Silver Under Nightfall (Reaper, #1)

by Rin Chupeco

They never tell you it’s the girls that are hardest to kill.

What a wild opening

The bar for empathy was on the ground as far as the nobility was concerned, but when you were used to eating dirt, being thrown a bone felt like kindness.

Gossip served as currency, and if there was anything the peerage had in surplus, it was money and rumormongers.

Lord Remington Pendergast, Marquess of Aphelion, with his mother’s suspicious ancestry and even more suspicious death, his vampiresque birth, his work as a Reaper, and the lord high steward’s undisguised hatred of his father and therefore of him, was the stuff scandals were made of.

“Armiger. That means ‘arms-bearer,’ doesn’t it? But why choose that?” “It suits me better.” He didn’t want to have to explain why. He wasn’t sure he knew himself. “It has none of the expectations that Lord or Lady require, and I… like that.”

Years doing bounties nobody wanted, years being denied entry into the dræfendgemot, and now this. They’d started a betting pool on which bounty was going to kill him. That stung worse than the beating Feiron’s flunkies had given. He’d wasted years trying to garner the respect that no one had ever planned on giving him.

There has to eventually be some sort of freedom in knowing that there's no point in trying to earn their respect, no?

“I thought you didn’t want me along,” Remy muttered. “I never said that I didn’t want you.”

I would swoon

By the time the carriage slowed to a stop near a village, he was almost certain vital gray matter had leaked out his head through his ears, and that he’d dropped the rest of his wits some thirty miles back.

Idk why this made me giggle

It wasn’t fair for them both to be this attractive, he thought sourly; one was his ideal woman if she wasn’t spoken for, the other a Lightdamned shitpouch even if he was the best-looking man Remy had ever seen.

😂😂😂

“Fuck you,” Remy said. “Perhaps one day, Pendergast. Now, shut up and strike me.”

“I’m going to fucking kill you and feed what’s left of you to the hounds at Chànggē Shuĭ. I’ll slice you from throat to cock—” “I see dirty talk is one of your more noteworthy skills,” the vampire purred. “We would have been wonderful allies, darling. I’m a far better lover than he ever was.” He leaned forward. “Let me change your mind, sweet bloodling. There’s still time to turn your back on him, to come to my side.” “I’d rather eat acid.”

“I’m not going up there on your back,” Remy said stubbornly. “And you can’t bloody make me.” “FUCKING HELL,” Remy said not five minutes later, clinging on to Malekh’s back for dear life.

He knew they loved each other. And he didn’t know what his place was with them, but if he had even a tenth of that affection, it would be more than he’d ever had in his life. It made him feel lonelier, but also a little less alone.

“Three is a paltry number, love. You’ll improve over time.” “Three times is paltry?” “Proper training requires the constant, vigorous testing of our subject,” Malekh’s voice was a soft, luxurious velvet, and somewhere on Remy’s neck, he felt a tiny bite with the promise of more to come. “And we are nothing, Pendergast, but constant and vigorous.”

“Did you ever even love her?” Remy asked bitterly. His father met his gaze. “Of course I did, Son,” he said calmly. “I wouldn’t hate her so much if I hadn’t.”