Seven+Four (Angels of Wrath Book 6)

THREE DAYS LATER

Nervously, I tuck a wild lock behind my ear and then push the heavy braid over my shoulder.

I’m naked. My cute rose lingerie set made of lace and cotton—or what Uri left of it—is somewhere on the wooden floor.

The blindfold covering my eyes takes away my sight, but all my other senses are alive, sharpened. The hint of musk in the air from our sweat and the rich smell of sex. The erotic caress of the velvety, purple collar around my neck and the smooth ties around my wrists. The clinking sound of the long, thin chains going from my neck to my wrists, at times brushing my hot skin. The feeling of Uri’s slick cock sliding between my ass cheeks. His sweaty body behind me, hard and unrelenting.

The bondage itself is new and a little unnerving, but being at his mercy pushes all my buttons—some I didn’t even know existed. Wanting to experience even more of the unusual intensity my body is savoring, I push my butt out, arching my back. Uri’s cockhead bumps against my gaping, dripping hole, triggering a series of shivers up and down my body.

“Why touch yourself when you can come just from getting fucked?” he whispers roughly, straight into my ear, pulling on the chains until he forces my hands behind my back—which I didn’t even realize were touching my length.

I can’t come at all!

The cock ring he slid around me thirty minutes ago is pushing desperate tears out of my eyes all over the blindfold. I want to orgasm so badly I’ll do anything he wants.

He nudges my legs further apart with his foot and bends me down from his sitting position. A tremble of excitement goes through my tingling balls, then up my back, and all the way down, stopping at my bound hands. He forces my cheek to the wall with a decisive push, the position not very comfortable. But the location ceases to matter the moment his crown kisses my hole, pressing against my rim. I can’t see anything, but I can imagine his eyes, pools of fiery hazel filled with depraved desire. My whole body quivers, empty and craving, my pucker clenching around nothing, attempting desperately to suck the tip in.

And then he thrusts again, all at once, one long, heavy slide of his long cock, his piercing dragging against my walls, so deep in me that it punches the air out of my lungs. For a long moment he doesn’t move, buried, throbbing in me, letting me feel every inch of hard, thick dick.

I moan as he suddenly slides even deeper, leaning forward so I can feel him bury himself to the very hilt. Oh God. Feels like he’s splitting me in two, like he’s reaching my stomach and poking at it.

“You’re thinking,” he says with a voice gravellier than before, pulling back slowly and then slamming into me. “I don’t fucking like it.” His tongue is liquid against the oversensitive skin of my neck.

“About…you,” I confess on a panted breath. How could I not think of him? He has no clue what he does to me. How much space he takes up inside my head.

His dark chuckle pushes some strands to the side, then he sucks hard on my neck. I gasp and moan as he yanks me down on his dick, pulling the chain on my wrists back. He’s sitting on a high, rolling chair, his healing leg propped on a stool on my right, but he’s still the one holding the reins—and the chains.

“Sexy as fuck on my cock,” he mutters, all rumbly. His voice melts my insides, and I clench hard around his delicious shaft.

Every time it goes inside, my body tenses at the feel of him filling me up. His hand moves to my head, keeping my cheek firmly on the wall. The fact that I can’t see what he’s going to do to me creates such exhilaration inside it’s becoming hard to breathe.

It hurts. It hurts so good. I don’t have a hope of bracing myself. All I can do is suffer the enjoyment as he pulls me back onto him, setting a brutal pace.

“How does it feel to be railed while handcuffed? To be forced to take it?” He grunts.

Forced? If my mouth could stop pushing out moans, I’d laugh at that. Because I’d never say no to being taken by Uri. To experiencing new levels of ecstasy and torment with him. I can’t get enough, want him so damn badly.

As he keeps ramming inside me, pain and pleasure are intertwined so deeply they become one. The cock ring is sadistic torture—the perfect tool for him. I’ve been on a razor’s edge of an incendiary climax for far too long. I’m going to pass out very soon if Uri keeps edging me.

It feels so good, so, so good. The way the hard, hot cock in me seems to mold my insides into something else. Something of his. A sob rushes out of my throat as I arch up, trying to meet his thrusts and fuck myself on him, chasing this addictive sensation. I’m there. I’m there, I can almost grasp it. The pressure in my belly pulses frantically with my racing heart. Every single muscle is drawing tight, tighter with each merciless drive of Uri’s hips. And the tight ring around the base of my length holds me here, in a pre-orgasmic limbo.

