35. Nat

35

Nat

under his hands

Sin stops. In the middle of everything. Just stops. I knock into him on a sway. His fingers wrap around mine and squeeze, but it’s all the attention I get.

He’s glancing over the crowd, finding spots of dark power, signaling with his free hand. Quick, sharp signals, a code made for battle. He finishes the silent communication, nodding at whatever response is given and then snaps his eyes to mine. “I’m taking you home and we’re going to bed.”

“Why can’t we stay?” Why can’t we live here in this happy bubble?

“Because I don’t want to get arrested for what I’m going to do to you.”

Sin’s possessive touch coasts down my hip to curl around my pelvis and press between my thighs. I gasp. Plant my feet. “I can’t.”

“A Fury admitting defeat.” Teeth graze my shoulder as he applies firm pressure to the seam of my shorts. “I’d never thought I’d see it.” He kisses my shoulder. “Fine. You want to do it here? Whatever makes you happy.”

His gaze jumps to the ignorant mortals, and the corner of his mouth lifts. He doesn’t say it, but his lips move, form the word fear .

Cold wind batters the bar. Chaos erupts.

Hades, I barely register it. The jerked stop to the music. The shouts of terror. The stampede of fleeing mortals.

Despite the surge of power, Sin doesn’t flinch, his body doesn’t strain. He instigates a frenzied exodus without his rich purple gaze straying from mine.

A suggestive glint dances in his eyes, and on his perfect mouth is a smirk that tells me this isn’t remotely close to the depth of his power. He said mortals were easier to crack. I didn’t realize he meant he could decimate them with a whisper.

Boots crunch over shattered glass, four Blackguard peeling from their corners and stalk evenly toward the doors.

Fear could never drive them away.

They’re leaving for their brother. Not for manipulation. They’d never surrender to fear, never splinter, never be shoved out.

Heroes.

They were heroes once.

Their auras ripple as they move side by side. Atlas, Rune, Drake, and Lev. Former heroes, now encased in dense black, each giving me the same warning look. Don’t break him .

I wonder if the first drop of black on their souls happened when they still wore Hope’s shield.

Fury code is to protect by any means. There’s doesn’t seem different.

“Keep making eyes at them and I’ll make them stay and watch,” Sin threatens.

I almost take him up on it. Just to see if I’m right that Atlas would watch silent and revolted, Drake would stare at the ceiling, hands in his pockets, Zeke would share helpful, if not unnecessary, tips, and Lev would be too black out drunk to remember he ever saw Sin railing me.

Sin knows.

His fingers press on my core harder, near pinching to build a smoldering ache.

I tear my gaze to him, to seven feet of gold skin and wicked intent. Dark energy surrounds him, desire and power that make him every bit the God he is. He leans in close, breath hot against the shell of my ear. “Let go, Natasa. Give in to what you want. What you need. Give in to me.”

A shudder runs through me, my resolve crumbling under his words, the promise in his touch.

In one fluid motion, he hoists me up. My legs instinctively wrap around his waist as he carries me towards the bar. The coarse denim of his jeans and his hard length entice me to grind down against him.

With his elbow, Sin sweeps the bar top clear, sending glasses and bottles flying to the floor before he sets me in the polished wood, tongue marking trails up my neck, over my bare shoulders.

I wrench an errant glass shard from his forearm, watch the shimmery pink steadily drip down the jagged edge.

“Want to kiss it better?” he asks, prying apart my thighs for his body to slot between.

“I could kill you with this.”

He grins.

Pulls me to him and claims my mouth in a wild, bruising kiss, stealing my breath with rough, demanding caresses. Teasing me with the way he licks into me, claiming with long, tempting sweeps.

The shard drops from my hand, bouncing off the bar, the shatter an echo in the empty club.

Neither of us care.

My threat collapses under itself, utterly empty and I arch into him, push fingers in his shirt, snapping buttons, drunk on the feel of him. The frantic desperation that matches mine.

Is this the last time?

Tomorrow brings Lesenia and Theia. Answers. Goodbyes.

He tears his mouth away to trail searing kisses down the column of my throat, and I hide the thought into the far reaches of my mind.

“You won’t, though, will you love? You’ll never kill me. You like me.”

Such confidence, he doesn’t wait for my answer.

His teeth nip at my pulse point and I push at him, a moan escaping my lips. I reach for my shorts, savaging the two tight buttons. He’s right there helping, like we’re both expecting someone to burst in on us with a flashlight and silly string and shout, Time’s up .

