Page 10

Chapter Ten

Asha

T he sea of black shapes and glowing eyes reacted in horror as they were attacked like this was The Birds movie—the single-most terrifying film I’d ever watched as a child.

But as soon as the eerie sounds of demons being torn apart by beaks and shadows started to grow louder, Thanatos walked me back until I hit the wall behind me. He crowded me, blocking my view from the crazy shit happening behind him. His thumb swept across my bottom lip before he lifted me under my ass like I weighed nothing at all. He pinned my body to the wet wall with his. Water slid down his gorgeous face, but he said nothing, only stared.

An eerie shriek filled the air. The shadows moving along the brick across from me responded angrily. Don’t ask me how I knew they were angry, but I got the sense that something had changed. My skin prickled with the sudden ominous sensation in the air. My flight or fight response was activated, and I squirmed anxiously, desperate to get away from whatever danger the demons brought with them.

I swallowed when a ghost of a smile tilted Thanatos’s mouth after I tried to lean to the side to see what was happening. Most of the noise was smothered by the thunder and electric cracks of lightning. I couldn’t hear anything, just the rhythmic sound of water hitting the metal balcony above us, but the dangerous sensation invading the space only intensified as the seconds ticked on.

“Don’t worry about all that, little raven. I’m the scariest monster out here. Those bastards don’t know their place,” he said, putting his mouth directly next to my ear. “But they will.”

I stiffened, not prepared for the storm of heat hitting my thighs and stomach. He’d spoken in such a sultry tone as if we weren’t in public and feet away from an epic battle I desperately wished to watch. Or maybe this was a normal Saturday afternoon for Death?

“I don’t know what the fuck is happening…” I whispered before gasping. His hips rolled into mine, sending a message—a message I wasn’t confident I could stop myself from answering.

Nipping my ear, Thanatos rumbled a promise. Or maybe to some, it’d be considered a threat. “A little demon nuisance isn’t going to come between me and my plans, Ash. I thought I’d made that perfectly clear this morning. You intrigue me, and it’s going to take more than a few demons to keep me from fucking you like I did last night.”

My head knocked back into brick, and I sucked in a greedy breath. It was hard to breathe with him whispering those filthy things in my ear.

Memories invaded my head of him fucking me while I was bound in his shadows. I wanted him to do it again. It was all I thought about since waking up. Not the fear of being assaulted. Not witnessing five men get torn apart. Not even the fact that he was some impossible supernatural being who reaped souls and sent them to their afterlife. No, I was remembering how his tongue felt inside me. His powerful body in motion. His greedy kisses and sultry smiles. His pierced cock slamming into me without mercy. I was thinking about how much I wanted him to chase me the second I ran away. I couldn’t make sense of my own thoughts.

I was a fucking mess.

Thanatos knew just what to say to make me forget he was the terrifying killer who controlled shadows and ravens and couldn’t die. Or that he was the monster who could reap my soul and end my life. Because when I should be frozen with fear, I was clinging to him out of desperate need instead. I hadn’t caught my breath since I crossed paths with him in the club. You know, before everything went supernaturally to shit.

“And I thought I made myself perfectly clear, Mr. Killer. I’m far too busy for this shit. Either take my soul or get lost. If my number isn’t up, then I’ve got shit to do.”

Where had all my confidence come from? In what world did I think I stood a fucking chance against Death himself? But I guess the biggest question was how threatening my words would come across with my hands gripping his wet shirt, pulling his chest to mine while my legs wrapped tighter around his hips. Talk about saying one thing and doing another.

I was a full-body contradiction.

He'd noticed. It was all in the little raise of one of his eyebrows as he looked down first at my hands, then at my legs wrapped around his waist. His sexy grin when our eyes met again made the thirsty thing between my legs contract, and my hips moved before I realized. He sucked in a quick breath before closing his eyes.

My heartbeat was in my ears, waiting for him to either kill me or fucking kiss me already. Just do something. Honestly, I’d take any response at this point. The suspense was brutal. I couldn’t take much more of it. I didn’t stand a chance against him no matter what he chose to do next.

