He was unhurried, hitting the back of my throat again and again with languid thrusts.
I inhaled sharply through my nose, but the small bursts of air were in short supply as his pace quickened. My head spun from the lack of oxygen, and the throaty sounds coming from his mouth did unholy things to me.
I felt lax. Floaty. Hazy around the edges.
He pulled away, stroking himself. “Take a big breath for me, baby.”
I did as he asked, filling my lungs to the brim before he rested the head of his cock against my bottom lip and tugged at the roots of my hair, shoving all the way back in.
With his pelvis flush against my open mouth, he shuddered for a moment, then sucked in a breath—like he was trying to stave off the inevitable.
He groaned and canted his hips as he began to fuck my mouth again. “Fuck,” he ground out. “So perfect. If you were mine—” his breath caught in his throat. “I would keep this pretty mouth stuffed full of my cock.”
His cock pulsed against my tongue, filling my throat. And the fact that it was my mouth—that it wasme—who was making him come pulled a deep, contented sigh from the back of my throat.
When he finally pulled away from me and tucked his spent cock back in his pants, the bubbledidpop.
The door swung open, and the man who entered eyed us curiously but said nothing. He was clearly drunk as he stumbled over to the urinals, and I scrambled to my feet, the absurdity of what I’d just done pressing down on me.
“I–I have to go.”
I pulled the door open and rushed toward the back exit. My phone buzzed with the arrival of my Uber and I didn’t look back, not when he called after me and not when I felt him movingbehind me in the torrential downpour that had erupted outside the doors of the bar.
I ran away from what we’d done—away fromhim—but the words he’d spoken that night stuck with me long after.
And I didn’t even know his name.
KIERNAN
ONE YEAR LATER…
Every day for the past four and a half years, I’ve woken up to the looming presence of death. Longer, even, considering I grew up with Samael Messor as an uncle. He’d lived and breathed for the lifeless and breathless, his taste for the macabre something he’d always hoped to pass onto me despite my complete and utter aversion to his line of work.
The flight back to Fate Trace had been quick and easy, but since the moment I’d stepped off the plane and onto the jet bridge, an overwhelming sense of dread and uncertainty had settled over me. Each step towards my potential new home felt heavier, and now that I was in the throes of what I’d come to do, I wasn’t sure leaving again would be an option.
It had been a full year since I last visited.
A full year sinceIris.
Now, I had torn myself away from my comfortable life, said goodbye to co-workers and friends, and relocated across the country for this. It felt like the right thing to do—taking over the family business—despite the doubt that had crept in during theprocess. My old boss had reassured me that if things didn’t work out, I could always return to my previous job. His words echoed in my mind as I looked around me.
I was used to working in a stale environment. My day-to-day was predictable. Monotonous. The clinical feel of working in a commercial funeral parlor was so very different from the home my uncle had made for himself here at Messor Memorial.
There was too much of him here; too much that felt like home to me because he’d once touched it.
Uncle Sammy had smoked like a freight train for as long as I could remember. It was so very like him not to take his doctors seriously. He’d become insensible in his old age and despite having kept in regular contact with him, it wasn’t until he was all but moribund that I’d fully grasped just how uncontrolled his blood pressure had been.
Less than a month after his debilitating stroke, I’d gotten the news that he died. And now he was here, his muscle mass wasted away to nearly nothing, lying on the mortuary table I’d recently inherited from him. It was hard to believe this was the uncle who used to carry me around on his broad shoulders when I was a child. I would miss him.
I already did.
The familiar strains of Eine kleine Nachtmusik filled the room, their animated and cheerful quality standing in stark contrast with what I was about to do.
I carefully measured and poured the vibrant dye concentrate into the embalming fluid tank, watching as the liquid turned a deep shade of crimson, taking the first steps to ensure that Sammy looked as restored to his usual rosy-cheeked state as possible, given the circumstances. The sterile scent of formaldehyde lingered in the air, tangling with the bright notes of the music.
It was a poignant and emotional moment for families to see their loved ones looking somewhat normal for their final goodbyes. I was Sammy’s last remaining blood family member, my father— his only brother—having passed away in a car accident when I was very young. But, I knew he had also formed a strong bond with his found family outside of our blood ties. As I looked at his pale face and frail frame, I couldn’t help but feel a surge of sadness knowing that his chosen family would also hate seeing him like this, just as much as I did.
Images of my own lifeless body, laid out on a cold, sterile mortuary table, flashed through my mind. I was used to it—the intrusive thoughts. My own death had played out in my mind a million different ways over my lifetime.