“Hurry,” I rasp.

He yanks them down and off my legs. A litany of sweet curses fall from his lips, and he licks up my calf, over my knee, along the line of muscle in my thigh.

“I’m going to take you apart, piece by piece,” he vows against my flesh. “Until all you know, all you feel, is me.”

His lips trail higher, creating a path of destruction for his hands to clean up, gripping too hard, too hungry in every spot, mapping every curve, every dip. Right when he reaches my apex, he pauses, peering up at me through long lashes. “Say my name if it becomes too much.”

I cut him a look. “I don’t need a safe word.”

“I know. I just like hearing you say my name.”

The reply should sound self-serving and arrogant, but instead it hits me like a plea.

I nearly grant it, chest tight as a bow, throat swollen.

Then he sets his mouth to my core, and I nearly fly off the counter at the sensation. He doesn’t lick, he tastes , perfect tongue giving a flat, firm pressure everywhere I need, sucking where he needs, working me over gradually, as if tomorrow is a lifetime away.

He spreads my knees farther and I topple back onto my hands, splashing in spilled beer and broken glass.

“ Hades ,” I gasp, fingers scratching through his cropped hair to hold his face against me. Lazily sucking, he hums in approval, the vibrations inducing shockwaves of pleasure. His tongue swirls and flicks.

Lazy, tentative, exploring.

Like I’m a book he’s not sure he’ll buy, leafing through to the good parts.

At last, he finds just what he’s looking for. I whimper, snapping my legs over his ears, tensing. Exploration over.

He doesn’t stop. Sin sucks at me desperately. At the spot that rockets spots to my eyes, that shoves me to my elbows, bows my back, pushing me to the peak I’m fighting.

He sucks as if I’m filled with poison, and he exists to ensure I survive.

I’m rocking against him, letting him take it, selfish and hungry, shuddering. Two fingers press inside me and curl as his lips envelop my aching clit.

It’s almost too much, the dual sensations threatening to undo me completely.

And he can sense it, the turning tides of the battle, a closed off exit, a spent clip, a dull blade. He knows exactly when he has me, when he’s won. He plunges a third finger into me, breaking through what’s too much and surging over it, sucking and thrusting, groaning at the sloppy wet sounds we’re making.

I’m shaking my head back and forth, falling apart in his arms. Finally, his name bursts forth like a war cry.

And I should’ve known it wasn’t a safe word.

He knows too much doesn’t exist to me.

Knows Furies don’t surrender weapons. If we battle, it’s to the death.

He groans and says something that might be stubborn fucking Fury as he finger fucks me. As he forces my back flat on the bar, leaving my head hanging over the edge, sending my blood rushing.

With godly strength, he lifts my hips. Raising them high in the air for him to better to eat and suck and torture me. He bites the inside of my thigh, puncturing tender skin, and then, as if he’s aware that I’m bracing for the next bite, he blows cool air over my core, a gentle breeze that ripples through my center.

I jerk, heart slamming, and he lovingly, softly mutters, “Let me stay here forever.”

I lose it. Struck down by prayer and divine coaxing. Having never felt more treasured, more worshipped and beautiful. My back arches over the bar as I tumble into blissful surrender. His name a chant, a white flag, a retreat.

He works me through the orgasm, drawing out every last shudder and moan until I collapse back, spent and trembling.

I wait for his smug retort, that was easy , or for the slam of humiliation. I push to my elbows to endure my shame.

His forehead rests on my knee, his hands clasp my thighs. His breathing is uneven, as harsh as mine.

Oh Gods. I hurt him. I scramble forward, forcing the limp muscle to strain, feeling like I’m pushing through wet sand, sliding my palm over his cheek. “Sin?”

He nestles his face into my hand and turns, lashes glistening, mouth wet. “Say it the other way.”

A broken plea.

Not the male he shows the world, who performs and dazzles. This is the male in the shower, a child without love, a male yearning for it despite having it used against him, letting it ruin him.

“Sin.”

His eyes shutter closed, lips tender on my thigh. “Again.”

I’ve just lost, and he’s not disappointed, not disgusted. He doesn’t think less of me. I stroke his cheek, my heart swelling with an unfamiliar tightness. “Sin,” I whisper.