Pushing against me, the dangerous supernatural beast bent his head and devoured my mouth. Even through the wet denim, I could feel how hard he was for me when we’d barely done anything at all. In the middle of a battle and storm, Death stole my common sense and self-preservation with his hungry kiss. I couldn’t run anymore. I wanted to be there with him. Call me stupid, say it was a death wish, call it reckless lust, but I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and pulled myself closer to his face, chasing his tongue whenever it retreated in the slightest.

Rain fell on us from the holes in the metal balcony, and I was completely drenched—in more than one sense—by the time he leaned away to glance over his shoulder. I followed his line of sight, noticing that we were now the sole entertainment for about a hundred ravens. Even the shadows writhing over the walls seemed to be watching. Weird didn’t quite cover the feeling. The shadows moved closer, reaching for me again, and I heard the beast of a man sigh like their reaction annoyed him.

His thumb stroked my cheek, taking a long moment where all I heard was the rain falling and the sky roaring. Before I could lean in for another kiss, Thanatos took several steps back with me still held firmly in his arms.

His shadows moved closer, then rose off the ground like curtains of black silk, dense and no longer translucent. We were wrapped in them like the night before. The same sensation that stole my breath after I watch five men die took powerful hold over me. But it was only seconds before we were at my office. I didn’t have time to be surprised because I was dropped on top of a desk. When I realized that he’d taken us to Major Asshat’s office, I almost couldn’t stop myself from laughing out loud.

“This isn’t my office, but something tells me you know that already.” I sounded way too amused for the annoyance I intended to express.

But Death’s little grin stole the laugh I worked hard to suppress. “I won’t lie, little raven. I’ve wanted to fuck you on this desk since that bastard tried to put his filthy hands on you.”

He saw that? How long had he been watching me? That was over two months ago.

Stripping off his jacket, Thanatos slid his hands up my pantyhose, teasing the hem of my skirt. His enormous shape seemed larger in Mark’s office. As though he took up half the space. And maybe he did. Something told me that no room could hold him. His moon eyes followed every movement his hands made before they jerked back up to mine, asking.

But I was too distracted by what he’d previously mentioned to make a cute comment about it. “Wait a second…”

I thought back on the day Mark nearly sexually assaulted me after calling me into his office to have “a little chat.” I’d thought it was odd that a bird got in—my little raven stalker—and attacked my boss when he’d pinned me to the desk, touching my thigh the same way Thanatos did now but with a much sleazier look on his face.

I was seconds away from giving Mark’s groin a good hit with my knee, fuck the consequences. Enough of us had been sexually harassed by Grand-pappy’s Golden Boy. I could easily build a class-action suit against him with Emily’s expertise and contacts. Instead, a raven attacked him out of nowhere. I hadn’t even seen how it got in through the window.

At the time, I’d thought that good ol’ karma had finally paid Mark a visit. The asshole was known for his sticky fingers and gross commentary. A few of the ladies talked about it, but none of them felt comfortable reporting him. Since it’d never happened to me, I couldn’t do anything about it. I wasn’t Mark’s type. I had a real woman’s body, and he liked them Instagram thin. So, I’d only ever heard about it. Color me surprised when he tried it on me. I figured it was the ammo I needed to spank him with the legal hand of justice, Ems style. Oh, and also Ash’s knee of justice, just for extra flair.

But since that day, Mark stayed away from the ladies in the office, and his fear of birds followed him everywhere he went. Last week, one of the girls said he’d screeched over a little black bird landing on their car on their way to an off-site client meeting. Not only that, his entire demeanor changed since that day, but I just figured nearly getting your eyes gouged out by a bird had made him rethink his inappropriate conduct a bit.

Did Thanatos have something to do with all that? Was there more to the story I hadn’t already gotten? Could I persuade him with sexy promises to get play-by-play details of how his bird tormented Mark into a fearful mess?

“Was that one of your birds?” I asked, giving him my cutest eyebrow waggle.

I wasn’t sure what I expected, but when Thanatos’s smirk grew and he tried to hide a chuckle, I found myself laughing, too. But I quickly realized that I was still sitting on Mark’s desk with fucking Death between my open legs. The irony wasn’t lost on me.

Clutching the mahogany ledge, I turned my head to stare out the window aimed at the rest of the office. The blinds were drawn, and the chances of Mark coming in on a Saturday were slim to none. Still, I was worried someone might know we were in here and come looking.

