20. Sin

20

Sin

genuine shock

I never share?

Where did that bucket of lies spill from?

I share. Plenty. My body, my thoughts, my dates, their dates, strangers on the streets.

My ring pinches as I grip the goblet harder, pressing the thick stem into the tablecloth until seams form around it. The fissures spread like spiderwebs, fracturing the perfect facade I’ve so meticulously crafted. Why do I feel this incessant compulsion to share, to offer pieces of myself to everyone who crosses my path?

Is it a desperate plea for connection?

A futile attempt to fill the yawning void within me?

I release my death grip, watching as the wrinkles smooth, erasing the evidence of my turmoil. On the surface, everything is back to normal. Underneath, I’ve never felt more unhinged.

It wasn’t a lie.

The answer razes through me, hot and overpowering.

The thought of another male touching Nat inspired one avalanche of rage after another.

She’s mine .

The heat drains from my body, mind a swirl of confusion and contradiction, heart brimming and empty. Cold fills me.

Is it possible she is … mine? Truly mine? A Fated bond. One chosen by the three Fates, a string specially plucked and tied to me, my other half.

Her thread would be the brightest silver, barbed and woven, digging and scratching and biting into mine until separation meant death.

No, it’s not possible.

She would feel it.

I liked you , she’d laughed.

So dismissive, so unimpressed.

I run a finger over the tablecloth’s weave like it’s the arch of a beloved cat’s spine.

Nat might hate me, might try to kill me, but she’s unwittingly shown her cards. She’s as confused as I am. Just as hopelessly attracted to me as I am to her. Maybe even more.

“Isn’t that right, Sinis?” A hollow, southern accent eradicates my wandering thoughts and yanks me to the present. I taste dry chamomile and expired cream.

Dislike and disgust.

The last thing Maxine deserves is a smile her way, but that’s exactly what I grant her, not half a second after she called my mother a wanton whore. Because while Maxine Chaconas is half Nereid—water Nymphs preferred in illicit trading—she flaunts her Scylla half with poisoned comments and personal attacks as she reigns over five course meals that only a mad king with gout could enjoy.

Suckled pig, veal, runny duck eggs. The table sags under the weight of delicacies barely sampled.

Her home is a plantation. Restored impeccably to the glory of its original purpose, to lord and conquer.

I hope it’s haunted.

I hope bitter ghosts rise through the floorboards and wrench every wretched bone from her body.

Gods, I’m spending too much time with Nat.

“You’ve hardly dined, Sinis. Have you no appetite?” Varley asks, slicing into his lemon-yellow custard with gusto.

Another languid, fake smile. “My appetite knows no bounds. Surely you remember.”

Maxine huffs at that, a sudden biting laugh from her position at the head of the table. She doesn’t want me here, probably didn’t think I’d respond to, let alone accept, her last-minute dinner invitation. I’m glad to have disappointed her.

As if he’s never seen sugar before, Varley scrapes the dish with his spoon, collecting the last bits as he jests, “I told our host you would not favor sending the entertainment elsewhere.”

Maxine’s frosty eyes harden, her long square tipped nails poke at her pearl drop necklace. “Please. Sinis flourishes under firm directions. Lesenia spoke widely that you performed best after a dry spout.”

I push an orange slice between my teeth and smirk. Coy. Secretive. Whatever the fuck they want me to be.

Anything but broken. No matter how well Maxine rakes me over the horrors of my past. “Allow me to call my date and I can show you all how to properly feast.”

“Date,” Brax responds with a scoff of offense from Maxine’s right hand.

“You saw how he dressed her,” Pearson eggs on in a vitriolic voice, the dumb to Brax’s dumber. “I bet he bathes her in milk and honey.”

It’s condemnation, not admiration.

Pearson’s date arrived in black lingerie and a busted lip, a tattoo of his name marked on her forearm.

“Do you?” Maxine demands.

She tastes like rotting leaves under a scorching sun. Revolted and offended .

I spill a feeling of comradery into the dining room. Again. “Black and purple look best on soft, creamy skin, am I wrong?”

