25. XXV
XXV
Spencer
I t was early hours in the morning, and we had settled into a sense of normalcy—which was a fallacy—grasping onto something tangible so we didn’t get lost in our overwhelming grief like we had so many times before. The new information was enlightening, accompanied with a small spark of optimism that had our motivation spiked to new extremes. We were one step closer.
Aster, on the other hand… I was still conflicted. I didn’t really give a fuck about our genetic relation. I had enough family and love in my life as is.
It was the secrets. So many secrets she’d chosen to keep from us. Our trust was fickle from the beginning, but it was fucking non-existent now. I would have to think hard about how beneficial it would be to let her live through it.
As my eyes lagged from exhaustion, Echo continued to stroke my thigh in rhythmic circles, both soothing and entirely confusing.
My mind and emotions were in disarray. I’d originally sought out to destroy him, infiltrating his life so thoroughly, he was mindfucked to the point of no return. But something changed along the way. Instead, he became a source of comfort in my everyday living—a source I was now unable to go without.
Echo had remained attentive throughout the whole shitshow of family drama. A quiet strength beside me, lending whatever he could spare, anchoring me to the present.
His subtle gestures and silent support caused a heaviness to settle in my chest. Whenever I looked at him, was near him, that ever-present ache just wouldn’t relent.
Is this what others call love?
I knew what love was—the emotion abundant and endless for what I felt for my family. Further cemented through our sister, Chase, and how torn and destroyed we were from her loss. Four years later, we still hadn’t recovered, and probably never would. What was that called, if not love?
Then why did what I feel for Echo seem…different? More , somehow.
I should have held reservations, should have questioned the shoddy attempt at reasonsing, but I was emotionally wrung out.
I just didn’t have the willpower to fight against him anymore. I didn’t want to.
Micah rubbed her eyes across from me. “Let’s call it a night. Aster, we will be in touch.” Her tone was undeniably foreboding.
Aster’s spine snapped straight as if ready to jump over the table and attack Micah, but before she could even twitch, Psycho bared his teeth. “Nope. Fix your face, cause I don’t like the way you’re looking at my girl here.”
Aster’s eyes narrowed into slits. “Or what?”
“Or I’ll scalp that shiny bald head right off your fucking skull?—"
“Watch your fucking mouth,” Echo said, piping up beside me. “Or I’ll melt your brains until they’re leaking out your ears, you ill-mannered, brutish fucking beast.”
Psycho preened, snapping his jaw at Echo. Then, Micah laid a hand on his forearm, putting an end to the posturing, and turned to me.
“Are you coming home with us?” Micah asked, ignoring everyone else.
Echo’s fingers stalled. “No. She’s staying here, with me.” The declaration made me giddy, but I wasn’t about to show it. Neither did my siblings, as everyone decided to ignore his demand as if he never spoke at all. I had to bite my tongue from smirking at his rising frustration.
He wasn’t used to being denied. Well, neither was I.
“To that decrepit temple? Hell fucking no,” I said. “I’m living the life of luxury, and I’m not going to give that up for rats, bones and cold showers.”
There was no way I was going to admit the real reason I chose to stay.
ECHO
Spencer was dead weight as I carried her into my apartment. A long night with a multitude of revelations caused exhaustion to finally take hold.
I wasn’t far behind, the last week pulling at my weary senses, begging for rest.
Placing her down on the bed, I turned to leave when Spencer interlocked our fingers, her grasp so tight that mine responded on instinct alone.
She pulled, a quiet power in her touch that had me submitting to her soundless demand. I was too tired to resist, allowing all my previous reservations to trickle away as easily as water slipping through my fingers.
I bent forward, capturing her lips with mine.
We kissed with gentle pressure, unhurried in our exploration as our tongues danced to a throbbing, low beat. Before that, I’d only ever shared one single kiss. With her. And it ended in blood, pain and mourning.
This felt different, the caress simple, yet holding all the strength to total me to the fucking ground.
Clothes fell to the floor as we intertwined our bodies, my arms circling her frame from the back, pulling her so close, she was completely aligned against my front.
No words were spoken, communication clear through the meeting of our skin, fluent in the language that only the other could recognise.
My teeth sank into the beauty spot behind her ear while her ass writhed backward, my throbbing dick slipping through her cheeks.
Spencer’s thighs were moist, heat channelling into my flesh from her wet, weeping pussy.
Unable to resist, I pulled her in tighter, one hand skating down her abdomen as the other slid upwards between her breasts, settling over her healing wound. I poured all my remorse into the hole I’d previously made.
With a calm ease, I stroked her clit while the dripping head of my cock notched at her warm entrance from behind.
As if on cue, our centres met with a subtle shift of our hips, her walls giving way to the intrusion of my sensitive, corded shaft.
I entered a channel of pure pleasure, and as we repeatedly reconciled, my soul filled with contentment.
A fragile, dangerous longing thumped in my chest each time she fully accepted me. The position intense, the primal act meaningful and intimate.
Spencer freely gave her whimpers and moans while I continued to press deep inside her, switching from slow to high tempo.
It didn’t take long… Both of us setting down our weapons to embrace this electrical connection that we had denied so many times before.
Without that barrier, it was easy, our subconscious minds accepting what we were so scared to admit— that we belonged together .
Regret slammed into me every time I slammed into her. The thought of causing her harm gave me a visceral response of disgust—towards myself.
My unforgivable action of stabbing her in the heart felt like it was from a different life, one I lived before her. I was an altogether different person to who I was now.
It’s then I knew. I’d never hurt her again.
My cold, decrepit organ of a heart gave a violent stutter, and my jaw painfully ground together from the foreign feeling.
We continued for hours. Stuck in a dazed state of bliss. Round after round. Utterly ravenous for one another. Continually chasing that intensity, the all-consuming bond that came with me buried within her.
And when Spencer reached her latest climax and cried my name, I had no way to resist, returning her gift with mine in turn.
“ Saints. ” I submitted, my Variant splintering the frosted glass walls of her room, which shattered into a million tiny pieces over the floor.
We refused to move, my dick still settled inside her warmth, our breaths synced as we inhaled deep, trying to regain some type of equilibrium.
And as we began to doze, my Variant sparked, recognising her heartbeat thumping perfectly in time with my own. That revelation broke down those final, lingering barriers, making me as buoyant as air.