Page 16 of Claimed By the Mothman (Greymarket Towers #1)

T he hallway was too bright, or too dark; she couldn’t tell. Everything shimmered. The walls reverberated as she passed, light bending around them.

Nell stumbled into the stairwell, took the steps two at a time, nearly fell, caught herself with shaking hands, and didn’t stop running

The teeth marks in her shoulder throbbed in time with her heartbeat. Blood slid down her collarbone, slowly congealing but not fast enough. The wetness between her thighs wasn’t fading.

She’d begged him. She’d ridden him like a wild animal and felt her body light up like a fuse.

This wasn’t like with Edward. Edward, with his gentle missionary apologies and his “are-you-sure?” pauses. Edward, who smelled like aftershave and self-importance. Edward, who never made her lose herself.

She made it to the fourth floor and dove into her apartment like she’d just escaped a crime scene, her chest heaving as she collapsed against the door.

What the fuck just happened?

She crawled through the hallway to the living room and pulled herself to the couch. Curling up into a ball against the cushions, she dragged a blanket off the back and wrapped it around her like a protective cape.

The mark between her thighs pulsed with every heartbeat, soft and rhythmic like a drumbeat. She pressed her forehead into the pillows and felt tears flood her eyes.

“I CLAIM HER!”

Nell stumbled to her feet and lurched to her purse. Fingers fumbling. Finding her phone. Dropping it. Picking it up. Dropping it again. Tremblingly flicking the screen on. Scrolling blindly. Hitting call.

It rang once. Twice. Three times.

“Helloooooooo?” Goldie’s voice chirped, bright and sugar-rushed, like she was in the middle of starting a dance party for one.

Nell’s throat clenched. “Goldie,” she rasped. “Goldie, I—I don’t know what time it is, I’m sorry, but I did something. Something bad.”

There was a sharp inhale on the other end of the line, and Goldie’s voice became serious. “Oh my gods. Nell, what’s wrong? Are you okay? Are you hurt? Do I need to call the police? Bring a shovel? What happened?”

“I—” Nell’s voice shook. “I almost died and then I had sex with one of my cryptid neighbors.”

Silence.

“I—we—he—we didn’t plan it. There was this thing, this ritual , and I don’t know what happened, but then I touched him and I just lost myself and —I think I’m still vibrating—”

Goldie screamed. A sound of pure, unfiltered delight that was utterly horrifying and oddly soothing .

“YOU GOT CLAIMED?!”

Nell drew a breath, the sound sobbing from her throat. “Goldie, this isn’t funny—”

“Are you kidding ? ! This is why I moved to Bellwether! Babe, stay right there. Don’t move. I’m coming over. I have questions, I have snacks, I’m going to rub your back and braid your hair and you’re going to tell me everything.”

“Goldie—”

The call ended.

Nell stared at the screen. She could still sense him thrusting into her, his teeth on her neck, the roar as he came. Her whole self felt ripped wide open like a wound.

What is happening to me?

—

The loud, insistent knock came twenty minutes later like a summoning spell performed with the heel of a boot.

Nell didn’t answer. She just made a weak noise that sounded like the love child of a moan and a dying bagpipe.

The door swung open hard enough to rattle the hinges. Goldie burst in, a gust of wind and energy wrapped in a velvet shawl and chaos.

“You beautiful whore,” she breathed, striding in with eyes alight and a grin like she’d just won the lottery. “You glorious bitch. You got cryptid fucked. Were there claws? Did he transform into another shape? Was it—I bet it was—Nell?”

The grin slipped from her face like a dropped plate.

“...You’re crying.”

Nell chuckled weakly. “Yup.”

Goldie softened like someone had let the air out of her. The bags dropped from her arms, clinking to the floor, and she flurried over the couch, her arms wrapping around Nell and pressing her to her shoulder.

“Okay,” she murmured, her voice gentling. “Okay. I’m sorry. I’m here.”

Nell drew a shuddering breath. Tears started to roll down her cheeks and she wrapped her arms around her friend and squeezed her tightly. Goldie squeaked once, only lightly, and then pressed a kiss to Nell’s temple.

“Tell me everything,” she said gently. “Did you get spiritually reorganized through orgasm? Can you smell the color blue now? What’s the situation? Talk to me, sweetie.”

Nell let out a garbled sob. Or a laugh. A laugh-sob .

Haltingly, she told Goldie about the red doors.

The Lustrum. The moment the world peeled open.

The way it started rewriting her. Waking up in Sig Samora’s bed.

About what happened when she touched him.

The way the world blazed into a fury of heat and lust and need.

The bite. The claspers. The way the world shattered and shattered again.

Goldie didn’t interrupt. Just nodded. Listened. Held her tighter when she trembled. Reached into one of her pockets and pulled out peanut butter pretzels and a chocolate bar without comment.

“I didn’t even know what I was doing,” Nell whispered. “My body just reacted, like my lizard brain took over and I was just along for the ride. I wanted it. But I didn’t. But I did. Does that make sense?.”

Goldie kissed the top of her head. “Oh, honey,” she whispered. “It makes all the sense.”

“It was like… being possessed. Like my body stopped being mine. And now it’s wrecked and humming and there’s this fucking mark between my legs … ”

Goldie touched the third finger of Nell’s left hand where the opal ring now glowed with a quiet, pulsing light. It shimmered faintly, like it was breathing.

Goldie pulled back and stared at her for a long moment. “Okay,” she said. “That’s hot. ”

Nell let out a strangled snort. “Gods, Goldie…”

The knot in her chest finally loosened and Nell dissolved into tearful laughter, breath hiccuping between grief and joy and everything in between.