“Please, take the ring off. Please…” My voice cracks as I shamelessly beg him.

“Oh fuck, Baby Blue.” He stops his thrusts and pulls out. The abrupt movement makes me cry.

“Widen your legs,” he demands with that moan-inducing guttural voice.

I frown but eagerly oblige, hoping he’ll finally listen to my plea.

He spreads my cheeks, brushing his thumb delicately on the still tender U he carved on my left cheek two days ago with the tip of the switchblade I gave him while I was orgasming so intensely I blacked out. Bliss and agony exploded at the same time, and my already exhausted brain couldn’t take it. I’d asked him to give me an indelible mark several times, and he finally did it in the most perfect way.

His hot, wet tongue suddenly spears me, and I cry out my desperate need while all my thoughts vanish into thin air.

“Tell me you love me,” he commands suddenly. He kisses my hole, tongue flicking into the center, insistent and dirty and coaxing.

“Please,” I can barely gasp out. He thrusts his tongue into me, spearing me open, my already stretched rim giving way for him, eager to be filled again.

“Tell me you love me.” I hear the words burrowing into my body, making it vibrate.

“Please, Ur…ahhh, please take it off. I can’t…” I’m on the edge of madness. Hands still trapped on my back, his long fingers around my wrists. My rock-hard dick is jerking and yelling, “have pity!”

“Say it!” he growls before pulling hard on the chains, yanking my torso up. My arms burn, my back aches splendidly.

He slides the ring around my cock off with a confident pull—sucking all the air from my lungs—and then eats my hole like his only job is to feed. I struggle to keep still; my hips move on their own, my dick weeps incessantly, as Uri increases the pace of his tongue-fucking. He licks up and down my crack, then swirls his tongue on the rim like he’s enjoying every single inch of me. This is the first time since he slid the blindfold onto me that I wish I could see him.

“So much to play with,” he breathes possessively on my overly sensitive pucker.

When his warm palm pulls and squeezes my balls, it’s game over. My head rolls back, my guts seem to tear under the pressure of the most powerful climax. On a wail, I scream, “I love youuu…”

My essence rises up to the ceiling and then plummets down, filling my shuddering body again as I paint the wall with ropes of cum.

“Mmm,” he hums with gusto as he gives a last lick, making me jolt.

His fingers start whispering over the skin of my back, possessively tracing the bites, bruises, and scratches he made. Every touch is reverent and entitled, reminding me who I belong to. His hand stops on the U on the rise of my left butt cheek.

“Your skin is painted with my marks. You are my own personal, and only, masterpiece, Baby Blue.”

The madness and obsession in his voice, the force of his dominance, I melt under it.

“But it seems you need some more since I had to repeat myself three times before I got my answer.” There’s a hint of irritation in his teasing tone. I hear him shifting behind me. Then the rustle of clothes and the clinking of metal…his belt. Oh shit! Goose bumps erupt all over my arms, still pinned down, and my dick twitches with renewed anticipation.

I’m so drawn by him that I edge backward, pressing my ass into his palm.

He takes hold of the chains on my wrists again as I push my forehead against the wall. Waiting…eagerly for the punishment to start.

“I’m going to give you three stripes across with my belt as a punishment for your selfish behavior.” The sudden feel of smooth leather dragging along my spine makes me tense. Heat coils in my gut.

“One for each time you made me ask.” The small growl that comes out of him pushes a whimper up my throat. The leather continues its slow, cold journey over my nape, my shoulder, and down my arm, almost leaving a flaming trail.

Having reached my limit, I exclaim, “Do it!”

“You sure you’re ready?” He’s still teasing me. Can this be called edging as well? For a masochist like me, it must be.

“Only I know if I’m ready or not! I want it,” I utter with impatience, biting at the inside of my lip to stop myself from begging again.

I arch my back and stick my ass out instead, going for a tempting move. Hopefully he’ll bite. It sends a tremble of excitement down my spine, and I suck in a deep breath and hold it. I hear the belt cutting the air just before it strikes hard across my ass. The harsh sound echoes in the room as I squeeze my eyes. My body jerks against the sharp pain, and I let out a moan and a cry as the lower half of my butt is set on fire.

Ohmygodyes! My brain is again on strike as my breath quivers. My body has the reins right now, and all it wants is more. I’m high on pain and I don’t want to get down ever again.

The leather belt strikes again, a little higher this time. Spank! My ass stays in the same position, even though my legs feel like jelly. The pain tastes like surrender and intoxication.

