Page 8

The mark had not faded.

I traced the dark line across my palm for the hundredth time that day, following its path from the base of my pinky to the base of my thumb.

Samuel Wilson's memories had begun to blur around the edges, fading like old photographs, but the mark remained crisp and defined.

Two days had passed since Morrow had fed on Samuel.

Two nights of searching the cemetery for Morrow, only to find nothing but moonlight and silence.

The cottage felt smaller each day, the walls pressing in.

When Winters knocked at my door that afternoon, I nearly did not answer.

His presence felt like an intrusion.

But duty won out, and I pulled the door open to find him clutching his ever-present clipboard.

"Afternoon, Ms.

Ruiz," he said, his wire-rimmed glasses slipping down his nose.

"Just wanted to update you on a few matters."

I gestured him inside silently.

"Good news, actually," Winters continued, settling into one of my kitchen chairs.

"The council denied the developer's permits during a late-night meeting.

Some historical preservation clause they managed to dig up." He smiled thinly. "The developers found a better location anyway. Fewer complications."

Relief flooded through me.

The thought of moving and losing everything I had found had been weighing on me more than I had realized.

Without the uncertainty, I felt like I could take a deep breath.

"That's good," I said, my voice sounding rough from disuse.

Winters nodded, his gaze dropping to my hands where I had unconsciously been rubbing the mark on my palm.

His eyes narrowed slightly behind his glasses.

"Cut yourself?" he asked.

I curled my fingers into a fist.

"Just a scratch."

Winters stared at my hand a moment longer before meeting my eyes.

Something in his expression shifted, a wariness creeping in.

"You should be careful around here after dark, Ms. Ruiz. Especially near the old graves."

"I know how to do my job," I replied, more sharply than I had intended.

"I'm sure you do." Winters looked away, shuffling papers on his clipboard.

"I just...

we've had guards leave before. Suddenly."

The implied warning hung between us.

Did he know about Morrow? About Frank Tillman and so many others?

"One other thing," he said, clearly eager to change the subject.

"There's a funeral this afternoon.

Eleanor Blackwood. Local philanthropist, quite wealthy. The procession should be done by your shift, but you'll need to make sure the gates are locked after they leave."

I nodded, already calculating how long the grave would take to settle, when Morrow might approach it.

"The family's a bit...

concerned about security," Winters continued.

"Apparently Mrs. Blackwood insisted on being buried with a family heirloom. Diamond necklace that's been passed down for generations." He shook his head. "Her daughter wanted it, but the will was specific."

My fingers tightened around the edge of the counter.

"I'll keep an eye on it."

"I'm sure you will." Winters stood, gathering his clipboard.

At the door, he paused, studying me with that same wariness.

"You look different, Ms. Ruiz. Are you feeling alright?"

I forced a smile.

"Just tired.

Adjusting to the night schedule."

He did not look convinced but nodded anyway.

"Get some rest.

Nights can be... long here."

After he left, I returned to the window.

I could not shake off the memories of Morrow s touch.

The intensity. The pleasure. Maybe, it was the forbidden aspect of it that made it so earth-shattering. I had to tell myself that. Otherwise, what did that make me?

Hours later, the moon hung over the cemetery, bathing the stones in silver light.

I walked my patrol route mechanically, my focus toward the east.

For once, my job took all of my attention. Eleanor Blackwood's final resting place was by the eastern fence, marked by an elaborate flower arrangement and a temporary placard.

If Winters was right about the necklace, the grave might attract more than just Morrow tonight.

As I doubled back, I caught a flicker of movement near the fresh plot.

I froze, squinting. Two dark figures hunched over the grave, and after a moment, I heard the scrape of shovels moving dirt. I stepped into the shadow of a row of trees and crept closer.

"Hurry up," a voice hissed.

"This one s a guaranteed payday."

"How do you know that?" the other grunted, tossing dirt aside.

"My cousin works for the funeral home.

Said they were required to bury the jewelry with her.

It s in there for the taking."

I scowled.

Unbelievable.

Before I could think better of it, I unholstered my taser and stepped from the shadows.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" My voice cut through the darkness and both men jerked upright.

One was tall and wiry, the other stocky with a patchy beard.

Patchy Beard recovered first, straightening with his shovel still in hand.

"Cemetery's closed, sweetheart," he said with a smirk.

"Why don't you run along?"

"I'm security," I said, stepping closer.

"And you're trespassing."

