23. Andrea
23
Andrea
M y eyes flutter open, thorny branches hover over me as my blurry vision becomes clear. My hands feel the grass and roots beneath me and a pounding in my head starts.
Where am I?
I sit up and look around the dead forest. A ruffling of leaves comes from my right and I notice someone else sitting up. His black hair is disheveled as he wipes the dirt off the sleeves of his jacket.
Ash…
The tree before me appears to be untouched. My memories flood in and I notice the charred bark is gone now.
The ash from the tree, the visions, Caroline, everything that happened remains in my head. By the appearance of the sky, I couldn’t have been out long, but thunder rumbles the already gloomy sky.
Ash winces as he tries to move. “Ash!” Standing on wobbly legs, I rush over to him and drop to my knees beside him. “Are you okay? I don’t know what happened, I just started feeling so much at once and… and—” The leather of his glove rests on my cheek and wipes away the tears I didn’t realize started to fall.
“Shh, it’s okay. I’m okay.” He grunts to stand and pulls me with him. “I’m not sure what happened. You were fine in one moment and then screaming the next. When I touched you, a green aura exploded from you, sending me into this tree.” He throws his thumb over his shoulder. “Whatever happened is blocking my power. I’ve tried to summon Azra, and I can’t get through.” He looks around. “We will have to get further away from that cursed tree for me to try again.”
I nod and start searching for the main reason we came out here.
“Where is the vial?” I ask, checking all my pockets and the ground around us.
“I have it. We should hurry before night falls and this shit storm starts.” Ash glances up at the crack of lightning that illuminates the clouds.
We walk for what seems like hours longer than we did to get to the tree. Phantom screams echo in my head every few moments. Ash hasn’t looked back once to make sure I was even still here.
Once we pass healthy, living trees, Ash stops and turns to me.
“Good news and bad news. The good news is we are close to civilization. The bad news is I still can’t summon Azra or reach the Forsaken, so we will be staying in your realm for the night.” He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose.
“I’m sor—” His piercing gaze stops me from finishing my apology. My eyes drop to the ground as I try to stop the sting in my eyes. Drizzling rain hits my face.
“Let’s find shelter.” His voice is soft. If he were a different man, I would think he is guilty for how he made me feel. But that’s just it, he isn’t.
Love him
I recall Caroline’s words. How can I love someone who is so repulsed by me?
After only walking a few more miles, we reach a small town that’s seemingly in the middle of nowhere soaked from the pouring rain. It looks like Crowlyn if it wasn’t updated at all since it was built. A small motel is lit up across the highway from the edge of the woods.
A bell rings over the office door of the motel as we enter. The wooden floor creaks beneath our steps to the large brown desk. The stale air around us makes me want to sleep on the side of the road than in any room this place has to offer.
Horrific taxidermy of any animal you can think of is staring at me as we wait for assistance. The only sound in this creepy office is the water splattering the floor from our drenched bodies.
An old man appears from a room behind the desk. It’s just like those scary movies with the creepy old man with a comb-over.
“How can I help ya?” His withered voice makes my stomach turn.
“Two rooms.” Ash’s tone is far sharper than I would use with a creepy man like this, but I guess he doesn’t have to worry about anyone hacking him up in his sleep.
“Just one please,” I counter. Ash is crazy if he thinks I’m staying by myself in this shit hole. I don’t care if I have to be stuck in the same room with him for a few hours. “Two beds, please,” I add. Ash slowly turns to me and squints his eyes.
The old man’s eyes bounce between us before Ash sighs and nods to the motel worker.
“Only one bed is offered in the rooms here,” the man answers.
Fucking great.
“That’s fine. We’ll pay in the morning.” I can tell Ash is even more annoyed now.
“That’s not how things work,” the old man starts, but Ash cuts him off.
“I said we will pay in the morning.” His deep voice sends a chill down my spine. The old man quickly turns to where all the keys hang and hand them over without another word.
I didn’t realize how stuffy it was in there until the fresh air hit me.
The motel room isn’t any better. The single queen-sized bed sits in the middle of the room with a tree and deer-patterned duvet. Two nightstands on either side that have seen better days and a bathroom door in the corner. The green carpet is dingy and faded and I don’t even want to ask where that brown stain in the corner came from.