“There. See.” Varley’s a referee, taking my pudding as a bribe.

Maxine doesn’t believe me, but we are in the middle of a tango. Here and now, in front of the audience she’s gathered of bigots and bastards. If she throws a punch mid spin, the reviews will be dreadful, but if I were to trip, lag, fail to make her shine, they’d skewer me instead.

I know this game.

Used to take pleasure in it.

Black eyebrows permanently arched, our host suggests we reunite with our Diakonos, and guides us to the white wraparound porch for spiced bourbon flights. Along the way, she takes precious care to point out the servant’s quarters, preserved in their original decrepit condition.

For authenticity.

Scurrying in riding boots, Varley is explaining how gelato is superior to custard into my elbow when a sharp pain bursts across my chest.

It happens so quickly, I almost reach for my knife, because it can’t be—it can’t have been real. She couldn’t have been—

Nat was looking at me.

She’s not anymore, and the smile, my fucking smile, has vanished.

I want it back.

One second, Nat’s bubblegum skirt floats in the breeze, dancing like the twin strands of hair in front of her ears. One second she’s staring, rosy pink lips curved at the corners like the tails of comets, promising wishes and dreams come true, lidded eyes climbing up the lines of my suit, settling appreciatively on my mouth, and then her gaze snaps to the side and it’s gone.

I miss it instantly.

I miss her smile, I miss her looking.

Besides a general complaint on my choice of clothing—her as heartbreaker princess and me as her prince charming in a royal blue suit—we haven’t spoken.

Not on the walk here, not waiting in Maxine’s gaudy vestibule. Nat didn’t so much as glance back at me when Maxine clapped at her like a pet and sent her to wait with the rest of the Diakonos.

Not even a farewell jab into my gut.

Now she’s smiling.

A terrible thought cracks into my skull.

Theia.

Nat found her. That’s why she’s happy, why she’d dare to smile at me.

I should smile.

A Phoenix within reach. A Phoenix to question and learn from, to rid myself of this godsdamned curse on my neck. I should be ecstatic for my brothers, for me, for the future.

I can’t move.

Can’t take the final stride onto the porch despite the bands of my curse tightening painfully, demanding I continue.

When we find Theia, Nat won’t need me anymore.

Denial hacks brutally at my insides.

“Pretty,” Varley muses, hooded eyes drifting over the gathering of Diakonos. “In this light, at least.”

I could choke him for that, but the logic he lends forces me to place one foot after another.

Nat’s still wearing her dress. Sequins and hearts and every shade of pink.

If she had Theia, she’d have shredded the skirt, set torches to the ribbons. She’d be soaked in blood and ichor, not giggling, she’d be raging, swinging a hatchet right for Maxine.

Or me.

It gives me the oddest sense of relief, struck short by the biting cinch of black around my wrists and throat.

Faster , the curse seems to say.

I join the party.

Spring in Georgia is wet and hot, but pleasant to an immortal’s skin. Our group is happy to disperse across couches facing the willows swinging on the expansive property.

Maxine has an Oceanid—a Nymph like her—in a butler’s uniform deliver glittering dark bourbon in green brocade glasses to us. She points a violent finger at the mangle of Diakonos watching as if they’re no more than gulls expected to chase a fry at the beach.

They scatter, timid and well-trained, dragging chains and hurrying to assist their masters.

Nat does not possess the ability to scurry. She marches straight for me, eyes trained on the gap in my collar.

I battle the impulse to button my shirt, hide the tattoo she’s imagining shucking off my skin.

I’ve done countless shameful, regrettable, and hateful things, but the tattoos were never a regret. The vow I made to create a fairer world for creatures and promote equality never made the list until Nat’s intense disapproval.

I understand it. Why did I need a king to tell me to be good? Why did I fail him?

Because I’m half the creature she is.

Varley is slurring beside me. On his way to drunk while Maxine and the trio of fuckwits chat estates and security.

I strain to pay attention, debating whether to infuse the night with friendship and try for information another day or layer the air with competition and start a my Diakonos is more rare than yours duel to the death.

Messy, but faster.

