He killed James. And he did it because James hurtme.
All things considered, James barely touched me, but when I look into Dice’s black eyes, I know there’s no point in arguing. Dice would never let something like that go.
And this proves that Dice won’t abandon me. Not when he’s willing to do something crazy like kill a man for touching me.
It’s almost like he loves me.
Tension seizes between my thighs. It’s insane; I’m in love with a killer. My body takes me forward. I throw off my hoodie, shirt, and bra. I don’t let myself consider the consequences. All I want is Dice.
Dice’s eyes widen as he takes in my bare chest.
“What are you doing?” he asks gruffly.
“Doing what I want,” I say.
I reach up, pulling his soaked, bloody shirt over his head. His muscles are bulky, like he’s pure masculinity, and when I see the lily of the valley tattoo with so many little blooms, I know the tattoo is for me. My heart aches with passion, and we kiss, our tongues colliding in a fury of desire. I run my hands over his chest, dragging my fingertips through the blood. His tattoos of the mysterious, powerful ocean mixed with skulls and flowers, are streaked with red. Blood that he spilled for me.
Dice pulls off my sweatpants and underwear. He squats down before me, completely in awe of my naked body. Then he licks my breasts. A dash of blood paints my skin from touching him. It’s disgusting and even dangerous to lick a stranger’s blood. Neither of us stops; he keeps tasting me. His tongue swirls around my nipples, sending a shiver through my core, and when he stands up, peering down at me, I cup his face, smearing the blood on his cheeks too.
No one has done something like this for me before.
Without another word, Dice whirls me around and puts pressure on my back, leaning me against the dead body. The warmth of the corpse unnerves me. You’d almost think he’s alive.
Dice presses down on my skull, his cock goring me from behind. With each thrust, Dice spreads my pussy wider than I can handle. And fuck,ithurts,but it feels good too, and I take every single thrust. The corpse’s nose stabs into my stomach. Dice groans, and I forget about the body. Tears well up in my eyes as I come on Dice’s cock, and he lets out a growl somewhere between painful and exhilarating. He comes too, his thick cock twitching inside of me, filling me with his seed.
Is this another way he’s claiming me?
He didn’t even ask if he could come inside of me. He doesn’t know that I’m on birth control. Does he?
My lower stomach hardens. He came inside of me because heassumedI was his.
And I know I am.
Our heart rates settle into a normal pattern. Dice stomps to the cupboard on the far wall. There’s a large bed in the corner on top of a cage acting as a bed frame, and so many jars of eyes and foods that I finally identify another smell: fermentation. Like sauerkraut and kombucha.
Dice likes to ferment foods and collect eyeballs. It seems so fitting for him.
Ronin had called this floor ‘the basement,’ and from what I can tell, it’s Dice’s home—an extra parking garage with only one car in it: Dice’s van.
I’ve seen that van many times before. It used to weird me out that I saw it so much. I would tell myself that white vans were common in Vegas. Now, I know the truth: Dice was always watching out for me.
My eyes rest on the cage underneath the bed. It’s big enough for an adult to crouch down in the fetal position or crawl on their hands and knees.
For a split second, I imagine being inside of the cage as Dice fucks my face.
A wet towel lands in my hands, and I snap out of those thoughts. I don’t know why I went there. Who thinks about getting face-fucked through the bars of a cage by a killer?
Then again, who lets a killer screw her over a dead body, right after he killed the victim?
Dice and I look at each other as we wipe the blood and flesh off of our bodies. It’s quiet between us, and yet there’s a connection bouncing back and forth like sound waves. This is the gentle side of Dice, the one that no one else gets to see. The vulnerability and tenderness that he keeps hidden. The part of him that secretly loves me.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
And this time, I nod instantly. It’s insane. I should run away. If Dice can kill a man he barely met, why wouldn’t he kill me? He attacked me before. He could do it again.
Yet, somehow, I trust him more than anyone else in the world right now.
“Why did you kill James?” I ask. I know the answer, but I want to hear him say it.