“Like, triple-x-rated hot,” Goldie said helpfully, a teasing note right behind her voice that said, it’s okay, girl. We’ll get through this. “I mean, seriously, Nell. Almost dying and then primal monster sex? Why do you have all the fun?”

“You’re… not helping…” Nell gasped, wiping her streaming eyes.

Goldie smiled and placed her hands on either side of Nell’s cheeks. “I’m staying over. I have wine, snacks, and a ritual hexing spell. We’ll build a fort, drink too much, and then watch Steel Magnolias so you can see that things could definitely be worse.”

Nell nodded. Her voice was thick, her eyes swollen. “Thank you.”

Goldie wrapped both arms around her, fingers threading gently through Nell’s hair. They sat like that for a while, wrapped in fleece and witchcraft and the scent of chocolate and peanut butter.

Then, softly, Goldie whispered into her ear.“And then, when you’re up to it… you have to tell me about his cock. I need details.”

Nell groaned, buried her face in Goldie’s shoulder, and dissolved into helpless, hiccuping giggles.

—

Sig stayed where she’d left him, legs folded awkwardly, still half-naked, the wreckage of his body cooling into shame.

He could still feel her. Nothing as clean and simple as the feel of her wet, slick body as he thrust into her, no. This was a low, aching pain that resonated from the marrow of his bones.

She had fled from him like he was a monster.

No—he was a monster, a monster crazed with lust and need and wanting , and he’d reacted without thinking, just instinct. Yes, she had begged him and wrapped her legs around him and wailed in ecstasy, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t still wrong.

Among his kind, who hadn’t been chosen to carry prophecy, mating was a mixture of need and want, when pheromones were in balance and desire required satiation.

Or it was an expression of power, demonstrating finesse and an exchange of favors.

It was a practical ritual, negotiated and performed and just as quickly forgotten.

But he was Harbinger. And although he had heard the warnings, the whispers from the Elders, he had never truly believed that the urge to claim would come to him, would rise up and overwhelm all his senses until he was nothing but instinct and urge and desire.

Now it had. And now, he was undone.

Sig shuddered, drawing his wings tight to his back, as if the pressure could clear his mind and make him feel stable again.

A knock shattered the silence. Three measured raps.

He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. The door opened of its own volition.

Mr. Lyle stepped inside with a motion as sharp as a guillotine blade.

His polished shoes made no sound on the wooden floor.

He shut the door behind him with delicate precision.

Turned. Folded his hands. And looked directly at Sig.

His eyes were twin marbles of obsidian threaded through with pinpricks of silver.

“Would you like to explain,” Mr. Lyle said, voice calm as ever, “what the fuck that was?”

For a long, horrible second, Sig considered lying. Then he simply bowed his head. Clicked. Waited.

“Do you understand what you’ve done?”

“I do,” Sig said tightly.

“No, I don’t believe you do, Samora!” Mr. Lyle slammed his hands against the wall of the apartment. The walls rippled, the lights dimmed, and a low wail began to weep through the room like a requiem.

The apartment manager straightened. The clean lines of his suit stretched as his spine elongated. The marbled silver in his eyes spread, swallowing his pupils entirely. The air around him bent slightly, as if reality itself had stepped back to give him space.

“You broke the pattern,” Lyle hissed, his voice deepening and echoing with the sound of dying stars.

“You let the Lustrum taste her and begin opening her shape, and then you ripped her out half-absorbed. The ritual is now incomplete, thanks to your pheromone-rotted brain, and now the Lustrum is hungrier than ever. ”

“I did what I had to do,” Sig said, quietly but without apology.

“And that is the issue.” The sharp edges of the apartment manager’s presence softened, as if something vast and ancient had briefly withdrawn its focus. “It desires her now, Samora. She rang through it like a struck bell, and now it wants to ring her again until she sings its song.”

Sig let out a low, rasping breath. “My claim still stands. She has not yet refused it.”

The air around Lyle wavered faintly, and for a moment, his shadow moved in the wrong direction.

“The Lustrum is now inside her, and she inside it. If— when— it calls again, she will go to it.”

He had broken the pattern, pulled her from the spiral, claimed her as his…and that was not enough?

The floor between them bowed slightly, like something massive had momentarily leaned its weight onto Greymarket.

“If she accepts your bond, she will possibly be safe,” Lyle said with a restrained voice. “Possibly.”

Sig chittered and bared his teeth. “Then I will win her. I will make her understand.”

“You cannot make her do anything. That is one thing you still don’t understand about human women.”

“She is mine!” Sig roared, leaping to his feet. His jaw split wide and his throat emitted a clicking snarl like splintering glass.

Mr. Lyle snarled. It wasn’t a sound a man could make—it was a warning from something that had eaten worlds.

The two of them flared—wings and suit, mandibles and gold-laced eyes, power thickening the air like syrup. A raw, vibrating collision of forces older than time and barely contained by flesh. The walls went still. The lights dimmed to pinpricks. Even the air froze in place.

Sig broke first. Wings sagging. Chest heaving. Power slinking back beneath his skin.

“You cannot assure her safety,” Lyle said with a restrained voice.

“I know, ” Sig rasped. “But I… have to try.”

The apartment manager’s face softened infinitesimally.

He turned toward the door, which opened of its own accord.

He brushed imaginary dust from his sleeve, adjusting the crimson square of his breast pocket with the same care one might use to reset a ritual circle.

“I know,” he said with a sigh. “I know, Sig.”

Lyle stepped through the door without looking back.

Sig was left alone, buzzing and broken, still feeling the shape of her in his arms. Still glowing from a bond half-sung, half-born, and reeling with the knowledge that unless he learned how to make her choose him, the Lustrum would finish what he had interrupted.