The Fated and the Damned (The Cursed Blood, #2)

by Chloe Hodge

I was beneath a heated glare or icy indifference, like I was no longer worth the effort of her feelings, good or bad. And that was the harshest pain I’d ever felt.

I’d never meant to fall for her, but she’d branded herself on my heart like a scar that would forever mark my flesh.

It felt like a thousand words went unsaid as the silence stretched.

We had so much to say, but as I pulled away, the window closed, my heart breaking further apart, crumbling into ash. I looked into his eyes, drowning in pain and sorrow and regret, but it was too late for us now. He had his chance, and I couldn’t wait for words that would never come. A future that would never pass.

“Not a day goes by where I don’t think about what I did. How I didn’t try hard enough to keep her safe or why I didn’t just tell her the truth. Every hour, every minute spent apart from her is agony. She will never trust me again. And even if she did, I wouldn’t deserve it anyway.”

“Pull yourself together man. You’ve had plenty of time to mope about your actions and, quite frankly, I am over your moods. You’re like a bear woken mid-hibernation.”

From the moment I’d met that wild flame, I’d been burned, and I wanted to walk right back into her fire.

“The wheel of fate keeps turning, my friend. We’re just along for the ride.”

“Touch me like that again,” he said quietly, “and I’ll break each of your fingers.” He let her go, his lips curling with disgust. “Belittle my betrothed again, and I’ll rip out your throat.”

Goddess save me. My heart thumped in my chest, my body flaring with heat at the icy rage flashing in the gold rings of his eyes. The dominance masked by the

calm and collected way he held himself. It was terrifying. And it was...

A witch worthy of being in this coven and someone who would always defend her own.

If she couldn’t love me, then I would take all the worst parts of her and still want her anyway.

There was nothing I wouldn’t do to get her back. I would raise the dead, walk through hell and back for that woman. If she was a monster, I was too. And so long as she was by my side, I was perfectly ok with that.

Sometimes

life has a way of setting people on the right path, and sometimes the decisions we make set us down the wrong one.

And those pants … those fucking leather pants that made me want to squeeze her ass and bend her over. My girl. My beautiful little hellcat.

The coven needed someone who wasn’t afraid to break the mould and reshape the world if that’s what it took.

This man was mine. For better or worse, whether I wanted him or not.

Love is your greatest strength … and your biggest weakness.”

In our world, full of magic and power and mystical things, we can’t afford to forget the parts that set us aside from darker beings.

You’ve been hurt so many times by the ugliness in this world, don’t you think it’s time you allowed yourself to be loved?”

Mercy was a foreign virtue when it came to hurting my family.

“Want is a base desire, and what I feel for you goes far beyond that. I need you like I need air to breathe, and sustenance to keep me nourished. You are both my biggest failure, and the biggest victory I might ever achieve. I can’t do this without you. I won’t.”

“You don’t. But I will spend every waking minute proving my worth to you. I will fight for my people, and I will die for yours. Nothing can change what I did, but maybe everything I do now can help those who need it most. I will fight for you Kitarni. If you’ll have me.”

“Hurting you will solve nothing. It won’t ease the pain.”

“No,”

I agreed, breathing in her ear. “But it will give you the release you’ve been so aching for. Let ...

“I will be your judge. And I am going to punish you.” She shoved me so hard I slammed into the wall with a grunt, my spine tingling and something besides me toppling over. Her hand slipped into my hair, her nails scraping along the roots until she pulled it back roughly, baring my throat. A groan escaped me, my cock hardening, aching for her touch.

Fuck, this witch would be the end of me.

“Do it, Dante. I want it. I want all of it.” “As my queen commands.”

I wanted more, the kind of filthy, unrestrained sex that would send Christian women to hell under the eyes of their god.

“You are mine, Kitarni Bárány,” he growled from above me. “Say that you’re mine.”

Home had never been the roof over my head, the town, or even the woods I loved so much. Home was my family.

“Dante,” I breathed. “Everyone is watching.” “Let them watch,” he whispered, his lips pressing against the shell of my ear. “I want them all to know who claimed you. I want them to know you’re mine.”

“Be quiet,

or I’ll have to punish you, Freckles.”

“Be silent, Freckles,” he whispered in my ear. “Or I won’t let you finish.”

He looked at me like nothing else in the world mattered, like he would kill anyone who would try to hurt me. And he would. Brutally and without mercy.

“Life with me will be whatever you wish it to be. I will give you everything you want. And I will destroy anyone in the way of you getting it.”

“There is nothing I would not do for you, Kitarni. I was born a killer, it’s what I’m good at. If the price of that gift means protecting the one I love, I will gladly pay it. I’ll enjoy it. For you, I would be questioner, judge, and executioner. And I won’t regret any of it.”

“My sword was yours the moment you asked for it. My life was yours the moment I swore to protect you. My heart? That you claimed for your own, tooth and nail and bloody beautiful murder. It was always yours. It will always be yours, from this day to my last.”

She could destroy

me and I would love her still.

When you have nothing, it is easier to let go of the possibility of something. When you have everything, it’s impossible to imagine having nothing.

“I will follow you into darkness, or I will burn in your fire. There is no monster alive that could keep me from you.”

“No fire could ever burn so bright as what I feel for you,” I said fiercely.