Page 12 of Make Me Hunt
She wants to play the bad bitch, huh?Then she'd better be ready to face the consequences.
“What asset would that be…” I push her jacket aside and spot a small hole in her shirt….Fuck.
A sharp gasp escapes her lips before she can stop it.
My fingers go to the hem of her shirt, lifting it gently to find a trail of blood streaking her skin. “What fucking asset would that be if you’re dead?” I ask, feeling her knees slightly buckle as I lift the shirt higher, past her bra, to see where the fuck the blood’s coming from.
“Things… things got out of hand,” she says, sucking in air through her teeth as my other hand moves up next to the wound, right beneath her breast. And I can’t help but notice the netted bra she has on, a silvery jewel shining against her nipple.
Fuck, I want to touch that.
Iwantto taste that.
But unless I’m planning to do it while she's a corpse, I need to focus on the bleeding wound.
My eyes run across her skin, examining every inch. The bullet did not penetrate her flesh. It’s just a scratch, but nonetheless, a very nasty one, splitting her flesh wide open and making her bleed enough that she’ll need stitches. And as my focus shifts, I catch the pale shimmer of more than a few silvery scars across her stomach. This isn’t the first time she’s gotten into trouble.
“This needs fixing,” I groan, looking at the blood already coating my fingers.
“No hospitals. Please,” she whispers, a slight trace of desperation in her voice, the kind I didn’t truly find her capable of. We don’t do hospitals here. But the wound needs to be cleaned and sealed. So, if she wants to play badass, fine by me.
I rise to my feet. “Stay here,” I command, leaving the room to return with a bottle of scotch and something I never thought I’d use again, especially on her—my seal.
I still feel I need to punish her somehow for disobeying me. I can’t let it slide. Not when I want to do far more than just punish her right now.
Patience, Ares.I remind myself as I regain my place in the armchair, dragging her closer so I can reach the wound.
I hand her the bottle of scotch, letting her take a long pull while I put the metal seal into the flames.
She takes several gulps, like pain’s already an old friend of hers and she knows exactly what comes next.
“You wanted my attention? Now you’ve got it,” I say, pouring scotch onto her wound to disinfect it.
She rips the bottle straight from my hands and starts drinking the second I finish. But that’s it, no scream, no cry of pain, no begging me to ease up on her.
That raises a lot of questions in my mind. I’ve seen injured men and women before, and this isn’t standard behavior, more like trauma resistance.
I stare at her. Her expression defiant, daring me to take the next step.
“You want in, little curse? Well, I mark what’s mine,” I say, rolling my seal in the fire, waiting for the metal to get lava-hot.
Anyone else would be trembling by now. But she doesn’t flinch, though, doesn’t even move. Just waits for me to do it.
Her reaction—or lack of it—gets me thinking. She wants this. She wants to work for me so badly that she’d let me do anything to her. But I won’t touch her just because she’ll do anything for a job. I’ll do it, because soon, she’ll want to purr for me.
Her blood is running down my fingers and I can’t stop myself from bringing them to my lips. To taste her in every way possible. To let the sweet taste of her origins flood my senses, forming that unbreakable bond between a god and his newest worshiper. Though I fear that with Brynn, I have no control over keeping our roles from reversing.
Framing her wound with my hand to keep her still, I pull my seal out of the fire. I haven’t branded anything in an eternity. I only used this for letters, and that was a century ago. But knowing that my mark will be on her, even just to stop her bleeding… that hitsdifferently.
Fuck, I’m hard. And if she weren’t bleeding right now, I’d already have her on her knees, wrapping those lips around my cock as punishment for disregarding me.
I take another look at her to assure myself she’s not going to back down, but she keeps her ground, her eyes trained on me, watching my every move.
“Take a deep breath,” I say, pressing the hot metal to the center of her wound. The sizzling of her skin and flesh fills the room as I brand her, and I swear this feels like a fucking epiphany.
Her eyes flutter, her hands lose grip of her jacket, while her knees buckle beneath her, and she collapses straight in my arms. She’s too weak to withstand this. Her body, too human for her inner strength.
I drop the sigil to the floor and stay in the armchair for a few moments longer, her body curled up in my arms, her breath softer now, as if she’s sleeping… as if she belongs here.
