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Mr. Bad News

SOMETHING WAS DIFFERENT. Something had changed.

I wasn’t sure what, but the way Phillip looked at me didn’t feel the same as before. It settled in my throat, then my chest, manifesting an anxious tick in my body. It tickled across my flesh and put my mind into swirling chaos.

Look at me getting all poetic again.

The second Sloan was gone, Phillip’s every glance demanded subservience. It was the feeling of a long-reigning king whose commands would only be met by eager compliance, or appropriate punishment would follow. Each time our eyes connected, electricity raced the length of my spine and my heart couldn’t catch up. It was exactly like being in the midst of battle. Never knowing whether you’d be the one to claim victory or be struck down where you stood.

Funny thing was, I wanted to submit to him.

It was exhilarating, and I couldn’t pretend I wasn’t wholly spellbound by the air the self-centered bastard put out. I walked a tightrope between losing myself entirely and maintaining the person I once was. Not that there was any way to go back after this. I’d become something new, something transformed and quickly evolved. It would be immature to think I could go back to the way things were before I discovered the truth about myself and the ones I loved.

So, it wasn’t just him who was different over the last week. Something had clearly changed for me as well. I struggled to put a name to it, to identify the thing that was different—or the many things—but very little in my head made sense these days.

I was starting to miss the inner ramblings of a normal teenage girl who only stayed up late at night to fight vamps. These days, it felt like a whole world was sitting on my shoulders. Nothing was the same. It was all new and uncomfortable. Half vamp. Half human. Half...magic? Wait. What was three divisions? Like, that one really obnoxiously long decimal number? Whatever. I’d just go with I was two-thirds fucked up.

So, I gave myself over to the one thing that did make sense between us.

I traced colorful ink, mapping its shape and path with my fingertips. I smoothed palms over petal-soft flesh and hard muscle. I tossed away anxiety and deep-thinking and instead took solace in the comfortable heat of Phil’s body. I chased pleasure and reveled in overpowering sensation that never failed to distract me.

My fingernails tore into flesh that instantly mended and my hips rocked down, my backside meeting Phil’s firm thighs in several hard smacks. Moisture painted my hands and every place our skin met—a sinful greeting of two people who never seemed satisfied.

Our pace never slowed. Every position perfectly transitioned to the next. Every orgasm was lost to a sea of unending ecstasy.

Phil never stopped to give me time to recover. He slammed into me, lifting my leg and lunging forward like it was his intention to go right through me. But I lived for the sensation of his dominating touch. I craved this.Craved him. I couldn’t get enough of it, and I voiced my appreciation like saying it over and over would make sure I never lost it.

The lure of sexual distraction was easy for me now, after I learned how to give in and not look back. After I put my trust in this thing between the Austrian and I. After I acknowledged it was everything I needed and wanted at this moment, and no one, not even that little voice in my head, could convince me to stop. It was a freedom I never realized I craved or needed; one I’d be stupid to squander for no reason but because others may scorn me for it.

Who cares when reality would most definitely come a-knocking soon? I might as well make the most of enjoying myself in these moments.

It wasn’t until I flopped back, covered in sweat and breathing for no reason but out of habit, that I finally had a minute to think about anything that wasn’t how intoxicating Phillip’s body was.

Good thing neither one of us required much in way of sleep these days. I’d never recover from our sin-saturated nights of pleasure otherwise.

The abrasive, hard-nut-to-crack man beside me followed the valley of my torso with his fingers, head propped up by a tattooed arm. His intense blue eyes devoured every naked expanse of me, as though it was the other Hunter’s intention to burn the sight into his memory.

Licking my lips, I captured his hand and stalled his ticklish descent. “We need to talk.”

Emotion I couldn’t identify came into his eyes before it was quickly gone. “About?”

“About how you seemed extra salty around Sloan this time. Or about how you didn’t once mention that I might have magic. Or maybe the reason why you went full beast the minute we got into this room.”

I expected him to laugh it off. But when the sweat-soaked Hunter didn’t, his jaw clenching like he was holding back, a nervous tension seized my chest.

Phillip’s eyes strayed away from my body and instead focused out the window, where morning light was already breaking across the horizon. “What do you expect me to say, V?”

That was new.

“Something clever?” I tossed back, suddenly uncomfortable with how serious he’d become.

Phillip sighed to himself, then fitted his arm under my shoulders before bringing me into the curve of his body. “I’m not always so clever. Sometimes I’m just as ignorant as every other man out there.”