Chapter 22
Take All of It
ELLIOT
My head is killing me, my chest hurts more than usual, and there’s a smell hanging in the air so potent I can’t breathe.
Like mint and honey. Or cinnamon and smoke.
It’s intoxicating.
I want to bathe in it. Drown in it.
Devour it.
On my hands and knees, I crawl. Down the shadowed hallway, through a doorway I recognize but have never crossed before, and into the plush comfort of a warm bed.
This is where the smell is coming from, somewhere between these sheets, where a quiet voice begins to grumble as I burrow into them.
“Ergh…” she says. “You’re heavy.”
A low growl churns in my chest, and she quiets.
It’s here. I know it’s here. I can almost taste it.
My hands roam over soft skin and cool fabric, touching and scenting every inch. The voice makes no protest, though she starts to squirm as I draw nearer.
I find the source between her thighs, and I breathe deep as her knees part for me.
“Baby…” I groan, nuzzling her panties. “You smell like…like us.”
“I know.”
The moonstruck haze lifts as her words ring in my ears, and I look up to see her watching me with puffy eyes.
She’s been crying. My fault, I assume. She ought to drain me for that.
“Are you hungry?” I ask her.
She lies.
“No.”
“Please, Iris. Just take it. I don’t need it.”
“Elliot, you’re not thinking clearly.”
Yes, I am. Nothing’s ever been clearer in my life.
I’m responsible for her pain. I’m the reason she’s hurting. And this is the only way I know to make it better.
“Please, Iris. Just take it. Take all of it. I don’t need it.”
I wrap my arms around her waist and rest my head in her lap as I plead with her. She takes pity on me and slips her hand down the back of my neck, stroking the space above my dampener. With every pass of her fingers, it constricts, but I ignore it in favor of keeping her close.
“Elliot,” she whispers. “I can’t.”
“I want you to. I want you to have it.”
She shakes her head.
“I know, but I can’t take it if there’s nothing to take.”
I push up, hovering over her.
“What do you mean there’s nothing to take?”
“There’s no lust in your heart right now,” she explains.
“No, that’s impossible. There’s always something for you. I always want you.”
Not a day goes by that I don’t want Iris. I’ll be dead in my grave, and I’ll dream of her. In fact, I think she may be the only thing I want.
If it’s not lust that’s drawn me here, then what is it? Why have I clawed my way into her bed if I have nothing to offer her? If I cannot love her, and I cannot feed her, what use am I?
The mere thought of failing her chokes me, and tears spring to my eyes as the dampener clamps down, cutting off my air supply.
Iris panics when they start to spill over.
“Elliot? Elliot!”
Her pretty, brown eyes are wide as I look down at her, and I watch helplessly as she starts to panic.
“Elliot, you have to breathe!” she shouts. “I need you—I need you to breathe!”
Her hands come around my throat, prying at the leather as I fail to intervene, and when that doesn’t work, she resorts to the only other thing she knows.
She kisses me.
It’s rough at first, frantic and needy, hands clawing at my shirt, arms roping me down until I’m crushing her beneath my weight. Her teeth catch on my piercings as she bites down on my lip, and I can’t help the sound I make when her tongue snakes out to soothe the sting.
I growl, deep in my chest, and she answers with a soft moan that I promptly chase down her throat. I draw it out with my tongue and nurture it with my hands.
Her chest arches into my palm as she mews for more, and air eventually finds its way into my lungs as she pulls away, panting. But I’m not ready to let go yet.
I’ve dreamt of this moment every night for four years straight, and now that it’s here, I must memorize the taste so I can call on this memory every night after.
I roll, carrying her with me so I can draw her deeper. With her body pressed on top of mine, and her ass in my hands as she moans into my mouth, she melts between my fingers, hot and wet, and the smell of our scent threads tangling around us leaves me crippled with need.
But she stills before I can sate her hunger.
She pushes into a seated position, straddling my hips as she plants her hands on my chest. There’s a familiar, faraway look in her eyes as she stares down at me.
“Iris?”
I call her name, but there’s no recognition on her face.
“Are you okay?” I ask, pressing my hand to her chest.
Her heart is still hammering, but it only grows faster as the silence stretches on.
“Iris, baby. Look at me.”
She blinks, eyes searching my face, and I sit up until she is cradled in my lap.
“You’re alright,” I say. “It’s just us. It’s just Elliot. You’re fine, baby. We’re fine.”
The last words slip out on their own, and it takes me a moment to realize they are true.
It’s hard to imagine when we’ve never been in this position before.
Every time Iris and I touch, there’s a reason.
Every time she entrusts her body to me, there’s a reason, and that reason has always been to feed her.
But now…we’re kissing for no reason. I’m in her bed for no reason. And yet, neither of us is on the verge of spontaneous combustion as we thought we’d be.
We’re not alone, and it didn’t kill us.
I’m about to start shaking her when she releases the breath she’s been holding and sags in my arms.
“What are we doing?” she asks.
“I don’t know,” I admit. I have no clue what this is. “But we’ll have to stop if you’re going to freak out every time I kiss you.”
She hides her face in her hands, shaking her head.
“I-I…I’ve never done that before,” she murmurs.
“I know. Me either.”
She rears back, frowning in confusion, and I sigh as I search for the words to explain myself.
“I only ever do this when I need to…feel something.”
I cringe as the words leave my mouth. I know how they make me sound. As if I simply wander around fucking every woman I find that’s willing. At one point, I might have, but that was long ago. And nowadays, nothing feels as good as Iris.
Iris nods, a pained expression on her face as she stares into my chest.
“So, does that make me your first kiss?” I ask.
For the first time since she woke today, she laughs, and the sound feels like a symphony in my ears.
“Fuck you,” she says, swatting me in the chest.
