Page 33 of Ravished By the Revenant

I freeze. Try to formulate my response so it won’t take this away from me.

“Seven hundred years as a revenant takes a toll on a body, Clara.” I keep my voice level through sheer force of will. “What you see… the hands, the ear, the eye… those are the most presentable portions. The rest is worse. Leave it.”

“The rest,” she repeats.

“Leave it.”

“See, here’s the thing.” She sits up, water sluicing off her shoulders, and turns fully to face me, arms crossed on the copper rim like a magistrate at the bench. “You’ve had your mouth on every inch of me. You’ve watched me fall apart… how many times was it? I lost count somewhere around the supper tray. You know what I look like when I can’t remember my own name. And I’m not allowed to see your chest?”

“It is not a matter of allowed⁠—”

“Then what is it a matter of?” she interrupts. “Aldric. I’ve seen the glow. I’ve felt your ribs under the shirt. I’m not stupid, and I haven’t run yet. Show me.”

“Clara.”

“Show me.” Her chin lifts. “That’s not begging, by the way. That’s a demand. Note the difference.”

Resigned, I stand, and the stool scrapes across stone. I look down at her and find I have no argument left. Only fear, and I have never once let fear command me. I will not begin now, in my own washroom, before a woman with rose petals in her silver hair.

“As you wish,” I say. “Remember that you insisted.”

My fingers go to the buttons. I do not rush. Collar. Chest. Waist. The linen parts, and blue light illuminates the steam rising from her bath.

I shrug the shirt from my shoulders and let it fall.

I reveal the tattoos decorating my chest and shoulders, wolves and weapons and words no one uses anymore. I reveal my exposed ribcage and the mockery of a heart suspended in it. I reveal countless scars and stitches and missing chunks of flesh.

Clara does not speak. Her eyes travel over me, and I make myself stand still under her gaze, spine straight, hands loose at my sides.

Then I strip off my boots and unfasten my pants and step out of them as well.

My cock springs free, flushed and rock hard, the ladder of piercings gleaming, standing hard against my stomach despite the dread in me. Because of her, always because of her, because her eyes are on my body, and even terror cannot compete with that.

Clara gasps.

20

CLARA

Holy mother of medieval blacksmiths.

My gasp echoes between us while my brain performs a full system reboot. Because I’ve felt that thing through his pants. I’ve had theories. I’ve drawn mental diagrams. And every single one of them undersold it.

It’s almost as long as my forearm. I know this because I’m staring at my forearm, then at Aldric’s dick, then back at my forearm, doing math I never learned in school. Thick enough that my fingers wouldn’t meet around it. Curved upward like it’s asking a question my pussy has the answer to. A ladder of gleaming barbells climbs the underside, and there are stitches on the shaft—fine, careful stitches, like the ones scattered over the rest of him, over the ruined map of his body. Even his cock is scarred.

His balls hang heavy beneath it, groomed just like he said.

I drag my eyes up. Force myself to take in the whole picture, not just the headline. The exposed ribs. The crystal heart pulsing blue in its cage of bone. The wolves inked across his chest, the words in dead languages, the places where flesh receded. Grotesque doesn’t cover it. Neither does beautiful. He’s both at once, a cathedral that got bombed and kept standing anyway, and a thought goes through my head that makes me bite my lip.

He’s monstrous. Sexy.

Mine.

“Come here,” I purr.

Aldric doesn’t move. His jaw is set like he’s braced for a verdict, standing there in all his ruined glory, waiting for me to scream or flinch or look away.

“Aldric.” I rise onto my knees in the water, petals sliding off my shoulders. “Come. Here.”