16. Azrael
Ieat my meal like a man famished. I want to say it’s because of having spent a full day in the dark wing without having eaten, but as I watch my wife devour her meal with gusto, I think it may have to do with the events in the library. Or maybe it’s seeing her across the table, hair tangled, makeup smeared, lips swollen, and dress torn that has me feeling so fucking starved.
I can still taste her mouth on mine, feel her teeth scrape across my lip. Her breath lives inside me now.
And my come is inside her.
Fuck.
I swallow a large mouthful of wine to drown the rumble inside my chest.
My come is inside her, running down her thighs. My seed is a part of her.
My gaze dips to the soft curves of her breasts, the crescent moon birthmark she does not hide, the very tip of the tattoo that runs down the center of her chest. I imagine those breasts swollen, her belly blossoming with my offspring. I reach rudely across my brother for the bottle of wine to refill my glass and drink it like it’s water.
Willow watches me. I glare at her because, not for the first time, I feel the strange current running between us. It’s like a live wire connecting us even now, even as my family is gathered, my brother peppering my wife with questions, staff coming and going, refilling glasses and removing dessert plates. Throughout it all, it’s as if it’s just her and me and this thing between us.
This thing.
This curse.
That’s what it is: the curse. Has every other Delacroix felt the way I do about their Sacrifice? Have they lusted the way this woman makes me lust? Hell, I could have bent her over and taken her a second time in that library. A third. And it wouldn’t be enough.
I shift in my seat, my cock readying itself. This strange new hunger will not be sated. How long will I be able to stand it?
My gaze shifts to her neck, to the bruise forming in the shape of my fingers. Her struggle only intensified the building tension between us, but when I’d loosened my grip on her neck and she gasped for air, fuck. What happened then shook me as thoroughly as it did her. She came with a violence that almost had me spilling my seed, but when she called out my name as I reached for her again, when she turned her head and looked at me with those eyes like molten ice, that charge simmered, lava tempering, and I wanted more. I wanted her closer still, and fuck, when she kissed me, I lost my mind.
“Finished?” I ask, pushing my chair back loudly and abruptly standing.
In my periphery, I see my brother’s eyebrows rise, but I’m addressing my wife. I can’t sit here another minute and see her looking like that and not touch her. Take her. Try somehow to sate this hunger because there is too much at stake to feel lust for this woman.
Willow stands, too, and I wonder what she was thinking as she slowly wipes the corners of her mouth with her napkin before dropping it on top of her dish. “Finished.”
The blue of her eyes has gone darker. My wife wants me as much as I want her. That is some comfort.
I gesture toward the French doors that will lead outside.
“Don’t mind me,” Emmanuel says from the table.
“We won’t,” I say without a backward glance. I set my hand at my wife’s back and open the door. She steps outside and shudders, wrapping her arms around herself. I slip off my jacket and set it over her shoulders.
Willow is clearly not expecting such a gesture and I’m reminded of what she said before the marking ceremony.
“Don’t think I’m trying to be a hero,” I make clear.
“Don’t worry, I won’t.”
Her comment makes me smile and, in spite of herself, she slips her arms into the jacket, which is about eight sizes too big for her.
Benedict barks from where he’s tethered by a short chain outside the kitchen door.
“Christ. I’ll be right back.” I go to get him. I’m sure he’s locked out here on Grandmother’s orders. “Hey boy,” I crouch down to release him, and he nuzzles his nose in my hair and neck, tail wagging, happy to see me. “Let’s walk.” I stand and watch him run right to Willow.
I remember her asshole cat last night and decide to let him go. I won’t let him hurt her, but he’s huge and has no idea of his own size. Having him come charging at you if you don’t know him can be frightening.
“Oh, aren’t you a sweetheart!” Willow drops down to her knees as he nears her and Benedict, the traitor, greets her in the way he does Rébecca, nuzzling her, sniffing and licking her, almost careful around her.
“It’s because he smells me on you,” I tell her with a smirk, drawing the dog away and sending him off into the woods.
She straightens. “Or maybe he just has good taste.”
“He likes me too, Little Witch. What does that say?”