“The sight of those cherry-red welts across your plump, bouncing ass. Fuck, Baby Blue!” I’m barely aware of his aroused voice as he slaps his hard, leaking dick against the burning skin, making me hiss and then shiver with pleasure.

I can feel the drops of sweat forming along my spine as he continues blowing my mind in the best way possible.

“Here comes the last one,” he warns me. I freeze, don’t think I’m even breathing, as I feel his soothing thumb rubbing over my lower back.

My thighs shake just a little as I strain to get my ass higher for him. Swoosh, spank! The pain hasn’t yet spread over my skin when I feel Uri’s mouth sucking along the red lines. When I finally register it and the scorching ache unfurls like hot flames over my flesh, I start making weird little noises like a small kitten. I don’t know what I’m feeling. It’s like my brain can’t recognize pleasure from pain anymore, but my dick doesn’t care as another orgasm hits me hard. Cum shoots out from my once again untouched shaft, and my hole pulses, still wanting to be filled, craving what Uri—and only my Uri—can give me. My throat hurts from how many times I’ve cried out. I shiver as his tongue keeps tormenting me, lapping, spitting, then sucking again. His fingers rub over my cockhead, scooping some cum.

“I fucking love the salty tang of your jizz,” he growls. His words sound crazy hot to me, but I might be drunk on orgasms. I’m also not sure whether the tingling and prickling sensation in my nipples is the result of his pinching or just my reaction to his voice.

On impulse, I blindly turn my head around as I straighten up and clumsily search for his mouth. When I find it, I give him a kiss that leaves my lips feeling bruised. He holds on to the back of my neck as I break the kiss, just so he can crush his mouth on mine. Our tongues tangle and battle until I find myself sitting on top of him, face to face. I hiss for a moment as my ass touches his thighs. Then the blindfold is slipped off my eyes, leaving me blinking at him.

It takes a while for my eyes to adjust, and if I didn’t love him and trust him more than anyone else on earth, I’d be terrified of the naked possession stamped all over his face. Like he wants to eat me alive. So profoundly and intensely focused on me and only me.

And he’s still wearing that sexy black leather vest open at the front. I could just melt looking at him.

He wraps himself around my body, surrounding me, so all I can smell, feel, and see is him. His morning stubble rubs against my cheeks and chin, and I feel the urge to stroke it all over my chest and nipples. I sigh contently in his cocoon.

Uri and I share a destructive nature—although I pretended otherwise until a few weeks back. But this is what true love is. Not just finding someone, but finding that someone who has the same level of darkness as yours.

Uriel

Those blue eyes should be outlawed. They show everything, the whole universe that is Sari, and shit, it’s the sexiest thing ever. I’m hard as fuck. I almost came all over his ass when I was punishing him with my belt. He fucking loved it. Loves my sadistic side. Loves me.

Not that this emotion has any importance for me. Love or not, he’s mine.

“Fuck me how you like now,” he slurs. He came twice and still wants dick.

I smirk as I grasp his ass cheeks roughly, reminding him with the burn who he belongs to. I spread them apart and drive my cock between them, rubbing over his loose hole.

“Get on my dick,” I growl into his ear. “Ride me like the world is ending, and the only way to stop it is milking me so damn good and long.” I moan, feeling pre-cum roll down the tip.

He moves his cuffed hands—the chains hanging from his collar to his wrists are damn hot—and guides my cock to his hole.

“Your dick is the only one I want to ride.” That’s what I fucking like to hear.

He’s panting, his gaze debauched as my cockhead pushes inside him.

But where did he learn to talk like that? Has he been studying those porn videos again? I don’t like that, and he knows it. I grab two handfuls of his ass and squeeze as I drive my hips upward in a hard thrust. I grunt at the feel of his nails scratching my thighs, and fucking hell, the pressure inside his ass is making my balls draw up already.

I start to bounce him up and down on my dick. “I’ll punish your ass, abuse it, and fuck it open until it craves the thickness and heat of my cum, coating your insides, filling your hole up, and marking the deepest part of you.”

His eyes roll back as I reveal once again how deeply, dirtily, and twistingly obsessed with him I am.

He’s fucking himself fast and rough, feeding his greedy hole again and again, head thrown back, high moans reaching the ceiling, lost to the pleasure I’m giving him. Bouncing on my lap, taking what he needs from me without shame.

I feel a little left out. My hand moves to the collar around his neck. I slide a finger under it on Sari’s nape and start to pull. The fabric presses on Sari’s throat, slowly making it difficult for him to breathe as I continue pistoning inside his ass.

