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Something occurs to me. I turn to Antony. “Mackenzie Malloy stole your car.”
Antony’s face flares red with fury. I laugh, but it hurts so fucking much.
Eli’s at my side in an instant, checking my bandages, stroking my hair. “Don’t laugh. You might pull your stitches.”
“I can’t help it. We just got our asses handed to us by the ultimate Valley Girl.”
Galen’s at my side, too. He injects something into my arm, and a wave of euphoria crashes over me. A scientific mind will say that I’m high on painkillers, but I know it’s the face of my Golden Boy, concern flashing in his eyes as he cares for me, protects me.
As I slip into a drug-fueled fog, the faces of my family around me bubble and morph, becoming the dark shadows of the shack, the sharp plains of Brutus’ face as he cackles maniacally, his legs stretched out in front of him, broken and useless. And I know that his death is not the end of this. His death is only the beginning.
Mackenzie Malloy is back. And for some reason, she’s in even deeper than I am.
Claudia
Eli is here. Eli is with me.
The sight and feel and scent of him sustain me through the haze of my recovery. I can’t stop grinning as I watch the Golden Boy of Stonehurst Prep wave a pair of fuzzy balls on a string for our two cats. Gizmo and Queen Boudica have become overnight friends, tearing around the ballroom after their toys before curling up in the cat tower to sleep together and lick each other’s faces.
Honestly, I get it. I want to lick Eli all over, too. I can’t get enough of the taste of him. Our kiss at the ranch was cut painfully short by the whole getting shot and nearly dying thing.
Now we’re back at Malloy Manor, I have all sorts of plans for him.
I mean, they’ve had to wait a bit, because I’m still struggling to move without shooting spasms of pain, but whatever. I’ll take being nursed back to health by three hot guys over bleeding to death any day. Now that my body is broken, my mind is a cesspool of filth and depravity involving Eli and my two other boyfriends.
Eli must have plans of his own, because he throws down the toy with a groan that soaks my panties. He circles around the sofa, leaning over me so a curl of his blond hair grazes my temple. His eyes linger on mine, filling with the fierce protectiveness that I’ve spent weeks wishing was for me.
And now it is, it is.
It’s Thanksgiving next week, and for the first time, I have something to be thankful for.
He’s all mine.
I grab Eli’s wrist, pulling him in for a lingering kiss that he returns with all the enthusiasm of a soldier coming home from the trenches. Pain flares around my wound, but I ignore it. I want to crawl into Eli’s skin and get lost.
Am I dreaming? Is he really here with me?
Who knew the way to the Golden Boy’s heart was spilling the blood of my enemies?
Or maybe it was taking a couple of bullets for him that sealed the deal.
Either way, I now have some great advice to add to a relationship book – The Mob Queen’s Guide to Romance.
Eli deepens our kiss, and my body hums with heat. I’m tired of waiting. It’s been a week of being near him, reveling in his buttercream and orange scent, wanting him to be inside me, and not being able to do anything about it.
Eli goes to pull away, to be the sensible one who doesn’t want to hurt me. I grab his shoulders and flip him onto the couch. He yelps in surprise as his feet fly through the air and he lands on top of me, his wiry muscles capturing me and something hard pressing between my legs.
It hurts. It hurts so bad I gasp and grit my teeth. But the hurt flares with something else, too. Something darker – my monster desperate to be satiated.
“How’d you do that?” Eli’s eyes widen in amazement. “You’re tiny, and you have two gunshot wounds.”
“Antony taught me.” I wiggle my eyebrows in a very Gabe-like way. “There’s lots you don’t know about me.”
“True. But I want to find out.” Eli’s fingers weave through my hair, pulling the waves back from my face so he can brush his lips to mine, touch my cheeks, and kiss along my neckline with that sinful mouth of his. It’s sweet and tantalizing, promising so much more.
Everything about Eli is so sweet and perfect and beautiful and yet… the memory of him splattered in mine and Brutus’ blood turns in my mind. I baptized him in bloodshed, and knowing he became mine over Brutus’ corpse makes every kiss that much more satisfying.
Nothing tastes as sweet as fresh blood on your lover’s lips.
