Touched by Darkness: (Sins of The Fallen Book 2)

Aurelia…

Each call is getting louder. Some days it screams so loud that I’m forced to press my hands over my ears. I’m going crazy. To prove my point, I’m pacing outside the gates while chewing on my thumbnail. My skin is itching. I need to escape. I need to scale those damn walls somehow.

The sun is blinding. Either that or I’m growing sensitive to it.

It’s early morning again, and I snuck out before Freya awakened. I struggle to sleep these days. The sun is too bright. I’m restless, yearning for the night.

I pause as my eyes catch on the apple tree down the length of the wall. The thick trunk gives way to crooked, long branches dotted with red, juicy apples hidden behind a sea of green leaves. There is something about the tree that draws me closer, some echo of a memory, perhaps. It’s different from the other trees with its weathered bark, out of place in a landscape untouched by bad weather. I trace my fingers over the ridged patterns, sensing the ancient wisdom it exudes.

Reaching for an apple, I pull it off, and the branch snaps back into place. The fruit rests in my palm, shiny and unblemished. Deep red, like a pearl of blood.

I bring it up to my lips. But before I can sink my teeth into its flesh, movement makes me pause. Brown and black scales slither closer on the crooked branch. Beady black eyes and a forked tongue.

My breath catches.

“Zzzsin,” the snake hisses, coiling around my wrist when I hold it out to the branch.

I stand frozen, mesmerized, as it whispers my name. It wants me to take a bite out of the apple, like in the stories of Adam and Eve.

I look up, scanning my eyes over the green leaves. The sun streams through, warming my skin.

“The tree of knowledge,” I whisper, gazing back at the snake. It’s now wrapped tight around my wrist, and its face is so close to mine that its forked tongue brushes over my lips. Hellfire flickers in the black eyes swaying before me, luring my lips closer to the apple in my hand. The promise of freedom dangles like a worm on a hook.

One bite—that’s all it takes.

“Aurelia?”

I startle and look up. Freya watches me from the path, her concerned blue eyes sweeping over me.

Confused, I gaze around. The snake is gone.

“What are you doing?”

I stare at the apple in my hand until I’m forced to blink. “I-err. I don’t know.”

“There’s fruit back at the field if you want some.”

I drop the apple to the ground, and it falls with a heavy thud. As I watch, it shrivels, turning brown and rotting before my eyes.

With a thick swallow, I slowly look up at Freya. Something is happening to me. Amenadiel was right. The darkness is calling me home and feeding on my light. Either that, or I’m going crazy.

We set off walking in silence down the path until Freya clears her throat. “I’m worried about you.”

I gaze down at the crushed wildflowers on the trodden path. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

“You’re not yourself. How many times have I found you by the gate lately? You’re there nearly every morning.”

Coming to a stop, I throw my hands out. “Something is happening to me, okay? I don’t know what, but I can feel it. I know you don’t believe I escaped the garden, but I did. I can’t pretend everything is fine. Don’t you get it? There’s no going back once you’ve been touched by sin.”

Freya stares at me for a long moment. “Why would Heaven take you back if you’re tainted?”

That’s the million-dollar question. I don’t get it myself. “The Bible teaches redemption and the forgiveness of sins. Maybe that’s why I’m back here as if nothing ever happened. Maybe Heaven can erase sins, but not memories? We’re taught about free will. If our memories were erased, we wouldn’t have the free will to choose the light.”

“Is that what you did?” Freya asks. “Choose the light?”

Did I? “I don’t know. I don’t think you can choose that which you are. Does that make sense?”

“No,” she laughs. “You need to explain.”

Chewing on my lip, I weigh my words. “It’s hard to explain. We”—I gesture between us—”are of the light. Better yet, we are the light. If I turn away from the light, I’ll find myself out there, lost in the darkness.” I gesture in the general direction of the gates. “But if I turn toward the light, I’ll find myself back here. I didn’t choose the light. I turned toward it.”

She looks confused. I don’t blame her. I don’t understand it myself. “I don’t mean an actual light.” Pressing my hand over her chest, I continue, “I mean this. Your light. Maybe Heaven and Hell are physical manifestations of our inner states. Maybe none of this shit is real. How else can what happened to me just be erased? How am I even back here as if I was never gone? The truth is, I don’t know why Heaven took me back. It makes no sense.”

“It does to me.”

“Yeah?” I ask, and she nods.

“I’m not going to pretend I understood your ramblings about manifestations and whatnot. But you’re inherently good. No matter what you may have done out there or what you have witnessed, you’re good and pure at heart. It’s not about your actions, but what’s at your core. Even perfection has flaws. Even good souls make mistakes. How can the Light forgive sin unless sin is committed?”

“You’re sounding like me,” I reply with a laugh, and she joins in as we start walking again.

“You said it yourself. We’ve known each other our whole lives. I may not understand most of it, but I do listen to you.”

“I don’t know what I would do without you,” I reply honestly.

“Where are you going?” a masculine voice asks behind me, making me jump out of my skin.

Oliver takes me in, running his eyes down my body before scanning the trees and the trodden path. I was on my way to the gates. No surprise there.

“I’m going for a walk.”

“Where to?” he asks, stepping closer, suspicion written all over him. He’s tall and broad with a blinding smile, which is nowhere in sight now. His blue eyes narrow when I hesitate to reply.

“I like it out here.”