The men exchanged glances.

The tall one shifted nervously, but Patchy Beard just laughed.

"Look at her, Devin.

One little girl.

What's she gonna do?"

"I'm calling the police," I said, thumbing on my phone screen.

Patchy Beard moved shockingly fast.

His shovel came up and across, slicing through the air between us.

I jerked backward, but the edge caught my forearm, tearing through my jacket and skin and sending my taser flying.

Pain blazed white-hot up my arm.

I staggered, barely holding on to my phone as I clutched the wound.

Blood welled between my fingers. He came at me again, shovel raised for another swing.

"Shouldn't have done that, sweetheart," he sneered.

"Now we got a problem."

The tall one, Devin, shifted uneasily.

"Man, let's just go.

This is messed up."

"Shut up," Patchy Beard snapped.

"We get what we came for."

I backed away, my injured arm throbbing.

Blood continued to seep through my fingers, leaving dark spots on my pants.

I could feel myself shaking, the fingers of my wounded arm barely holding my phone. How much blood could you lose before it became an emergency? I looked around frantically before I realized the crickets had gone quiet.

The grave robbers did not notice the change at first.

The subtle shifting in the shadows behind them, the sudden stillness of the night creatures.

I felt some of the terror fade.

Patchy Beard took another threatening step toward me.

"Now, you're gonna sit there nice and quiet while we "

He never finished the sentence.

Morrow emerged from the shadows like they had birthed him, his elongated form unfolding.

In the moonlight, he appeared more monstrous than I had ever seen him. His eyes glinted with predatory focus, moving from the grave robbers to me and back.

You re bleeding, Carmen Ruiz, he rumbled.

Devin broke first, dropping his shovel and bolting toward the cemetery gates.

It did him no good.

Morrow was far faster. It darted across the space between them, too fast to track. There was a horrific crunch, shrieks, and then gurgling.

Patchy Beard remained frozen, his face drained of color as he stared at Morrow s back.

A dark patch slowly spread across the crotch of his pants.

When he finally tried to run, he tripped over his own feet, sprawling across Eleanor Blackwood's grave.

Morrow turned to him like a coiled snake.

His lower face and chest were drenched in blood.

Nothing like the small messes he usually made. His gaze skipped over the remaining grave robber to fix on me. Or rather, on the blood. He tipped his head back, letting his eyes fall closed as his chest rose in a deep inhale. When his eyes snapped open again they landed on the thief.

He launched himself at the man, taking him down in a tangle of limbs.

Patchy Beard shrieked in agony before a ripping sound silenced him.

I looked away, peering down at my bleeding arm. I probably needed stitches.

I painfully shed my jacket, planning to wrap it around my arm.

Before I could, a shadow loomed over me.

I glanced up. Morrow reached for my injured arm with one blood-drenched hand. When his long fingers wrapped around my wrist, I felt a jolt of electricity go through me. He lifted my arm gently, examining the gash that ran from wrist to elbow.

"Why didn't you run?" he asked, still staring at the blood.

"They might have killed you."

"This is my cemetery too," I said simply.

My home.

Morrow's head snapped up at that, eyes meeting mine with an intensity that stole my breath.

For a long moment, neither of us spoke, the connection between us almost tangible in the night air.

Then his gaze dropped back to my wound, and I saw the struggle play across his inhuman features.

His lipless mouth tightened, his jaw flexing as if fighting some internal battle.

His grip on my wrist tightened fractionally.

The creature who had consumed Lawrence Emmett, the two thieves, and probably countless others over the centuries was fighting the impulse to feed on me.

But I felt no fear.

Only a strange, perverse fascination.

"You want to taste me," I said softly.

Not a question.

Morrow's form went perfectly still.

"Yes," he admitted finally, the word barely audible.

The confirmation should have terrified me.

Should have sent me running from the cemetery, from this creature who wanted to consume part of me.

Instead, I felt a thrill of dark excitement curl through my belly.

"Then taste," I said, extending my bleeding arm toward him.

Morrow's eyes widened.

"You don't understand what you're offering."

"Then explain it to me."

He released my wrist and stepped back, putting distance between himself and temptation.

"The dead have no claim on what I take from them.

The living..." He seemed to struggle with the words. "A willing offering creates bonds. Connections that cannot be undone."

I thought of the mark on my palm, the thin black line that had not faded.

"Like the blood sharing?"

"Deeper," Morrow replied.

"Irrevocable."

