I was floating, falling, dizzy with the need to tear both of us down until nothing was left. Rans’ cock pounded against my G-spot, combining with the pressure against my clit to drive me inexorably toward something ugly and devastating... and painfully, inescapably necessary. I could feel him rushing toward the same cliff, desperate and self-destructive.
He groaned—an animal noise. His hand around my throat dragged my head to the left. An instant later, his fangs sank into the juncture of my neck and shoulder with the unexpected abruptness of a striking snake.
I shrieked and struggled and came; fought and sobbed and came even harder, my pussy clamping around his dick while his jaws clamped around my flesh. Every muscle in my body went taut as I felt him follow me into release, pouring his animus into me as he growled against my bitten flesh.
We ended up in a sweaty heap, still draped over the back of the couch. Tears traced rivulets down my face, while two dribbles of blood trailed down my right breast from the twin punctures in my shoulder.
“I’m afraid I’ll get you killed if you stay,” I rasped eventually, my voice completely wrecked.
Rans rested his forehead against my back for a long moment. I felt cool breath sigh out against my skin, chasing shivers down my spine.
“Yes... well. It does seem rather unavoidable now,” he said. “Though it hardly matters if I stay or leave at this point.”
And then he was lifting me upright, steadying me on my feet, still holding me facing away from him, his arms wrapped around me from behind. I stood there, very still, with bruises on my hips, blood on my chest and my sex aching from the abuse it had just received. How fucked up was it that I now felt about a hundred times better than I had before?
It was really, really fucked up, I decided. But that didn’t make it any less true. Fresh strength flooded my limbs, the pain and creakiness in my joints a fast-fading memory. My mind felt clearer, my head no longer ached, and the insatiable pit lurking in my chest and belly no longer threatened to consume me from the inside out.
“Please talk to me properly now,” I whispered.
I felt the softening of his stance at my back—felt him giving in.
“I will, Zorah,” he promised quietly.
* * *
The shower in the little cottage might have been fairly lackluster, but the water coming from the tap was hot, and the old claw-foot tub was big enough for two. I lay back between Rans’ legs, resting against his chest and letting the water lap against my chin. With luck, the warm bathwater would help to soak away the chill of what I suspected I was about to learn.
Rans’ voice was low and even. “A life-bond is an unbreakable connection between two individuals. It’s forged through the exchange of blood, and sealed using a certain kind of crystal imbued with demon magic. It becomes permanent upon the destruction of that crystal.”
I swallowed. “So... when you talked about my death causing your death, you were being literal?”
“Very.” His hands didn’t move from where they rested across my belly.
“Where did you get the crystal?” I asked, as a way to avoid the question that I really needed answered.
“I stole it. From Nigellus. I stopped in Atlantic City on my way from Chicago to Dublin.” He paused for a beat. “Of course, I expect he’ll be quite cross once he notices it’s missing. Especially since I had the unmitigated cheek to ask for the use of this cottage right after I’d nicked it.”
Great. So I’d managed to drive a wedge not only between Rans and Albigard, but him and Nigellus as well.
I steeled myself. “I’m human, Rans. Well, mostly. Even if I don’t get killed before then, I’ll die of old age in fifty or sixty years. If we’re... magically tied together somehow, what happens to you then?”
His voice was level. “About what you’d expect.”
Denial suffused me, and I twisted in his grip. “Why would you do that?”
He met my gaze and held it. “Why would you sneak away behind my back and go to Dhuinne?”
I pushed away from his body, scooting around to sit at the other end of the tub, facing him—our legs tangled together under the water. Unfortunately, if I’d wanted space, a bathtub had probably been an unwise venue for the discussion, but oh, well.
“I told you,” I said. “I needed to find Dad, and I wanted to make sure you wouldn’t get killed trying to protect me when and if Caspian and his goons found us and descended in force.”
So instead, he’s going to get killed whenever I end up getting killed... whether that’s tomorrow or decades from now. Good one, Zorah.
My throat grew tight.
“You should have talked to me instead of running,” he said in a low tone. Then he sighed, and eased back, consciously relaxing his frame. “How did you manage it, anyway? You didn’t take money, or even Guthrie’s credit card.”
There was no point in trying to hide the details from him. Not now.
“When you gave me your phone after we left the newspaper office in Chicago and sent me ahead to the car, I thought it would be a good idea to transfer some of the important phone numbers to my burner phones for emergencies,” I explained. “You told me to call A.C. if you didn’t come back. That was obviously Nigellus. Guthrie was in there, too, and it wasn’t hard to figure out who Tink was supposed to be.”
“Ah.”
“It was pretty obvious that Nigellus and the other people you talked to that night weren’t going to be able to help us. Not without taking forever, anyway. You knew it. I knew it,” I continued. “My dad had already been in Fae custody for
