Didi
It seems rather silly to be studying when I’m not sure Talia will let me go to school anymore. But I’ve been reading and practicing equations all night, waiting for Remy to get home, and it’s a nice way to pass time as my stomach twists and turns.
Talia went downstairs with Tommy earlier, and I haven’t seen them since.
The clock on Remy’s desk reads half past ten by the time he opens the door. He pauses when he sees me on his bed.
He doesn’t say anything as he takes off his leather jacket, rolls his strong shoulders and fusses with his windblown hair. His silence continues as he pulls off his shirt and changes into sleepwear, then crawls next to me, tugging me into him.
When Tommy touches me, my skin hums, but when Remy does, I can feel him in my bones.
The inside of my thigh throbs as he reaches down to touch it with his thumb.
“Hi, little lamb,” he whispers. “Did you have fun with Tommy this morning?”
My stomach flutters at the memory of what Tommy and Remy did to me last night. I missed Remy all day because of it.
Wide-eyed and sleepy, I turn and face him. “Where did you go this morning?” His dark, brooding eyes flash in response.
His chest rises and falls beneath me. “I’m used to sleeping alone.”
I turn my eyes downward. “Oh.”
He sighs. “After you crashed, I came up here. I had to get some studying done, so I went to campus. Finals are in a month, and those assholes in class keep beating me.”
A few excruciating seconds go by, and he doesn’t respond. “Should I go?”
He grips my waist. “Didn’t say that.”
“You kinda did.”
“I said I like to sleep alone, but I never said I wanted you outta my bed.”
My heart races. “Did I do something, Remy?”
His jaw tenses, and he swallows like it hurts. “I was a jerk last night, Didi. I shouldn’t have done that to you.”
I shake my head. “Don’t say that. I wanted you to mark me. I want to be yours Remy. I want to belong to both of you.”
“We were…we were messed up. I was outta my damn head.”
“Remy…” I inch away from him. “Please don’t act like this. Don’t act like anything we did was a mistake.”
His face turns cold as stone. “I don’t see any circumstances where you live through this, Diana. You know that, right? As soon as Talia catches wind I marked you, she will make me kill you. It may not be today, or tomorrow, but she will.”
My hand hits my mouth. “Remy…”
He lets out a deep sigh. “You told her.”
“She questioned us at breakfast—the meal you missed because you were too much of a coward to face her. It’s a tiny mark. She knows you’re in love with me.”
He snarls at that. “You just sealed your own coffin.”
“I’m already dead.” We face each other and his eyes flare. “What does it matter if she makes you kill me? You get your inheritance, you’ll study to be a lawyer, and I’ll be six feet under, or chopped into tiny pieces. At least now I mean something.”
He touches my face and cups my chin. “Never question how much you mean to me, little lamb. I meant everything I said last night. You’re mine.”
I breathe deeply as my body conforms to his. He’s so tense all the time, always so wound up. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Remy smile. “You love me, but your loyalty is with her, isn’t it?”
His pupils flash again. “She’s my sister, Didi.
It’s completely different.” He finishes his thoughts with a deep kiss.
Showing me I’m different by stroking my tongue.
“The way I feel about you is indescribable. You made me love something after years of thinking I wasn’t capable of it. I can’t ignore that.”
He can pretend all he wants, but I’ve seen his devotion to her. Tommy’s hinted at it, too.
I run my hand up his bare back. “Remy, what happened to you to make you darker than the black side of hell? What happened to Talia?”
He bites my lip and finishes our kiss. “Did Tommy tell you that? Because he needs to shut his mouth and mind his business. He doesn’t know shit.”
I exhale hard. “He cares about you. He loves you like a brother.”
He rolls off me and stares up at the light on the ceiling. “And that’s the only reason he gets to lay his hands on you.”
I let out a frustrated sigh as I lean up on my elbow, letting the blanket fall down my chest. “What happened to you and Talia? I deserve to know.”
He rubs his beard and shakes his head. “You don’t want to know.”
“This affects me, too, and other than embracing your fires and silly rules about sacrificing your lovers, I don’t know what we stand for. Does this have something to do with Father Malcom?”
“It’s embracing chaos, not fires.”
I give him a flat stare. “I want to be a part of this, but I need to know your secrets.”
He leans in closer. “You shouldn’t…want to be a part of this, that is.”
“Remy…” I breathe.
He takes a deep, nervous breath. “I’ve never talked about this with anyone. Not even Talia after it happened. And especially not Tommy.”
I narrow my eyes, a squirmy sensation hits my stomach. “Okay.”
He glances at the large window that overlooks the forest and wickedness that lies beyond.
Branches slide against the glass, breaking our silence and he begins, “When I was young, the Order would get together a few times a year, usually at our house. Sometimes my father would let me stay, and when they drank too much and started talking about things I didn’t understand, he remembered that I was still there and would kick me out.
