Page 32 of Mate of a Monster

Whatever it is, it crawls beneath my ribs and hugs me there, squeezing tighter when I try to shake it. It’s buried deep in that same place I trusted before—only the warmth morphs into acid and eats away at everything.

But right now, that gaping hole he once resided in beats like a living, breathing thing, trying to seal itself one stitch at a time. I can feel each little thread winding and binding the longer the Nightkin touches me until I’m but a bag of bones, sagging against his warm flesh.

The red in his eyes seems to swirl with satisfaction.

I stare up at him, struck by how right this feels and how wrong it is to even think such a foolish thing.

“Who are you?” I whisper, more to myself than to him.

“Hellpet,” he rasps possessively. “I am yours.”

Chapter Six

Legend

“Legend.” I whip around at the sound of his voice, glaring at the bastard who finally shows up after days of silence.

“Where the fuck have you been?” I charge at Creed. “I went to the school. No one there has seen you—so where the fuck were you?”

His eyes sweep the room—hardening when they land on Arabella—before he finally allows himself to meet my gaze. “Come with me. Now.”

I’d tell him to go fuck himself if it weren’t for his wrinkled clothes and the dark circles beneath his eyes.

I follow, sweeping a hand to shut the door behind me before Arabella can pursue us, and muffling her protest.

Creed snickers ahead of me, but it’s a low, exhausted sound.

He leads me straight through the side corridor that spits us outside at the head of Mother’s garden, where the stone paths still look like they’ve been scrubbed clean every night since the first Deveraux carved them out.

This place is the soul of the Royal grounds, both literally and figuratively. The very grounds are fertilized with the ash of our ancestors, fathers included, making the grounds as sacred as the realm itself. To disrespect it, to delude it, is an act of war.

You do not fuck with the sacred grounds of our ancestors.

Yet as we push deeper into the gardens and the view opens up, there’s a patch of rot that doesn’t belong.

“What is that?”

Creed doesn’t answer, but the rot does.

The moment we step onto the grass, a smear of ink black spreads along the base of the roses, petal edges turning wet and gray as if the flowers are melting from the inside out. The air around it tastes sweet in the most nauseating way, like fruit left too long in the sun.

What would it taste like?

Creed’s arm shoots out, hitting me in the chest and bringing me to a stop.

I hadn’t even realized I’d moved closer.

“You knew this was here,” I realize.

“I may not have been seen but I’ve been watching.” His arm lowers, and he shuffles forward, stopping at the edge.

I drag in a slow breath, forcing my pulse to level even as something in my chest hooks in deeper.

“What the fuck is happening?” I ask, my voice rough. “Is this some twisted lesson of fate, demanding we prove we’re worthy of a throne we were born for? Why did you call me down here and not the others?”

Creed’s expression doesn’t shift the way it normally would when I’m pressing. His attention remains on the ground face pinched in focus.

He looks…tortured.