Page 4 of Bite The Terror That Feeds

“Their numbers have been decimated. They’re no threat to us anymore. Doesn’t matter.”

“But that’s not the point, is it?” His brown eyes were furious, his need for revenge desperate. “You don’t betray your allies without consequences.”

“If you want to chase down a bunch of rats in little caves, then have at it,” I snapped. “But your time is more valuable than that. And killing the women and children isn’t revenge. It’s barbaric.”

Viper stared, still angry, but he didn’t refute my words.

“Let it go.”

He looked like he might say something more, but he chose to pour a glass for himself and take a big drink.

The dead had been buried and the city had been repaired, but buildings and homes were lost, and it didn’t look quite the same. But now, time had slowed as everyone got used to the peacetime between battles. I found myself without a purpose, because a cure for this disease wasn’t possible, and at some point, the Ethereal would return and I didn’t have a plan.

The door opened, and Fang slithered inside, snaking up the other armchair until he made himself comfortable, like he was another brother of mine. He looked at Viper, his tongue slipping in and out, and then looked at me once again.We need to ssspeak.

“Give us the room, Viper.”

“I can’t hear what you say anyway.”

“Just go.”

He set down the glass then turned to Fang. “Make him feed. He looks like shit.” He stormed out.

I refilled my glass and put my feet on the desk. “What is it?”

Speak with Larisssa.

“She doesn’t want my company.”

But she needsss it.

I ignored his suggestion.

Her overreaction is due to sensitivity. She’s been betrayed before—and she hasn’t let that go.

Every time I pictured that son of a bitch, it infuriated me. With a spine made of jelly and eyes full of terror, he was a weak man who didn’t deserve a strong woman. Knowing he’d touched her…made me sick to my stomach. Knowing that he might have hurt her…made me want to kill him.

Ssspeak to her.

“She wants nothing from me.”

She misses you.

Now I looked him in the eye. “She said that?”

His tongue slipped in and out.Yesss.

* * *

I knocked on the door before the guards unlocked it.

The room was dark except for the lamp on her nightstand and the chandelier in the other room. She was on the couch in the sitting room, an open book in her hands, and the second she saw me, she froze.

The servant brought the trays of food and set them on the table before he left.

During that time, we just stared at each other.

I didn’t realize how much I’d missed her until now. Those feelings had been locked in a cage inside my heart, but now they burst through the steel and roared to the surface. The loneliness became more potent. I longed for our domestic bliss, the way she trusted me implicitly, the way she would expose her neck to me entirely on her own. She wanted to make me powerful, and she enjoyed my bite more than any other woman had.