Lemons hit me, and then, “Lord Sin.”

Her voice wipes my mind clean. There’s no derision in her tone. No mocking edge.

And the way Nat looks at me, tongue perched on her incisor, hooded eyes tracing my features, interest intense and matter-of-fact, it beckons me.

She’s a cavern opening up the earth, tearing it apart, and I’m a river, helpless to fall.

Moving on instinct, I tug on her wrist to sit beside me, grateful for the crush of silken pink fabric keeping our skin from making contact.

Closer, we’d agreed. I fear I’d demand it even if we hadn’t.

At Hedone, she was a diamond among seashells. Tonight she’s sweet in a bitter home.

The other Diakonos squat at their owner’s sides, hands perched on knees and arms, waiting to be slapped or grabbed or pinched.

Not Nat.

With warrior precision, she maneuvers out of her seat and lowers herself into my lap, knees tucking beside my thighs, arms gliding around my nape. The rest of her packed tight into me, ribs and chest and hips.

My breath catches.

There’s the barest hint of blood and sweat below her citrus tang. I don’t think I’ll ever have lemonade without getting immediately erect.

“Knew you’d make it a party,” Varley grins, groping for his female to sit astride him as well.

Maxine heckles outright, throwing an orange peel at his shoe, but bastards will be bastards and it’s not minutes before the regal southern dining extravaganza is no better than a frat house with top-notch roofies.

Ignoring them all, Nat twists my hair, pulls and scrapes as she brings her lips to my ear. “You were less tense when you were rigor mortis.”

I force a smirk, unsure of where to put my hands, what we’re doing, how Nat’s going to quarter me for this. Or how to command my body to stop buzzing, and anticipating more.

“Little to fear when you’re already dead.”

A smile. A wandering fingertip dips inside the gap of my shirt to draw a nail across my sternum.

I shudder.

She smiles. “Are you scared of me, darling?”

“No.”

She licks her lips, studying me, and then slides into me, down me, grinding forward until I feel her every inhale, until my skin tightens at the burn of citrus. “Would you admit it if you were?”

Her mouth touches high on my neck, and I imagine those full lips poised in a self-satisfied smile.

“No,” she whispers, undoing a button at my chest. “Males have too much pride for that.”

“I don’t have pride, I have vanity.”

“What’s that?” Varley asks. He’s chewing on his cocktail straw, eyes glazed.

I snap back to the world outside of Nat flirting on my lap. Nat in pink, Nat gripping me. Rolling and swaying.

Clear my throat. “My female was praising my body, and I requested she be less redundant.”

I brace for a pinch or stab but Nat merely curls tighter against me, fingers sneaking into my shirt. Her grin is a red flag in the corner of my eye.

“Too much of a good thing,” Varley murmurs, watching rabidly as Nat’s tongue traces the edge of my jaw. “That’s what got you into trouble the first time.”

“I thought it was his mouth,” Brax calls, his pudgy fingers snapping his date’s bra. “And tongue.”

“Brax is right,” Maxine sneers. “Hard to believe you can speak after the work Lesenia offered.” She sets her drink on her Oceanid’s silky black hair. “Now that female was right and proper, had her skirts velcroed to the bodice so she’d never mess her face.”

Silence blows through the porch, sweeping over horror struck expressions.

If I weren’t here, they’d laugh. They’d share their own tales of my enslavement, times they’d seen my hands cut off for helping a female stand, the weeks I’d gone without eyes for daring to look at another.

Teeth nip my pulse. Nat’s whisper hauls me back to reality. “Say the word and I can remove her head with a hairpin.”

I stroke her spine in quiet thanks. Tell Maxine, “I’ve heard the Atlantides cast her out of favor. Does she continue to spend time at court? Or is she still considered … unkindly?”

Maxine’s knuckles bleach white on her knee, but Varley has survived on his skill to ignore potential danger. “She wouldn’t,” he says. “It’s been a century since she was there. Bet she could tell you the exact day.”

I can.

Same day as my sentencing.

She pushed the court too far with me. Now she must reign over the realm’s underbelly, no better than me.

