Redemption: A Custos Novel

by Emjay Soren

  “Abraham and Isaac?” He knew the names, and the story as well. He was asking me why.

  I shrug. “Before I knew you were a Preacher in your human life, that painting made me feel safe with you. I didn’t think that a ruthless killer would have a Bible painting on his wall.” I kissed him softly on the lips, relishing in the knowledge that from here on out I could kiss him and touch him as I pleased. “I felt so safe with you, the way you let me into your dark place.” I blushed and rested my head on his chest. “That dirty place inside.”

  “I am honored that somehow my faith, what little is left, made it easy for you to fall for me.”

  “You made it easy, Preacher, your faith is just a part of you.”

  His eyes went dark and he gave me his ‘fuck me’ smile. “Want to see dirty?”

  “Duh.” I giggled.

  He went for the button of my jeans immediately. “Looking for something?” I asked just as he found my slit and stroked along the seam.

  “Well, if you have to ask Bird, you’re seriously confused.”

  I laugh huskily. “I want to hear you say it, Baby.” I loved when this man let the dirty out to play. After the emotional rollercoaster that brought us back together, I needed my dirty guy.

  He slipped two fingers inside me and I about lost my balance. “Bird, I am going to finger fuck you, then I’m going to eat this pretty pussy…for hours. And when I am at the brink, and desperate to come, I will fuck this pretty cunt …maybe come all over that sweet flesh just to mark it.”

  “Oh my god!” I moan, as he squeezes my clit between his knuckles and tugs. It is too much and not enough at the same time.

  “Get on the bed on all fours, ass in the air.”

  His voice was deep and scratchy, like a breath against every nerve. I jumped to comply. I clamored my body, not at all gracefully, onto all fours and lifted my ass as he commanded. I had a passing thought of being taken there and felt flush almost immediately.

  “What just ratcheted your fever up, Bird? I can smell how bad you want me.”

  In a moment of desperation I answered without fear. “I was thinking of you taking my ass.”

  He cursed and moved faster than my human eyes could follow and I felt his fingers as they tickled along my spine. “This ass ever had a dick, Bird?”

  I felt that familiar fissure of pain and humiliation at his question. Then like a feather, I felt his lips against the cap of my shoulder. “Don’t answer, Bird, I picked up on it, and I know you have.”

  I felt the tears choke me like they always did when I thought of my time at Bliss. “I wish I had something I could give you that was untouched.”

  “You have.” He fell to his knees behind me and then … his tongue, licking up my center leaving me breathless. “You made me feel again, Bird. I was alone for so long, lost and desperate for closeness I didn’t know I was missing. I had walked this second life in agony until you.”

  My man is seriously better than anyone’s.

  He melted me with those words, all while fucking me with his fingers. “I love you.” I gasp as he begins licking me while his fingers slide in and out of my hot, wet center, and I don’t know why I can’t shut up. “I keep saying that I know, but I can’t think of another way to explain how deep you are in me.”

  “I want deeper. I want your blood Bird, and I won’t stop till you give it to me.”

  I had no words, no words to formulate my answer of yes, make me yours. So I let him own me by my body. He stroked my labia and clit, his fingers curling inside me in such a way that I felt fucking desire to the tenth degree. “There Baby…” I pant, and then scream as he strokes that special spot so deep. “Yes!”

  I hear him snarl in disgust and I am taken back by it. He pulls back from me and stands quickly, tossing my clothes at me and demanding I get dressed.

  Now.

  I watch him and see him blatantly adjust that enormous cock, trying to calm himself down. Then I hear it, faint to my human ears but it must have been a roaring thunder in Preacher’s. “Is that Cash?” I asked, hearing the faint sounds of a deep male voice getting louder.

  Then my bedroom door flew open and all hell broke loose.

  *

  Preacher

  There I was, on my knees, at the altar of pleasure and peace, when I hear Cash, low enough that Tavern couldn’t hear, but loud enough to warn me to get dressed. I knew he could smell the sex. Whatever was so important that he interrupted this made my fucking hair crawl.

