Chapter 13 #2
I pushed a finger inside her, rubbing at that soft, spongy spot that had her bucking against my face, riding me like she was as caught up in the chaos as I was.
And when I pushed the second inside, she clamped down on me and forced my head where she wanted, her second climax claiming her.
Her thighs squeezed my ears. Her cum painted my mouth and tongue. Her praise echoed off the closet walls.
It sent me over the edge. My orgasm rocketed through my cock like a teenager, and I spilled in my pants, completely rung out and spent.
Despite this, I kept licking her. I swallowed her cum and her sweat, and when she could handle no more, she pushed my head away and opened her legs so I could lower her trapped legs to my back.
The most depraved part of me wanted to yank my jeans down, pull out my rapidly deflating cock, and spear her with it to see how narrow she could make my refractory period.
But a quick movement by the door caught my attention, and when I glanced up, I saw Atlas standing in the hallway, his cheeks flushed, his eyes focused on us, his lips wet and parted.
He had a beer in one hand and the other firmly wrapped around the bulge in his jeans, grabbing the tip seemingly to alleviate the pressure.
The sight smacked me back to reality, one where we shared this house with him, one where we were preparing for a “blood-joining” ritual tomorrow, one where the tension between Marta and him was almost as tangible as it was between him and me.
He had every right to storm in here and deck me, or maybe explode in a rage of jealousy fury.
Instead, he canted his hips, adjusted his cock, turned, and walked away.
“Fuck,” I murmured, disentangling myself from the trap of Marta’s legs and jeans. I ran my hands through my hair and started to go after him, but Marta grabbed my arm to stop me.
“Hey,” she said.
I paused to look at her while she pulled her pants up, fixed her hair, and smiled.
Then she pressed up onto her toes and kissed me, melting the panicked part of my soul that had thought to react first and respond second.
I leaned into the touch, and when she broke away, she nodded back toward the supplies.
“Let’s finish this, okay? Then we’ll explain.”
Explain what, I didn’t know. It had all happened so fast, too fast for me to understand where it went wrong or why it happened in the first place.
Yes, Marta was attractive, and yes, I had feelings for her that were complicated and difficult to put into words.
I felt the same way about the bond with her as I did with Atlas.
I didn’t like it when it happened, but now, its absence ached like a void in my chest.
Together, we were unique and complete. And now…now I didn’t know what the fuck was wrong with me, but I needed to fix it.
* * *
At dinner that night, Atlas didn’t say anything about what he saw, just carried on like nothing had happened. I made food, and we sat at the breakfast table to eat the same way we’d done in the weeks prior.
“So everything’s ready?” Atlas asked, digging into his chicken parmesan.
Marta nodded. “I plan on cleansing the space tonight and praying to the ancestors for their blessing. We’ll need to bathe tomorrow before the ritual.
” She went through the steps, including the specific oils we would need to use and the amount of time we would have to spend in the water for it to take effect.
Cleansing the body would ensure we didn’t accidentally invite something wicked to come this way.
“The wards around the estate should protect us, but I’ll cast protection spells and anoint us all in protective ointments before we go. ”
“And what do we expect to happen?” Atlas asked, raising an eyebrow at her. “Once the ritual starts?”
She shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. Some of the texts describe a trancelike, almost euphoric state of consciousness. Blood magic is powerful, but almost always overwhelming. I don’t expect it to be more cumbersome than our original binding, but…again, that was a full coven. This is just us.”
“Have you done blood magic before?” I asked, trying to keep my voice as clinical as possible. “On your own?”
“Not like this,” she said. “But blood creates sacrifice, and sacrifice is always an energy exchange.”
Atlas shifted his weight, and I straightened my shoulders, meeting my brother’s gaze for half a second before he quickly looked away.
“I don’t think it will alter our consciousness to the point where we don’t know what’s going on,” Marta said. “But there could be some after effects. Euphoria. Giddiness. A magical rush. I’ll act as the connection point between the three of us.”
“And you’re used to that, huh?” Atlas murmured under his breath, barely audible, but both Marta and I picked up on it.
I sighed, anticipating the argument between them, and she grabbed Atlas’s wrist to stop him from biting into another piece of food.
“If you’ve got something to say, out with it.” She tightened her features, perhaps preparing for the attack.
I readied myself for the fight. He’d seen what we’d done. He’d watched us from the doorway and said nothing. He didn’t stop it. He didn’t even condemn us after it happened.
Atlas glared at Marta and ran his tongue over his teeth before glancing at me.
“Did she tell you about the training room?” he asked.
I raised my eyebrows, a sinking realization hitting me in the gut.
I wasn’t first.
Of course, I wasn’t first. Why would she pick me over him? Why would I think I’d ever come before Atlas? I was nothing compared to him.
“What?”
“Yeah. Me. Her. A sweaty session on the mats,” Atlas said. “She makes this cute little groan when she—”
“Okay,” Marta cut in, glancing at me. “Enough.”
I wanted to be angry. In the real world, I probably would have been.
Atlas and I had never shared a woman between us, even if there were some hazy nights where it came close.
I sat there, willing the wicked, fiery slice of jealousy to come, but it never did.
Instead, the thought of the two of them fighting and fucking sent a different kind of heat to my stomach, one that clenched my balls and made my cock twitch.
I would have liked to have seen that.
