32. It’s Your Wound, They’re My Sutures

Dawn crept through the frost-laced curtains, painting Ash’s skin in hues of corpse-pale and gold.

He’d revealed the sun-walking advantage her venom had given him during one trip to the old theatre for training.

It only lasted until he was hungry again. The silvered and thorned VII on his wrist had changed.

Only one thorn remained. Liora lay rigid in his arms, her horns retracted, but the ghost of their weight still throbbed at her temples.

His lips brushed the sensitive skin there, once, twice, a mockery of tenderness that made her snarl.

“Stop that.”

“Why?” His thumb traced the ridge where obsidian had pierced flesh hours before. “Embarrassed I liked them?”

She scoffed, shadows flicking against his calf like cat’s tails. “You’d like anything that let you win.”

Ash chuckled, breath cold down her neck. “Byron didn’t even try, did he? Coward.”

Her muscles locked, heart racing at the reminder. “Don’t.”

He didn’t listen. He never bloody did.

“Rasputin scorched them. The witch cursed them. Oscar, Victoria, all the rest…”

His voice hardened, fingers splaying possessively over her ribs. “Small men, jealous women with smaller minds. They couldn’t fathom what to do with you.”

He hadn’t stopped making comments whenever he noticed she was awake to hear them. Each one designed to perforate the very core of her.

They worked. Liora lifted her head to face him, shadow fangs bared. “And you can?”

“Yes.” He said, frost-spun truth.

She faltered, throat tightening, and her breath shallowing. His hand slid to the base of her spine, where her tail slumbered under her glamor.

“You think I’d balk at wings? At teeth?” He leaned in, nipping her bottom lip. “I’d beg to watch you eviscerate armies in that form. To kneel in the wreckage after you’re done and lick the blood from your claws.”

Something roasting in her chest hitched. Warmth bled between her sticky thighs, stomach dropping. Dangerous.

Too late.

“You’re lying.”

“Try me.”

Silence pooled between them, thick with centuries-old armor cracking. The last pieces began to shatter now.

Ash’s knuckles dragged down her spine, frost glimmering in their wake. The sensation was too close to reverence.

“They didn’t deserve the honor, Liora.”

His gaze pinned hers, and it was merciless.

“To taste you? To see you bare? Weaklings, all of them. I’m not kind. I’m not good. But I am”—he gripped her hip, pulling her flush against him—“thorough.”

Her laugh came out spiked. “Thoroughly arrogant.”

“Thoroughly obsessed.” His lips ghosted the corner of her mouth, where a too-sharp canine peeked through. “You’re a fucking supernova. Of course I want to burn with you.”

She searched his face—the pale eternity of it, the scars he’d never explained. She knew how he’d gotten them now. For today, only her inner voice existed.

It wasn’t at peace, no, but the usual diatribe had dulled to a butter knife.

No longer a double-edged dagger. There was just Ash, cold and relentless, and…

Mine.

She kissed him. A savage, teeth-clashing, necessary thing that made her back arch. He groaned into it.

His hand fisted in her hair, and she let herself believe. Here, she could believe him.

It lasted for a while. But they broke apart, her thumb lingered on his lower lip, smearing black blood from where she’d bitten him.

“One more word about supernovas and I’ll disembowel you.”

He grinned, all fangs and victory. “Noted.”

The questions returned as time ticked away, and they remained tangled in bed together. Why him?

Why this dead man? This leech who’d crawled between her thighs night after night, uninvited and unafraid, grinning like her claws in his gut were a prize?

She’d devoured kings who wept as she drained them. Shattered warlocks and witches who’d begged for mercy as she stole their magic.

Rasputin had choked on his own lightning when she ripped it from his spine. Byron? He’d sobbed her name like a prayer as she gutted him, all poetry ash in his throat.

Ash laughed. Laughed and acted like he belonged there no matter how hard she fought him off.

He chuckled now, low, coarse, and dark, as his lips again found the place her horns had breached her skin, his tongue a brand of frost.

“Still thinking,” he murmured. “Dangerous habit, Red.”

Her shadows coiled and undulated against the headboard. They whispered, “ours, he stays,” as if they’d conspired against her and wouldn’t let her deny him anymore.

The succubus agreed; Let him.

“You’re not listening,” she hissed, unsure if she meant it for him or the voices in her veins.

“Never do.” His teeth grazed her ear. “Tell me again how you’ll eviscerate me. Use the bit about my entrails decorating the Chrysler Building.”

She growled, but it lacked venom. His hand slid up her spine, fingers lingering where wings might tear free. Heat flashed through her.

What does he really want?