  Then the fucker opens the door with no warning.

  He also sees my girl naked and flushed from having my mouth on her fine, wet pussy only seconds before.

  I was not to be blamed for my reaction. I shifted until I was just inches from his face, my fangs loud and proud, I hissed in his face. “Knock, you fuck!”

  “We found Angelo, so pardon the interruption.”

  There it was. The moment you know that everything in your life is about to be scattered. This was the moment that was over eighty years in the making.

  I looked at Cash. Even without words he still understood me. “I’ll be at the door. Cain and Able are bringing Princess, and Stupor is with them. Leave Tavern with them. Bas is coming with us.”

  I nodded and slammed the door. I looked at my Bird sitting on the bed looking decadent and angry. “I heard.” She spoke, her voice quiet.

  “Don’t let the fear in, Bird. I will be back.”

  She nods and smiles at me. Like I don’t know her fake smiles from her real ones? I would kill and maim for the real smile. This fake version means she doesn’t want me upset.

  It’s not that I don’t love her worrying about me, because I do. But it’s pointless. Maybe she needs to see what I am capable of up close and personal so that she won’t fear my demise. The thought is gone as quickly as it arrived because I wasn’t dumb enough to bring her in… not until she was one of us.

  Thinking about her with fangs again I was sidetracked when I heard Cash growling from the door, followed by the entry of the rest of our gang.

  “You heard Cash, Bird. Bas is with us, so you stick tight to Stupor, London, and God’s Army, feel me?”

  She nods and I’m a bit surprised by her calm demeanor.

  I walk to the side of the bed and lean down, dropping a kiss on her lips. “You smell like me, Baby.” She says quietly, making sure only I hear her.

  “Bleedin’ hell. I would leave it there if it didn’t bother the fuck outta’ me knowin’ the boys could smell that fine pussy all over me.” I walk to the bathroom adjoining her room and wash my face and hands before scrubbing a wet towel down my chest trying to get her scent off me. I want Angelo thinking she is a distant memory.

  “Will you tell him I’m nothing to you?” She still spoke softly so only I would hear.

  I stepped out of the bathroom and stopped to gaze upon her fine body in that giant bed. “Yes. I’ll make him bloody well believe it, too.”

  She looked hurt at my honest response. “You know that I love you and anything I tell him is a lie.” I watch for her reaction, but still all I see is hurt. “Bird, you know that right?”

  She nods and gives me the fake smile again. “I know. I just don’t like you lying to him for my safety. I want everyone to know how much I love you. I don’t give a fuck about Angelo.”

  I love her, I do. Right now though, I could seriously box her bleedin’ ears for being so damn dumb. “Do you know that my loving you is his biggest weapon? That your love for me is a weapon to him as well?” Trying to keep my anger in check, I slipped my hat on and then began dressing again. Oh my Christ, I could still smell her on my clothes. It made me hard all over again. “You need to understand that this, all of it, is a vampire rights issue. You are mine Bird, for no other reason than because I said so. Leushus, Bastian, Cash, all of them, even Stupor, will back me to blood and bones with it. This isn’t about bonds or turning you into a vampire. This is my right as a man, as a monster. We don’t play fair, Bird. We fight
dirty and kick ass while our enemy is down. We throw low punches, and whoever walks away wins. When vampires get mad Bird, we don’t Facebook it to the world and start a name calling war. We kill. When you realize that I’m deadly, that I’m a vampire and not a human or a priest any longer, then perhaps, you won’t be so quick and careless.”

  I could see her anger, and I preferred that to her whining over me endangering myself. Call me a prick, but like I said, we are vampires not men. The sooner she remembers that, the better.

  “You act like I haven’t seen you bastards at your worst. I witnessed rape before being raped. Repeatedly! I watched as your kind killed thousands of innocent girls, all because they didn’t follow dosage directions on Bliss, or got too rough, or forgot to feed and hydrate some. I’ve seen vampires, Preacher! All I meant was that I don’t like Angelo. I think he should know that I won’t be used as a weapon against you.”

