Page 41 of Fallen Rook

“Holy shit, Tomcat, is that an honest-to-God smile I’m seeing on your sulky-ass face?” His face lit up. “And you cracked a joke, too.”

I gave his chest a shove, and he stumbled back, his amused smirk morphing into a devious grin. I stalked him backward, crowding him, suddenly remembering exactly why I’d put off seeing him again.

This.

The push and pull.

The lack of control.

The whirlpool of madness that threw me into the deep end and made me lose sense of time, space, and identity.

I hadn’t planned on nearly fucking him on his parents’ golf course the other day, and I certainly knew he wasn’t ready for full-blown sex now.

I was going to ease him into it, though it would probably cost me more than my sanity was willing to pay.

“First, show me your wrists.” I tucked my badge back into my pocket.

“Fuck off, dude.” Enzo shoved at my chest in anger. I captured his wrists, rotating them toward me. Upon closer inspection, it didn’t look like cutting. Not only cutting, anyway. More like a really nasty rash.

“That’s it, I’ve had enough of you, asshole.” Enzo jerked his arm back before throwing an accurate sucker punch straight to the side of my nose. Blood sprayed out of it, gushing all over my designer suit. My glasses tumbled somewhere under the couch, probably broken. Not done putting his point across, he slammed the door behind me, pounced on top of me, and sent me sprawling to the floor. My head plunked against the French herringbone as he mounted me. I stared up at his exquisite, blurry face—my beautiful, intoxicating ruin—holding his gaze in a vise grip.

“You’re not cutting. It’s something else. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Jesus Christ, would you let it go!” He bashed my head against the floor, the ricochets of the assault reverberating in my spine and jaw. He was a big, muscular guy, and his job was beating people to death.

I watched him stoically, allowing him to let it all out, to purge the darkness he harbored from being the enforcer, the killer, the wayward brother, the lesser Ferrante.

“Whatever it is, I can help,” I said calmly.

“Stop fucking talking!”

His fist slid across my jaw in another brutal blow. My patience was running thin.

“Kid, I’m allowing you one more punch before I start retaliating. You don’t want me to do that. If you prefer, we can talk about the marks on your hands tomorr—”

He pummeled my mouth, splitting my lip. More blood gushed out. I licked my bottom lip, running my tongue along my teeth to make sure they remained intact. The coppery taste flooded my senses and turned me the fuck on.

Blood wasn’t usually a kink I indulged in. Making Enzo face his feelings, though? Worth it.

My violent little butterfly.

So beautiful.

So fragile.

So fucking mine.

“Good. Now get off me.”

“Not until you stop talking about my damn wrists.”

“Oh, we’ll discuss them. However many times we need to. Until I stop seeing abuse marks. Is it drugs? Is it—”

He threw another punch, toward my sternum, but this time, I dodged expertly. I wrapped his fist with mine, twisted his hand, then quickly rolled over, flipping him down so I was on top of him. He panted hard, snarling like a wounded beast, reaching to claw my eyes out in anger.

Seizing the pressure points in his neck and grabbing him in a frontal chokehold, I tsked. “I don’t want to cause you brain damage. You can’t afford to lose any gray matter. Can we stop with all this violence?”

Those bottomless whiskey ambers flared at me in rage, before dimming in acceptance. I kept the pressure light, but we both knew I could finish him off effortlessly.