“Even the best of us have lapses in judgment. Besides, Fi doesn’t like you.”
“Fi?”
“Fiona. My cat.” She points to my hand where the asshole had scratched me.
“She’s wild like her master.” Willow shifts her gaze higher to the scratch marks she herself left in the library. I bend closer, slide my hand up her back, under the mass of hair and wrap it around the nape of her neck. “I’ll tame her master, though. Teach her how to take it rough and like it. Oh, wait,” I straighten, grin. “You already like it.”
She flips me off, and I laugh out loud, some of the tension easing.
“Where are we going?” she asks as we take the steps off the patio, past the pool house and toward my mother’s greenhouse. There is a more direct route, but that would take us past the cemetery. I find I want to hide her from Shemhazai’s sight, at least for now. I don’t know why or where the thought comes from, but there’s no question about it.
“Nowhere particular. We’re just walking.”
“Why?”
“I need some fresh air. You don’t?” I look down at her, and she glances up at me.
“I’d rather walk alone.”
“No, you wouldn’t, little liar.” I caress the nape of her neck with my thumb and hear her breath catch. We walk in silence, and I know she likes this—being outside in nature, under a clear, starry sky.
“What’s wrong with Bec?” she asks after a while.
“You noticed.”
“It’s hard not to. She told me her birthday is in a few weeks, that she’ll be sixteen.”
A weight settles over my shoulders, a sadness, a sense of powerlessness, spreading through my insides.
“She looks twelve, Azrael. And she’s not well. She hardly eats. I don’t know. But something’s wrong.”
“Do you think I don’t know that?”
“What is it?”
“We don’t know. Doctors can’t figure it out. She was born small, always has been small, but over the last few years she’s just almost stopped growing.”
“Does she have her period?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“At nearly sixteen, most girls have their periods. It’s natural. A milestone.”
I look straight ahead. “I don’t know. Grandmother would know. She looks after her.”
Willow shakes her head, stops and steps in my path, setting her hands on her hips. “Really? Are you blind?”
“What?”
“Rébecca is terrified of your grandmother. And that woman, there’s something not right about her.”
“She’s not terrified?—”
“And you giving Bec the choice tonight to stay or go, do you have any idea what position you put her in?”
“What the hell are you talking about? I told her she could stay if she wanted to. She chose to leave.”
“Christ, you really are blind.” She turns to walk on but the path splits here, and she takes the one leading toward the cemetery.
“This way.” I pull her back.
“I’m serious, Azrael. Maybe take her to a different doctor.”
I look straight ahead, forehead furrowed. We have taken her to many doctors. She just doesn’t get better. My grandmother’s words play in my head. What I need to do to save Rébecca.
“I know someone. I can take her,” she offers.
I look down at her. “We have specialists. I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”
“She’s been our family doctor for years. She delivered all of us and?—”
“I said we have specialists. Drop it.”
“If you promise to think about it, I’ll drop it. For now.” I look down at her eager face. “You accused me of playing some game with her, but I’m not. I wouldn’t want to see her hurt. Just think about it, okay? I’ll drop it for now if you promise to think about it.”
“Fine. I’ll think about it.”
She nods and we fall into silence. It’s not uncomfortable though. In fact, I feel more at ease than I have in a while, and my headache’s staying away.
Benedict begins to bark which is unusual. I stop to listen. He’s close but off the trail. “Stay here,” I tell Willow.
“Where are you going?”
“He doesn’t usually bark. Stay on the trail. I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“Stay.” I head into the woods, calling for him. He doesn’t stop barking, though and when I get to him, he’s standing at the single gate near the back of the property that’s unused. The huge solid door was here when the property was purchased centuries ago. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it opened.
“What is it, boy?”
He whines, sits. I follow his gaze to the door, then look at the overgrown grass around it, the ivy creeping along it and up the twelve-foot wall. I test the chain. It’s locked tight, the ancient wooden door with iron fixtures undisturbed.
“There’s nothing here. Come on,” I say, petting him to reassure him, but he just whines. “Come, Benedict.” He lifts his nose in the air and bounds back toward the trail, disappearing from sight. I follow the path to where Willow should be waiting, but she’s gone.
