Page 118 of Something Handsome This Way Comes

“Will do. And uh, Pembrooke?”

“Yeah?” Milo said through the crack in the half-closed door.

“Thanks for not ratting us out.”

“I’ve got you covered,” Milo said, his chest feeling warm.

“Oh, and don’t forget, succubus venom only wears off at sunrise, and that is,” he checked a nonexistent watch on his wrist. “At least three hours away. So, uh, good luck.”

Milo’s shoulders fell.

Oh, bright Lantern, give me the strength not to poison this man.

“I fucking hate you so much right now. Fuck you.” Milo yell-whispered to the giggling baker as he escaped down the front steps.

“No thanks! I’ll leave that to the big guy!” Rowen called back, then, with a captain’s salute, disappeared down the lane.

CHAPTER SIX

milo

“I’m going to kill him. I’m really going to do it.” Milo mumbled as he examined himself in the vanity mirror. “He has officially baked his last bun.”

“Pip will help kill his buns.”

“How about you leave his buns alone and take on Ralph.”

Pip hissed behind him.

“Inferior familiar. I will tear off his worm tail.”

“That’s the spirit,” Milo said, then thought better of it. “You know I’m joking, right, Pip?”

“Yes, yes, yes,” Pip said, waving a leg in the mirror’s reflection, “I understand the chasm.”

Milo flinched as he applied some salve to a bruise along his bicep.

“Hells.”

He was hurting all over. His spine felt as though someone had tied him into a pretzel in at least three anatomically questionable directions. And his hips… fuck, his hips just felt like one giant bruise, protesting every single micromovement. He had a mild headache too and…

Milo giggled to himself. He couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t help the bubble of mirth.

He looked like he’d lost a fight with a mountain troll, so then… then why was he so giddy? Even as he inspected himself, he couldn’t help the stupid grin from overtaking his face.

Because I’m a fucking lunatic, that’s why.

But instead of looking for wounds, it felt more like a hunt for pieces of a story. Clues on just how good Milo got it last night. He couldn’t stop searching for more.

“Lanterns,” Milo muttered, pulling his collar aside.

There were teeth marks on his shoulder. Teeth marks on his chest, around his nipple. A particularly colorful bruise wrapped around his hip where some eldritch horror with four fingers had apparently grabbed him hard enough to leave marks.

But of all his battle scars, his favorite mark of all⁠—

Milo craned his neck to the side, revealing the now scabbed-over wound.

His mating mark.