Page 10 of Irreverent (The Marked Saga #7)

Apparently, my appetite hadn’t vanished after all. It had only been in hiding.

After fixing myself a BLT sandwich and then scoffing it down in two minutes flat, Gabriel and I sat at the kitchen table chatting as I finally caught him up on everything that happened with Trace earlier that day. The truth of my divided heart was completely out in the open now, and the consequences were looming over me like a prophecy of death.

Judging by the I told-you-so look on his face, he had seen this predicament coming from a mile away. I, on the other hand, had not. Somehow, the realization that I would have to eventually pick between the two loves of my life had never fully occurred to me. But it was all I could think about now. No matter which way I sliced it, there would only ever be one of me, and two of them.

And yet, I still couldn’t seem to let either of them go.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do if he doesn’t forgive me,”

I said as I thumbed a straggling bread crumb on my empty plate. “Trying to avoid him today was absolute torture. I wouldn’t be able to do it for the rest of my life, and definitely not living in this town and having to see him every day.” Though truthfully, I wasn’t sure there was a town far enough from here that would ever make it okay to live without Trace. Or Dominic for that matter.

I inwardly groaned, knowing this was bound to end in a catastrophe.

He rubbed his jaw and then relaxed in his chair. “Wouldn’t he be doing you a favor in a way?”

“A favor?”

My eyebrows drew together in confusion. “How so?”

“Well, by removing himself from the equation, you wouldn’t have to actually pick one over the other. Dominic would win by default.”

He made a face like he knew how bad that sounded only after he’d said it.

“I don’t want either of them to win by default. And more importantly, this isn’t a contest. No one is going to be winning anything, and least of all me,”

I grumbled, irritated by this entire conversation, and knowing that no matter what choice I theoretically made, I’d be losing one of them.

His features softened. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. I’m sorry if I offended you.”

I tossed the bread crumb on my plate and wiped my hands. “You didn’t offend me. This isn’t your fault or your problem,”

I said, shaking my head—mostly at myself. At the impossible predicament I was in. “Let’s just…turn the page.”

“It’s already been turned,”

he said, leaning back in the chair and then folding his arms across his chest. “How is everything going with your classes? Are you keeping up with your assignments?”

I made a face letting him know I didn’t want to talk about that either.

“Okay. Turning the page again.”

I smiled. “We should probably work on the bloodbond,”

I suggested tentatively, hoping he was up for it.

His throat bobbed as he met my eyes and nodded.

“Have you fed tonight?”

I asked as I unzipped my hoodie, shucking it off and then placing it on the chair behind me. Apparently, I was super pumped to get this started.

“I fed before going to the supermarket,”

he informed and then worked his jaw. “Should I feed again?”

I thought about it for a quick second and then shook my head. “I think we’re good to go,”

I said, being that we hadn’t run into a single issue thus far. He’d even managed to make it through the entire grocery store without attacking anyone. What more could I ask for really?

I extended my arm to him and then grimaced at the various puncture holes littered on my wrist, none of which had yet to fully heal. I made a mental note that I needed to bandage that up for school tomorrow. You know, in case Trace decided to look my way and happened to notice the marks before I had a chance to tell him about my plan firsthand. That was just about the last thing I needed to happen.

“The wounds aren’t healing as quickly as I would like them to,”

noted Gabriel, his eyes examining my wrist with worry creased brows. “I really think we should reconsider spacing out these sessions a little more,” he said, his eyes still roaming over my skin as his index finger prodded one of the punctures.

Even with the very real prospect of all-you-can-drink Slayer blood dangling right in front of his eyes, he still couldn’t seem to stop worrying about me or trying to protect me.

Rolling my eyes at him, I pulled my wrist back and shook my head decidedly. “You already know my answer to that. Besides,”

I said as I presented my other arm to him and grinned. “That’s why I have two wrists.”

“You’re incorrigible,”

he said with a shake of his head.

“I certainly try.”

Relaxing my free arm against the table, I scooted my chair in closer to him and then held out my virgin wrist, ready to go. There really was no stopping me. I was basically a mudslide. “Thanks for doing that grocery run for me, by the way,” I said, realizing I hadn’t properly thanked him earlier. Had it been left up to me, I probably would’ve gone another week without eating.

“It was nothing.”

“Was it weird going shopping for food when you don’t eat the stuff anymore?”

I wondered.

“Not really,”

he answered as he curled his fingers around my wrist and then paused, arching a brow. “Not any weirder than deliberately trying to form a bloodbond with my brother’s on-again off-again girlfriend.”

“Well, when you put it that way...”

My smile came and went like the summer rain as that nagging thought made its way to the forefront of my brain again. What was Trace going to think once he found out what I was doing with Gabriel? Would he ever be able to understand why I needed to do this? For Dominic. For myself?

Or would this be the thing that finally spelled the end of us for good?

“Jemma?”

called Gabriel, recapturing my attention and drawing me back outward. His pupils dilated as he watched my pulse throb beneath the thin, delicate skin. “Are you still with me?” he asked, his voice strained as though it was taking every bit of strength he had not to tear into me right then and there.