The purple returns, fluttering free, brilliant and glimmering with raw emotion. In that instant, I see him—truly see him. Not the swaggering Demigod, but the male beneath, yearning for connection.

For me.

He rises slowly, brushing feather-light kisses up my body. Over the curve of my hip, the dip of my waist, the swell of my breasts. Each brush reignites the embers of my desire to a roaring flame.

Once he gets to my mouth, he hesitates. Searches my face for permission. I answer by raking my fingers across his shorn hair and pulling him down into me. His fingers locate the hem of my shirt, rip it over my head in one swift motion.

Cool air pebbles my skin.

Sin’s molten gaze rakes over me, a mix of hunger and reverence.

A Goddess.

He thought I was a Goddess.

And I feel like it. Under his gaze, his reverence.

It’s different this time—slower, deeper. A melding of souls rather than a clash of wills. His tongue sweeps over mine, and I moan at the taste of wine and Sin and me.

In a flagrant show of strength, he hauls me into his powerful arms and turns our kiss searing. I grip the sculpted planes of his back, nails sinking in as I hold him closer.

Sin carries me across the empty club, our lips never parting, until we’re in the center of the floor, where he drew me to dance and I told him yes. He’s quick then, unzipping his pants, shoving leather down on wide thighs, hooking his arms under my ass and hauling me up his body.

I will myself to be still, refusing to wiggle or take control. Terrified to ruin this moment for him. Terrified I might snap and run again. Instead, I open my mouth over his, the tip of my tongue whisking along his bottom lip in a smooth slick caress.

A groan escapes him, the sound slow and sinful. “You ready?”

“Are you still talking?”

A taunt. A challenge.

Exposed flesh against his, I sink my nails into his shoulders, gasping as the thick head of his length nudges my core. “One day,” he whispers, tormenting me with the shallow stroke of his cock. “One day you will ask nicely for me. Say please with those pretty lips.”

I smirk at him and snake my hands over his shoulders and down his back, feeling the tension in his muscles as he holds himself back. “Well, until then, you—”

He thrusts inside me. A long, smooth stroke, entirely too deep and devastating, and yet filling me perfectly.

Our moans rein together.

I shut my eyes at the surge of frisson, the fullness.

“I don’t know.” His voice is ragged, a shudder racks his body. “How I ever thought I could resist you.”

It’s like he’s reading it from my thoughts.

Seated inside me, long and stiff, the wet drip of our arousal paints streaks down my ass. I lift with my elbows on his shoulders, and fall over him in a deep stroke.

It changes the angle, the depth, and blasts heat down my spine. “Fuck,” I hiss, mouth connecting with his, whispering his name, praising him with nips of my teeth.

He rewards my enthusiasm with a thrust, severe, firm, red-hot. We move together without speaking, panting and kissing, his hand fisting my hair. Then his rhythm quickens, the intensity ratcheting.

Our moans echo off the empty walls. The lights are half on, the glass front of the bar is unblocked.

Anyone could spot us.

The knowledge should anger me or embarrass me that anyone could see a Fury twisting mind-melting pleasure from a cursed soul.

Instead, it makes me proud. The idea that any mortal or creature walking by could observe me being the object of Sin’s affection gives me confidence.

I’m be proud to be with him.

It’s over before it begins. I’m wet and swollen and sensitive, and when his hips snap up into me, feeling like he’s in my ribs, I shatter. Finding pleasure like it’s my purpose. I groan into his mouth, clutching him, mumbling yes and yes and yes .

As if he’s only waiting for me to catch up, Sin delivers a final, powerful thrust and tosses his head back, teeth clenched as he finishes inside me. He stumbles to the nearest wall, pinning me to the cool dark surface, still nestled deep within me. Maps a fiery path along my jaw, nips and sucks, marking me as his own.

“You … Gods … Nat. I …” He drags his mouth over my skin.

“The Passion of Athens. Speechless.” I lick at his neck. “How disappointing.”

His laugh is honeyed and exhausted and beautiful. Real.

It washes over me like a caress on my soul.

Like chipping ice off a windshield, piece by piece we peel apart, exposing sweat slick skin to the bar’s overworked AC. Sin uses his shirt to clean between my legs, kissing my shoulder before he retrieves my clothes.

“Let’s get home,” he says. “And get to bed.”

I step into my shorts, buttoning. “I’m not tired.”

