Aberrant Monsters (New Blood: Eldritch Blues, #1)

by Debbie Cassidy

hawked and spat blood. “I’m sorry, did my face hurt your fist?” “You should be unconscious by now.” The look of confusion on his face was almost comical. I blinked blood from my eye, wincing at the burn. “Oh, is that the rule?”

Rift walkers like me. Individuals who could see the residue an eldritch monster left behind and track it. My kind were the only ones with this ability. The monsters were invisible to the human eye, and supernaturals couldn’t see them for what they truly were. Their brains distorted the monsters into something else.

“What’s meant to happen to me? Go on, tell me.” He smiled indulgently. “Now that, my child, is entirely up to you. All I will say is that a life lived without risk is no life at all.”

“You can’t just eat everyone who pisses you off.” “I can. But I understand it makes you uncomfortable, and so I refrain.”

“Tell me what you fear, and I’ll eat it.” My stomach fluttered. Butterflies? No, moths. Urgh.

“I desperately want to survive this and not become a monster, but if that means killing the creature that saved my life, then the answer is no, because saying yes to that is becoming a monster of a different kind, and I won’t do that either. So I say find another way… Please.”

“Where is she?” Telarion’s voice drifted into the bedroom. “Where is my human?” Oh, crap.

“You don’t need the incubus.” Telarion sneered. “You have me.” He dipped his head so his eyes were level with mine. “I can give you what you need, tiny human. I smell your arousal when I feed on you. I sense the carnal desire rising inside you. I have the tools with which to satisfy you. A fair trade, don’t you think? A symbiosis.”

“Morals mean nothing if keeping them can kill you,” Telarion said softly. “Trust me, I know.”

“No one will touch her,” Telarion said. “No one harms what is mine.” Silence followed his declaration. Archie cleared his throat. “Well, that was almost sweet, until it turned psycho possessive.”

“You want me to take so that you don’t have to give, so that you can feel less like a freak for wanting it.” He released me suddenly and I lay gasping on the bed, stomach in knots that weren’t necessarily related to terror.