Breath play. Let’s see if my Baby Blue enjoys it.

Judging by the lust spreading inside his shocked, wide eyes and how tightly his hole is gripping my dick now, I’d say he fucking digs it. But of course he does, he is my Sari.

“Your hole is eating me up. I’ll let you ride me up high whenever you want,” I whisper on his lips. “Want me to choke you a little bit more?”

The rapid moan leaving his lips is the answer I’m waiting for, and I pull the fabric, almost ready to finally spill inside him when I see him yielding completely to me. I could do whatever the fuck I want to him right now, and having that sense of power over him is more addictive than any drug.

“Fuck, yes, use that asshole on me!”

His movements pick up, creating an erotic slapping sound every time our flesh connects. I know I need to speed things up. He’ll lose his senses if I keep choking him.

I slide my leg off the stool, ignoring the pain, and clamp a hand on his hip as I ruthlessly slam my hips up, forcing him to accept every inch of cock I give him. His tight ass spasms around me, spurring me on. I grab the collar more firmly to hold him in place, making him gasp.

“This is going to be fast.” It’s my time to ride hard, my pace almost rabid. I’m plowing into him as I have the burning need to feel him surrendering to me, to have his hole welcome my cock over and over, all swollen and begging for more. I brutally pound against his sweet spot, urged on by his choking sounds.

I give his collar a hard tug. His eyes roll back, and then he comes like a fire hydrant over my chest, strangling my dick with all he’s got. I’m hit by pure bliss as he shakes on top of me like he’s been electrocuted with ecstasy.

“Christ,” I growl, giving his ass long, hard thrusts, sending my cum far inside.

“You needed this, didn’t you?” I grit out, as more jizz shoots out. “To feel me coming right where I belong.” Jeez it’s so fucking good!

He’s limp in my arms as I continue moving inside him, enjoying the feel of his wet hole a little more. I let go of the collar to cup his face with both hands and bite his lip until I taste sweet, warm blood. He fists a hand in my hair and pulls my head back, licking at the spot I bit. A smile spreads on his mouth, then he kisses me. His tongue batters mine, his teeth sinking, nibbling, claiming. His lips move down to kiss the pomegranate tree tattoo and the blue flowers reverently.

I lace our hands together, looking forward to tomorrow and the appointment we have with Ash to ink our left ring fingers with Seven+Four.

“Tell me again,” I demand, resuming the kiss, lips catching on his tongue teasing the roof of his mouth and pushing in, almost choking him.

He tilts his head back. “For a sociopath, you really like to hear it.” He smirks and then chuckles, making me smile at him.

He wraps his arms behind my neck and clenches hard on my dick. “I love you so much. I don’t wish for anything else. Don’t need anything else but you, Uri.” His confession fills me with satisfaction. My work is done for today.

“I also love when you have your way with me.” He waggles his eyebrows in a cute way, and then brushes his fingers over the collar around his neck.

Maybe I can work a little bit longer.

Sariel

An hour later Uriel limps out of the bathroom before freezing with his pierced eyebrow raised, gaze sliding up and down my body. Then he eats up the small space between us with two slow steps—his leg is still healing; the painkillers must work since he doesn’t want to rest.

“I’ve got no clue why you put on clothes, but take them the fuck off. I’m coming all over your skin before we go downstairs to eat, and I want you to be bare when I do.”

Whoof! The mouth on my boyfriend. Are all sociopaths this obsessed?

Before I can melt at his feet, my phone starts ringing and ringing; it’s like an incessant knock to my short-circuited, lustful brain.

“Tell your phone to fuck off.” Uri’s words make me huff as he tries to grab my waist. After everything that happened and with Phoenix still out there, I need to take all the calls.

I walk to my phone and see Lori’s name on the screen.

“Suriiiiii! We are outside, open the door!” he yells right into my ear.

“Fuck!” I hear Uri.

Two minutes later, I get down to the entrance to welcome…everybody—except Ollie, who went to pick up Sully.

They go into the kitchen after hugging or patting my head, and I close the door behind Lori.

“Why are you smiling like that?” I ask him as he keeps staring at me.

We follow the others. “I’m trying not to think about the boners that popped up all around because of your tree shag the other day in the forest.”

“There was nobody around,” I whisper as my neck and cheeks turn scarlet red.

“Animals,” Lori counters.

“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard,” Raph exclaims.

I see Gabe ready to reply to his brother, but Lori’s hand on his chest stops him. “Hey, feelings here! Yeah, who am I kidding. I don’t give a damn, bully boy!”