“I’m debating between complete spine removal,” Nat’s voice is low and rough as she caresses my curls. “Or the ever-satisfying heartstring.”

“Who cares about such details?” I whisper back, carefully placing my palm over her hip with a gentleness akin to testing a sizzling pan. “With you on my lap, I doubt I could even pick her out of a crowd.”

Nat draws an X on my heart.

Likely marking where she’ll plunge her knife.

“It’s sweet, really,” she continues, twisting into me, angling for my hand to shift to her ass. “I open her up with a single cut down the chest and crack her ribs apart. Toss ’em, keep ’em, it won’t matter. I find the heart and string a big loopy bow around it. Tight, but not too tight. That’d be no fun.” Her mouth grazes my jaw while her nails leave half moons along my arms. “Then I dump all the stuff back in, bones, blood, car keys.” Her tongue swipes my ear, crooning threats like love songs. “Then I sew her up nice and pretty and wait.”

Beside us, Varley’s reminding me how beautiful Lesenia is. Maxine’s fuming, fisting the sleek tresses of her Nereid.

I can’t keep the mood level with Nat’s nails clawing into me, pleasure radiating out from the sting, spreading like fresh, rich wine in my blood.

“Wait?” I ask.

“Wait,” she echoes, gutting me bloody with a grin. Wild and dangerous and devastating. “The string limits the beat. The heart compensates and quickens. It beats like she’s running a marathon and another and another until splat. It bursts. Broken heart special.”

Sounds like what she’s doing to me.

“My version’s different,” I murmur, crushing the Fury into my vibrating frame. “Two to the head, one to the chest. Less mop up required. More time for this.”

“Scared to stain your nail beds? Your list of fears is mounting. What’s next, Blackguard? Your shadow?” Teeth graze my earlobe. “How many enemies must I silence to get your focus on me?”

“You want to fight for me, love?”

I’m smug.

Smug and rock hard and wondering if her pussy’s wet enough to take me. Completely ignorant to the voices around us, the stares.

“I want to fight you, Blackguard. I want to tear you apart piece by piece until you’re begging for mercy beneath me. Until you admit that I terrify you.”

“Take heed, Bloodspiller,” I warn, control wavering. “You play with fire and we both get burned.”

“I want to watch you go up in flames. I want to taste the ashes on my tongue.”

My instincts well and truly betray me, suck the calm I’ve set to the wind and form bullets of heat-seeking arousal.

Gods, the images she paints, the promises in her threats.

She could destroy me.

I’m not entirely sure I wouldn’t shatter my kneecaps begging her to.

Not if it means having her, even for a moment.

I want to be on top of her, inside her, fucking her until she screams.

Until I scream.

Until we’re hoarse and limp, and she can’t move without wincing at the imprints I made, can’t inhale without my scent wrecking her day, ruining her mind. Just like she’s done to me, with a single sloppy, public rock of her hips as she plays pretend.

“You have my focus, Bloodspiller.”

Too much of it.

I yank her closer, hands clasping her hips possessively as she grinds against me. The friction is maddening, stoking the inferno blazing inside me higher and higher.

“Careful what you wish for, love,” I growl at her ear. “I’ll ruin you for anyone else. I’ll make you crave me, ache for me, until the only name on your lips is mine.”

A throaty and wicked chuckle as she follows the curve of my throat with her tongue. “I could break you with a whisper.”

She already has.

I clutch her ass with big handfuls, pull her flush against me. Admire her pupils blown wide with desire.

“You want my focus?” I taunt, every new word gruffer than the previous. “You have it. Any time you threaten me. When you come for my blood. That godsdamned scowl.” My face falls to her neck, and I’m panting angrily with my lust. Pulse points hammering. When I draw up, I’m no less collected, murmuring, “You’re mine, Bloodspiller. Don't waste your time torturer her, keep torturing me instead.”

Her lips hover over mine. “Sin …”

A ragged word.

I quit holding back. “I might just drag you down with me. Pin you beneath me and feed you every throbbing inch of me until you almost don’t hate me.”