I look up and down the path but don’t see any sign of her.
“Willow?” I call out but get nothing. Before I can decide which way to go, I hear a loud splash. Fuck. The lake? No. She wouldn’t have found it, would she? “Willow?” I call again, hurrying toward the back of the property where I hear Benedict. I can imagine him running along the bank in and out of the lake, making as big of a splash as he can.
I run faster, stopping only when I come to the clearing where the forest opens up and find them.
It is beautiful here, the most beautiful spot on the grounds, with a riot of colorful flowers blooming almost year-round and the water clear and crisp. Mom loved bringing us swimming here when we were younger.
When Grandmother came, she forbade it, of course, but Abacus, Emmanuel, and I would sneak out here anyway and swim on hot summer nights.
Benedict is paddling around in the small lake. Grandmother can apparently smell a wet dog a mile away so it’s rare that we bring him here, but it’s not him I’m worried about. It’s Willow. She’s standing at the foot of the tallest tree on the property set at the far end.
Thetree.
I slow my steps as that familiar sadness, that immense sense of loss, overwhelms me.
Once I reach her, Willow glances up at me, her face paler than usual, one hand resting on the tree. She feels it too. I see it.
“What happened here?”
My head begins its pounding, and my throat closes up as I try to tamp down all the fucking emotions. One year. It’s been one year, but it feels like yesterday I came across his body. Yesterday when I stopped right here, in this spot, and cut down my brother’s dead body.
“What the hell happened here?” she demands.
“Nothing,” I say, not sounding remotely like myself.
“Not nothing.” She touches the tree. “Someone died here.”
“Let’s go back to the house. This was a bad idea.”
Willow shakes her head. “Did you hang a Wildblood witch from this tree?” Her question catches me off guard. It’s not what I’m expecting, not remotely. Her eyes are ablaze, shards of glass that would slice me through if they could. She spins to face me fully when I don’t respond. “Did you, you fucking psycho?”
“It’s not what you think.”
“No? Then what is it?”
I glance up at the branch he’d used, and I can almost see the image of him hanging there.
“You’re a family of murderers.” She slaps both hands against my chest.
I look down at her, half-hearing what she’s saying, half-reliving that moment, the morning I found him.
“You motherfucker! You barbarian!” She pounds her fists against my chest, pulls at my hair and nearly scratches her nails down my face until I catch her wrists.
“Why did you come here? You don’t belong here,” I tell her.
“Did she? Did my ancestor belong here? Hanging from your fucking tree?” She rages, struggling against me.
I grip her arms and give her a good shake. “You don’t have a fucking clue what you’re talking about.”
“No? Tell me then. Explain it to me. Because from what I know, once The Tithing takes place, every one of the Wildblood Sacrifices is dead within a year. That’s just history. They all die! Explain that, Azrael! Is that what you’re going to do to me? Hang me from a tree? This tree?” she asks more quietly, her voice breaking, her skin pink and stained with tears. She quits fighting, and I release her.
“Shut up, Willow. You don’t understand,” I say, more quietly too.
“I understand just fine. I understand that you’re a goddamn sadist and a murderer.” She shoves me, but when I don’t budge, she takes a step away to put distance between us. “May you rot in hell, all of you, for what you’ve done to us. Although you know what? You’re already living it, aren’t you? That’s what I feel in that house. Hell. Maybe that’s what’s killing Rébecca!”
We’re both struck silent, Willow wincing at her own words, and looking as shocked to have said them as I am to have heard them from her lips.
But I get over my shock faster. Every muscle in my body coils, and heat surges through my veins. I back her toward the tree, the very tree Abacus died on.
She puts her hands on my chest. “Azrael. I didn’t mean…” She shakes her head. “I care about Rébecca. I’m sorry, I wouldn’t?—”
“You are right. Someone did die here, but it was no Wildblood witch.” I spit the words.
At that revelation, her eyes grow wide. She searches my face, the fury gone, replaced by something else. Morbid curiosity? No. Concern? No, surely not that.