I rush to the kitchen, wanting to forget about Lori’s statement. I see Rami and Rague placing five cake boxes on the counter. When I turn, I notice Ezra sitting at the table.

“How did you get in here?” I ask him. He wasn’t with the others.

He smirks.

“By boat. But when in the city he uses the maze of tunnels beneath the ground to move around undetected,” Uri reveals, entering the kitchen.

“Bravo. It took you long enough.” Ezra taps his nose before taking a sip from his coffee mug. How long has he been here? Did he hear us in the bedroom? Does everybody know how we sound when we have sex? Jesus!

“Pretty sure Sari meant inside the house,” Gabe clarifies.

“I asked Rami to add Ezra’s details into the house’s security,” Uri states simply, landing a kiss on my head before moving toward the cabinets to grab plates and forks.

“So, he can get in while we have to stay outside your house?” I can’t see Lori, since I’m making more coffee and tea, but I know he is pouting.

“He has information Uri wants. That we all want,” Raph explains. “And speaking of information, I want to know where Uri hid my sunglasses.”

Uri flips him off. “I had to go inside a freezing lake to retrieve my moccasins, which were fucking ruined.”

“Let’s pause on your idiotic nicking game for a moment.” Rami sounds grim.

Hunter tucks him to his side, while holding Albert E. in one hand. “After the firemen, the police, the fire marshal and arson team—who were all thanked for their discretion—left what remained of Meg’s house, Rague investigated the fire. Checking with Serena, we know it originated in the shack in the backyard, near the garden. Someone with a fireman’s uniform⁠—”

“Phoenix, the sleepless malice!” Rague growls threateningly. “I analyzed the burn path, found the point of origin, and checked for signs of accelerant like kerosene which were left in different places around the house to assure it would all burn to the ground. They used potassium permanganate and glycerin to start the fire, then added the kerosene, which caused some of the explosions we witnessed. The flames propagated very quickly, enveloping the house in less than ten minutes.”

“Phoenix didn’t leave any fingerprints anywhere,” Gabe let us know as he stops behind Lori.

“Fingerprints rarely survive high temperature fires, and if they do they’d be corrupted by soot or debris. So it’s highly unlikely we would have been able to find any.”

A heavy silence falls on the room, filled with memories of what we have lost. It’s like we are driving further into the storm when the visibility is zero.

Having Meg in a coma for more than two months has been agonizing, but losing her house and all her things as well? It’s too much. Linda really hated that old mausoleum, but she too cussed like a sailor when we told her about the fire. She’s now trying to cover the cause behind it, calling favors and bribing the people in charge. We can’t afford to get law enforcement agencies entangled in this Phoenix mess, as well.

“Thank God, nobody was harmed,” I break the silence, squeezing Uri’s hand for a moment before letting it go.

“The light turns waxy and brown when someone burns to death in a room because human fat gets congealed in the light bulbs,” Michael reminds me of an article that I read a while ago about fires and human remains.

“Ugh,” Rami makes a gagging face.

“I don’t think I have the stomach for this,” Bez declares.

“Says the guy who scooped up a donor’s eyeball with his fingers and then squashed it in his palm,” Uri says, while I start plating slices of pie.

Yeah, we are still going to eat, regardless of the gory topic. There’s a vanilla sponge cake, red velvet, coconut, chocolate, and tiramisu. They all look yummy. Michael is passing coffee or tea mugs around, while Lori offers the slices.

I leave the last plate in front of Ezra, who’s looking at us eating sweets with a frown on his face. Right, he doesn’t know about our Sunday family meals.

“We usually gather together once a week to eat,” I tell him, patting his shoulder. He saved Uri, I’m grateful to him. All those jealous feelings have disappeared. I know where I stand with my boyfriend, and his brother, as far as I’m concerned, is part of this family, if he wants to be.

I move toward the counter since there are no chairs available anymore. Uri suddenly grabs my wrist.

“You sit on my lap,” he orders me. “Ass on my cock.” The second part is whispered in my ear as I oblige him. His voice has taken on that husky quality it gets when we have sex. My body is conditioned to yield to it, and I shiver against him as I feel the urge to wrap myself around him.

“What are you going to do without your base now?” Ezra asks.

“I can build a new one,” Rague states, shoving a big piece of coconut cake inside his mouth.

“We can’t stop the bloody family side business, though. So in the meantime we will improvise,” Rami adds. He already bought a warehouse—using his favorite shell company Cinderella & Co, LLC.—in the middle of nowhere on the edge of the city.

