Page 48 of Twisting Beauty

The blade came up again and every muscle in my body clenched as he pressed the flat tip against my sternum, right over my heart, and held it there, the steel cold through the thin fabric.

My lungs forgot how to work.

“What,” he said, announcing each word carefully, “are you looking for?”

“I already told you.” I lifted my chin. “I lent him a book I want back.”

His jaw tightened. He drew the blade down slowly, splitting the front of my top from collar to hem. Two fast slashes and both straps fell, the fabric sliding off me, leaving me topless.

I gasped, crossing my arms over my bare breasts, an instinctive protective reaction. Heat flooded my face as indignation churned in my guts.

Underneath the shame, a different kind of heat began to seep through my body.

Stupid body.

He hadn’t looked away once, his attention so fixed and deliberate it pressed against my naked skin. Was it just me or had his breathing shifted?

He let the silence build until it felt like part of the game, another way of stripping things from me.

He used a finger to tug out my skirt’s waistband, his fingertip brushing against my skin, making a shiver cascade throughout my body. Then he slipped the knife in, cold blunt side against my belly, the material catching on the blade’s edge.

I let out a whimper. No. Please, not this skirt. Not the only skirt in her whole wardrobe that I had chosen. The only skirt that was mine.

“Why are you masquerading as my sister?”

There was no way I was telling him that. No way he would see my answer for anything but a lie.

Goodbye, pretty skirt.

“Lorcan, I am your sister.”

He shook his head as if he was disappointed in me. With one fast slash, he cut a long slit down my new skirt. The lace dropped without a sound, pooling around my bare feet and I let out a small involuntary sob.

I clutched my arms harder around my breasts, my shoulders hunching over protectively as cold air coiled around my bare legs. A numbness spread everywhere like ice except for the heat in my core pulsing low and unwanted each time his gaze moved across me. Slowly. Down the length of my body and all the way up, his gaze sending a flush across me like a fever.

Something in his eyes darkened. Something… I hadn’t seen before.

I pressed my thighs together against the traitorous wetness leaking into my panties.

The pause this time was longer, heavier.

Dear God. How many more questions did he have left?

He took half a step closer, my skin prickling at his nearness, my nipples pressing painfully against my forearms. He trailed his knife from my shoulder, down my ribs, my waist, goosebumps chasing it.

Finally, he slid the blade into the hem of my panties, hooked it, and pulled it away from my hip with the flat side.

“Last chance,” he said. But I swear there was the smallest of cracks in his voice.

One more lie and I’d be completely naked in Alistair Lasair’s bedroom.

“Who are you, little imposter?”

My throat closed around the truths I still couldn’t tell. My mind scrambled for a way to get out.

Fuck. I was so screwed.

I couldn’t claim to be Rua. He’d already seen through it. I might as well strip off my underwear myself.