Chapter 9 The Present #2
“Fuck,” I gasp.
The birds rustle in synchronized shivers, feathers sliding against feathers in a low, rippling hiss. A beak taps sharply against the glass beside my head. Another caws—a single, deep note that feels hurled straight at my spine.
It’s bad enough that they’re here. It’s worse that they want to attack me.
“I hope you have a good reason,” I say, “because it’ll take a lot to convince me.”
Talon’s watching me the entire time.
“It’s a good enough reason,” he says, “as long as you want it to be.”
He reaches out, grabs my hand, and pulls me onto the couch.
“The world might burn,” he whispers, “but at least we finally got there.”
“Got where?”
“To the point where you can’t use the ‘I need power’ excuse anymore.” His fingers pinch my chin. “Now, if you want to get fucked, you need to admit you just want it.”
The grin he throws me is pure wickedness.
My mouth opens, then closes. That is so not helping. But also… it is. Helps to tune the crows out. One moment my heart is racing with panic over how deep in shit we are; the next, my hands are around Talon’s neck and I’m thinking about his cum still spilling from my pussy.
“You’re so unserious right now,” I whisper.
“Maybe,” he murmurs back. “But it looks to me like the crows aren’t going anywhere. Finding a solution might take a while. Your powers are pretty much gone, and…” He smirks. “You’re stuck here. With us.”
“That’s some perspective.”
“One that I like very much.” His hands slide to my ass and grab a handful. “She doesn’t need our cocks to get stronger, guys. Turns out she just really likes mine.”
I glance back.
Cassian’s eyes are locked on us.
Nathaniel’s staring at my ass, mouth slightly open.
I wonder if he’s thinking about my fear of him—how he implied earlier that my caution, back when I first turned human, had hurt him. Does it still hurt now, when my lips part and every thought slips from my head?
“There are no wraiths out there yet,” Talon whispers. “We’ve got supplies for a while. And I think we all need a little lovin’ after what those bad, bad crows did to us.”
Cassian’s gaze drags from my face to my hands around Talon’s neck, then down the curve of my back. His jaw flexes once, twice, like he’s tasting the moment. Then he nods. Sharp. Uncompromising.
“If that’s what Skye wants,” he says, voice low, rough.
Fuck.
Heat crawls down my throat and chest.
I look at Nathaniel.
My fingertips tingle.
“Seems like I’m stuck with some bad men, huh?” I taunt softly. “You’re so selfish you’d just—what? Want to fuck me? Even now?”
His eyes widen. I think I’ve hit the nerve I wanted. I know what he’s done. I know what he is. A part of me will always be afraid of him. But right now… I want him.
“You’d let us?” he asks finally. “If we all wanted to?”
My hands stay on Talon’s neck, but my pulse betrays me, hammering so hard I know Nathaniel can hear it.
Three serial killers might just share me.
My body. My mind. My soul.
Wow.
I wet my lips.
“If we’re all on the same page,” I murmur, “then yeah.”
“Are we?” he presses.
He moves closer, dropping to his knees beside Talon and me. He tilts his head, eyes pale, fingertips hovering inches from my face. Then he touches me. Just a swipe, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.
So delicate. So charged.
“I am,” I whisper.
The air thickens until even the birds outside seem to hush.
Talon moves first, unable to stand the silence. He rolls his shoulders beneath my hands, that wolfish grin returning, and presses his hips forward until I feel his cock against my pussy.
He’s rock hard.
“Let’s do it, Little Grim,” he purrs. “Forget the world, yeah?”
Just one question. Asked almost innocently.
I’m still aching from what he did to me behind the building. My nipples tighten. I don’t need convincing.
My head’s moving before I know it.
I’m nodding.
That’s all it takes.
Nathaniel moves. His hand drops from my face to my leg. And before I can breathe, he’s lifting me off Talon’s knees, carrying me in his arms like I weigh nothing.
“Showers,” he tells the others.
Cassian falls into step beside us. Talon trails behind, whistling low under his breath.
The showers in this place are a joke—cracked white tiles, drains that always smell faintly of rust, pipes that creak even when the water’s off. But when Nathaniel sets me down on the bench against the wall, it doesn’t feel bad at all.
“Did you guys… clean in here?” I ask, looking around.
They’ve always been neat where it mattered, but this is different. The space smells sterile. Disinfected. Almost new.
“Changed a few things,” Talon murmurs. “Part of the welcome package.”
He kicks the door shut with his boot. Cassian turns the water on before any of us are undressed.
“Fixed the pipes,” he mutters by way of explanation.
Nathaniel kneels in front of me, dark hair falling across his face. From above, he looks like some long-lost gothic poet. Tragic, out of time. The metal in his skin is the only modern thing about him. That haunted quality never leaves.
“Let’s clean you up,” he says softly. “Shall we?”
He picks up my leg and massages the ankle just for a moment before his long, pale fingers begin to undress me. Behind him, Talon kicks off his own shoes, while Cassian starts from the top, peeling off his top and throwing it to the floor.
Nathaniel takes off my sneakers and puts them neatly to the side. Then he tugs the shredded blouse off my shoulders and works his way down to the thin cotton shirt beneath. His fingers ghost over my ribs, not lingering, not even trembling, but I know it’s a big deal to him.
I see it in his eyes.
When the shirt finally gives, Cassian’s growl breaks the quiet. His gaze drags over the scratches down my side like they’re sacrilege.
“Be careful,” he warns Nathaniel. “Don’t touch where it hurts.”
“I know what I’m doing.”
Cassian doesn’t look convinced, but he stays back. His jaw is tight enough to crack a tooth, and I swear to god, I want to kiss it loose. He’s jealous. So jealous. Possessive. Strong. The kind of man who could fight the other two right here, just to have me all to himself.