The question scuttled across her mind. Rooted in her deepest doubt. One that still said he only wanted her power and blood, her ability to keep him out of hunters’ hands.

He’d proven it wrong last night, but it wouldn’t stay quiet. She had to hear the answer.

From him. Her pulse raced faster and faster. Fingers shaking. She moved abruptly, fisting his hair, their noses inches apart.

His eyes were quicksilver, reflective, and didn’t flinch as she asked, “What do you want?”

“You.” Simple. Brutal.

Truth. “The screaming, scheming, celestial rot of you.” His hand cupped her jaw, and she shivered. “The way your cunt sings when I ruin you. The way you taste like hellfire and denial. The—” She surged forward, mouth crashing into his. Sighing. Actually, she hummed. Because she could.

Because his mouth was the closest thing to peace she’d ever felt. Winter, want, and wit, a paradox that burned, changed as the taste of him twisted down her throat.

Soothing the wildfire heat beneath her skin with every flick of his tongue, every stroke of his hand down her side. He broke away, forehead pressed to hers, breath ragged. “Still waiting for the evisceration, love.”

“Shut up.” She possessed his mouth again, softer this time, her claws pricking his shoulders.

Mine to maim. Mine to keep.

He smiled against her swollen lips. “Never.”

She stayed.

The knowledge was a collar of spikes locking around his throat—sweet, piercing, and perilous. He didn’t dare close his eyes, terrified he was dreaming.

Liora’s breath warmed his chest. Her shadows coiled lazily around his ankles like a house-cat. Absurd.

He’d braced for claws, a return to denials, the inevitable outburst that would send them into a battle of blades and fangs. Violence, bloodied, beautiful.

Familiar. Safe. Instead, her fingers clung. Blunt human nails digging half-moons into his bicep.

As if he were an anchor in a storm, she’d never admit to weathering.

Pathetic, he chastised himself, even as his hand stroked down her back, memorizing the topography of scales and scars.

You’d let her gut you if she asked nicely.

He’d often told himself it was strategy. That binding himself to a succubus, to her, was about power, survival, the thrill of the hunt. His failsafe to keep him out of his true grave.

Lies.

Ash had tasted all flavors of mortals and more than a few supernaturals. He’d drunk them dry. None of them burned like her.

None of them mattered. He let out a soft sigh, inhaling the fragrance of sex and their mingled scents. Liora stirred, her lips grazing his collarbone like a question in the room’s gloom.

“Still here,” he said, whispering, frost feathering across her shoulder.

Still yours.

She huffed, but didn’t pull away. His mind had memorialised the moment she had yielded to him the night before.

The moment her defenses frittered away, all she had left was her wanting. And she wanted him. He remembered the moment he’d flipped her.

It wasn’t just for the angle. He’d spied the flicker of self-conscious terror in her eyes.

The fear of seeing her own reflection unraveling into scales as all her false humanity faded away. He’d given her the back of her own head to look at.

So she could fall apart without the added burden of watching herself do it. He would be the only witness.

It was his privilege and his duty. One day, he’d make her see the majesty of her true form.

She wasn’t ready yet. Her heart still ran like a kicked dog, and he hadn’t uttered a joke or taunt in hours.

She burrowed closer. Chasing his chill, melting into him as her fiery face turned into his neck.

Her teeth found his throat, pressing into his cold skin, not breaking it. Her claiming without bloodshed.

His undead heart spasmed, a quiver running through his chest. The phantom ache was more acute than it had ever been.

Why him?

He knew her doubts. Knew a part of her still expected him to flinch when the wings tore free, the tail lashed out; the fangs dripped venom.

When she wasn’t the succubus, but the destroyer. Velthara Nyxarrah. The bringer of endless nights.

Just one of the old titles he’d found despite her erasing her past. Fools had died for lesser offenses than screaming. She just— He wanted her. Whole. Alive. Undone. All of her and all of him. Nothing less. Let her be monstrous.

Let her live, and not only survive. Her eyes had been deader than his the night they’d met.

The light had returned. It was shaky and easily dimmed, but he’d seen it more often. She even laughed.

She looked like it killed her to do it, but a win was a win. He breathed her redolent scent in, letting it banish the niggling worries about hunters and labs.

And the constant nagging thought that he’d end up back there soon. Enough of that; this was for them.

He rolled her onto her back, settling between her thighs. Afternoon light bled through the ice-glazed windows, gilding her copper hair, her too-sharp smile.

“What?” She sneered, even as her pulse stuttered.

“You’re staring, leech.”

“Admiring my handiwork.” He traced the maroon bloom on her neck, frost melting under his touch. “You’re… tolerable when you’re quiet.”

