Page 66 of Godless Saints

I ripped my hand free the second we reached the side entrance. He glanced at me. Said nothing. Just stared at the empty space between us. I moved past him, stepping inside. The kitchen reeked of whiskey, fried bread, gun oil, and cologne. Narrow corridors. Crimson runners worn thin by generations of bloody boots. Low ceilings. Everything felt older and meaner than Aster.

I stepped deeper into Thorn territory.

Voices crashed from the common room. Loud. Drunk. Feral. Laughter. Glass shattering. A chair breaking. Chaos that would have Aster security swarming like vultures. Here the kitchen staff didn’t even look up.

Cillian didn’t flinch.

“Do you always sound like you’re running a fucking fight club in here?” I muttered.

“Oh, this is nothing. You should be here when it’s not fall break,” he replied, clearly amused.

I exhaled through my nose. “Deeply concerning.”

He grinned and finally let his palm settle on my lower back. My body reacted instantly. A traitorous shiver. Heat curling low and unwanted. I forced distance between us, refusing to melt into him like a fool.

We slipped through a side passage Mikhail had supposedly cleared. I was now placing my life in the hands of Cillian Ashbourne and Mikhail Lovchy. A Russian whose smile was too smooth and whose stare suggested he’d killed men for far less inconvenience than escorting an Aster heir through Thorn territory.

Absolutely fucking brilliant.

The grand foyer opened ahead. I stopped. Black wood stairwell. Bloodied Ashbourne ancestors stared down from cracked frames. All pale eyes and weapons. The air smelled of old wood and gun oil.

YIELD NOTHING. BLEED EVERYTHING.

Cillian followed my gaze. “Family values.”

“That explains so much about you.”

He didn’t deny it.

Another roar erupted from the common room. I tensed. Cillian shifted, putting his body between me and the noise.

“We go up the back stairs,” he murmured against my ear. “Straight to my room. No one sees you.”

“If someone does—”

“They won’t.” His hand settled on my lower back again, guiding me up the stairs. “And if they do, I deal with it. You don’t.”

The door barely clicked shut before Cillian crowded me. I slammed my palm against his chest and shoved him back a step, claiming the space first.

He still crashed into me, driving my back against the wood with a dull thud that rattled my ribs. I grunted into his mouth, hands already moving. I yanked fistfuls of wet hair and twisted hard enough to sting.

“Fuck, baby, you’re always so rough with me. Keep going. I fucking love it when you get mean.”

He groaned, the sound dragging down my spine. His thigh shoved between mine anyway, heat bleeding through damp fabric straight against my cock.

I let go of his hair. He spun me, pressed me hard against the door, and kicked my feet aside, spreading them.

I hissed as he smashed me into the door. His hands clamped my waist, fingers biting like they already owned the bruises they’d leave. My pulse hammered under the fresh cut on my collarbone. “Stop manhandling me like one of your thugs, Ashbourne,” I snarled, twisting and pushing him back. I shoved his soaked shirt up his back. Nails scraped rain-slick muscle, marking territory.

Cillian tore free just long enough to shrug the unbuttoned shirt off and throw it aside. “You’re mine, so if I want to manhandle you, I fucking will. Just like I’m going to ruin you on that bed behind me tonight.”

I didn’t let him finish the taunt. Grabbed the waistband of his boxing shorts, the same black ones from the ring, and stripped him. Fabric dragged down his thighs. Heavy wet slaps hit the floor. My clothes followed.

Cold rain on fevered skin. Hard muscle. The electric first press of bare cock against bare cock. I pushed him backward toward the bed, harder than necessary. He let me, the smug bastard, eyes locked on mine like he was still winning. Aggression. Good. Let him read it that way.

Sex with girls was easy. This wasn’t. Trust sat heavy. So did the not knowing. Would he hurt me? No. He wouldn’t. He was always too fucking preoccupied with making me feel too good. It annoyed me. Really. But it let me relax, just a fraction. I’d rather die than let him know that, though.

My gaze dragged over him hungrily despite myself. Black crosses on his neck. A kiss print near his pulse. Thorned vines. A cracked cathedral window over his heart. And there, near the base of his thumb, small and painfully recent, a black crescent moon.