I nodded, even though his eyes were still glued to my wrist. “Ready when you are.”

His fangs dropped, and a surge of desire and excitement spasmed through my belly at the sound of it. Gabriel’s black eyes immediately shot up to mine and then narrowed, drilling into me as though he had heard or felt something just then.

But what? And how?

Surely, he hadn’t just felt what I was feeling, had he? Because that wasn’t even possible at this point…was it?

“What is it?”

I whispered, my throat already dry from sheer anticipation. “Did something happen?”

His expression shuttered as he slowly shook his head. “No. Nothing.”

I stared back at him for a beat and then tried to let it go. Tried being the operative word. I wasn’t sure why, but I had the strange feeling that he had just lied to me then—that he was hiding something from me.

Even later, as he fed from me and I slowly drifted off into a state of blissful nirvana, I couldn’t help but wonder what had caused him to falter like he had. I couldn’t help but hope that something was beginning to take shape between us. That we were beginning to build a connection that would one day turn into a full blown bloodbond.

It was the last thing I remembered before slumping back in my chair some five minutes later, my head rolling aimlessly as I struggled to sit up straight. Gabriel cursed under his breath as I continued to bounce from cloud to cloud, oblivious to whatever the heck had gotten him into such a tizzy.

“Drink this,”

he demanded, and my mouth closed around his wrist as he held it up to my lips.

With every drop of his blood that entered my system, I felt myself descending from the clouds triumphantly, like an anointed warrior of the gods, growing stronger and more alive until my feet finally hit the ground again.

What a fucking rush.

My eager fingers darted up to grip his wrist like a vice, desperate to keep a direct line to the thing that had woken my body from the inside out. I wanted to get as much as I could while I could, certain that Gabriel would withdraw his offering at any moment, the way he usually did, but instead, he kept his body perfectly still, his wrist against my mouth as he allowed me to take from him freely. Greedily.

And then it was my turn to become worried. Feeling strong enough and for once, satiated, I lowered his wrist from my mouth and then looked over at him. His eyes were half-lidded and appeared to be unfocused, as though he were suddenly seeing two of me and couldn’t decide which one to settle on.

Shit on a matchstick.

“Gabriel?!”

I called out nervously, snapping my fingers in front of his face to get him to snap back to reality. “Are you okay? Can you hear me? Answer me!” I shrieked, my voice getting louder with every question I pelted at him.

A groan-like rumble emitted from deep in his chest. “I can hear you just fine,”

he replied, and even though his voice was but a decibel above a whisper, there was definitely a condescending note to it. “I’m not dead.”

I blew out a lungful of relief and then leaned over him, brushing his hair off his forehead to get a better look at him. While the full green of his iris’ had returned, his pupils were nothing more than two pinpricks.

That couldn’t be good.

“I think I took too much,”

I said, frowning as I watched him struggle to sit upright.

“I think I’m going to have to agree with you,”

he said and then propped his head back before squeezing his eyes shut as though the light were too painful to absorb at the moment.

“Why didn’t you tell me to stop!”

I yelled at him, panicked, and desperately needing to absolve my mounting guilt. I mean, really, this was obviously his fault. He couldn’t have actually expected me to have self-control, could he? Had he just met me for crying out loud?

“I thought you needed it more than I did.”

“Oh, sure. Clearly,”

I mocked, motioning to his boneless-looking body. “How’s that working for you now?”

He grunted his answer, not even bothering to open his eyes this time.

Feeling like a total asshat, I rubbed my sweaty palms against my shirt and tried to figure out a way to make this better. Quickly. There was really only one thing I knew of that would bring even the most drained vampire back to life.

“Here,”

I said as I stepped between his spread thighs and leaned over him again, bringing my wrist back to his mouth. “Take some more of my blood,” I ordered, figuring it was the least I could do being that I almost bled him dry.

Who even does that? There was something seriously wrong with me.

“I’m fine,”

he said and rolled his head to the side. “I just need a few minutes to regenerate.”

“And what should I do in the meantime? Stand here and let my guilt suffocate me to death?”

“Don’t be so dramatic.”

“Don’t be so stubborn!”

I countered, shoving my wrist at him again. “Just take it! Take my damn blood!”

“What in the hell is going on here?”

The sound of my sister’s hissing voice sent a jolt of panic down my spine that nearly stopped my heart dead in my chest. I stared down at Gabriel, waiting, hoping, praying that I had just imagined her voice and that she wasn’t really standing there in the kitchen with us. Unfortunately, judging by the horrified, anguished look in his eyes, my prayers were not going to be answered any time soon. Not tonight anyway.

Straightening to my full height, I slowly turned around as all the blood drained from my face. Not only was Tessa standing in the kitchen entryway with a furious scowl on her face, but it appeared that she’d also brought our mother along to witness the special moment. Because that was just the kind of luck I had.

Fuck. My. Life.