  Bleedin’ hell she wasn’t getting it. “You are a fucking weapon, Tavern!”

  She growled at me in frustration, the sound erotic as hell, and it pissed me off I was too mad to enjoy the sound.

  “You are the very weapon that he knows will get me where he wants me. The Cado weren’t dumb, Bird, they knew damn well how to get a soul. They have fun fucking around with victims. They went after Angelo for my soul, and they love this shit, love watching me scramble and squirm to save you. Trust me, you are a weapon.”

  “Then yes, I will become a vampire.”

  Oh for the love of… “This isn’t some cheesy ass vampire movie where becoming a vampire will make you this indestructible monster. You won’t understand the power, the sight or hearing. It will take you months to familiarize yourself, mind and body, with drinking blood non-stop. So no, you won’t become a vampire.”

  “And you think you can save me?” She asked. I almost lost my fucking cool. I left before I said something I would regret. I knew she didn’t mean it like it sounded, but that was how I took it. And she was right.

  I didn’t save Emigen or Peter or Mary. She was no different from all my other failures.

  “Ready?” Bas asked. I nod, looking at Cain and Able who were sitting on the couch, with Stupor in the giant chair across from them and London on the arm next to Stupor. I caught a whiff of Cash’s jealousy, territorial posturing, and love. Poor guy was pissed that God’s Army was watching the girls tonight.

  I looked at Cain and Able. “See if you can talk some sense into this one.” I pointed at Tavern, my eyes staying locked on hers as I kept talking. “She thinks that Angelo can’t use her as a weapon, oh, and that we apparently are heading off to slaughter.”

  I knew I was being irrational, but her disregard for our ways, just pissed me off. So did the comment she made about keeping her safe. The look in her eyes said she knew what it’d sounded like.

  “First of all, I didn’t mean that how it sounded, and second, I don’t need it explained to me like I’m a child.”

  “Oh my God, do you two ever get tired of fighting?” Stupor asked mid yawn.

  I didn’t respond. I grabbed my keys off the table and walked out the door without another sound.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Tavern

  “Does anyone else ever want to smack him?” I asked, and fell onto the couch with a sigh. This night had been a whirlwind. I had met Cain and Able, a Nex who is apparently friends with my man, I finally had Preacher back, and in the same breath as he’d told me he loved me, he asked me to be his forever.

  Fuck!

  Now he was out there in a fit, and I mean fit of rage. He was running on fury and vengeance. I understood why, I did, but it didn’t mean I would stand back and watch him head off half-cocked and end up dead.

  I understood the anger; I had been angry like that. I knew what it did to the mind. It made you think you were invincible, when in reality it made you weaker.

  “I always want to smack Cash.” London said with a sad smile that she tried to make look real.

  She had been like this more and more lately, and I wanted to smack myself for being too self involved to get into her mind. Getting in Londons head was a trip of self loathing proportions. She wasn’t the type to feel bad for her ass being a little too big, or the victim of a blemish. She was by far the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. Seeing her sad and somewhat broken made me sick.

  Whatever it was, it was bad.

  “What has you so blue, London?” I hoped she would talk to me and Stupor, but I didn’t know if she would with Cain and Able around.

  “I am sick of Cash and his games, the bastard!”

  Who was I kidding, of course she would talk. London was uncanny that way. If she had something to say, she would say it. Company be damned.

  “What games, Boo?” Stupor asked and scooted from the chair to sit beside her. Stupor was the male version of London, I swear to God.

  And then it happened. The woman who I admired down to the last fiber of her perfect being, broke apart before me. Stupor understood how bad crying would affect London. Her strength was to be regarded as a blessing and a curse. A blessing because you never forgot how strong the little sprite was, a curse because in the end she was human. Stupor lifted her quickly and took her back the “Closet” aka a spare bedroom devoted to more designer clothing and accessories than a storeroom at Barney’s.

