“Yes. I’m not a prank or a joke.” The gun muzzle presses at my temple and tracks its way across my forehead. “I’m not an illusion you conjured from this beautiful brain.”
I freeze. The rough metal sends violent shudders down my spine. I’m one wrong move, one wrong word away from getting myself killed.
He traces my jawline with his weapon and then presses it to my chin. “I’m the man you’re destined to be with for the rest of your life, and I am very, very real.”
The ignorant mind, with its infinite afflictions, passions, and evils, is rooted in the three poisons. Greed, anger, and delusion. “I know you’re real. I’ve always known.”
He leans closer, his breath, warm and quick, against my cheek. “Then why the games, darling?”
I’ve provoked him out of his hiding for a reason. My plan has worked, but the outcome is unexpected. I made my move, and this is his. Not exactly how I’ve hoped he channels his anger. “I think you know why.”
Silence stretches between us for a thrashing heartbeat. I picture him smirking under that mask in response, a cruel awareness of the desires he unravels deep within me.
“I do, my naughty, impatient queen. But I need to hear you say it.”
My throat constricts as fear and a perverse excitement war inside me. “I want you to finish what you started.”
Moving the gun off my face, he brushes the pad of his leathered thumb over my lips, and another quiver runs through me. “Oh, my darling, you have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear those words, coming out of your beautiful lips, whileIam here, looking straight at your face.” A hushed chuckle escapes his chest. “I knew you’d understand. Like Enzio and Bianca,we’re two sides of one dark soul, and I know exactly what you want.”
“Do you?”
“Blake,” he says, the name dripping with venom. “You want him gone as much as I do. Like the pervert, like the thief.”
A plain confession that leaves no room for doubt. He killed them. He killed Aaron and Saldana.
My heart races, torn between exhilaration and terror. I’ve crossed a line, one I can never uncross. But isn’t this what I’ve wanted all along? “When?”
He laughs under his breath again. “Patience, darling. I promise you I’ll make him pay for what he’s done, just like the others, the ones you know about and the ones you haven’t known about yet.”
What? Does he mean Gia? Are there more? Unrevealed murders he’s committed in my name already or upcoming kills? I gulp. “I don’t want anyone else dead. Just him.”
“You have to trust me, my queen. I have a plan, and you’ll thank me for it when it’s all done. I promise you Blake will be gone soon.” His fingers feather over my face, and then the gun traces a cold path down my neck, further down the line between my breasts, a chilling reminder of the danger I’m in. “Sooner if you letmefinish whatyoustarted.”
“What?” I shiver involuntarily, the weight of his words crushing me. Part of me wants to scream and end this madness. But another part, the part that dances with monsters and lays with them in the dark, the part I’m no longer ashamed to acknowledge, drips wet at the unforgivable.
Slowly, the gun slides with his hand down my abdomen, then, as it reaches my inner thighs, he tries to spread my legs apart. “You heard me, darling.”
“No.” I press my thighs as tight as I can, hyperaware my panties are below my knees. I’m completely naked under my gown. If he reaches under it… “Stop. This has gone too far. You can’t…” A sob rips out of my throat. “Are you going to rape me?”
His hand stills on my leg. “Rape you? How could you say such a terrible word? I’m breaking my back to earn your love, and you think I’m just gonna… If that’s something I’m capable of, if that’s what I want from you, why go to such lengths to show you I’m worthy of you?” His tone turns gentle, even sweet. “You’re much more than a body to me, my darling butterfly. You’re my queen.”
“But you’re touching me without my consent.”
Silence—the complete silence of a predator—slices the air surrounding us again. My temples pulse wildly. He said he was never going to hurt me, but how can I trust a murderer who has broken into my house, armed, and cast implicit threats of violence? Is he going to stop or have I angered him some more? Will he force himself on me? Kidnap me?
Kill me?
“You don’t want me to touch you?” His voice wavers with heartbreak and disbelief. The hurt is palpable, laced with a plea for reconsideration and a rawness to his tone that comes from having your deepest hopes shattered.
Despite the fear of the impending atrocity—he has a gun between my thighs—I can’t bring myself to lie or give voice to the truth; I crave his affection as much as I dread it.
“Then who is it you want?” His voice takes a harsher turn. “Who was touching you in your head tonight? Who was making you moan like a dirty slut?”
You.How can I want him so badly when every instinct screams he will be my demise?
“I’ve always thought it’s the characters that pleasure you when you need a release. I mean, them I can forgive. They make me jealous, but I can’t kill them. I can’t even hate them because they’re part of you.” The heat from his body radiates closer, and then his mask touches my ear. “And I worship every piece of you.” His breath falls on the hollow of my neck before it’s buried in my collarbone. “You. All of you.” He takes sharp inhales along the side of my neck, like an animal sniffing his mate. Then his nose, beneath the softness of his mask, glides up and down my shoulder. “Your darkness, your light, every shred of your soul.”
I shut my eyes, my lips trembling. The intensity of his twisted emotions, his simplest touch… Everything he is ignites an unholy fire in me that forges rather than destroys. An abyss that sees right through me, ready to embrace me when I fall.
