Chapter 4 #3
Everything about the man caused my pulse to quicken, and when he was in that form, he seemed so intertwined with this primal energy that it surprised me that most days he came off as so relaxed and playful.
Even as he sat here now, red smoke and shadows twirled around his fingers as he tapped them on the tabletop, making me want to reach out to play with them myself.
I knew that would probably distract him, though, or bring out his nightmare side, something that would have to wait until after we had talked about their mission.
My heart warmed, thinking about how I had touched him the other day and the reaction it had caused in that form.
He had let out a low growl before almost wrapping me completely up in his darkness, leaving a ruby-red glow on my skin in his wake.
I liked the idea of bearing his mark on me, if we were being honest. I just wish that it didn’t fade so quickly.
I also hadn’t thought twice about falling back to sleep around him following that, because I honestly think he just wanted to watch me sleep.
Zain didn’t feed off of fear like Razar.
No, I think his nightmare was just more curious about me.
Considering Zain and his nightmare side seemed to have a bit more of a separated existence than the others, it wasn’t all that surprising.
It was almost as if they were two different people.
I wasn’t positive how ‘normal’ that was for apocalyptic terrors, but I was thrilled to see him like that, so I would never complain.
I shifted in my seat as he offered me a smirk, as if he knew where my thoughts had gone.
I looked down at my tablet, finding it a bit unfair that they could no doubt notice my body’s reaction to them far easier than I could theirs.
I mean, putting aside the blush, which was a dead giveaway, there was the ability for them to hear my pulse and scent the fact that I was turned on.
Something I very much did not want to consider because it made me want to turn even more red in the face.
As I looked up from my tablet, I found him still watching me with a bright, fascinated expression.
Bastard. I muttered under my breath, glad that Razar was suddenly asking him something so I didn’t have to explain why I was acting like a crazy person.
“I literally trained all last night, I’m not doing it again.
I am goddamn exhausted,” Zain groaned in reference to Razar’s suggestion of sparring before the mission tonight.
I had a feeling that despite his protest, it wouldn’t take much convincing to get him into the training arena.
The nightmare was a bit of a workout junky, and it made me wonder what else he could do with all of that excess energy.
As in, I wanted to know how far that endurance extended into fucking me.
I really was very much into the idea of testing that out, personally, but hey!
That was just me. No one else seemed to be on board that train, so…
I did have to admit, the man’s current outfit really did show off how muscular he was, his massive boulder-like shoulders and golden arms on display in the black cutoff workout shirt he wore with gray sweatpants and sneakers.
Damn him. He shouldn’t be allowed to wear sweatpants like that.
My eyes darted down his muscular frame before trying to focus on Razar instead.
I knew if Zain caught me, he would just flirt with me more and while, trust me, I absolutely loved it, I also didn’t think it meant anything to him.
I would instead just have to suffer in silence and enjoy how gorgeous he was without touching.
His dark beard, trimmed and matching the short, shaved hair on the sides that contrasted the red up top, made him look even more striking.
I had imagined running my fingers over his jawline as he kissed me several times now, and honestly, I was pretty damn sure that if I ever actually got close enough to kiss him, I would get distracted.
Either by his neon icy-blue eyes or the tiny dark runes that ran against his temple to either side.
I had asked him once what they meant, but he had never directly answered me, so I would have to renew my efforts.
Even after all this time, I felt like there was so much more to the nightmare than he let on. I wanted to know everything about him.
Honestly, I think I was a bit of a masochist. I mean, seriously—I knew I was building a team and all, but I kept just bringing on amazing, fascinating men to torture myself with. Amun was a fantastic example of this. I suppose, at least with Zain, there hadn’t been a choice.
He had been with us since we were sixteen when he had shown up on the doorstep of the institute, seemingly homeless and beat to shit because of some humans that had tried to cage him up.
I hadn’t questioned bringing him into our little group because there weren’t many ‘teenagers’ at the institute to begin with, and oddly enough, he hadn’t shied away from the offer.