I bet it was hilarious. I bet it was hot. I bet—
“If we’re going to perform some fucked-up ritual in the woods, we might as well put all the cards on the table,” Atlas said. “You can’t fuck both of us and expect us not to say something about it.”
“Yeah? And what about you, huh? Standing outside the storage room, watching us like some kind of creeper—”
“Alright, stop it, both of you,” I cut in with a chuckle, surprising myself. “Look, we’re not exactly in ideal circumstances. Trapped here in this big empty mansion, a fucking lust demon on the loose somewhere. Let’s just…make the best of it.”
“What?” Atlas balked. “So you’re not jealous?”
I laughed and shook my head. “If we plan to do all three rituals, this was going to come up eventually. Jealousy won’t get us home.”
The words rang true in my heart. I wouldn’t begrudge either of them for taking their frustrations out on each other.
We were in a frustrating circumstance, made even more irritating by the limited prospects of getting home.
What if we were stuck here indefinitely?
Would I expect them not to act on what they felt between them?
And what happened once we got the bond back and those emotions were amplified?
What if we couldn’t control it like before?
“Are you?” I asked Atlas.
“Pfft.” He balked and sipped his beer, clearly searching for the right words to say. When he sputtered something that sounded like “I don’t know,” I took pity on him and said my thoughts out loud.
“What if we never get out?” I asked. “What if it’s just the three of us until we grow old and die?”
“There’s something about this place,” Marta said. “I feel…out of control. With both of you. Like I can’t stop it.”
“Me too,” I said.
“Ditto,” Atlas agreed.
“That’s got to be the demon,” I said. “It was making people consume each other in the real world. What would it do with the three of us in a reality made specifically for it?”
Atlas sighed, and Marta shook her head.
“It’s only going to get worse,” she said. “We might be somewhat shielded behind the wards, but when we leave this place…if we ever venture out there…it’ll fuck with us.”
“So here’s what we do,” I said, my rational mind quickly searching for a way to organize the chaos, a way to keep us going.
“Anything that happens in the liminal, stays in the liminal. If doing this ritual gets us a step closer to getting home, we’ll do it.
Whatever happens in the meantime is…nuance. ”
“Nuance?” Atlas barked a laugh. “Jesus Christ, I can’t believe this is my life.”
“Look, you and I have never had many boundaries between us,” I said. “We were raised in motel rooms and the back seat of Dad’s pickup. I’m honestly surprised this is the first time something like this has happened.”
Atlas met my gaze then, his emerald eyes shimmering with a tumultuous mix of fear and anticipation.
Something else danced behind them, too. Something depraved and licentious, like maybe the thought didn’t bother him as much as it should.
Like maybe this wasn’t the first time it had crossed his mind.
Like perhaps some part of him was even looking forward to it.
Am I?
I couldn’t think about it.
“When we get out there,” Marta said. “Let the magic guide you. Open yourself up to it. Whatever happens stays here. It’s just us.”
Atlas nodded, and I agreed. Later, after she’d gone to bed, my brother and I stayed in the parlor, lounging on the antique couches with a bottle of whiskey between us.
“C’mon, man,” I said. “It’s just you and me now. How you doing?”
Atlas ran his index finger over his eyes and sighed. “I’ve been better.”
“Are you stressed about the ritual tomorrow?” I wouldn’t blame him if he were.
“No,” he said. “Oddly, I’m okay with whatever happens.”
“Then, Marta?” I was ready to talk him off the ledge again. We didn’t need to have alpha-male animosity between us. There didn’t need to be mine or his. There could just be ours, just like our entire life had been ours.
Atlas took a deep breath and drank the rest of his whiskey in one gulp before pouring himself another, topping off my glass as well. “I should be pissed, but I’m not. And then I’m worried about why I’m not, but that’s not it, either.”
I waited for him to continue and picked up my glass to sip the amber liquid, relishing the mild burn as I swallowed it down.
“You ever wonder what our lives would have been like if we weren’t raised in this?” He gestured around the ornate room and decorative crown molding, indicating generations of wealth before the Harlots inherited it.
“I imagine you would have been a mechanic, and I would have gone off to college,” I said. “But it doesn’t do any good to wonder what could have been. We’re here. This is our life.”
“Right,” he said. “Our life.”
“Don’t tell me you regret it,” I said. “You’re the one who convinced me to stay when I got accepted to Yale.”
“I know.” Atlas frowned and drank another swig of liquor. “But what if I was wrong? What if you should’ve left years ago?”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “What? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for me. You wouldn’t have gotten sliced up by demons or been trapped in the liminal—”
“Yeah, it would have been you instead. You, here, alone with a witch you can’t stand.” I snorted a laugh. “Couldn’t stand.”
“Hey,” he said. “Hate-fucking is a thing, alright. Just because we let off some steam doesn’t mean we’re besties.”
I reached across the space between us to grab his shoulder and give it a squeeze in solidarity. “I stayed because I wanted to, Atlas. It’s you and me, no matter what. Always.”
He looked at me again with that same mix of trepidation and yearning, the same one that had nearly stopped my heart at dinner. It seemed like he wanted to say more, that he had a lifetime’s worth of things he wanted to say. Instead, he let out a sad laugh, gulped the rest of his whiskey, and stood.
“I think that’s enough for one night.” He patted my shoulder as he passed me, leaving me alone in that room with a million thoughts rumbling around my pathetic brain.