Total pages in book: 165
Estimated words: 159487 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 797(@200wpm)___ 638(@250wpm)___ 532(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 159487 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 797(@200wpm)___ 638(@250wpm)___ 532(@300wpm)
“We’ll table this for now,” he growled. “But you’ve got a hell of a lot of explaining to do later.”
Severin wiped blood from the corner of his mouth with the back of one hand. His broken oculars were gone, and without them his pale blue eyes looked strangely exposed. Maybe it was only because Cassie had gotten used to seeing them on him, but without them he looked less like a cold scientist and more like a wounded man trying desperately not to show how much the wound mattered.
“If there is a later,” he said quietly.
Cassie’s stomach dropped.
“What does that mean?” she asked.
Severin didn’t answer. He only turned and pointed toward the horizon.
Cassie followed his gaze. At first she didn’t understand what she was seeing. The mist along the ravine floor seemed to be moving—rippling in a long gray-green wave.
Then the wave resolved into shapes—too many shapes. Dozens—no, hundreds—of Visskous bodies were lurching and crawling and running in that horrible jerky way the Infected moved…
And they were coming straight toward the tower—straight toward them.
“Clearly we’ve been scented,” Severin said in his cool, practical way, as though he was discussing the weather and the possibility of light precipitation later instead of the fact that a zombie hoard was headed their way.
Cassie looked around wildly, but there was nowhere to hide. The tower rose behind them, skeletal and exposed. The ravine stretched to either side, black stone and broken fencing offering no real cover. The bunker was far behind them and already lost. The Infected were ahead—pouring out of the mist like a nightmare made of teeth and hunger.
Ravik picked up his shock blade and Severin retrieved his broken oculars from the grass. He looked at them once, then discarded them and drew his plasma pistol.
Cassie forced herself to stand, though her legs shook and her head throbbed. No one spoke because there was nothing to say.
They were trapped with no way out.
47
RAVIK
Ravik stared at the herd of Infected coming across the broken ground and tried to make his mind work like it used to.
Count the enemy. Look for weapons. Look for cover. Look for high ground. Protect the female. Protect Sev, even if Sev was a lying bastard who had just bitten him and pumped his essence into Ravik’s bloodstream like Ravik was his fucking mate.
The thought made his jaw clench so hard his teeth ground together.
No. Not now, he told himself.
Now was not the time to think about that. Now was not the time to think about the way his body had arched and bucked under Sev’s bite, or the way pleasure had ripped through him so hard he’d come in his trousers like some untried youngling with no control over his own fucking shaft.
Now was also not the time to think about the fact that Sev’s essence was still in him—moving through his blood, warm and strange and not entirely unpleasant.
Fuck!
He hated that part most of all.
The cure had worked—he could feel it. The fog was gone now, burned away by whatever Sev had injected into him through those sharp Blood Kindred fangs of his. His mind was clear for the first time in what felt like forever, and that should have been a reason to thank the Goddess and maybe even thank Sev.
Instead, all he could feel was rage and shame and a sick twist of humiliation.
Because his memories were coming back…gods, the memories. They were coming back in pieces—bright and sharp and completely fucking unwanted.
Cassie lying naked between him and Sev in that huge Visskous mating bed, her skin flushed and her thighs spread while Ravik’s mouth was on her…Sev’s arms around her and Sev’s long fingers on her breasts…Sev’s voice low and commanding as he told Ravik where to touch and how to pleasure her.
Ravik’s grip tightened around the shock blade.
The worst thing was, he had listened—listened and obeyed.
That was the part that made heat crawl up his neck—that he had listened to Sev. Not because he had been forced and not because the Hunger had made him mindless. He remembered enough to know that wasn’t true. No, he had listened because Cassie needed them both and because some deep, shameful part of him had liked Sev telling him what to do and how to make her come.
Another memory pushed up through the back of his mind and nearly made him stumble.
Cassie on her knees, her mouth swollen and wet, her hands wrapped around both their shafts. She had pressed him and Sev together—pressed their cocks side by side and licked across both of them like they belonged that way.
Ravik remembered the heat of his own shaft rubbing against Sev’s…remembered the sounds Sev made when Cassie took them into her mouth together…remembered how his own body had not recoiled.
You didn’t recoil because you fucking liked it, whispered a taunting little voice in his head. You liked the way it felt to rub against him while Cassie licked you both. Hell, you fucking loved it.