I never went to bed; instead, I listened through a vent, and one night, I heard them talking about what they did to those girls.
Bragging about murder, detailing how they did it while they puffed on their cigars.
I pieced everything together after I found a box of obituaries in my father’s study.
Each of them killed their high school sweethearts and got away with it. ”
“How old were you when you found this out?”
“Nine.”
My heart weeps for him.
He sighs, his guilt-ridden eyes pinned on mine.
“I knew about the Order for years before Talia did. It excited me, seeing how much power they held. I knew that power was going to be mine one day—I felt it in my veins—so I kept their secret. Eventually, my father caught on that I knew and cornered me about it.”
“What did he do to you?”
He slides his knuckles along my cheek. “They embraced me. I gave my blood oath that night. They were so powerful, rich, and egotistical. I wanted to be like them.” His jaw ticks and his eyes glaze over.
“I didn’t realize at that time that half of them didn’t belong there.
That most of them were blood-thirsty old pricks who liked to fuck little girls.
My old man broke every rule.” His eyes flicker up to me.
“We’re not the only families in town who know the secret. ”
I slap my hand to my mouth as the realization hits me. “Father Malcom.”
He curls his lip. “Talia was in high school when she became his obsession. He would watch her at town events and barbeques when all the new members would get together. She was na?ve then, innocent. Not like she is now, but she liked his attention. She’d go with him into the woods when she thought no one was looking. ”
A bubble of emotion as the memory of killing that man overwhelms me.
“It happened over the entire summer. He was so high on lust and power, he didn’t think anyone would notice. And since Father Malcolm was such a powerful figure in town, my old man let it happen. He marked her Didi…that bastard marked her for death.”
“You didn’t say anything?”
His jaw flexes. “I thought she was pathetic, or a slut. I didn’t know or care. She started crying all the time, and it just pissed me off.”
“Remy…”
Emotions bubble to the surface. “It gets worse, Diana. It gets so much worse. Eventually, his wife found out. He lied about the entire thing, saying that Talia was the one who pushed herself onto him. That she needed Jesus in her life. So, my father and stepmom forced her to Sunday school, right into the arms of his jealous wife, who was already mortified and humiliated. They saw her mark, the mark he gave her, and they decided that she needed to die.”
The taste of metal infiltrates my tongue. “What did they do to her?”
He closes his eyes, a muscle ticking in his jaw.
“Instead of blaming her husband, she blamed Talia. I went to check on her one night when I heard something. She wasn’t in her room, so, I went looking for her, and I saw blood in the snow.
By the time I found her…she was already buried.
The bitch and her nasty daughter buried my sister alive.
If I were five minutes later, she’d be dead. ”
A burst of emotion comes out of me, and I clutch my rosary. “Jesus, Remy…”
His eyes tick to my cross. “Jesus wasn’t there for her, Didi, but I was.
God doesn’t exist in this town, not anymore.
But something else does. She was never the same after that.
I brought her back to life, but barely. Part of me thinks she died that night, and something else was reborn.
I swore to myself I would always protect her. ”
I roll on top of him, squeezing him with my thighs, reminding him that I’m here and that I can take all the pain away if he lets me.
He leans up and captures my lips with his. “Even after everything, I still crave power. I’m an evil man, Didi. I’ve been waiting for you for a long time. Searching for you in the shadows.”
I move my lips to his chest and kiss his pecs, then work my way to his stomach. His cock twinges between my legs. “Well, now I’m here. And you get to do whatever you want with me.” I kiss his lips and smile.
His hand slides over my breasts as he pulls me in, changing the subject entirely. “How many times did Tommy fuck you today?” I frown at him. “How many times?”
“Three.”
He grabs my hips and nudges my legs open, sliding down my underwear. He pulls down the hem of his pants, releasing himself.
He thrusts in hard, but this time, I don’t want him to fuck me.
I want to fuck him…I push my hand on his chest, nudging him.
He rolls over onto his back, and I crawl on top of him, and he rests his hands on my hips as I slide myself over his cock, pulsing and clenching my pussy until that burning feeling returns and heat sweeps through my body.
I see my pale reflection in the window, like a ghost staring back.
I’m claiming him the way he’s claimed me.
I lean in, grinding against him until I come, our breaths mixing together.
Eventually, he can’t take it anymore, and we climax together.
I fall on top of him, and before I can shutter out a proper breath, he’s already twisting me, sliding his dick inside my cum-soaked pussy.
“That’s only once,” he whispers, nibbling on my ear. “Three more to go.”
He’s not done…he’ll never be done until he beats Tommy. I smile when I realize just how deep their competitiveness runs, and how much I’ll never be sick of it as long as their obsession is with me. My life depends on it.
“I love you, little lamb,” he whispers as my pussy heats up again. “I’m going to fuck you until my seed is part of your bloodline.” I close my eyes and imagine my future child, the one who my mother was so certain would be evil.
My child will be Shadowface.