming the streets late at night and tearing into the first person we saw because we’d let ourselves get too hungry and desperate. Or landing a cushy job in a morgue or funeral home with extremely questionable operational standards.

But I’d opted out of that lifestyle. I preferred this one. And usually, I was totally fine working with the humans here. We had to have two kitchens at Broth with a Bite: the human one, with human staff, for our unsuspecting human customers. And the other one. The one I worked in and oversaw.

As far as the human staff were concerned, the reason for the separate kitchen was because we specialized in catering to a clientele with a very complex, unique set of dietary requirements. Which, I mean, was the truth. They didn’t question it too much, because we did get a lot of customers of a certain… complexion.

Pallid skin that was almost gray. Sunken eyes that were permanently shadowed. Teeth that were maybe a little sharper than they should’ve been. Dark fingernails and prominent veins and the faint whiff of sweet almonds that always lingered around them. The human staff just seemed grateful that they didn’t have to deal with the ‘difficult orders’ off the ‘special menu,’ so they mostly kept their questions to themselves.

At first, when I started working here at eighteen, it had been tougher to ignore the fact that there were several humans practically basting themselves as they sweated away in a steamy kitchen right next door—chopping herbs and vegetables, stirring big pots of fragrant stock, wiping garlicky fingers on their aprons. Hissing when the fat from sizzling meat spat onto their hands, which—goddamn. There was no other smell like it. Mouthwatering.

After working here for eight years, it was much easier. We all got at least one meal with every shift, so it wasn’t like I didn’t already have a well-balanced diet containing plenty of tasty, nutritious human. And like I said, ethical ghoul here. Although, in some small and overzealous circles, I was considered a lazy, immoral ghoul because I didn’t hunt for my own food. But I mean, come on. This was the 1980s, for fuck’s sake, not the Middle Ages. I was a busy guy. I had video games to play. Beer to drink. People to fuck. That kinda thing.

Which brought me back to the new guy I wanted to eat. In various ways.

I was pretty sure even thinking that made me a depraved pervert. My traditional ghoul grandparents would be turning over in the family grave if they knew. But my relationship with humans was a little complicated given that they were a main food source for me and all. Although, ghouls weren’t the only supernatural creatures who fed off humans. Vampires needed humans to survive too, right? It wasn’t that different. Right?

That was what I told myself when I left the back office at the start of my shift, still tying my apron, and crashed directly into the unfamiliar person about to walk through the door. His scent hit me first. Hot skin and sunscreen and something spicy, like he’d literally been marinating himself before coming here. My mouth actually watered.

Then he spoke, and his smooth voice made my skin prickle with a weird mix of lust and predatory instinct.

“Darn, sorry.” He chuckled, face turning bright pink, the heat in his cheeks only intensifying that delectable scent. “Already making a crappy first impression.”

“It’s all good,” I heard myself answer automatically, too busy staring at him to even fully take in what he’d said.

He was… perfection.

Messy brown hair that was short on top and longer at the back. Light brown eyes with little specks of green and long, dark lashes. An aquiline nose, square jaw, and cute little snaggletooth that I spotted when he gave me a shy grin.

And he was… meaty. There was no other word to describe him. Wide shoulders and thick arms and a sculpted chest, with the tiny curve of a belly under his tight T-shirt.

He was like my ideal sexual fantasy come to life, and the perfect meal. Which was so totally fucked up—I was fully aware. Like I’d said, complicated relationship with humans over here. So complicated.

“Um… I’m Ricky.” He held out his hand when I didn’t move. I finally tore my awed gaze from his face and blinked down at it, then I watched myself slowly reach out and shake his hand. My pale skin looked almost gray against his warm tone.

“Elliot.” My voice was a little raspy.

“It’s my first day.” Ricky blushed again and scrubbed a hand over the top of his head, ruffling his hair. “I mean, um, you probably know that seeing as you work here. Sorry.”

Fuck. On top of everything else, he had to be adorable. And that blush brought out the smattering of tiny freckles on his cheeks and the bridge of his nose, especially as it deepened when I continued to stare at him in stunned silence. Was I drooling? I hoped not.

“Okay, well”—Ricky shifted on his feet, then made an awkward attempt to get past me—“I should probably…”