Mm. Sure. I just bet it was. Nothing more fun than cleaning seats on rides and stewing in the silence of my poorly concealed animosity. Even when I don’t dislike someone, it’s not like I’m particularly cordial. I don’t know how to be. People are confusing and dirty and…if they’re not cruel, they’re still condemning. I gave up a long time ago on trying to figure them out.
I just accepted that we lived a universe apart. Aliens to one another. Estranged and unwanted.
Glancing at Malcolm, I linger with my car door open long enough to parse through my feelings. I’m both disappointed that he’s not dead and annoyed that it very well could be my own fault because something as stupid as a desire to play a useless game pricked my curiosity.
I know I’m a dating sim addict. I know my favorites are the ones with strong female leads and devoted men. I’m fully aware of the high I get when I make the right choices and everything falls into place.
I like to win.
Iwantto win.
I want to know how far Malcolm will go, what his limits are, what could possibly constitute this level of madness.
I know I shouldn’t be this invested in whatever cruel game he’s cooked up, but I can’t ignore the feeling that—for the first time since I met Malcolm Swallow—I have a chance towin.
Steeling myself, I release my car door handle and face him fully, then I point at the asphalt.
He needs no clarification as he drops to his knees, looking up at me as though I’m his whole world. It’s a captivating sensation—having the person I hate most seemingly at my mercy.
Gripping his jaw, I watch his breath catch.
His eyes glaze; red illuminated by the evening sun glows in his cheeks.
Not a centimeter of him speaks of anything but submission. Adoration.Pleading.
I can’t figure him out.
I never have been able to.
But I’ve never exactly wanted to, either.
Do I…want to now?
Shuddering, I release him and climb into my driver’s seat. “Well.” I pull my seat belt on. “Goodbye.”
Still kneeling beside my car, he chuckles. “Goodnight, my darling dove.”
I swallow, meet his eyes beyond my window before I’ve closed the door hard enough for it to latch, and stare until my gaze falls to stick on the bruises around his throat.
Level with my face, he smiles. “Until tomorrow.”
Tomorrow. Right. Yeah. I still have to come in to work tomorrow. Which means I need to get home and get ready for it tonight. But that’s not all. I also need to check my burner phone and see if I didn’t royally mess everything up.
Unnerved, I close my door fully, pull out of the parking spot, and try not to focus on Malcolm—still kneeling—in my rearview mirror as I drive away.
Chapter Eleven
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Romance isblackgold and blue.
Malcolm
“You know, most men would have hickies after a romantic excursion, not handprint bruises around his neck,” Iverson, myendearingandnot even a little bit creativeyounger brother, says minutes after I’ve walked into his Tudor-style mansion home and found him in his very, very blue home office.
After the magical past few days I’ve experienced, all I want to do tonight is head home and reheat a pizza, but a pizza I do not have at home.
Hence, my visit here, to see my brothers—one blood, the other soul. Shoulder braced against the door jamb of my blood brother’s office, I arch a brow. “Most men aren’t dating women who want to kill them. But I’m actually fairly proud of her for taking the hands-on initiative after she attempted to step back in the name of ‘self-preservation’. Can you imagine my disappointment when she told her ‘contact’ that she preferred the role of accomplice to that of assassin?”
