Page 94 of Worse Fates

“But?”

“But…” Lucero’s teeth run across my jaw. “I love how much you need me.”

My fingers, still rooted in his hair, bring his face to mine and our lips meet in a rush of need and biting desire. His heavy weight anchors me to the mattress, his mouth demanding more, as his hands slip under my t-shirt, running calloused palms up my torso.

“You’re wet,” I moan between kisses.

One of his thumbs rubs across my nipple, and I shiver. “I had to wash off with a hose.”

“Apollo?” I pull back. “You found him?”

Lucero sits up. “Not yet.”

“What happened?” I ask, pushing myself up on my forearms.

Lucero’s gaze sweeps over where I lay and I see myself reflected. Lips swollen, hair a mess, and shirt ridden up, exposing my hard nipples and dick straining against soft pyjama shorts.

The blue in his eyes melts into something darker, lust so stark I can’t help but cant my hips up for him. “Stop distracting me.”

“Stop tempting me.”

“Ramy said I could look in your direction and you’d be seduced.”

His rumbling laughter waves across my chest. “He isn’t wrong.”

No wonder there are so many songs and poems about sex and love when my mind is lost to it.

“I kinda get whatRobert Herrickmeant now, even if he was a huge perv.”

Lucero raises an eyebrow.

“Yeah, you know, ‘And this same flower that smiles today, Tomorrow will be dying.’”

The corner of his lip quirks up. “I’m afraid poetry was never my thing, beautiful.”

“He was an answer to a pub quiz, and I looked him up after.” Sitting up, I straighten my clothes. “Tell me what happened.”

Lucero stands from the bed and angles his body away from the moonlight, and tells me about the two blood mages, and Mickey killing them and…

“Summer told me you’d be disgusted if I allowed him to suffer.” Lucero’s brow furrows. “I’m old, Golden, but even when I was human I only cared about Cristóbal. Everyone else I felt indifferent towards.”

When he stares out the window, I wonder if he’s remembering his brother. Or the deaths of the mages. Maybe neither. It doesn’t matter, he’s far away from me and I need him back.

Slipping from the sheets, I go to him. Maybe he needs to hide in the dark to tell me these things, but I refuse to let him stand alone.

“You think I don’t see you?” I take his hand and rest it to my chest. “I know you, Lucero. Do you think I haven’t picked up that you don’t care about other people? That I don’t know you can be cruel?”

When I’m the centre of Lucero’s world his gaze turns soft, indulgent, but suffocating. Yet how fucked up that I’d live on the edge of a single breath for him.

“You thought I’d stop loving you because you aren’t a beacon of good?” I tilt my chin up. “Well, fuck that, my light. This world is harsh and sad and it hurts. You’ve been patient and regretful with Ramy. Hard, but supportive of Rurik. Disappointed but hopeful with Vidar. I see you, Lucero. All of you. And I only want you.”

Unmoving, chest not even rising, Lucero watches me. “I would’ve let a blood mage die in agony today. A kid, really.”

“You didn’t.”

“I would’ve.”

I pause.