Page 65 of Pareidolia

If I slaughtered the entire town, Death and the creatures that made the world might come together to show me why shadows are meant to stay in the dark, not stalk humans and find themselves wanting.

Hours later, that same black mood approaches the cabin. Aspen rolls through the forest like a thunderstorm, and I can feel the lightning crackling against my skin.

I can tell something’s off the second he steps into the cabin. Aspen doesn’t go straight to his laptop, or to the kitchen to get a drink. His eyes search me out, and he makes his way across the room with a cloud of determination and want following him. His apathy is washed away with the heat of demand.

“Careful, little monster.” There’s danger in his eyes, danger in his desire.

“I want more.” Aspen’s eyes flash with that brilliant light again as he completely ignores my warning. “If you want me to stay, I want more.”

“More?” I can’t fathom what else I could possibly give. I’ve shared my hunts with him, my shadows. There are pieces of me buried in the depths of his chest that bind him to me in ways only death could shatter. I don’t have more to give.

“You’ve shown me hate and desire and fear. I know what it feels like to die, but I don’t know what it feels like to want to live. What does it feel like to want something so much you’d change yourself for it?” The question comes on the wings of confusion, on the edge of confession. “You said you could give me anything I wanted, any emotion I need.” He steps forward and shoves his finger to the center of my chest, to the place where a heart would beat if I had one. “I want you to show me what love feels like.”

CHAPTER 26

ASPEN

Love.

It’s an emotion I’ve never felt, never experienced. It’s something I’ve never wanted.

Until now.

And I know whatever Nox shows me isn’t going to be the love that people talk about in movies, or in books. It’s not going to be the thing little boys and girls dream of when they’re young.

Love between a monster and a man who is empty inside is never going to be beautiful—it’s going to be as toxic and broken as we are.

Nox changed me. I want a love that’s all consuming, that’s jagged teeth and sharp claws. I want a love that’s going to eat me from the inside out, that will fill all my empty spaces and place my beating heart on its tongue.

I want a love that will devour me until the idea of Aspen as a word that exists alone is erased from the world—that the very thought of it would mean death.

All consuming.

I want the exact kind of love that only Nox can give.

At first he says nothing—he just moves, circling around me slowly like he’s trying to size up the shape of my request. I don’t fight it as he strips me out of my jacket, my gloves, as he drags his claws along the back of my shirt and shreds the fabric until it’s in tatters on the floor.

“Do you know what you’re asking?” He doesn’t pause his movements as he questions me. Nox strips me until I stand nude in front of him, and I shake my head.

“No, I don’t… which is exactly why I am. You did this, Nox.” I take a step back, because whatever is about to happen, it doesn’t need to be in this cabin.

It needs to be on the earth.

Against the ground and amongst the trees.

It needs to be in the place where Nox exists between one shadow and the next.

“I did this?” He stalks me from the house, his expression dangerous and his wings unfurling the second we step under the moonlight. Giant, flickering red and white.

Eyes.

Eyes and that soft thrum that promises everything and delivers nothingness.

“You changed me—you showed me what it is to want. I’m greedy now.” I take another step back, digging my toes into the rocks and soil beneath my feet. This feels good, even as the cold air bites at my skin and makes my nipples hard.

This feels right.

“Greedy… greedy, greedy. Greedy little monster.” I shiver at the change in his voice, the way it goes deeper and darker. I’ve been around him enough now to realize when Nox slips from the thing that lures people into the woods to the thing that devours.