Fear the Reaper [malexmale]

Chapter One

I inched up behind him with the intention of startling him, only for him to roll his eyes.

"You can't sneak up on me, Stanton," he chided. I blew a raspberry, making him laugh, and he only laughed more when I caught him around the waist and hoisted him up, putting him on the counter by the fridge and leaning in to get in his face. He smiled at me, his deep set hazel eyes gleaming and his stark white hair falling around his face, save for his bangs that he'd clipped back from his face. I tilted my head up, capturing his perfect soft lips in a kiss, feeling his tongue brush my bottom lip.

I growled, deepening the kiss, taking over his soft mouth, leading his tongue where I wanted it to go, and he let me. His eyebrows tilted up, his breath becoming desperate, his hands sliding off the counter and to rest on my arms. I broke free to let him breath, his cheeks flushed, his lips pinkened, his eyes sparkling. He licked his lips as I moved kissed down to his throat, savoring the vibration when he cleared his throat.

"Your dad called," he said suddenly. I froze.

Wow. Talk about a fucking boner killer.

Nobody wanted to hear about their dad during a makeout session.

Nobody wanted to hear about their fucking psycho backstabbing piece of shit dad, especially.

I sighed, annoyed as fuck that he would bring that asshole up now while we were just getting hot and heavy and after I'd clearly set down the rules involving the damned demon. I went through them in my head, just to make sure they were as clear as I thought they were.

Don't fucking bring him up. Ever. I hated the bastard and no amount of lovey-dovey, psychotherapy was ever going to make me change my mind.

Alaric had no idea what Xiphrus had done to his own family, his own people. He didn't see the carnage, the misery, the torture. He didn't have night terrors, eons later, about the whole thing. He wasn't there when Xiphrus had shown up at my door, just days before the first battle, telling me that if I didn't side with him, that he would not only disown me, but use my corpse to decorate Atlan's front porch.

He didn't know. Nobody knew, except the people who were there. And I don't just mean physically, like Joxeia. Joxeia was there and he fought and he struggled, but the bastard was awfully good at shutting out his own mental process on the fucking thing. He wasn't mentally there to feel the pain, the betrayal. Sure, he felt it, but it was numbed. And that's why he was dumb enough to fall for Xiphrus's empty apologies.

But not me.

I didn't have the luxury of shutting off my humanity like Joxeia did.

I was there; mind, body, and soul.

So yeah. I thought I'd made it pretty clear that talking about my dad was off limits. Just like talking about cigarettes and Hades was off limits for him. He liked both of those things, and I hated both of them, so I didn't talk about them. So why did he think it was okay to talk about Xiphrus?

"Before you get mad," Alaric started, making me wipe a hand down my face, already fed up with the conversation before it had even started, "It sounded really urgent. He said he's been trying to get a hold of you, but your number wasn't working."

Because I fucking blocked his ass.

"Anyway," Alaric went on, eyeing me warily now as I watched him in irritated silence, "He says he needs you to come to Heaven as soon as you can. It has to do with this whole Viviana mess."

I'd already wasted enough time on that crap. Clearly it was just another leftover shitbomb Xiphrus had left behind and stirred up again. Because that's just who he was. He got hooked on the evil and couldn't quit it.