“It’s just for the night, at least until I have enough power to summon Azra. I can feel it coming back already, but it’s still too weak to reach him. Whatever you did was powerful. I’ve never had my powers diminished completely before like this.” He tosses his leather jacket on the chair in the corner and he sits next to me on the bed.
“What did you see that day?” His body tenses at my question. I don’t have to specify. He knows exactly what I am asking. My rain-soaked body shakes as I anxiously wait for his answer.
“Nothing,” he forces out. I can hear the pain in his voice.
“Bullshit. She told me you would have the answers.” His head snaps to mine.
“What are you talking about?”
“When I touched that tree, it sent me somewhere. It sent me to her. She told me you would know the answers.” I turn my body to face him completely. I pull down my shirt to reveal to him the burned A in my chest. While we were walking back, the pain still lingered in one spot. That’s when I discovered the branding.
His eyes widen and shock takes over his features. Pain and sorrow fill his gaze as his piercing blue stare meets mine only for a moment before he drops his head into his leather-coated hands.
“It’s okay, I’m here now.” I gently place my hand on his back. I can feel his body tense from my touch.
“Right before her death, she knew her village was up to something. Caroline heard the ramblings of a monster that decimated three villages that had lineage there. She was related to the creature somehow, and she knew she was being hunted by other creatures. She was terrified they were coming after her.”
“Being with me didn’t help either, we planned to run away after I was done destroying everyone who participated in the war that killed my sisters. I convinced her she had nothing to worry about. That I would protect her. That the story of the Morveaux Witches was just a myth and she couldn’t be related to them.” His eyes fill with guilt and despair. I tilt my head slightly trying to recall where I have heard a story similar to that recently. His throat bobs as he forces the words out and continues.
“She insisted she bond us, just in case. Something that could never be broken, even in death. So we could find each other in every life. Each of our initials, branded in our skin over our hearts with iron and blood. It was a new spell to her. We thought it didn’t work. We didn’t know how it would.” I place my hand over the initial. “When I saw you, that branding burned like the day she gave it to me. I thought maybe you were some demon playing a trick on me at first, that’s why I attacked you.” He shakes his head before continuing. “The ache hasn’t stopped since. I wanted to ignore it, I wanted it to be a coincidence but when you placed your hand over it that day, I knew. I knew, and I didn’t want to believe it.” His voice cracks slightly as his pleading eyes fall upon mine.
“Why? Is that why you would avoid me like you would set fire at every touch?” Tears streak my face. He stands and runs his hands through his hair. The muscles and tattoos show underneath his soaked white shirt, making it see-through.
“Because it would!” He whips around, his voice strained. The veins in his neck bulge. “I would be consumed by your fire and I won’t be able to escape it! It would ravage me, burn me alive and I won’t survive this time… I won’t survive losing you. I had to hurt you the other night, I couldn’t let myself lose control again. It was easier for you to hate me.”
“I can’t risk what it’ll do to me if I never get to feel your touch again. I have searched for you in faceless women for centuries. Hoping to feel even the smallest spark when I was with them. There was never anything there and I would quickly move on to the next warm bed. I instantly knew that day, and every time I am near you, Andrea, I know. It will always be you my heart belongs to and I can’t lose you again. It will kill me this time.”
A sheen builds in his gleaming blue eyes.
“My hands are dirty, Andrea. Filthy with the touch of other women. But I couldn’t stop, I had to feel something, anything other than the emptiness on the other side of this bond.” His hand yanks his shirt to reveal the scarred C over his heart. The only part of his chest that is clean, untattooed. “These tattoos, I got them because I couldn’t stand to look at the skin she had once touched, I couldn’t bear to see another female wipe her touch away. So I covered it. Covered it until there was nothing left bare. What kind of soulless monster would I be if I touched you with these tainted hands…” His deep smooth voice cracks again, just like the sound of my chest at this moment.
The pain he put himself through searching endlessly for something all these years burns in his eyes. Searching for me.
Me .
I stand and reach my hand up to rest on his cheek, his hand, still in the leather gloves, grabs my wrist before I can touch his skin. His eyes close and he took a deep breath, “Don’t. I don’t deserve you anymore. I do not deserve you in any lifetime that you find me.”
“You don’t get to answer for me. I may not understand your longing but although my life has been a mere fraction of yours, do not think that my heart has not longed for you, too. Before I even knew a hole was there in the first place.” Tears sting my eyes as I look into a pair that feels so familiar. Like I have stared into them for years.
