As we push through the stairwell’s exit, the cold seeps through my thin jacket, but it doesn’t register beneath the buzz of electricity running under my skin.
With my free hand, I tug the mask off so as not to appear suspicious while the fingers of my other hand tighten around Rowan’s, neither of us acknowledging how this contact should feel strange but doesn’t.
“Keep walking,” Rowan murmurs, his breath forming white clouds between us. “Normal pace.”
I focus on my feet, counting how many steps between cracks in the sidewalk as we maintain the rhythm of a couple with nowhere particular to go.
Rowan guides us away from the building with subtle pressure on my hand, turning right at thecorner where a broken streetlight offers a pocket of darkness. The night wraps around us, autumn wind carrying the scent of wood smoke from someone’s chimney mixed with the ever-present undertone of car exhaust.
“You still with me, precious?” His thumb traces small circles on the back of my hand.
I nod, not trusting myself to speak.
We pass a closed convenience store, its windows covered in faded advertisements. My reflection in the glass appears distorted, features unrecognizable. Is this what happens when you kill someone? Do you become a stranger to yourself?
“Your hands stayed steady,” Rowan says after we’ve walked another block. “Not everyone can do that their first time.”
The implication hangs in the air between us. This might have been my first kill, but it wasn’t Rowan’s. Not by a long shot.
“I work with knives,” I reply, starting to shake.
Rowan’s fingers tighten around mine. “That’s not why.”
He’s right. The steadiness came from the same place inside me that allows me to pick locks without questioning the motive of the client, and where practical necessity trumps morality.
My body betrays me now, though, trembling starting in my knees and working upward. The controlled focus that carried me through the kill dissolves in the open night, leaving me shaking.
“It’s the adrenaline,” Rowan soothes, noticing my shaking. “Your body’s catching up with your brain.”
A police car passes on the opposite side of the street at a slow cruise, its lights off. My heart rate doubles, triple beats hammering so hard my ribs ache. I force myself to keep walking and not look at the car as it passes.
“They’re not searching for us,” Rowan murmurs once the taillights disappear around a corner. “No one knows he’s dead yet.”
The word ‘dead’ hits me like a physical blow. I killed someone and watched the life drain out of him.
“Stop,” Rowan pulls me into the shadow of a closed storefront. “You’re hyperventilating.”
My chest heaves with rapid, shallow breaths that bring no oxygen. The edges of my vision darken, and my free hand reaches out to the building beside me for support.
Rowan steps closer, his body blocking the wind to create a pocket of warmth in the cold night. His pheromones cut through everything else, and my heartbeat quickens for reasons unrelated to murder.
“Focus on me.” He brings his face close to mine. “That’s it. Breathe, precious.”
His palm flattens over my chest, over my thundering heart, and the warmth of his hand penetrates through my clothes.
“Good,” he says as my breathing slows. “You did well back there. Don’t start second-guessing it now.”
The praise shouldn’t affect me, but warmth blooms beneath his palm. I haven’t been told I did well in years. Maybe not ever.
His fingers slide from my chest to my throat, coming to rest on the pulse point under my jaw. The touch sparks heat across my skin despite the cold night, and my pulse jumps beneath his fingertips.
His pupils dilate as he feels my response, and he shifts closer. “You understand what comes after violence like that, don’t you, precious?”
I shake my head, even as instinct coils in my gut.
“Your body needs release.” His deep rumble vibrates through me. “Your brain needs to replace the chemicals you burned through. Fear into pleasure. Death into life.”
His words stir low in my hips, a building heat that has no business existing while a man I killed grows cold less than ten minutes away.