It made me wonder how he was so relaxed and charming, because there had to be some residual anger there, right?
Hell, I was just glad that he didn’t absolutely hate me for being human because of his past experiences.
Then again, Zain didn’t really hate others, and almost no one hated him.
Razar had even easily accepted him into our lives because his calming temperament really was needed on this team.
I mean, shit—even Saint sometimes listened to him, and that was something to be grateful for.
Speak of the devil and the devil shall appear.
My pulse picked up as the nightmare in question entered the room with a commanding stride, his gaze immediately focusing on me.
He flashed a stunning, dangerous smile that had me swallowing as he slid into a seat next to me, across from Razar, before tugging on my chair so that I was yanked closer to him.
I let out a curse as Razar took my coffee from me, because honestly, none of us ever knew what Saint was going to do, so it was better safe than sorry when holding a hot liquid.
The man’s actions usually made little sense to anyone but him.
I couldn’t lie—it was one of the things I loved about him. He was always surprising me, and it was exciting to be around him, even if he was a bit of a nutcase.
“We need to talk, flower,” he insisted, pulling my hands between his while leaning forward so that we were inches apart.
“And what do we need to talk about, Saint?” I tilted my head, examining his dark, almost charcoal eyes that were surrounded by a metallic silver ring that seemed to expand and shrink depending on how worked up he was at the time.
Or psychotic. Whichever you wanted to view it as.
The man was absolutely lethal, and his stunning smile and bright, playful attitude didn’t dissuade me from that analysis.
Although, I would admit that he probably got away with a lot in his life because of how fucking beautiful he was.
It was unfair that someone like Saint could have eyelashes like he did, for the record.
It looked like he was wearing eyeliner! Who did he think he was?
! I felt like he didn’t appreciate the good fortune he so clearly had.
“I don’t like Amun,” he explained simply, his eyes glinting with a familiar darkness.
“In fact, I have the extremely present and compulsive urge to rip out his throat. I need you, my perfect little flower, to tell me that’s okay and that you won’t be mad at me for doing so and then disposing of his body out back.
I know you love the garden out there, but I promise it’s good for the flowers.
I mean, clearly it is—think how beautiful it is out there!
That is thanks to several, okay—maybe more than several—very well-placed decaying bodies.
So really this would be a very advantageous thing. ”
Oh man. I blinked and then shook my head, leaning forward. “Saint, you are being ridiculous. Amun is perfectly fine, and I have no doubt a great addition to our team—”
“Arabella,” he groaned, his eyes flashing silver. “We can find someone else. I don’t like the way he looks at you.”
I now had the compelling urge to ask him how exactly he looked at me.
“No,” I simply responded with a smile, sitting back slightly as he pulled me even closer. His warm brown sugar scent wrapped around me possessively as his handsome face transformed into a near pout.
And no, for the record, I would not address his claim about burying bodies in my favorite garden out back. That would give him far too much freedom to run through the literal list of who was actually buried out there, because I absolutely did not believe he was joking.
If the nightmare said he killed someone, or multiple ‘someones,’ then he most definitely did.
I had made the mistake once of teasing him about not actually killing over one hundred guards on a mission, and…
he had gone through each and every slaughter with me, despite Razar attempting to stop him.
Saint was the type of person that gave you exactly what you asked for.
His blunt nature was sexy, but man, you really, really had to be precise.
The nightmare was persistent as hell, and I had a feeling he would be attempting to convince me of Amun’s lack of usefulness for some time coming up, so I couldn’t give him any leeway.
Luckily, I also knew that Saint wouldn’t do anything without me truly being okay with it.
The psycho was a complete sweetheart at his core… well, when it came to me.
Sure, he was a bit different and a possible—read as ‘for sure’—psychopath, but I couldn’t lie, I had a complete soft spot for him. Maybe it was because I did see a slightly different side of him, one that was filled with small romantic notions that even the coldest of hearts couldn’t reject.