I considered his warning, weighing it against the pull I felt toward him.

The fascination that had transformed from terror to fixation to something dangerously close to desire.

Whatever bonds formed between us, I had already crossed too many lines to turn back now.

"Take it," I repeated softly.

Morrow's restraint shattered.

He crouched over my arm, his lipless mouth hovering just above my bleeding flesh.

"There is no return from this path," he warned, his grinding voice rough with hunger.

"I know," I whispered.

His mouth opened and a long tongue, the same black as his blood, slithered from between his teeth.

The first touch made me gasp.

Morrow made a sound I had never heard from him before. Something between a growl and a moan. His grip on my arm tightened as his tongue lapped at the blood. Each stroke sent another pulse of pain and twisted pleasure.

I panted as I watched him, the pain slowly fading as the wound did.

I swayed on my feet, my free hand clutching his shoulder for support.

Beneath the thin fabric of his tattered pants, a large lump formed between his thighs. He groaned.

The strokes of his tongue on my skin became more deliberate, more rhythmic.

My heart began to pound as my nipples hardened.

The parallel to another kind of intimacy was not lost on me. Suddenly, I wanted that more than anything. My pussy throbbed.

When he finally raised his head, his eyes were hungrier than I had ever seen them.

My blood stained his mouth, but I had the insane urge to kiss him.

His gaze moved down my body. We moved at the same time, a frenzy of hands stripping my pants and shoving my panties aside.

My back slammed into the dirt covering Eleanor Blackwood s grave.

I barely had time to gasp for breath before Morrow s face was between my thighs.

His tongue lapped at my pussy with the same hunger he had tasted my blood. I clawed at the dirt under me, jerking my hips into the shocking pleasure.

More! I gasped.

Morrow snarled and his hands gripped my ass.

He lifted my pussy to his mouth to plunge his tongue into me.

It writhed inside me, cool and slick, stroking my inner walls like it was searching for something. When he found something deep inside me and gently probed, I choked out a cry. My cervix, I realized.

It was the strangest sensation, but it made my toes curl.

With a pleased growl, Morrow pulled back to hungrily lick my throbbing clit.

My thighs tensed and I whined, struggling away from the intensity.

No, he snarled.

I choked on a scream as my orgasm slammed into me.

My nails clawed his shoulders, but he only purred louder.

He licked and sucked at me until I was sobbing too hard to speak. Finally, he raised his head. His black gaze met my teary one and he smiled with all of his teeth.

Delicious, my dear, he rasped.

I felt light-headed, both from blood loss and the brain-melting orgasm.

My mouth moved, but no words came out.

Morrow climbed over me, his heavy cock resting against my slick folds.

He braced himself on his elbows to cup my face, staring at me hard.

"Why did you give me this?

I scanned his expression.

Confused, fond, still hungry.

I-I wanted to, I said. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I wanted you."

Something flashed in his eyes.

His thumbs traced my cheekbones with surprising tenderness, leaving a cold trail across my flushed skin.

"You have no idea what you've done," he said softly.

"What you've started."

"Then show me," I challenged.

Morrow's lipless mouth curved in that unsettling smile.

Without warning, he rolled to the side and pulled me in against his chest, his arms encircling me.

I tensed for a moment before relaxing into it, my head resting against his silent chest.

"I have known many humans across the centuries," Morrow said, his words vibrating against my cheek.

"Watched them live and die, consumed their memories and essence.

But never..." He paused, seeming to struggle. "Never have I been offered what you've given freely."

I pulled back slightly to look up at him.

"What does it mean? This connection between us?"

Morrow's expression remained unreadable, but his grip on me tightened fractionally.

"It means you carry part of me, as I carry part of you."

"And what happens to me?" I asked softly.

"That depends on the path you choose," Morrow said.

"Some who have shared blood with my kind have lived long lives, forever changed but still human.

Others..." He trailed off.

"Others?" I prompted.

"Others have sought a deeper communion.

Have chosen to dwell in darkness."

I shivered at the idea of these unnamed people choosing to become ghouls.

Flesh-eating monsters.

Would I ever be that far gone? I liked to think not. Morrow s long palm stroked my bare thigh as if he sensed my unease.

"Where do you go?" I blurted.

"When the sun rises?"

Morrow's head tilted at that unnatural angle, studying me as if weighing a decision.

After a long moment, he spoke.

"Would you like to see?"

My heart skipped a beat. "Yes."