Page 56 of Reaper’s Ruin (Reaper’s Ruin Trilogy #1)

Time seemed to stop. The world narrowed to just the two of us, his confession hanging in the air like the steam rising from the water.

He took a step closer, his eyes blazing with an intensity that stole my breath.

“Please,” he said, his voice breaking. “Find your peace. Right now. Manifest your door. I can’t take it anymore.

I can’t stand spending one more day with you.

It feels impossible to love you more than I do now, but I keep falling more in love with you every second we’re together.

Each moment you’re in my life is only making the pain of losing you more agonizing.

Loving you like I do, more and more, but knowing I don’t deserve you.

That you could never love someone like me.

That you’re leaving me—either through your door or by a Reaper’s scythe. Please, Soraya. I’m begging you. Go.”

Tears spilled down my cheeks, hot as the lava flowing in the distance. “I can’t,” I whispered.

“You have to. You deserve your afterlife. Your mother. You deserve peace. Please, Soraya. Go. You have to go. Put me out of my misery.”

Staring into those eyes filling with agony broke something in me. He loved me. He needed me. And I...

“I’m in love with you too.”

His body went rigid, eyes widening in shock. “What?”

“I’m in love with you.” I laughed through my tears, the words feeling both impossible and inevitable. “It’s crazy. It’s nonsensical. How could I fall in love with Death? How could I fall in love with the being sent to erase me from existence? But it’s true. I love you, Rhyker.”

I closed the distance between us, placing my hand over his heart.

As I touched him, my body froze because I felt him.

In this existence of no sensation, I felt him, only him.

Just like in a life where I had simply coasted by on existence until I met him, he was the only thing now that existed to me.

I closed my eyes and whispered out my truth. “I don’t know how to find my peace when it means leaving you behind.”

He caught my hand in his, holding it against his chest, and even though his heart no longer beat in this form, I could still sense the ghost of it, almost hear the echo of it from when I’d lay on his chest and he’d held me in his arms. “We can’t do this, Soraya.

I can’t lose myself to you anymore and then watch you walk out of my world forever. ”

“Maybe you can come with me? Through my door?”

Pain twisted his beautiful features. “That’s not how it works.”

“Then you need to find your peace. Right now. Forgive yourself for whatever you blame yourself for and manifest a door. Then I’ll get mine too.”

Sadness and pain crashed into his eyes. “I don’t know how to find my peace. I’ve been trapped here for eight hundred years. I don’t think I’ll ever find it, Soraya.”

“Then I’ll stay with you.”

“No.” He gripped my shoulders, his face fierce. “I won’t let you sacrifice your afterlife for me. I won’t condemn you to the shadows.”

“Then we’ll find another way.” I cupped his face in my hands, forcing him to look at me.

“But I know one thing for certain: I can’t go on pretending I don’t feel what I feel.

I love you, Rhyker. I love you more than I thought it was possible to love anyone or anything.

And I don’t care if it’s wrong or impossible or doomed.

I don’t care if I only have days or hours or minutes left with you.

I want them. All of them. Any of them. I want you. ”

Something broke in his expression—the last wall, the final defense crumbling into dust. His hand trembled as he reached up to brush away my tears.

“I love you,” he whispered, the words sounding strange on his tongue, as if he’d never spoken them before. “I love you, and I can’t deny it anymore. I can’t fight it. I’ve tried, gods know I’ve tried, but I can’t.”

That was all I needed to hear.

I surged forward, hands fisting his coat, pulling him down to my lips. Rhyker stilled for half a second before he was on me, his arms wrapping around me with devastating need .

This kiss wasn’t like our others—it wasn’t just heat or desperation. It was something more, something deeper. A promise. A surrender. A beginning.

His lips moved against mine with exquisite tenderness, as if he was memorizing the feel of me, the taste of me.

His hands cradled my face like I was made of glass, precious and irreplaceable.

I melted into him, my whole body singing with the rightness of it, with the perfection of this moment we’d both fought against for so long.

He walked me backward until my back met the smooth stone wall beside a small waterfall that tumbled down into a clear pool. Warm steam rose around us, but I couldn’t feel it. Couldn’t feel the wall behind me.

While the world around seemed to exist on one plane, it was just him and I existing in this one together.

Him. I could only feel him.

His lips. His breath. The hard muscles of his back as I clung to him like I would never let him go.

And I didn’t want to. God, I never wanted to let go of this man, this Reaper, this being I loved with all my heart.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his voice a rough whisper against my lips. “Are you sure this is what you want?”

I answered by sliding my hands beneath his leather cloak, pushing it from his shoulders.

It fell to the ground with a soft thud. His eyes never left mine as I reached for the fastenings of his shirt, my fingers trembling slightly with urgency and need.

I slid it off him and it fell to the ground atop his cloak.

Awe spread through me like wildfire as I took in his incredible form, my hands following the path of my gaze.

