“This isn’t your first hunt?”
“Nor is it Rhykus’,” he points out.
“You don’t seem like the sort of man who’d be easy to bring down.”
The flash of fury in his eyes makes my breath catch. It promises a world of pain for someone else and I recognize it, because I see its like in the mirror every day. Then he shrugs. “I trusted someone I shouldn’t have. He pretended to be injured and when my back was turned, he leashed me with this fuckingcollar. It’s designed to mute my magic. When I turned around, fifteen of Rhykus’s men appeared with crossbows.”
“Yousurrendered?” He doesn’t strike me as the type, for there was not a hint of submission in him when the two guards were bothering me.
The stranger laces his fingers together over his abdomen. “You might say that.”
No. Not surrender. I return my attention to the bars he bent. He’s biding his time, just like me.
“I am Bael. What’s your name?” he asks.
“A secret.”
“Now that is an unkindness,” he teases. “I have given you mine.”
“More fool you. Some say there is power in a name.”
The air seems to thicken between us, like charged lightning. His lashes half-lower as if he considers my words. “Perhaps you are correct.”
“And you have not earned mine yet.”
“Did I not earn it before when I scared away your tormentors?”
They weren’t merely my tormentors. They were my escape route. I wanted them closer. I wanted Broken Nose to forget his orders and make an attempt at me. But I don’t say it. Let him think himself the hero. Let him play at protector. He merely forestalled the inevitable.
I am going to burn this fucking whorehouse to the ground.
But first, I’m going to nail Rhykus, Broken Nose, the Mouse, and all their fucking merry little band of murderers to the walls.
“So, what is the plan?” Bael asks, pushing to his feet again.
My head jerks toward him as he saunters toward me. “Plan?”
There’s that smile again, slow and sinful as he traces his fingers along the bars between us. “You think I believe a womanlike you isn’t plotting her escape? You’ve been stalking the cell ever since you got here, looking for a weakness.”
There is a… weakness here.
If one could call it that.
“You bent those bars,” I muse. “How far could you…?”
“Not far enough,” he warns, leaning against the ones between us. “I was angry at the time, but I’ll never get them wide enough to slip through. Not wearing this fucking torc.”
I tap my finger against my lips. “You also seem to want Rhykus dead.”
His eyes narrow. “I am not the hero you’re looking for.”
I tip my chin up, staring into his eyes. “I never wanted a hero.” Stepping closer, I curl my fingers over the bars, taking the moment to enjoy the sight of him. He’s dangerous, yes, but something inside me thrills a little at the thought.
“No?” He’s close enough to touch and the rumble of that one word does things to me.
I’ve never been with a man—the Knights of Malus check for chastity within their promised brides—but I’ve seen handsome men before.
All of that fades before the sheer presence of Bael. I knew nothing of true temptation. There’s a sheer carnality in his expression, a hint of a smile touching his lips as if he knows exactly what I’m thinking as I let my gaze drop to his mouth, and bite my lower lip.