“We all know where this road leads. You shouldn’t be here.”

Freya sounds awkward as she interrupts our stare down. “I’m going to head back before the elders come looking for us.”

Neither of us reply, locked in a battle of wills.

“I’ll see you guys later.” She walks off, the sound of her soft steps growing fainter.

Grinding my jaw, I steer off the path, refusing to justify myself to him. It soothes me to know I can still experience anger and annoyance in this shiny place. It reminds me that the part of me that aches for Daemon, Alaric, and Ronan is real. Not a fragment of my imagination.

Oliver chases after me and cages me against a tall tree. “Where are you going?”

I study him, running my eyes over his defined cheekbones and straight nose. When my gaze flicks down to his lips, a familiar throb awakens in my clit. More proof I’m not going insane. I had never felt sexual desire before I left Eden. I didn’t know about sex. Now I do. Now I’m painfully aware of his nearness and masculine smell. The muscles in his arms, where he traps me against the tree. The rise and fall of his broad chest.

“Nothing good can come from stealing an angel.”

“Besides the pleasure of defiling her.”

My eyes dance across his skin.

“Want us to corrupt you beyond repair?”

“I was going for a walk,” I repeat, my eyes catching on a splash of red on the branch behind him.

An apple.

My breath catches. I can practically hear the hissing in my ear as my eyes collide with Oliver’s.

I reach up, dragging my fingers through his day-old stubble. The look on his face would be humorous if the insides of my thighs weren’t sticky with arousal.

I drop to my knees before I can think it through.

“When we’re done with you, your white wings will drip with ink.”

“Aurelia, what are you doing?” Oliver asks, confused. His words soon die on his tongue when I palm his soft length while sinking my teeth into my bottom lip. Oliver has never been touched before. The same innocence that once burned bright in my eyes stares back at me through his ocean-blue irises. I want to taint him. The satisfaction I get when he hardens in my hand makes me feel alive for the first time since I re-entered this fucking place.

“We shouldn’t do thi…” he blurts, but drifts off when I take him in my mouth.

Hell, he’s big. I can barely fit him between my lips.

I moan around his length and reach down to rub my aching clit. I need release.

His hands tangle in my hair, but he doesn’t pull me off. Oliver is warring with himself, gazing down at me through darkening, lustful eyes. Daemon was right. Defiling innocent virgins does cure boredom.

I smile against his veiny length, then drag my tongue from his root to tip. His thick cock throbs as I swallow him down until I choke. I wish he would be rough with me. I wish he would fist my hair until my scalp prickles with pain and fuck my throat like he means it. His hands remain soft, pulling gently on my blonde strands. It’s okay. His choked grunts are all the music I need.

Rubbing my clit faster, I bob on him while the hiss of a snake whispers in my ear and thunder rumbles overhead. Oliver is too lost in my darkening eyes to notice the storm on the horizon.

“You like that, big boy?” I taunt him, wrapping my lips around his bulbous head. My eyes fall closed. This is why I need to escape this place. I can never go back to who I was.

Oliver tenses and makes a choked sound, then groans deep in his chest when my mouth fills with his salty cum. Seeing him fall apart is such a turn-on. At the sight, I explode around my fingers. It’s the first release I’ve had since I found myself back here, and it steals my breath.

After swallowing down every delicious drop, I rise on shaky legs and wipe his cum off my chin. “That was fun.”

The look on his face is priceless as he stares down at his still-hard dick. It’s impressive, swaying and touching his belly button.

“What in the heavens?” he breathes, and I roll my eyes, correcting him.

“What the fuck?”

His head snaps up. “What the fuck did you do?! We’ll get banished.”

Pushing off the tree, I start back the way we came. “Don’t pretend I didn’t blow your mind, Oliver.”

He curses before chasing after me. “What the hell was that? How did you even kno—”

“You ask a lot of questions.”

Oliver is in panic mode, rubbing his face and looking down to make sure his cock is slackening.

It is.

“Finally aware of your nakedness, huh?”

Swallowing thickly, he tries hard not to check out my breasts. He fails.

“You’ll have to be careful from now on or you’ll sprout a hard-on all the time.”

“Seriously, what the fuck was that?” He pulls me to a stop.

My eyebrows shoot up. “I’m impressed by your cursing.”

“What if we get banished from Eden?”

I shrug and start walking again. “Then we get banished from Eden.”

“The elders will know.”

“That I sucked your dick behind a tree? I seriously doubt it.”

“The Light—”

“The omnipotent light knows everything, right? Then why are we still here?” I reply, whirling on him. “You’re not going to find yourself banished from the Garden of Eden because you had your fucking dick in my mouth. That’s something the elders want you to believe. Sin this and sin that. You have a cock, Oliver. Why the fuck would the Light create one if it’s such a sin for me to suck it? Why taunt me with it if I can’t touch it?”

“But it’s a sin.”

I blink. “I’m sure there are worse things than pleasure.”

“Where are you going now?” he calls out when I set off walking.

“I’m bored with you. We have class soon.”

He follows behind like a lost puppy; that’s what I get for defiling Oliver. I shouldn’t have touched him. If Daemon found out, there would be hell to pay. Oliver has never been in a fight. He wouldn’t stand a chance against Daemon’s unleashed fury.

The thought makes me tingle. Angry Daemon turns me on far more than he should. What I wouldn’t do to rile him up again.