Page 17 of Vengeful Melodies (Heaven’s Guilt Revenge Tour Duet #1)

Chapter Seventeen

Takoa

The name’s gospel in my mouth, and her body’s the heresy I’d bleed to commit. The pen digs into my fingers, pressing scripture into paper that’s already bleeding under the ink. Every line feels like it’s coming from someplace unholy.

Bash sits across from me, guitar against his thigh.

He strums slow and heavy, the sound dragging like a funeral march.

Four chords, over and over, until they start to feel sacred in the wrong way.

The hymn is there in the bones of it — bent, warped, stained with the kind of worship that leaves bite marks.

Kaiser leans back in his seat, tapping steady against his leg. Not fast — heartbeat-steady — like the pulse you feel in your throat when you’re begging for something you shouldn’t want.

From the back of the RV, the faint blue flicker of the TV spills into the hallway. The door to her room’s cracked just enough for sound to slip through — a creak of bed springs, a slow shift of weight. My hand clenches around the pen. Alix is in there with her. Sleeping, probably. Or maybe not.

I start writing. The words spill faster than I breathe.

She’s the breath before the drop, The prayer before the blade, The altar and the sin, The reason I stay unmade.

Bash slides higher on the fretboard, dirtier, letting the note ring until it vibrates in my ribs. Kaiser’s still tapping, now with two fingers, locking into the groove.

Another creak from the back. A faint exhale that’s not mine. It shreds my concentration and feeds it all at once.

Kneel before the breaking, Worship in the ache, Drink her like she’s shadow wine, Let her mercy make me break.

Bash hums the warped hymn under his breath — and the words in my head burn darker. I’m not just writing anymore. I’m confessing.

Bend the knee at midnight, Body as my creed, Bleed into my open hands, Let your ruin be my need.

From the back, the bed groans. I picture her bare skin against sheets, hair spilling over her shoulder. The memory from earlier hits hard — her standing there in front of us, naked and sure, dripping with sex and challenge.

She is no chalice — she’s the poison in the cup, Sweet enough to drink to death, Holy enough to damn me twice, And I’d kneel for every drop.

It goes on until I don’t know if the ink is mine or something older and worse, something we pulled out of the dark together.

By the last chorus, it’s 2 a.m. The three of us are humming it like we’ve been hexed. Bash’s guitar softens — a confession whispered after the sin. Kaiser slows his tapping, like a priest closing a book.

Exhaustion crashes in. Bash lays his guitar down on the table like an offering to an altar we already desecrated. “If I don’t sleep, I’ll lose half this.”

Kaiser cracks his neck. “You’re carrying me.”

“Fuck off,” Bash mutters, stumbling toward the bunks.

We drag ourselves up the narrow steps. Bash drops onto his bed boots-on. Kaiser’s gone in seconds.

I climb into mine slow, notebook warm in my hand, still humming the hook like it’s carved into my bones. From the back, there’s one last creak. I close my eyes and pray she’s in my dreams when I get there.

The pen slips from my fingers, the notebook slides from my chest. I’m already half gone when the last thought hits — every line, every word, is just me on my knees at her altar, begging to be ruined.