She laughed, rich and venomous, real and wondrous, and he couldn’t stop himself. He kissed her as though they were mortals with nothing else to do.

Slow, mapping every corner of her mouth, a duel without weapons. Her tongue met his, a tang of iron, sweetness, and pomegranate, and he groaned.

Mine. Finally mine.

Their coupling was a blasphemy of tenderness. Her claws stayed sheathed. No curses or insults came.

Only gasps, hums, and the whisper of silk under them broke the sound of their shifting bodies. Her hips arched into his.

His fangs skated over her rattling pulse point in a promise. Instead of a wound. He moved inside her, pace unhurried and driving deep.

When she came, it was with a shudder and a sigh, her human nails raking his back.

He followed, spilling into her with a growl that shook the frost from the walls.

Stay, he didn’t beg.

Stay, his hands pleaded, knotting in her hair.

Stay, her shadows hummed against her throat.

After, she collapsed atop him, sweat beading on both of them. He didn’t know if it was her heat or venom that caused him to perspire. Her breath hitched—a fractured sound he’d never heard. Tears?

A hot droplet seared his throat. Yep. Tears.

He froze, swallowing hard. Panic spiked, ice creeping up the bedposts. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Had he pushed too far? Been too soft?

Monsters weren’t meant for gentleness; it curdled in their throats like milk left out in the sun.

“Liora—”

She pressed her lips to the bite mark on his neck, muffling a ragged inhale. Her Dutch slurred into his skin, a language she thought dead to everyone in the room but ghosts, shadows, and her.

“Don’t you dare leave.” She sounded strangled. “I can’t rewrite myself again.”

His cadaver heart crumpled to dust. The void filled with their bond as it scalded his chest. She didn’t know.

She didn’t remember that his mother had sung lullabies in this tongue, her voice rasped by nicotine-smoke as she bandaged his childhood wounds.

Now you’ll heal crooke d, she’d say, like the rest of us.

Liora’s fingernails dug deeper into his shoulders. Fragile. Another surrender. One that made his bones throb and ache.

He crushed her closer, his cock still buried inside her, their sweat and spend melding. Her shadows coiled around his wrists.

They weren’t restraining him. They wanted to keep him too.

“Look at me,” he demanded.

She didn’t.

He gripped her chin, forcing her gaze up. Amber eyes, violet strands, raw as open veins, met his. So many emotions swam in their depths.

Too many to name. The brand on her collarbone was flashing again. The last digit seemed thicker than usual.

He drew a tight breath.

“Ik blijf,” he said, rougher than sandpaper.

I stay.

She went rigid. Her heart stumbled over itself as her head shook. “You… bastard. You understood?”

“You’re not the only one who steals things, sweetheart.” His thumb smeared a tear across her cheekbone. “But if you’d prefer”—he shifted, grinding deeper into her, drawing a gasp—“we can stick to threats.”

She laughed, broken, breathtaking, as she said, “I’ll skin you.”

“Promises, promises.” He kissed her languidly until her shadows purred against his ribs. He pulled back, his voice turned lethal. “If you ever glamour yourself for me, I’ll gut you. Wings. Teeth. All of it. Or I walk.”

It was a lie. He’d crawl through hell for half her shadow.

Her smile cut like a scalpel. “Bold words for a man who came twice.”

“Three times.” He nipped her jaw. “Try keeping count.”

She rolled her eyes, but her hips rocked against his, a lazy claiming. “You’re insufferable.”

“And you’re stuck with me.” His palm slid to the small of her back, where scales glinted. “Scars and all.”

She traced the claw marks she’d left on his chest. They looked like runes. Pretty, almost. Compared to the rest.

Her Dutch was a blade dipped in blood and forged in fire. “Mijn monster.”

My monster.

He didn’t flinch. He wasn’t afraid of what he’d become. Not anymore. They fucked again. Hungrier, sweat-slick and snarling.

Her shadows weaving through his hair like bridal lace. His back was against the headboard as she straddled him.

The penthouse trembled as Liora’s claws carved furrows into the creaking wood. Her hips ground down onto Ash’s cock with feral precision. Her inner walls scalded him, pulling him deeper in.

She siphoned his every grunt and groan, every molten swirl of lust in his veins. Frost crackled across his fingertips, his palms splayed over her thighs as she rode him.

Long fingers spanning the side of them. She was a hurricane of sweat, venom, and greediness.

“More,” she commanded.

Ash smirked, holding her down and stopping her from chasing the orgasm he felt as if it were building in his own body. “Ask nicely.”

“I’ll end you!”

“You’ll come,” he corrected, icy breath skimming her hot collarbone. “But not until you show me.”

