Pareidolia (Mayhem Manuscripts Season Two: Cryptids)

Here's Lee McCormick's "Pareidolia." It's a novel in the multi-author series, Mayhem Manuscripts Season Two: Cryptids.

["Something always has bigger teeth.

Aspen
I've spent my life chasing emotions I can't understand. I don’t feel bad for what I am—I don’t feel much at all, really. I’m a monster, comfortable in my own skin. When I move to a small town where people go missing and they say the woods are haunted by a beast, I think I’ve finally found a place to settle.
And then he finds me… A creature made of shadow and moonlight.
A beast with wings that feeds on pure emotion.
A monster who says I belong to him.

Nox
I am the shadow that hangs over my small town by the mountains. I am the thing the children fear and the adults speak of in hushed voices. I’ve never cared to know a human, until Aspen shows up in the woods with blood on his hands. I feed on emotions, but his are volatile… different. He doesn’t feel fear, but I can taste the desire for violence just beneath his skin.
I want to consume him. I want to keep him. I want to peel away his layers and wrap him up in my wings until I can taste his heart on my tongue.
I never believed in mates, but I know Aspen is mine."]

Dude, can you be that shocked that the monster wants to keep you when you literally just called him "my monster"? This being chapter two. Chapter one, you mentioned that you tattooed him on your body.

Sure, Nox didn't understand the difference between asking and telling, but Aspen barely felt any emotions so... they work. They really work. Nox feeds and teaches Aspen about "typical" human emotions that he's never felt before, and Aspen feed Nox that cold apathy and that untampered lust. Two monsters don't cancel each other out; they make each other stronger. Nox taught Aspen to welcome his monstrous side. Aspen taught Nox a little bit about being human.

And another fabulous epilogue that ties into what was quite frankly a fabulously dark prologue. 

Trigger Warnings: blood play, death, gore, murder, body horror, cnc, forced mating/marking, violence, torture, kidnapping, stalking/hunting/capturing of MC, mentions of past child abuse, and more.

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