“Did I ask if you were?” He frees my hair from my shirt collar, cascading it over my shoulders. “We’re doing that again, on thousand count sheets, with a pillow under your hips and an ice maker on standby until I drift asleep inside you, and dream about my name on your lips.”

Yes .

Yes to all of it.

Except. “We’re not sleeping together.”

“I can negotiate the cuddling down to full contact, no penetration.” He reels me into him, brushing a strand of my cheek. “That’s my final offer.”

“I can’t.”

“Nat, I love the chase, but let me catch my breath.”

“I can’t ,” I repeat, stern, becoming a Fury again. “I could hurt you. I—”

The icy thought tears me from him, placing distance between us.

Waking up in his blood, seeing his face frozen. That cold dead stare absent of color.

I shake my head, rubbing warmth into my biceps. “I won’t. I have no control when I’m out. What if something happened?”

“Love, you already tried to strangle me in your sleep. May have succeeded. Things got fuzzy for a moment there, but I’m here, aren’t I?”

Horror skitters across my chest.

He thinks he’s teasing.

This is funny to him.

I can’t breathe. I rush out the doors. Memories pound at me. Blindly feeling for a pulse in a limp cold hand. Scrubbing blood off my nails. Bleaching sheets.

Humidity tackles me outside, heat following its wake. It’s late, the street is empty as I turn left, then right.

Again . My stomach drops to my feet. Once is a mistake. Twice is a nightmare.

It’s me. Who I am. I destroy. I run.

A joke of a Fury. I’ll never belong.

“Where are you going?” Sin catches me from running, a furrow in his brows.

“I …” I choke on the words, frustration and fury bringing tears to my eyes and a knot to my throat, feeling everything slipping through my fingers. “I strangled you.”

Sin doesn’t understand. “Nat, you are not the first creature to try to end me in the sheets, though you gave the best effort. I can handle it.”

“Why? Because you’re a son of Ares? Because there is some silver in your blood?” I’m heaving, snarling. He doesn’t get it. Doesn’t understand. I shove him away. “Don’t touch me. Don’t come near me.”

He doesn’t listen. Instead, reeling me into him and gathering me up, steel arms locking around my waist as he sets his cheek to my temple. “You can’t kill me, Nat.” He plucks a black-handled knife from his belt and forces it into my hand.

I don’t grab it, terrified of what I’ll do with it.

“Kiss me.”

“I attacked you.”

“I’m forgiving. Kiss me.”

It’s not about forgiveness, it’s about control. About awareness, and my own choices. Which are never quite aligned with reality, with my biology. The same reason I never fit in with the Erinyes is why I stand out in the empty night here with him.

I shove out of his embrace. “I can see what you’ve done. The killing, the lying. I was created to purge it, to cleanse the realm of your misdeeds. To eviscerate you.”

“You think a saint will fuck you like I can?” He takes an even step to me, ringed fingers outstretched, treating me like an animal even as he argues the opposite. “I am yours, Nat. You need to realize it. I can take whatever you lay—”

“You can’t .”

“Let me fucking try!” He snares my wrist, wrapping his fingers around the blade of the knife I don’t even remember accepting. Ichor spills from his cut palm, and he lets it sizzle against my skin. “You have me. You had me the first time you tried to kill me and every time after. I’m yours. Honestly, if you stopped trying to end me, I’d be insulted.”

He is half Olympian.

I hesitate. He’s strong. Strong in every way Evan wasn’t. Hardened.

My grip goes slack, and Sin wipes the blade clean on his thigh before tucking it into my back pocket and yanking me into him.

“Let me try,” he murmurs against my temple. “Please Nat, I think it might be the only thing I’ve ever wanted.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

I’m not sure I’d survive it.

“You won’t,” he assures, all Divine confidence. He draws back just far enough to look into my eyes, hands cradling my face. “Stay,” he implores quietly. “Stay and let us see where this takes us. Please. Want me. Want me like I want you.”

It’s not about want.

He kisses me. He tastes like wine and kisses like a siege, overwhelming and endless, killer.

A brisk night breeze envelops us. The sound of our labored breathing and passing cars fill my ears as I feel myself being swept away in the moment.

What if he’s right?

“Sin.” I clutch at him, glorying in his touch, and the hammer of his heart. I lose again, eager for him to fuck me on the street as he yanking me tighter into his chest, sheltering me as a cool breeze whips at my cheeks.