Her shadows lashed the walls, her face scowled despite the urgent need in her midnight gaze. “Show you what, leech?”

He thrust up, harsh enough to make her teeth rattle, savoring her choked whimper. “The wings, Liora. Or do you need me to beg?”

She laughed, spiky, unsteadily. He’d caught her thinking of them the night before. He wasn’t leaving this bed without seeing them.

“You’d grovel prettily,” she said with a tilt of her proud chin.

“I’d make you grovel first.” His thumb found her clit, frosted friction sparking a sob from her throat. “Wings. Now.”

She trembled, teetering, her cunt fluttering, a sleeve of pure flame around him. He missed the spiralling sensation.

Next time, he promised himself.

“Ash…”

“Show me,” he growled, teeth grazing her pulse, “or I stop.”

A few strained heartbeats passed. Another snarl. Then she gave in.

The explosion of bone, sweltering heat, and membrane ripped through the room. Her wings erupted in a storm of onyx, anguish, and visible relief.

They were leathery and vast, with veins glowing like magma under obsidian skin. Ash stopped breathing.

He devoured the sight of them like a man finding salvation after decades of suffering. His cock jumped inside her, stomach tightening as arousal flooded him. Magnificent.

Liora panted, cheeks flushed, wings shuddering. “Happy?”

“Ecstatic.” He dragged a finger down the nearest wing’s edge. Testing a theory.

She jolted, cunt clenching viciously, and he moaned as she cried, “Fuck!”

“Every inch of you,” he murmured, ice blooming where he touched, soothing the tremors, relishing her whine, “is a fucking revelation.”

His other hand seized her jaw, not letting her hide from his gaze. “And I’m starving.”

He inverted them, slamming her onto her back, wings splayed beneath her like a sacrificial altar.

Her hips arched, wetness trickling, desperate. He pinned her wrists, drinking the panic in her eyes.

“Still think I might run?” he taunted, thrusting deep to prove he never would. Just in case her doubts were hammering at the edges of her pleasure-drenched mind.

“I wish you would,” she hissed, but her leg hooked around his waist. The other braced on the bed. Toes curled into the mattress as she met his every slide inside her with a sharp buck of her hips.

“Liar.” He kissed the hinge of her jaw, Dutch slipping like a secret. “Mijn vuurspuwende draak.”

My fire-breathing dragon.

She glared through her warbling moan. “You sentimental f—” “Shut up. You love it.” He bit her wing’s joint as it curved around them, frost threading from his teeth.

She couldn’t even scream, climax obliterating her voice. He groaned and cursed her name as her cunt clamped down.

Venom and essence gushed, soaking the bed and his cock, splattering their stomachs. The scorching, sweet and salty musk of it made his fangs drop and ache to sink into her vein.

He’d never felt her this wet. She sobbed and flailed as he fucked her through the bed-shaking aftershocks.

He preened despite the tremors in his muscles. Ash only lasted another few thrusts before the tingling and tension snapped.

He came inside her with a moan, teeth buried in her throat. She held him there until her inner walls stopped clenching.

Later, her wings draped across the ruined sheets, smoking faintly. Ash traced the membrane’s edge, frost healing micro-tears. “Predictable,” he muttered.

Liora snorted, sprawled boneless, trembling, and sated atop him. “Says the man who came in three thrusts.”

“Four.” He nipped her horn, grinning at her shiver. He doubted she’d noticed that they’d surfaced again. Progress. “And you’re one to talk—you soaked the bed when I bit your wing.”

She flicked his ear. “Pervert.”

“Your pervert.” His palm settled between her wings like a vow. “Admit it. You’re disappointed I didn’t flee.”

“I’m disappointed you didn’t pass out.”

“Try harder next time.”

She huffed, but her shadows curled around his ankle.

Ours. They stayed in that cocoon of burnt sugar, bergamot, and dark amber-hazed darkness until night fell.

Neither spoke until her magic grew restless. He knew she needed to move now.

She wasn’t one for idle days spent in bed. The fact he’d kept her here so long was a testament to all they’d overcome.

Her first words as she untangled herself from him made frozen lead settle in his dead gut.

“We have to go to the Hamptons. I think they’ve moved on already.” She paused as she slid to the edge of the mattress. He felt her sigh rattle through his own marrow. “There might be something to find. We’ll leave tonight.”

Ash nodded, a coffin in his throat as a chill wound down his spine. The Hamptons was the elite’s playground.

A place of extreme wealth and privilege. Where everything that could threaten such a polished image got swept under the perfectly manicured hedges.

What the hunters had to do with it, he wasn’t sure he wanted to find out…