Page 47 of Twisting Beauty

“Oh. Um, thanks.”

He leaned closer and his scent came with him, whiskey, woodsmoke, and that male musk underneath, and the low broken orchestra of violins swelled through my chest, raw and aching and too loud. “How about we play a game?”

“I don’t want to play with you.”

“You say that like you have a choice.” He leaned closer still. “Or maybe I should call out for Father.”

“No!” The word came out before I could stop it.

Lorcan’s smile was slow and vicious. “Thought so.”

My pulse thumped at the base of my throat.

He had me. He knew it.

The last of my composure gave way without drama. Every lie I’d rehearsed for this moment vanished. My mind emptied itself down to one hard fact: I wasn’t getting out of this.

The only question left was how much he meant to punish me before he was done.

His hand moved so fast I barely saw it. Suddenly he held a knife between us.

Oh fuck. My fingers came up to the thin scab at my throat.

He turned the blade, letting it glint in the dim light.

“I get to ask questions,” he said. “For every lie, I take something.”

My gaze dropped to the knife, then back to his face. “T-take what?”

He didn’t answer. He traced the cold tip of the knife over my cheek, skimming the edge down the side of my neck, along my pulse.

I froze so completely it hurt, every muscle locked, every breath trapped high and useless in my chest, while he studied me.

“What are you doing in this room?”

I swallowed, my dry throat catching. “Looking for a book.”

He went still, his eyes narrowing. “Liar.”

“I’m not⁠—”

“Hold still.”

My heart lurched into my throat, pure animal terror, as he slipped the blade under the collar of my cardigan. I stopped breathing entirely.

He drew downward in one slow pass, fabric parting clean. My cardigan gaped open. Then he cut down from the shoulder along the length of my sleeve, then again at the other shoulder.

The whole thing fell away and the cold air of the room poured over my arms and shoulders all at once, the shock of it immediate and total.

I scanned my body, waiting for the fiery lines of pain where he’d cut me.

But there was nothing, just the goosebumps of cool air against my bare arms and shoulders.

He didn’t just know where to cut but knew how to cut with surgical precision. A psychopath with the finesse of a surgeon.

I repressed a shiver.

His gaze moved over me, and my skin prickled everywhere his eyes landed.