Yet doubt continues to scrape at me. Fear. I pull away. “Stop, I—”

“Kiss me, Nat. Kiss me and I’ll take care of the rest. Please, fucking hell, please . Want me,“ he rasps. “Love me. At least try.”

How could I not? I scrape my fingers over his cut hair, marveling at the texture. His dazzling eyes lock on mine, and briefly, I believe that we can survive. That if we kissed like this until the day he died, he’d swagger up the banks of the Lethe and bend a knee before my aunts.

It’s a sweet fantasy.

A son of Ares. Could he be the one male who can survive me?

Who I could love, faults and all?

I grip him closer and inhale his scent, committing it to memory. The idea of us outlasting tomorrow swarming.

I’ve always been drawn to him, even when I knew I shouldn’t be. But now, under these streetlights and in his arms, it feels like anything is possible.

I kiss him. Desperate despite just having him.

Why can’t I have more?

Day and night are boring, rigid. The beauty lies in the sunset.

With Sin.

Before it’s truly begun, Sin retreats abruptly, leaving me cold and exposed as he releases my mouth, steps backward.

I glance up at him, lips stinging. I’m confused as he takes a step back.

His eyes are no longer filled with warmth but crowded with a distant, wounded look.

“We can’t do this,” he says, his voice scarcely above a whisper.

My heart stops.

But the beat returns forcefully. Angrily.

I laugh, because he’s such an ass. Needing to get me back for teasing him. I cross my arms. “Should we find somewhere with tile? How about a room packed with people we can kick out?”

His eyes carefully seal. “Fuck.” He scrubs his neck and there, loping out from the black band of his curse, is a sliver of blue. A bruise, already healing. Roughly in the shape of my hand.

He doesn’t seem to notice.

He’s strong. That much is undeniable. He’d held me down, stolen my strength and still found his pleasure.

Maybe Evan was my test. Maybe only the strongest of us have to make impossible choices, endure impossible things.

Strength is developed in a safety of the crucible, but power, pure vicious Godly might, is made right in the brutal heart of the flame.

“Forget what I said.” He slides his hand across his hair, only belatedly realizing it’s cut and ends up scratching light pink trails over his skull. “Fuck. Nevermind, Nat. I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. You don’t want me. I should’ve listened. I was wrong.”

He takes another step back, shaking his head. “I didn’t realize I was doing it. Fuck . That’s a lie.” He laughs, rough and dry, humorless. Stares up at the sky. “I’m a fucking liar.”

I gape at him.

Forget what he said? About me ? About us ? About staying and wanting?

Hurt slams into me, chased by panic and doubt.

But then he laughs again, and it’s deprecating, hateful. A sound that doesn’t belong in his tenor. “See. Gods, you were right. We’re not good together. I lie all the time and it’s not for some greater purpose. It’s to cover up the truth.”

I close my eyes against the statement, the mortification that comes with it.

Just moments ago, he was begging. We were …

This is what he does.

He charms and seduces. He told me that’s what he does, what he wants. So what if he seemed genuine?

He’d seemed genuine at Hedone and Maxine’s. Didn’t he call Oberlin his friend?

“Of course you already know I am a liar.” Another mean laugh from his perfect mouth. “You see it all.”

I shake my head, tears threatening. Force my eyes to the ground, afraid he might see. “What’s going on?” I demand, a new sort of sickness rolling in my stomach.

“Fuck. Fuck .“ He’s shouting, struggling to pull hair that isn’t there, ramming knuckles into his temple.

I start toward him, stop. Collect myself. “Stop laughing like that.”

Sin won’t meet my eyes. He scrapes his hand over his jaw and sighs. Turns around, long legs striding down the sidewalk, away from me.

“Where in the three realms are you going?” I shout after him, my heart whimpering in its little cage. “Get back here. We’re fighting!”

He doesn’t slow his pace. “I’m not.”

The words are an icy slap.

I’m not even worth a fight.

Hurt expands, consuming me, smothering me.

Sin jogs across the crosswalk, and I’m vibrating with rage, seething, crumbling. I fetch my knife, his knife, and launch it at him. It flies straight and true, soaring through the night, slicing toward the back of his head when a single orange petal bursts from the tip.

My lungs empty.

The blade explodes into petals. A rainbow of color sprinkling lightly over the street.

A voice meets me coolly, peacefully, like it’s tangled in the wind. “I don’t know what the mortals law says, but in the Underworld, we kill anyone who’s mean to our children.”