Page 20 of Death Will Follow

Nova rocked her hips, pressing her ass against the swell of his cock. Callan swallowed a groan, his mouth against her ear. She twisted her neck further, capturing his mouth with hers and teasing him with a swipe of her tongue along his bottom lip.

“Tell me what you want,” Callan urged. “Whatever you need, I’ll give it to you.”

Nova reached behind her, slipping a hand between their bodies. She glided her fingertips along his length before gripping him firmly at the base of his cock. Callan inhaled sharply through his teeth as she stroked him, her movements slow but firm. His fingers tensed on her hip, but he remained still, allowing her to set the pace. She continued to pump him, relishing every hitched breath and rush of air at her cheek as Callan seemingly fought the urge to thrust into her hand.

Releasing him, she rolled onto her stomach. “Show me how much you care for me.” She arched her back slightly, lifting her hips in further invitation.

Callan rose onto his knees beside her and slid a hand between her thighs, urging her legs apart and making space for him to settle himself there. Nova closed her eyes and sighed contentedly as her mate massaged her back, her ass, teasing her as ihs hands moved closer and closer to her core. She choked on a moan when he parted her, brushing his thumb over her clit before dipping it inside her. Humming his approval, Callan drew his thumb out, coated with her wetness.

“You’re impossible to resist spread before me like this,” he said as he laid on top of her, the solid weight of him pressing her into the mattress. He moved his hips forward, the head of his cock sliding along her slit. “My needy girl.”

Nova whimpered as Callan positioned himself at her opening, creating a delicious pressure as he stretched her, then lowering his hips until he filled her completely. The mattress dipped as he braced an elbow beside her head. Slipping his other arm around her chest, he laid his hand at the base of her neck and pulled her tight against him.

She moaned as he drew himself out slowly and entered her again, her skin sparking with heat at every point of contact with his long body flush with hers.

“Gods, I’ve missed you. Missed sinking into the warmth of your cunt.” He tunneled his fingers into her hair close to the scalp and tightened his grip, murmuring promises against her ear in time with each thrust.

You’re safe with me. As long as I live. No harm will come to you.

As his pace quickened, Callan’s words flowed from his lips in a frenzied stream of consciousness, the snap of his hips and firm grip across her ribs at odds with the tenderness in his voice and the delicate brush of his thumb over the pulse at her throat.

Not while I have breath. And the power to stop it.

Nova welcomed it all: his words and his cock. The inexplicable calm that flooded her whenever he was near. She slipped a hand between her thighs, stroking her clit in time with Callan’s movements.

“You’re mine,” he murmured against her ear.

“Deeper,” Nova pleaded. “I want all of you.”

Callan grazed his teeth over the point where her neck met her shoulder. Nova tilted her hips, opening herself further, and Callan bottomed out. Teeth sank into flesh, hard enough to sting but too shallow to break the skin. Nova cried out, her release coursing through her, brought on by the pleasure and pain—the possession—of Callan’s bite. With a stifled moan, her mate came soon after, his teeth still pressed to her skin.

Several moments passed before Callan lifted his body from hers. Nova turned onto her back. Leaning over her, he pressed his lips first to her forehead, then each of her eyelids and the corners of her mouth. He dipped his head lower, laying kisses as soft as butterfly wings along her collarbone and between her breasts. After tucking the blankets around them both, he settled into the mattress beside her and drew her close to his side. Fears forgotten and mind quieted for the moment, Nova drifted off to sleep with a contented smile on her lips.

Ten

Callan paced back and forth, his boots firmly packing a path across the snow-covered ground. His uncle had agreed to meet them at the abandoned village a short distance from the Estate, but he was late. The sun hung low in the late-afternoon sky, shadows gathering at the circle of trees surrounding what remained of the settlement. Callan halted his steps, exhaling sharply through his nose and flexing his fingers inside his gloves. Nova sidled up behind him, wrapping her arms around his middle and pressing her chest to his back. Her cheek resting between his shoulder blades warmed him through his cloak. He laid a hand on top of hers, the tension in his spine easing a degree.

He dared a glance over his shoulder to the ruined village, eerily silent at the bottom of the hill, and his skin prickled with goose bumps. Callan hated the place where his parents had last been seen alive. But he and Nova agreed it would be a fitting spot to tell Thorn of their plans. Callan’s gaze wandered over the broken-down buildings, roofs caved in. Weathered beams jutted up out of the underbrush like the bones of some great, decayed beast. It seemed even the birds refused to sing. The place was a tomb.

Bryn busied herself peeking through the cracked windowpanes of the few buildings that still stood. Callan narrowed his eyes on the Wyldling, as the folk of Maedwen were known, considering her for a moment. Nova was resolved to take Bryn at her word and, when Callan had voiced his doubts, encouraged him to do the same. He trusted his mate’s judgment, but part of him remained on guard, ready for the moment Bryn showed her hand.

The Wyldling had shared everything she could about Omen’s army of the Enchanted. Under the thrall herself, she’d lacked the awareness necessary to recognize any of the others specifically, but she estimated there were a thousand of them, perhaps more. It was a harsh existence, she said. Many died of starvation over the decades. Still, Callan fanned the foolish spark of hope glowing faintly deep within his chest. He pulled his gaze back to where the horses stood hitched to a rail, restless and pawing at the snowy ground beside the path leading to the Estate. Callan spat a curse for his uncle under his breath.

“He’ll be here,” Nova murmured, squeezing him reassuringly around his ribs before releasing him and standing at his side.

“I know,” he muttered. “But he’s certainly taking his sweet time.”

Just then, the horses nickered at the hammer of hoofbeats approaching. Thorn rounded the corner a moment later, riding a broad-backed mahogany mare. Dismounting without extending a greeting, he tethered his horse to the rail beside the others then turned to face his nephew, his mouth twisted in a grimace beneath his full beard.

“Why have you dragged me to this godsforsaken place?”

Callan squared his shoulders. “I’ve called you here to remember what has been forgotten.”

“What are you on about?” Thorn shook his head and made to turn for his horse, but Callan caught his uncle with a firm hand on his shoulder, keeping him in place.

“You’ve called on me to remember my vow to Nivali. I’m asking you to remember those who Omen has taken from us: Angrid and Gunnar, my mother and father. And the countless others throughout the Realm who have been stolen over the centuries since Omen formed the Shadow Court.”

Thorn jerked his shoulder out from under Callan’s hand and leaned in, bringing his face close to his nephew’s. “Perhaps you don’t recall, as you were nowhere to be found, but it was I who left this village standing as a monument to those who are gone.”