It takes her a minute to put it together. We’ve kept Abacus’s suicide a secret, but she’s not stupid. I’m sure the Wildblood family has done at least some research.
“Bec said…” She looks up at the tree. “Oh, Azrael. You had a twin.”
“Shut up, Willow.” My throat closes up again, and my head throbs. “Just this once, do as you’re told and shut the fuck up.”
Her hands move to curve around my shoulders, then creep up my neck to cup my face. Her fingers come to rest on my temples, then she does something unexpected: she rises up on tiptoe and, eyes open, kisses me.
I’m taken aback, and when she does it, the throbbing in my head softens, then stops altogether.
She draws away but keeps her hands where they are, and I find myself searching her face.
“What are you doing to me?” I ask quietly, no anger, no fight in my tone. Just sadness. That sense of loss.
“Shh.” She bites her lip, then kisses me again.
This time, I wrap my arms around her, taking a handful of hair in one hand and tugging her head backward to kiss her hard on the mouth.
She doesn’t resist, wrapping her arms around my neck as I take her mouth, wanting—no, needing—to devour her whole. I push my jacket off her, then rip what’s left of her dress away until she’s naked and we’re kneeling on the ground. She draws back to pull my shirt over my head and reaches for my belt.
“What are you doing to me?” I ask her again between frantic kisses, laying my body over hers until she’s lying back on her elbows. I push her legs open to look at her. “I don’t know what the fuck you’re doing to me,” I mutter before bending my head to devour her wet pussy. Greedy, as if starved, I don’t take my time to tease or taunt. I scrape my teeth over her clit and hear her moan, her fingers weaving into my hair to pull me closer, thighs on either side of my head. Her breaths are my name as I lick the length of her, tasting all of her, tasting myself on her.
“Azrael!” she cries out. Her hands turn to fists in my hair, thighs squeezing as she arches up, throws her head back, every muscle tensing as orgasm tears through her.
When her body dips and her legs fall open, limp, and her hands drop away, I settle on my knees and watch her. Her eyes are closed, one cheek to the grass, sated, my little bride. My Little Witch.
When I grab my shirt and draw it back on over my head, she turns lazily back to me, reaching for me as she licks her lips. The sight of that little pink tongue has me wanting to bend my head to kiss her again, to capture it between my teeth as I drive into her again, but I can’t. After last night and this evening, she’s got to be sore.
We look at each other for a long, long moment until Willow shivers.
I reach for her destroyed dress but toss it aside and wrap her in my jacket. “Let’s get back. It’s getting cool.”
She nods, and I help her up. Benedict comes bounding out of the water, almost soaking us as he shakes himself off.
“What was he barking at?” she asks as we get back to the house.
“Nothing. There’s a sealed off entrance to the property there but it’s undisturbed.”
“What?” she asks, stopping on the step to look up at me, her expression suddenly panicked.
“It was nothing.” Before I can say more, the French doors open. My grandmother stands looming over us. She takes in what Willow is wearing and I’m very aware of my hand around the back of Willow’s neck.
“Well, I hope you two won’t be too tired for church tomorrow morning.”
“Church?” Willow asks, glancing up at me.
“Yes, church. We are not heathens, and you’ll be attending. Azrael, a word.” She stands back, making space at the door.
“Grandmother, now?—”
“It cannot wait.”
Christ. “I’ll be right there.” I turn to Willow.
“It’s fine. I’m tired anyway.”
Grandmother snorts at that. “I can guess why.”
Willow rolls her eyes and walks past the woman without another word. I enter the house and close the door behind me. Grandmother waits until she hears my bedroom door open and close before turning to me.
“Are you sure she’s on birth control? This could be a trick. Getting herself pregnant to save her neck. She wouldn’t be the first Wildblood to try it.”
“Grandmother—”
“The way you two are carrying on, well, I just want to warn you, Azrael. It’s not as though that harlot could harbor anything but ill feelings toward you. You’ll do what needs to be done, child or not, if it comes to that.”
“Jesus Christ.” I push my hand through my hair and walk away.
“Azrael! Do you hear me?”
“I’m going to bed, Grandmother. Goodnight.”