Page 66 of Bite Marks & Broken Hearts

It was almost like Flynn kept reaching inside me and playing a discordant note. Each interaction left me off balance, wanting more despite knowing better. Despite what I’d said to him to push him away. Shame burned through me as I remembered that intense conversation. The wayI’d let my guard drop, sharing details about James I’d buried deep. The softness in Flynn’s expression as he listened.

My self-loathing deepened as I tormented myself by replaying how I’d acted in the kitchen just now. I was supposed to beprotectingFlynn—not confusing him, not leading him on. It was like I had no control over myself around him, and for that, I despised myself even more than usual.

I paused at a shop window, studying my reflection. My skin had taken on a greyish tinge, dark circles prominent under my eyes. Good. Perhaps looking like death would remind me what I was—a predator, a monster who survived on blood. Not someone who could offer Flynn anything but pain.

I checked my watch again. Time to meet Greaves. I straightened my coat.

Focus on the task at hand. Get the blood. Feed. Restore control.

I quickened my pace as the underground hospital car park came into view, the stale scent of gasoline and human urine making my nose twitch.

As expected, Greaves’s vehicle was parked in the far corner, engine silent and lights off. But something else caught my attention—a massive shape in the harsh fluorescent lighting. I froze. The hyena. That impossible creature, here in the underground car park. It sat perfectly still beside Greaves’s car, yellow eyes reflecting the artificial light with an unnatural intensity.

This time, I wouldn’t let it escape. I moved forward swiftly, supernatural speed making me nothing but a blur. But as I reached for it, the beast slunk beneath the vehicle, disappearing into shadows. I could have sworn I heard laughter—that distinctive hyena cackle—echoing off the concrete walls.

That’s when it hit me. An unmistakable metallic tang permeated the air—the thick, cloying scent of fresh blood. Through the car window, my eyes snapped towards the driver’s seat, and I froze.

There sat Greaves, slumped over the steering wheel in a grotesque tableau of carnage. His clothes were shredded, deep gashes crisscrossing his torso like crimson brushstrokes on a macabre canvas. Blood oozedfrom the wounds, pooling beneath him in a viscous puddle that seemed to breathe with each sluggish drip.

Contorted towards me, Greaves’s face was a ruined mask of agony, eyes wide and mouth twisted in a silent scream. His throat… dear Lord, his throat had been torn open, flayed flesh revealing a pale gleam of vertebrae.

I gripped the door handle tighter, knuckles blanching as a guttural growl rumbled in my chest. The scent of fresh blood ignited a primal hunger within me, scorching through my veins like liquid wildfire.

Feed. Feed now.

The call reverberated through my mind, drowning out all other thought. Ancient instincts, older than my conscious memories, clawed their way to the surface. My gaze locked onto Greaves’s ravaged form, the gaping wound at his throat like a gruesome beckon. I could already taste the metallic tang on my tongue, my fangs aching to extend and pierce that crimson bounty.

Now now now now now

Part of me recoiled at the feral impulse, disgusted by the depravity it represented. But that voice grew fainter with each splatter of the thick liquid dripping onto the car floor in an agonizing rhythm that hollowed me out until only the hunger remained.

My lips peeled back in a vicious snarl as I yanked open the door. The scent hit me like a tidal wave, crashing over me in dizzying waves that left me reeling. I crawled across the seat towards the still-warm corpse, rationality fraying like a severed thread.

Mine. All mine.

With a low growl, I leaned in closer, fingers digging into the tattered fabric as I inhaled deeply. The coppery musk clung to the back of my throat, urging me to take that final step over the edge into savagery.

My tongue flicked out, brushing against his blood-soaked shoulder, and before I could process what was happening, I was tasting Greaves’s essence on my lips.

A tremor of ecstasy shot through me. It had been so long, so very,verylong since I’d had fresh blood.

I couldn’t stop the inevitable.

I pressed my face into the soaked material of his hospital scrubs, dragging my tongue along the fabric in long, greedy strokes.

The rich, salty tang flooded my mouth, and I moaned aloud at the decadent rapture. Every fibre cried out to continue, to bury my fangs in that tempting flesh and gulp down every last drop.

I gathered fistfuls of the blood-drenched scrubs, shoving the fabric between my lips and sucking with desperate, shameful need.

More! More!

My gaze fixed on the ragged tear in Greaves’s throat, and before I could stop myself, my mouth was reaching towards that precious fountain of warm blood. Just a moment longer and I’d be—

Through my frenzy, a flicker of humanity sparked within—a memory of a warm smile and tousled, dark blond hair that cut through the crimson haze like a blade. Flynn, at the marina that night, colours dancing in bright blue eyes as he looked at me like he could see into my very soul.

Flynn.

I recoiled as if struck.

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