“Killing feels good. Presumably even to God, since he does it all the time,” Ezra gives us his two cents. He hasn’t touched his cake, but his gaze keeps going to the slice of tiramisu on his plate.

“God?” Raph huffs.

“One of man’s superstitions. Belief in a powerful being that decides humanity’s fate seems to help the largest part of the world’s population,” he clarifies. Yeah, a psychopath believing in a higher being is ludicrous.

Uri snorts as I feel his hand slide under my sweater to caress my belly.

“You said no fingerprints, but Phoenix wasn’t wearing gloves.”

“You sure?” Lori asks my boyfriend; he grabs Gabe’s arms and curls them around his waist.

“He kept his gun pointed at me after shooting twice, what do you think?” Uri snaps.

“Super Model, when I tell you to go fuck yourself, it’s because I care. Orgasms are good for your health. They lower stress levels. So, fuck you!”

I hurriedly lift my fork and push my red velvet cake inside Uri’s mouth to stop the banter before it worsens.

“Maybe he was wearing gloves in the shed when he started the fire and then took them off,” I offer.

“I won’t let you put the big brother guilt on me,” I suddenly hear Sully’s sweet voice as Ollie enters the kitchen before him.

“No need for that. Lori or Serena are always on your ass.”

Sully sniffs with outrage as his shoulder bumps the doorframe with a thud. I still feel sorry for being the cause of canceling his going away/ twentieth birthday party.

I smile at them and wave when they greet us. I introduce them to Ezra since he’s never met them before. The way he’s looking at Sully, the undisguised curiosity in his eyes, I have never seen any kind of emotion in him. It’s a little disconcerting.

“Now that everybody is here,” Gabe starts, turning to Ezra. “You saved Sari and Uri. But you are still keeping information from us.”

“I told you about Marlon Finch,” he declares in a bored tone.

“The chemist who allegedly provided Phoenix the poison to kill Meg.” Hunter says. Rami and Linda have been reaching out to their contacts in New York to try to find him. Gabe and Lori will fly there tonight.

“The way I see it, since you appeared, Meg was poisoned, her house got destroyed, Uri almost killed, Sari was kidnapped. Phoenix admitted to Uri that they are out for revenge toward us for some reason. So why should we trust you?” Raph challenges him. Psycho to psycho.

Ezra makes a tsk sound, not looking fazed by the many suspicious eyes aimed at him. “So needy,” he utters in a calm tone. “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.”

“It highlights a logical fallacy,” I interject. Looking at all the confused faces around me, I continue, “It means that the lack of evidence supporting a claim does not automatically prove that the claim is false. Essentially, not finding something doesn’t mean it’s not there.”

Michael nods. “It points out the fallacy of arguing that something is not true because there’s no evidence for it,” Michael explains further, perching on Raph’s knees. “Why are you bringing that up?”

Ezra replies straight away this time, “The lack of evidence can be informative. Adermatoglyphia.”noveldrama

One word, and I understand.

“The condition in which a person has no fingerprints,” Sully voices my thought out loud, earning a sharp look from Ezra.

Phoenix! Doesn’t matter if they were wearing gloves or not.

“Adermatoglyphia is the absence of ridges on the pads of the fingers and toes, as well as on the palms of the hands and soles of the feet. The patterns of these ridges, called dermatoglyphs, form whorls, arches, and loops that are the basis for each person’s unique fingerprints,” I recite part of a study I read online.

“Fucking hell!” Rague mutters as he scratches his stubbled cheek. Ollie has rushed to his side, probably to keep him calm.

“Damn!” More curses and surprised exclamations rise in the kitchen.

“You must know Phoenix well to have discovered that,” Uri states, his body feels tense under mine.

“To a certain degree.” Ezra has a real vague way of answering. “Phoenix will lie low to lick their wounds and plan their next move. In the meantime⁠—”

“Cut the crap!” Raph barks, pulling Michael more firmly to his chest.

“Do you know Phoenix’s identity?” Hunter asks in a demanding voice.

“Yes,” Ezra states.

“Bloody Mary Magdalene, enough with the dramatic pauses. Just spit it out!” Lori clips.

Ezra’s eyes move to Uri and me.

“Ezra, if my boyfriend wasn’t sitting on my lap, I would shoot you then leave the room and find someone else to work on,” Uri threatens.

I snuggle further into him as Ezra finally utters, “She’s Subject Nine.”

Nine?

She?