Page 38

His hand moved from my arm, circling my shoulders.

His fingers trailed down my chest, tentative at first, then bolder.

When they brushed across my nipple, pleasant rushes of liquid fire shot through me.

The monster within stirred—savage, demanding—flooding my mind with images of how easy it would be to twist, to pin his writhing body beneath mine, to sink my fangs into that perfect throat while he gasped my name.

“Flynn.” I caught his wrist.

He made a soft chuckle of disappointment. After a moment’s hesitation, his voice came again, small. “Can I… stroke your hair?”

The simple request knocked me senseless. Words seemed beyond me—all I could manage was a jerky nod, my throat too tight to speak.

His fingers soon found their way to my head.

He scratched gently at my scalp, threading through my thick curls until my whole body hummed with the attention.

The sensation was exquisite torture, and I had to clamp my mouth shut to prevent the shamefully needy sounds building in my throat from escaping.

“Rory rang Priya from that detective’s car. He told us what happened. He seemed scared for you. Said you looked shaken. Did you know him well? The guy who sold you blood?”

“No. From what little I saw of him, he wasn’t the nicest.” Though he still had a family, one that he wouldn’t be coming home to.

“How did you meet him? ”

“Through another doctor, at the hospital. One who moved out of the area, and thought Greaves could continue to help me in his stead.”

“And what will you do now, for blood?”

“That’s not for you to worry about,” I said softly.

“I can’t help it,” he whispered, close to my ear. “Worrying about you.”

For a moment, I couldn’t speak, lying there as Flynn’s fingers continued their gentle exploration through my hair. The sensation was both torturous and divine—each stroke causing shivers I fought to suppress.

“If it comes to it, I’ll give you some blood. I want to help you. Like you’re helping me.”

Helping me. The words were a stark reminder of my failure.

We’d made pathetically little progress on his case, hitting dead end after dead end.

Felix had trawled through hours of CCTV footage, and Kit had exhausted his network of contacts, but Damien remained elusive.

We had no idea where he was hiding, or which demon—or other unknown entity—held his leash.

Precious days were slipping by, days we couldn’t afford to waste while that mark slowly poisoned Flynn’s system.

“It’s my job,” I said stiffly, and his hand paused its movement. I immediately wanted to kick myself. “That came out wrong. Obviously, I care for you. Quite a bit.”

His fingers resumed their hypnotic path through my curls. “Quite a bit, huh? Wow, you do flatter me so.”

I gently kicked him with my leg. “Careful with that cheek.”

His laugh vibrated against my back as he drew me impossibly close. “Or what?”

A buzzing sound interrupted any retort. Flynn shifted behind me, reaching for his phone on the bedside table.

“Oops, that’s the other vampire I was sexting. I forgot to reply to him.”

I instinctively tensed for a moment before I processed the joke. “How many vampires do you know, exactly?”

“Just the one grumpy one.” He paused. “It’s my mother. She’s asking when I’m coming home to visit. ”

It was on the tip of my tongue to suggest he do just that, but I swallowed my words. It would be extremely unsafe for Flynn to travel anywhere—and he’d possibly be endangering those around him.

“She’s threatening to come to London if I don’t,” Flynn continued, tone laden with guilt. “Says she’ll organise someone to accompany her. Her carers are amazing, but…”

“Do you miss Braymore terribly?” I asked, dreading the answer.

“God, yes.” His voice grew distant, wistful.

“Mostly the ocean. There’s nothing like being out there alone.

Just me and the water, no land in sight.

The way sunlight catches the waves just right, turning the whole world into liquid gold, and the salt spray hits your face like a wake-up call.

Like the sea’s reminding you you’re still here, still breathing.

And if you’re very lucky, dolphins come and say hey.

They’ll splash you, though. It’s their love language. ”

His description painted such a vivid picture that for a moment I could almost taste the salt air. “I can’t imagine it. I haven’t been on a boat in living memory.”

Flynn propped himself up on one elbow, looking down at me with surprise. “Never?”

“Never.”

A slow smile spread across his face, just visible in the darkness. “Well, that settles it. When we can, we’ll go together. I’ll teach you everything you need to know.”

The earnestness in his voice made something in my chest constrict, a painful stab of a knife.

How could I shatter this beautiful moment with impossible truths?

That even with an umbrella, I could barely tolerate that sunlight he was so fond of?

That the ocean he loved could be lethal to me—the deadly mirror of its surface causing my skin to blister and crack?

“We’ll go in the evening, obviously,” he added quickly. “When the sun’s setting. And if we go in Braymore, the weather’s always shit there anyway. ”

He settled back down against me, his chest warm against my back.

Reality pressed heavily on my shoulders.