“Maybe if you say please.”
Her dark eyes roll as she giggles.
“I’d rather starve,” she says.
And a smile cracks open on my face so wide I worry all my feelings might pour onto the bed in a sticky mess. She’d probably love that.
“Too bad, I won’t let you.”
She squirms on top of me, fighting to be free, but not in earnest. Instead, she spends wasted energy wriggling and pinching at my sides like we’re six.
I return the favor, wrestling her back down into the sheets and pressing kisses to whatever part of her I can find. She isn’t wearing much. My Deadheads tee that she never returned, and a thin pair of shorts, so I manage to land a few good ones before she bucks me off.
“Where were you?” she asks, rolling to her side and propping her head up on her fist. “I thought you’d been drinking.”
She pushes my hair away from my forehead, pressing gently on a tender spot above my right eye.
I haven’t seen myself tonight, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find a bruise there in the morning.
I can feel a few cuts mending themselves together beneath my jeans, and at least one other bruise on my back. But whatever I find will surely be nothing compared to the full moons of the past.
“The Manor,” I answer, and even though I can hear Mother’s voice telling me to stop there, I continue because I want her to know.
“Cross wolves shift differently under the full moon. Our power is so strong that it can be dangerous. Not just for others, but for ourselves. Most of us choose to be chained for the evening. But coming out of a full moon shift can be rough.”
She nods, moving her thumb across my cheek.
“It hurts?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“Terribly?”
Yeah, like getting hit by a bus. Over and over, until you black out.
“I’m used to it by now.”
Her eyes narrow as I parrot her excuses, but she doesn’t ask again.
“Did I scare you?” I ask.
“A little.”
“I’m sorry, princess. I didn’t mean to—”
“Oh, no.” She cuts me off. “I was just scared you wouldn’t wake up. You were…”
Her voice trails off, but I know what she’s thinking.
‘Fucking gone’ are the words I would choose.
The last few hours are a complete blur. I remember the rattling metal as the door slammed shut, and the clank of the keys as the lock clicked into place.
The next thing I know, I’m waking up with Iris in my arms in a room much different from the cage I’d been in. I don’t even remember how I got here.
“What did I do?” I ask.
Her brow lifts, and brace myself as she glares at me.
It must have been something heinous for her to be so silent.
“You apologized. And then you insulted me.”
“I what?”
“Yeah, you told me I was disgustingly beautiful. Actually, no, ‘so beautiful, it’s disgusting.’”
Her finger bounces through the air with each word, careful not to miss any, and I cringe, rolling onto my back.
“That’s not an insult,” I say, counting the stars on the ceiling.“That’s just embarrassing.”
I’m not sure what I was expecting Iris’s room to look like. I’d never really thought about it before. But, seeing it now, it makes sense.
Every inch is covered in her.
From the walls plastered with ancient literature to the collection of teacups above her desk. Even the well-organized quills. It’s her. A place where she doesn’t have to hide.
On the top shelf, I spot the book I’d given her, wedged between her other favorites like a small trophy, and I can’t help but smile.
“Yeah, well, it sounded like an insult,” she says, joining me on her back.
“Well, it’s not.”
“Okay, fine.”
“Fine.”
As we lay there, her hand stretches across the bed, knocking into mine, and before my senses come rushing back to me, I lace my fingers with hers and hold tight to her as we lie staring at her tiny stars.
The strange thing is, this room that I’ve never been in, with the mountain of pink pillows and the scent of us hanging in the air like a cloud, feels more like home than the Manor ever has. And that scares me, more than just a little bit. More than anything.
No, that’s not true. Not more than anything.
I wrap an arm around Iris, dragging her across the bed until she’s crushed against my chest.
She doesn’t argue as I press my face to the top of her head. She merely slips her hand beneath my shirt, fingers trailing over tender skin as I shut my eyes and breathe in deep.
“You really don’t feel anything?” she asks, breaking the hard-earned moment of peace.
I’m not upset with her for it, though. I knew this would come eventually. It’s one of the reasons I never told her.
I shake my head.
“No, I don’t.”
“What about other things? Like adoration? Or affection?”
Adoration? Definitely not.
But I’ve gotten pretty good at faking affection over the years.
I smile at Kitty when she’s sad. I hug Dame when he’s lonely. And I kiss Iris when she seems like she could use a little calm.
But none of that’s really for me. I do it for them. Because I don’t want them to be in pain, like I am.
“No,” I answer, feeling Iris’s body stiffen in my arms.
“What’s left then?” she asks.
I sigh.
“Mostly desire, anger…and pain.”
She presses closer, squeezing me tight.
“Is that why you have so many?”
“So many what?”
“Piercings,” she says.
I understand then that Iris sees me. Perhaps better than I see myself.
“Yeah,” I say, stroking her back. “I guess so.”
She doesn’t seem bothered by my answers, but I may be mistaken because she slowly starts to shift, twisting in my arms and lying herself between my legs until her chin rests on my chest.
“What do you feel right now?” she asks.
The puffy redness in her eyes is gone now, but the hope in them is more than enough to kill me.
I know what she wants me to say. She wants me to lie, to tell her I feel rage or shame or joy. Anything but the truth. Which is that I feel nothing.
Even as she’s smiling at me, anticipation steadily thumping in her chest, I feel nothing, and the longer I look at her, the more I realize, “I can’t do this…”
“What?”
Gods, that’s her favorite word.
“I can’t do this, Iris. I’m sorry. I thought maybe, but—”
Her face falls as I untangle her limbs from mine, and the dampener constricts as I watch her hope turn to agony.
Unable to say anything more, I repeat the words again, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
She stands, face slack as she watches me duck through the doorway, but she doesn’t try to follow, and thank fates she doesn’t. The longer I look at her, the more it hurts.