Page 15

“You’re quiet again,” Harmony says, breaking into my memory.

We’re approaching the edge of the carnival grounds now, the distant sounds of tiny calliope music and the dull roar of a crowd bleeding through the glass.

Bright neon lights—pinks, blues, and electric greens—cut through the dark, painting her pristine skin in shifting, brilliant hues.

She’s so beautiful it makes my teeth ache.

Even now, as my blood boils with a decade and a half of unvented rage, there’s the cryptic pull of my obsession.

I want to trap her in the dark, overpower her completely, and make her mine in every way a man can claim a woman. I want to feel her trembling under my heavy grip, completely helpless, bound to me by the secrets we both keep.

But, I already know I’m sick. The question is: how sick is she?

Instead, I settle for reaching out and twisting a curl of her brown hair around my finger.

At my touch, Harmony stops breathing.

There’s an immense need to pull her close, inhale that intoxicating vanilla perfume, and feel the violent thrum of her heart beating against my chest.

“Just taking it in. The town hasn’t changed much,” I whisper, cutting through my unhinged thoughts.

“When was the last time you were here?”

I don’t answer. If she wants to know who I really am, she’ll have to dig back into the recess of that brilliant mind of hers.

“Well, things rarely do around here,” she replies, pulling the car onto the gravel shoulder near the brightly lit entrance archway of the carnival.

She puts the car in park, but leaves the engine idling.

She faces me, her pale eyes cautious, alert, and shining beneath the neon light. “Well. Here we are.”

It’s an invitation to leave. A polite, desperate plea for me to open the door, step out into the cold, and let her escape back into the night.

I look at her for a long, silent moment, letting my gaze drift from her eyes down to her full, pouty lips, and then down to the quick, shallow rise and fall of her chest.

I’ll allow her to assume this ride was a coincidence. That she picked up a creepy stranger who got a little too intense, a little too comfortable, and now the ordeal is over. But if she thinks once I step out of this car, she can go back to her life of lies, back to her perfect little life, back to being the untouchable queen of Blackwood, she’s mistaken.

She has no idea that the trap was set the moment she pulled over.

I’m going to follow her into those crowded fairgrounds, corner her in the dark behind the flashing rides, and bring my double-edged knife across her silken flesh.

Not enough to draw blood, unless she’s into that kind of kink, but just enough to have her panting, and watch as her world comes crashing down.

“Thanks for the lift, Harmony,” I whisper with a dark, velvet promise.

I pull the door handle and slide out into the crisp, autumn air.

The metallic smell of the blood on my jeans catches the wind, mixing with the scent of funnel cake, woodsmoke, and fried dough drifting from the fairgrounds.

I shut the heavy car door with a sharp, final thud that echoes over the gravel.

Through the glass, I watch her draw a deep, shaky breath of relief as I slip into the shadows near the entrance, hood pulled over my head.

She sits there for a few seconds before she shifts into gear, kicks up a cloud of dust, and pulls away toward the parking lot, her taillights burning like two angry red eyes in the dark.

At the edge of the gravel, I pull my jacket tighter around my shoulders, a slow, sinister smile curling on my lips as she parks under the flickering stadium lights.

Run all you want, sweet girl.