Because he could feel it, knew the exact flavor of my every emotion, but he couldn’t know my thoughts.
So I submitted to the flood. Let him feel my terror, the last noxious fumes of hope as they guttered out beneath the deluge. The tender wisps of feminine interest that fluttered to life as he drew near.
Everything I was, exposed to his inspection.
I showed him that the haze of placid indifference had been replaced. Washed away by something far more deadly.
Acceptance.
Because we matched.
Because it wasn’tjustCaledonian seed wetting my thighs.
It was the hunt. The chase. Knowing that no matter how hard I fought, nor how fast I ran, he would catch me.
That Iwantedto be caught.
Yearned for the fist in my hair, the fingers tight around my throat. The punishing grip of desperate hands and the burning splash his seed—it was a drug.
Mine.
For he would let the empath feast, as long as it was from him.
One side of the coin would take everything not offered.
The other would spend until there was nothing but dust and smoke.
But together, they were balance.
Feast and famine…
.. and I was starving.
I bolted away from the bathroom, away from the last place I wanted him to look.
A booming crash made me yelp, whirling toward the sound.
The door bounced off the wall, kicked open, left sagging from twisted hinges. And there, framed in shadows and splintered wood,Asher.
Disheveled. Rugged. His black gaze cut to the bathroom, first. Suspicion etched in his every line, he narrowed his eyes. Trying to find something out of place. Astute, cunning as always, the man saw right through me as if he could smell the deception.
I staggered back, heart full of terrorized panic as I inched away. And when my hands found the sill, I glanced over my shoulder. Down at the street below, as if contemplating jumping from a second story window just to escape his wrath.
It was enough to break his focus—he pinned me with a slitted glare.
I recoiled from that storm of seething rage. Inched closer to the edge.
Teeth flashing, fists clenched, he surged forward half a step. “Don’t,” he spat, but still, my chains did not burn.
I glanced at the bed. The crisp, clean sheets that had been a refuge and a prison.
Head tilted to the side, he took another rolling step then paused.
My grip squeaked on the sill, and I let my knees go soft. Braced to jump.
He moved between blinks.
Faster than I thought possible, he closed the gap. One hand landed on my hip, but the other found an anchor at the base of my throat. Face to face, he towered above me. Trembling with a fury reserved for me alone, he pressed forward. Making me bend backward as he tipped us both over the edge and impaled me with twin chips of icy obsidian.