No matter how many times I touched him, it would never be enough.

I traced the hard planes of his chest, the ridges of muscle, the scars that told stories from a life lived centuries before my birth.

His muscles tensed at my touch as I slid my hand across his skin, reverently, wondering how this incredible man was mine.

“You’re so beautiful,” I whispered, watching his eyes darken at my words.

His fingers slid down my back with agonizing slowness. “So are you,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. “So beautiful it hurts to look at you sometimes.”

He gathered the bottom of my nightgown in his hands, slowly raising it up my body until it slid over my head.

Slowly, I stepped out of my cotton underwear as he watched until I stood before him, bared to his gaze, my pulse thundering in my veins.

There was no shyness, no uncertainty. Only love. Only trust.

He took his time, his gaze drinking me in as his hands followed, fingers tracing every curve, every plane, as if committing me to memory. When his mouth followed the path of his hands, I gasped, my head falling back against the stone, my body arching toward him.

He pulled my nipple between his teeth, the gentle tug causing me to cry out. Then he erased the slight pain with pleasure as he flicked his tongue against my aching skin.

He worshipped me with a reverence that brought fresh tears to my eyes—this creature of darkness and death, treating me as if I were light itself. Each brush of his fingers between my legs, dipping them inside me slowly, had me gasping for breath, shaking with need to feel him fill me completely.

“Rhyker,” I whispered as he slid his fingers deeper inside me, the palm of his hand rubbing against my clit making my body swell with desire. His lips found mine again, the kiss deepening as he pressed against me, his body hard and insistent against the softness of mine .

I tugged at his remaining clothes, desperate to feel all of him against me with nothing between us. He helped, shedding them quickly until we stood skin to skin, breath to breath.

“I love you,” I whispered against his mouth, feeling him shudder at the words.

“I love you,” he echoed, the phrase sounding more natural this time, like a truth he’d always known but never spoken.

He lifted me, my legs wrapping around his waist, his cock brushing against my wet skin, causing me to pulse with need.

He took his time, holding me against him, teasing my entrance as he kissed me so deep it felt bottomless.

And then finally, when I thought I might explode with desire, he slid himself inside of me, my body stretching to fit his large cock, filling me so completely I gasped at the perfection of it.

When our bodies joined, it was different than before.

Not just passion or release, but a communion—soul to soul, heart to heart.

We moved together, finding a rhythm as ancient as time itself, as natural as breathing.

His eyes never left mine, holding my gaze with an intensity that stole my breath.

I saw everything in those storm-gray depths—love, fear, hope, desperation, joy.

Every emotion I felt reflected back at me, amplified and returned.

Water from the falls misted around us, but I couldn’t feel it. Couldn’t smell it. It was him. In this world where I felt nothing else, I could feel him. Touch him. Worship him. Love him.

Because in a world where I didn’t even feel the ground, I felt him.

And I knew then, down to my soul, down to whatever tattered piece of magic bound me to this plane:

He was my tether.

My storm.

My flame.

And I would burn for him .

I ran my hands through his hair, down his back, feeling the muscles flex and ripple beneath my fingertips as he moved within me. My breasts rubbed against the broad planes of his chest, his hands gripping my ass as he held me in place while he thrust into me again and again.

Our bodies spoke what words couldn’t express—the depth of our connection, the impossibility of our love, the defiance with which we claimed it anyway. Every touch, every kiss, every shared breath was a declaration: This is real. This matters. This is worth fighting for.

As his cock pressed deeper inside of me, I moaned, rubbing myself against his body, feeling him hit that perfect spot that made stars burst behind my eyes, the tension building as we climbed higher together.

I kept my eyes on his, unwilling to miss a single moment of this transcendent joining.

I didn’t know how long we had in this strange existence together, but I didn’t want to waste a second of it.

When release finally came, it wasn’t just physical—it was a shattering, a remaking, a transformation so complete I felt it in the depths of my soul.

In the aftermath, he didn’t move away, didn’t release me. He pressed his forehead against mine, our bodies still joined, our breaths mingling in the small space between us.

“Whatever happens,” he whispered, his voice raw with emotion, “whatever comes next—remember this. Remember that I love you. That I will always love you. That I will love you beyond the end of all things.”

I wrapped my arms around him, holding him as if I could keep him with me forever by sheer force of will. “We’ll find a way,” I promised, though I had no idea how. “Whatever it takes. However impossible it seems. ”

We stayed like that, locked together, forehead to forehead, heart to heart, breathing each other in as the sun set behind the volcanic mountains, bathing us in golden light.

In that perfect moment, I didn’t care about doors or peace or what came next.

I didn’t care about the impossibility of our situation or the inevitability of our separation.

All that mattered was his arms around me, the safety in his embrace, the love that had somehow bloomed between Death and the soul he was meant to reap.

And for now, for this moment, that was enough.