45. Wraith #3
I don't want to see the exact second the light reveals some new detail she hasn't noticed before, some angle she hasn't processed, and maybe she'll stop smiling at me like that. Even if it's only for a second. It might kill me.
My hand twitches toward the scarf.
Ivy catches my hand.
She guides it back down to her hip. Then she leans forward, tilts her head, and presses her mouth against my teeth.
The kiss is gentle and warm, and I freeze up as usual, but I don't feel like I'm going to fucking pass out from stress this time. My ears don't ring. She holds there for a moment, not rushing, and when she pulls back to nuzzle my nose, I'm able to make eye contact with her again.
"Thane marked me," she says quietly.
She reaches up and loosens the knot of Thane's tie around her throat, pulling it aside.
The mark is… beautiful.
Clean arcs of healed teeth impressions layered over the old burn scar on her left shoulder, the silver of new tissue merging with the pearlescent texture she gave herself with a flat iron.
Thane's bite has already closed and scarred, the way mating bonds do, faster than any normal wound, the skin flushed pink at the edges where it's still fresh.
Nothing like what my bite would look like.
I know, I sign. I caught the change in your scent when you walked in.
She bites her lower lip. "And…?"
I'm happy, I tell her honestly, crinkling my eyes at her so she knows I'd be smiling if I could. Very. It's just…
"What is it?" she asks quietly.
But her eyes are already drifting to my mouth, her gaze softening as she takes in the sharp points of my teeth.
My stomach turns.
She knows. I don't know why I'm surprised anymore that she can basically read my fucking mind, bonded by mark or not.
I'm scared to M-A-R-K you, I sign reluctantly, fingerspelling that word since I don't know if she knows the sign for that. I turn my head slightly to the side and down, keeping my eyes on the far wall again. Scared I'll hurt you.
"I know," she murmurs.
My teeth aren't… I stop and start again. My teeth aren't made for M-A-R-K-I-N-G. They're made for tearing. Tearing F-L-E-S-H—
She catches my wrists again, both of them this time, stopping me mid-sign. Her way of interrupting me.
"I know what they're made for," she says. "I also know what they feel like when you kiss me."
I swallow hard. The motion pulls at the scar tissue covering my throat.
"I've been thinking about it," she continues, her voice calm and steady.
It's the tone she has when she's already worked something out and is just waiting for everyone else to catch up.
"If the others mark me first, here…" She touches the spot on her shoulder where Thane's fresh mark gleams. "The scar tissue will build up.
Layer over layer. The skin will be tougher. It won't hurt as much."
I blink at her.
She's planned this.
And the plan includes me, somehow.
I could still hurt you. My bite is not like theirs.
"I know." She smiles. "I want it anyway. Even if it hurts, Misha."
All I can do in response is stare.
She presses her forehead against mine, her lashes fluttering shut.
I close my eyes, too.
For a few seconds, I just breathe in her honeyed scent and the woodier scent beneath it now, proof that she's claimed and loved and protected by my brother.
In that sense, we are bonded.
Because even with her plan… what if it's not enough? What if my teeth go through all of it anyway?
I push it out of my head for now. There's fuck all I can do about it tonight. There's something else we need to discuss anyway.
I can't take you out on a date like the others are planning to, I sign when I pull back finally, my shoulders sagging. We can't even go to a restaurant without there being a fucking scene.
I'm signing faster and more complex than usual, and for a second, I'm worried she didn't catch all that. She's hesitating, eyes slightly narrow, processing. Filling in the signs she doesn't know, maybe.
She nods in understanding, then shrugs. "I don't care if there's a scene. Whiskey makes plenty of scenes. It isn't like I need to be stealthy anymore."
Not the fun kind of scene, I add. The kind of scene where I get thrown out.
"Then I'll go so nuclear on Yelp, they'll beg us to come back. Trust me. I've done it before and I'll do it again."
I look doubtfully at her.
"But we could always have a date here," she says, gesturing at the loft around us. "Just us. And you can mark me right here in the loft."
The growl that rumbles in my chest is even more doubtful.
"Or the tunnels," she adds, nudging me with her knee. "For nostalgia."
That makes me laugh. Sort of. It's one of those freakish huffing growl noises I make that she seems to like for some reason, and she's already beaming because she's insane.
My shoulders shake once and I press my face into her scar and my brother's fresh mark, breathing her in, her fingers in my hair and lightly scraping against my scalp.
She deserves more than a fucking tunnel or a loft.
She deserves the moon.
I just need to figure out how.