And yet he swallows it down. For me.
Goosebumps ripple down my arms, my chest, my breasts. My nipples turn to tiny pebbles, and every part of me wants to bend, to preen, to provoke.
The water heats in the pipes. Steam spills from the showerhead, ghosting through the air.
Nathaniel rises from where he’s been kneeling and cups my jaw with a hand so cold it burns. His thumb skims beneath the scratch on my cheek, feather-light, like he’s memorizing where I hurt. His mismatched eyes drag over me.
In one move, he takes off his shirt. The fabric slides over his pale chest and shoulders, revealing skin that looks like it’s been starved of sunlight but carved out of marble.
And my god.
He has piercings in his nipples.
My breath hitches before I can stop it.
The steam clings to him instantly, curling through his hair, dripping down the long lines of his throat. He doesn’t look like a man at all. He’s a temptation in human form.
“The feeling goes both ways, Skye,” he says.
I didn’t even speak, but apparently my face did.
He’s far too perceptive sometimes.
Behind him, Talon lets out a low whistle.
“Mm, isn’t this nice?” he drawls, tugging his shirt off in one fluid motion.
His body’s golden, tight with lean muscle, a trail of hair leading down his abdomen exactly the way I remember it.
“How’s this, baby? Like what you see? Told you, you could be fucked senseless anytime with us. Get up and show us your pretty pussy.”
My legs feel shaky when I stand, but it’s not exhaustion this time. It’s want. Pure, pounding want.
I hate feeling weak. But maybe this kind of weak is an exception.
Cassian steps forward, closing the distance. The heat from his bare chest rolls into me. Steam has seeped into his pants, dampening the fabric, but he doesn’t care. He takes my hand and presses it against the bulge there.
Thick. Hot. Twitching.
He’s absolutely into this.
“You let Talon fuck you outside, in the dirt,” he growls. “Do what Talon said, and let us clean that dirty pussy of yours.”
My pulse hammers in my throat.
Steam curls around Cassian’s shoulders, sliding down the ridges of his chest. His eyes pin me, sharp as knives.
So I do.
My fingers hook into the waistband of my sweatpants, tugging them down slow, inch by inch. The fabric slides over my thighs, then my calves. I’m not wearing underwear, so that’s all it takes to get bare for them.
The damp sweatpants pool at my ankles until I step out of them, leaving only my skull socks. I don’t take them off. If anything, the absurdity of it makes me stand taller.
That’s who I am—a Grim Reaper standing in front of three serial killers.
The boys don’t seem to mind.
“Fuck,” Talon mutters, his voice low and rough. “Look at you. Could eat you alive.”
“A dream come true,” Nathaniel agrees. He hooks a finger under one sock and tugs, letting it snap lightly against my calf.
Talon rolls his pants off, his cock springing free. He fists himself once, lazily, keeping my gaze.
“How about we don’t take turns this time?” he asks.
My thighs press together instinctively, slickness smearing, heat rolling through me.
“You want to do it… all at once?” I murmur.
“Mm. Team spirit,” Talon purrs.
That’s one way to put it.
I’ve never been with more than one man before. Gods, Mark would’ve combusted before accepting a threesome, let alone a foursome.
Could I even do it? Take all of them? It feels impossible when they’re this big, this ready, this close.
The doubt lingers. But fuck it. I didn’t come back to life to play it safe.
“Alright,” I whisper. “Let’s try it.”
Have they done this before? Cassian… definitely not. He doesn’t strike me as the sharing type, even in his hormone-crazed teenage years. Nathaniel, maybe. The doctor mask doesn’t fit half as tightly as he thinks. And Talon… yeah. Probably.
I look to him.
Talon catches my gaze instantly. His grin widens, sin incarnate, and he steps in, cupping my jaw.
“Don’t worry, baby. You’ll feel better than ever.”
His lips crash into mine—greedy, open-mouthed—his tongue sliding past my lips with a hunger that pulls a moan from me before I can stop it. Maybe it’s my imagination, but I swear he still tastes like my pussy.
Nathaniel moves behind me, his hands cold as they glide up my sides, careful of the scratches, until his palms cup my breasts. His piercings graze my back when he leans in, his lips ghosting the curve of my neck.
“Relax,” he whispers, though the scrape of his teeth says otherwise.
My hand is still pressed to the bulge in Cassian’s pants when he lets out a guttural sound and yanks the fabric down. His cock springs free. He wraps his hand over mine, forcing me to grip him properly.
“You’re going to take all of us,” he growls, his forehead pressing to mine. “Every inch.”
His face is so close to Talon’s it feels indecent.
And both of them want me. Only me.
My pussy clenches.
Talon pulls back just enough to smirk, his thumb dragging across my spit-slick lower lip.
“Oh, yeah,” he purrs. “Can’t wait, can you?”
His hand glides down my stomach, over my mound, between my thighs. The moment his fingers find my opening, they come away wet. He groans, eyes burning.
“Can’t wait,” I manage to breathe.
Nathaniel pinches one of my nipples, twisting just hard enough to make me gasp. His fingers roll and squeeze and rub.
“Does it excite you, Skye?” he murmurs against my ear. “Being with us all at once?”
I can’t answer with words. Not with Talon’s fingers circling my clit, Cassian’s cock heavy in my hand, and Nathaniel’s mouth sucking bruises into my throat. A whimper slips out, needy, broken.
“That’s a yes,” Cassian snarls, pushing my hand harder along his length.
Talon guides me backward toward the shower, his mouth sealing over mine while Nathaniel crouches to strip off my socks.
When I step under the running water and they close in around me, there’s no going back.