Ladd Russo was dying-they all were except the immortals among them-truthfully, though: he could smell their flesh rotting and feel their hearts growing wary. They looked out windows lusting for the grass to be brighter and more vivid, the air fresher and dripping seductively with sweetness. When they spoke, their words writhing out from between their bone white lips, it was without all youth, joy, life.
Ladd rested his chin on her shoulder and ran his hands over her jutting blades where he imagined wings would sprout up any moment now.
If she was an angel (a real one and not just the blarney he spoon fed her) and heaven called to take her away she would cut off her own wings to stay with him because he was her demon. They were entwined more than physically.
Lua would hold him until the men with rainbow faces came for him. They would be dressed in white like they were going to some grand party just like his men had been. He only made them wear white so they could see how pretty the blood was. They never appreciated the little things like he did. Not that it mattered anymore.
They were all dead now. He had killed more than half of them and the others, forgotten, someone was always trying to kill them.
Ladd was not a brave man. He waved a gun around, an idiot's weapon of choice, to reduce a train full of people to their knees. The first time he met Lua he stuck the same gun in her mouth. He just wanted to scare her a bit. Make her understand that she was his from that day on.
His head was a crowded room filled with ghosts and ash and if he stayed there too long they would devour him.
All his fears were beading down his back. They had been through this before. She would sing him a lullaby and he would hurt her to hurt himself. His hands traversed her back. He stuck his fingers in all the wounds he had made on her body. Never touching the ones she had made herself or the ones long stitched and faded. She was his. He just wanted her to know that.
She kissed his damp forehead. He gripped her hips and said, "It's going to take more than that, angel."
Angel.
The word tasted like cough syrup to her and he had been poisoning her with it for years.
Ladd was dying. They all were. So he pulled his cancer a little closer to his chest. She would be the death of him. That was, if he didn't kill her first.