Mark usually kept his door locked, but that didn’t stop the spiraling fear that I’d lose my job because some supernatural dude who controlled birds and shadows thought it’d be cute to rewrite the script and recast the hero’s role. Not that I was complaining with who’d been cast this time.

Thanatos grabbed me around the jaw and forced my eyes to meet his again. “I think you’ve forgotten who I am and what I can do.”

Gah, he’s so goddamn beautiful. Look at that jawline. Is it carved from stone, or is that just another supernatural Reaper of Soul's thing?

“No, that’s pretty much all I can think about right now, Mr. Killer. I’m just not sure why we’re here and not back home.” I’d forgive the fact that I’d essentially admitted I was fine with what we were about to do, just not where.

My thighs were shaking. I wanted to pretend it was because I nearly got attacked— again —or that I’d confirmed demons were real and out for my blood, which wasn’t great for my overall mental wellness. But if I were honest with myself, it wasn’t out of shock or fear I was trembling. It was the promise of sex that transcended reality. More than that, it was the fact that he hadn’t left.

He was still here.

I should be scared for my life. I should wonder why Death was stalking me at all. I didn’t buy this you-intrigue-me business. My gut told me he was after something else, and that alone should terrify me, but it didn’t. If anything, I was glad he hadn’t gone far; that he’d shown up when I needed him to. That our night together wasn’t the last.

Emily’s YOLO lifestyle was apparently rubbing off on me.

It was fucking insane how quickly I gave into him. But so was the fact that I’d become Death’s newest obsession. Or because whatever I was to him made me the target of both demons and angels alike. I wasn’t sure what it all meant, but the part of me that came alive when he fucked me like it’d kill me made it impossible to reject him.

I wanted another kiss. I wanted him inside me. I’d conveniently forget that having sex with him was playing with fire— and my life —because if I could have another night like that, maybe dying wasn’t a big deal. I mean, like he said, there were perks to being special to Death.

He watched me, never doing more than running his impossibly large hands up and down my thighs. When I’d decided to give in, his entire vibe changed. Like he’d been patiently waiting for consent that wasn’t coerced by the situation we’d been in. Like my feelings mattered to him.

Which was so weird when you considered how powerful he was. He could take whatever he wanted. I couldn’t fight him. I didn’t have powers, or shadows, or even a bird that I could sic on him so I could run away screaming. My little raven stalker probably took orders from him, anyway. So, why didn’t he just take what he wanted? Why didn’t he enslave me with his mystical Death powers? Unless sex was the enslavement? Made sense. I was willing to risk my safety to be with him. Maybe he’d put a spell on me. Could Death do that?

“Ash,” he whispered, leaning in and nibbling my lower lip in that sexy way of his. I gasped, and he groaned low in his throat as if it took every bit of his willpower not to attack me. “I won’t do anything you don’t already want. You’re right. I do have the power to control you, but I won’t.”

He dropped a kiss on my neck, and I angled it so he’d have better access. The hands on my thighs squeezed, and I moaned without meaning to. His feral growl echoed in my ears. “Tell me to stop, little raven. You have all the power here.”

I caught his gaze, confused. “I do?”

His pretty moon eyes sparkled and glowed. “You do.”

“I can just say no and you’ll stop?”

His throat bobbed and his pupil-blown eyes dropped to my lips when I swiped my tongue over them. The line of his jaw was taut for a second before his stare lifted. “I will. Do you want me to stop?”

No fucking way.

His smirk was downright diabolical. “I thought not.”

I still wasn’t convinced he couldn’t read my mind, but I was thankful I didn’t have to speak. It’d give me the excuse later that I didn’t have any choice in the matter. A lie I’d tell myself when reality came swooping back in.

He moved in on me, slamming our mouths together so hard that I nearly fell back. A hand splayed and pressed across my shoulders, keeping me upright, as the other slid under my skirt, teasing fingers over sleek fabric and making it impossible not to hold my breath. Last time he’d torn through it. I waited for him to do it again, but he simply slipped his hand under my waistband and into my underwear.

His thumb pressed over my clit, and I moaned into his kiss, surrendering the same way I did the night before. Becoming his perfect, willing prey.