Is this why I have never felt a true connection before? Was my heart searching for him?
Waiting for him.
So I’m not broken. I’m not incapable of love. My heart belonged to someone I hadn’t met yet.
I slowly place my hand over the scar on his chest as he watches me so intently. The touch takes my breath away this time. My arm begins buzzing.
His eyes never leave mine as I reach for his hand with my other and gently place it over my fresh wound. I hiss from the touch but an electrical current snaps into place and runs throughout my body.
Our hands glow a light shade of green over our chests and into our veins. Warmth floods my body. The same warmth I feel when I am home.
“All this time, I thought I repulsed you.” I look up at him. “And I still couldn’t get you out of my head. I thought I was going mad.”
“I’ve gone mad restraining myself from fucking you every waking moment until the only feeling you had was from me.” A shock of pleasure shoots down my middle at his words. “I would claw and thrash out of the deepest, darkest pits hell has to offer to merely crawl to you little bird.”
His lips crash into mine. The kiss is ravenous, drawing blood from the intensity. Ash’s hands slide down my body as his mouth claims me. My cold wet clothes are the only thing cooling me off from his devouring warmth.
I push him away, my hands still on his chest, his blue eyes search mine for a reason why I stopped the intoxicating kiss. Smiling, I walk over to the edge of the bed and peel my jeans off slowly before sitting. I slowly spread my legs as he fucks me with his eyes.
He doesn’t move, only stares at my black lace panties that don’t conceal much. Ash’s lips part as he sucks in a breath and steps forward.
I hold my hand up and shake my head. He stops and a smirk tugs at the corner of his reddened lips from our kiss.
“Then, crawl,” I mutter. I have never talked like this to anyone before but it feels right. It feels good to demand him.
Ash’s grin grows wider before dropping to his knees. His eyes still never leave mine. He places his hands on the floor and slowly crawls to me. The ache building in my core is nearly painful watching his muscles shift with every movement.
How did I ever resist him this long?
His eyes are an even prettier shade of blue from down there. He is close enough to my middle that I can feel the warm breath hitting my sensitive spot. A whimper escapes my mouth.
Ash rises back on his knees and grabs the neck of my shirt with both hands and pulls. The soaked fabric splits perfectly down the middle exposing my lace bra. His pleased growl rumbles my aching bones.
I lean back on my hands to give him a better view of my body. I can’t quite explain this feeling other than right.
Perfect.
Mine.
His hand slides down my front until reaching the top of my underwear. He pulls the lace until it rips, baring me completely to him. A smile splits across his flawless face.
Ash peers at me through his brows, I never realized how sexy piercings are until they are on the face of a fallen angel between my legs.
His eyes never leave mine, he lowers his face. Sticking out his tongue, he torturously drags it up my slit, twirling it once he reaches my clit. My head falls back and I bite my lip to stifle my moan.
His slow lapping doesn’t last long before he shoves his face completely between me. The cold metal of his nose piercing brushing my skin as he devours me. My legs shake the closer I get to finishing.
Regardless of him being the only man to ever make me finish, he is damn good at this. My body tenses as I imagine how good his dick will feel once it enters me for the first time.
He must notice that I am about to reach my peak so he grabs my thighs that are resting on his broad shoulders. His tattooed fingers dig into my thighs as he relentlessly consumes me until I am coming all over his face.
I don’t try to keep my scream in as my orgasm rips through my body. The waves of pleasure crash into me continuously until I’m on the verge of tears.
Falling back onto the bed, my heaving chest rises and falls as I try to catch my breath. My eyes open when I feel him kneel over me and pepper kisses on my sweat-slick face.
“Fuck me,” I whisper, shocking myself with the bold statement but I need him.
His perfect teeth show as he smiles. His wet black hair hanging down in his face is a sight I would like to frame and place somewhere I can stare at all day.
“When I fuck you, little bird, and believe me, I will fuck you, it won’t be in a shitty inn.” His deep voice is absolutely devastating when he says such vulgar things to me. He drops to my side and pulls me into him.
His large muscular arms wrap around me and warms me to my core. Sleep takes over quickly from the pure exhaustion of today. The last thought I can remember before falling into my dreams was how much I couldn’t wait to have him inside of me.