  “What is it baby girl?” Stupor asked, his voice full of love and concern. I had always been a watcher and a thinker. I process emotions and arguments and rarely attack unless I am backed into a corner. Seeing

  London so shattered, my rational side went out the window. I wanted to hit and hurt whatever did this to her.

  She looked at Stupor through wet, red eyes. “He won’t ask me.”

  I knew then that she was losing faith in Cash wanting to marry her. I didn’t think vampires were big with the marriage thing, but London had dreamed of it her whole life. Knowing Cash was dragging his feet was shaking her to the core. “He had said back when we first got here that he would marry me and that he would propose when I least expected it. I was even planning the wedding…” She paused and looked at me, and stopped talking.

  “What sweetie?” I ask and sit on the opposite side of her taking her hand in mine.

  “We stopped planning and halted everything when we got home from Inked that night.”

  Wow, the guilt rolled in like a long lost friend. “Oh fuck, London. I am so sorry.”

  She shook her head and rolled her eyes. “It was my choice, Tavern. I told Cash that I didn’t want anything weighing on either of our minds, and I was worried about Preacher too. He had suffered Tav, knowing I…killed you to save him. We had argued about it time and time again. I knew that with you being back he would be affected by it. Now I’m so glad we halted the wedding, because there is so much shit going on, and I want it to be about me and him and our love.”

  “We know you want to be the center of attention Boo, we know you remember?” Stupor was teasing her and she smiled faintly.

  “Maybe you should just plan it, and all the evil, and all the bullshit will just have to wait until the next day. You shouldn’t have to put your life on hold because of the evil lurking around us. I’m thinking there will always be evil just around the corner.” I tried to be reassuring and similar to London’s own views on life. She was a ‘fuck em’ all’ type. The fact she was waiting spoke volumes on how important this wedding was to her.

  I sucked at comfort though, because the strongest most defiant woman I knew just started crying harder.

  What. The. Fuck?

  “He won’t talk about it. Every time I try to talk about it he cuts me off and tells me not now.” She looks at both Stupor and I, her look pleading. “I don’t think he wants to marry me anymore.”

  For London to say that, it had to be like taking a knife to the gut. She was normally self assured to the point of being vain. I never knew she could question herself.

  “Girl, you know that man is obsessed with you.” Stupor
said.

  She just shook her head. “Not anymore. He seems mad all the time, either at Preacher or Leush. He won’t talk about it. He distracts me…”

  “Boo… Talk. To. Him.”

  “I agree, London. I watch Cash and the way he looks at you and touches you. He can be in a room full of women and he will lean in and take your hand in his. His eyes are always on you.” I squeezed her hand in mine. “I know that this whole thing with my return, and the fighting between Preacher and I, has put everyone in an uncomfortable position and I think that’s all this is for Cash. According to Preacher, Cash, as his Sire, knows him on every level. He says that Cash is in a state of constant worry over him since he went to the tomb.”

  Both London and Stupor looked at me when I said that.

  “He told you about going to the tomb?” She asked, her voice pitched high and sounding nasal.

  “Yeah, he said he went and that Cash, Leushus and Bastian waited outside, while you went in with him?” It was a question because I wasn’t getting their reaction.

  Then London started crying all over again.

  I was real close to panicking.

  “That almost makes it worse!” She shrieked and I actually jumped, startled by her tone.

  “I get that he worries about Preach because he has made it his life’s mission over the last eight decades. If Preacher is stable enough to talk about Emigen and his kids, then I can’t figure out his distance.”

  I didn’t know what to say but I knew I had to say something and so I told her what I felt and thought.

  “London, before Preacher came to me at Paddy Coins and confessed to loving me, I would watch you and Cash and wish like hell I had even a fraction of what you and Cash have. You need to call on your inner bitch and demand answers. Honey, there isn’t a man in our lives who doesn’t bow to you because of how fiercely they love you. There is no way, not in the world I live in, that Cash isn’t completely and utterly enthralled with you.”

  With a weak voice full of fear and desperation she spoke just above a whisper. “I can’t lose him.”