Killigrew Street consumed every moment of my existence.

The organisation couldn’t run itself—between managing supernatural threats, keeping the peace between the wolf packs, maintaining our network of contacts…

There was barely time to think, let alone plan holidays to Ireland.

And wasn’t that the crux of it? I was supposed to be protecting him, not indulging in romantic fantasies about sunset sailing. Each of Flynn’s exhalations tickling my neck should have been a reminder of my failing, rather than this dangerous, delicious respite I couldn’t seem to resist.

“Sounds wonderful,” I said to placate him. “I’m sure I’ll be in safe hands with you at the helm.”

I shouldn’t have encouraged it. He was twenty-five, a child really, with all the bright-eyed optimism that came with youth—still believing in possibilities where I saw only obstacles. Still viewing the world as an adventure rather than the dangerous game of chess it was.

But logic crumbled to dust with his chest pressed up against my back, his arm wrapped around me, heavy as an anchor.

He’ll be gone soon, to become another fading memory. Enjoy his fleeting warmth while you can.

Flynn fell quiet then, his breathing evening out against my neck. For a moment, I thought he might have drifted off to sleep. But then his voice came again, soft and hesitant.

“Do you remember your mother? Your family?”

“No.” The word came out oddly sharp. “I know some from my diaries, which I kept sporadically during my human years. I had an older brother who died of disease, and… a younger sister. Magdalena.”

When was the last time I’d spoken her name aloud? The sound of it felt foreign on my tongue.

In my office, locked in an ornate chest that had survived hundreds of moves and a dozen wars, lay those early diaries—leather-bound volumes documenting my journey to Inquisitor, then to the monster I became.

The time was approaching to read them again.

Soon, I would have to unfold those brittle pages and relive it all.

Because I didn’t deserve the mercy of forgetting.

Flynn’s hand stilled in my hair. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.”

I caught his wrist before he could pull away entirely. “It’s fine.”

He paused before he asked, tentatively, “ One more question?”

I tried not to sigh. “I can guess what it is.” He wanted to know about my turning.

Everyone did, eventually. The morbid curiosity of how one becomes a vampire.

But the memory of my sire’s face flickered through my mind like a shadow, and I couldn’t bear to speak of it.

Not now, not when Flynn’s radiance had finally quieted the darkness inside me.

“But it’ll be dawn soon. It can wait for another night.

” I caught myself too late, realising the implication. “I mean, another time.”

“The question was just…” Flynn’s arm tightened around me. “Are you going to ghost me?”

“What?”

“I’ll wake up and you’ll be gone?”

“Well, I’m already dead, aren’t I? Though I suppose vampires are an upgrade compared to ghosts—all the haunting, none of the walking through walls.”

Flynn’s answering laugh was barely more than a breath against my neck. His grip remained firm, as if he could physically prevent me from disappearing. Within minutes, his breathing deepened and evened out as sleep claimed him.

As I lay there, surrounded by his warmth, I couldn’t keep thoughts of my sire at bay.

Of the way he’d corrupted me, isolated me from my family, twisted my faith until I couldn’t recognise myself.

The way he’d used my position in the Inquisition, my desperate need to prove myself worthy, to manipulate me into killing my own sister.

Some evils should stay buried in the past where they belonged.

Flynn didn’t need to know about the priest who’d destroyed everything I was, whose obsession with me led him to turn me into this creature of darkness without my consent.

Flynn had enough darkness in his life already—he didn’t need mine as well .

I twisted carefully, not wanting to wake him as I repositioned us.

Now he lay on his back, and I rested my head against his chest, letting the steady thrum of his heartbeat fill my senses.

Each beat called to me—but for once, that call wasn’t tied to hunger.

Instead, it spoke of comfort, of connection.

The little puffs of Flynn’s exhales ghosted across my skin like butterfly wings, delicate and precious. I pressed my palm to his chest, to find the skin there slightly cooler than the rest of him. The demon’s mark. My jaw clenched.

I should have attempted to sleep—dawn approached, and with it my body’s natural inclination to rest—but I couldn’t bear to waste these precious hours unconscious.

Instead, I committed every detail to memory: the rise and fall of his chest, the softness of his skin, the way his fingers had curled loosely in sleep.

Running the back of my knuckles over his face, I traced the curve of his cheekbone, the slope of his nose, the slight part of his lips. He looked so young in sleep, so defenseless. So human .

“My sweet angel,” I whispered, the endearment slipping out of me from a hidden corner. “ Mi amor.”

Morning would come, and too soon. But for now, I would enjoy this stolen pleasure. I would imagine what it would be like to have him in my arms every night, to measure eternity in the rhythm of his breathing.