He goes still. It’s not the coiled stillness of a predator about to strike, but like he’s locking a door from the inside.
“They’re a kill count.” His words land like stones. “All seventy-three of them. Mostly vampires. Some rogues. A few… others.”
Seventy-three tally marks, each one representing a person who stopped breathing because of Kieran Cross.
“That’s...” I search for the right word.
“A lot.” He finishes for me, one corner of his mouth curving into the ghost of a smile. “You asked.”
I did ask. Now I’m standing in his room, staring at a man who’s killed more people than I’ve had meaningful conversations with in my entire life.
“Why tattoo them?” I ask, since I’m apparently ininterview Kieran Crossmode. “Why keep count at all?”
“Because forgetting would be worse.” He moves to the wardrobe, and I try not to watch his back muscles shifting beneath his shirt. “Every mark is a reminder of what I’m capable of, and of what this world requires.”
A map of violence permanently etched onto his skin.
Most people would be calculating the nearest exit and fire traveling back to their room by now. Instead, my heat signature is spiking in ways I desperately hope he can’t sense as I wonder what it would feel like to trace each mark with my fingertips.
It’s data I would have no business collecting. But since when has that ever stopped a Thorne from pursuing forbidden research?
“You don’t want that kind of weight,” he says, yanking me out of my extremely inappropriate thoughts that I should definitelynotbe having about my combat instructor. “Trust me.”
With that, his expression closes off like a blade resheathed.
I don’t push. Some doors aren’t meant to be opened.
“I didn’t come to talk about the Fury Loop,” I say, forcing my thoughts back on track. “I came because I need to access the Ember Archives. Tonight. Right now.”
Kieran pauses, one hand on the wardrobe door, his eyes locked on mine as he waits for me to explain.
So, I do.
“Every text I’ve found about the sea surrounding the island references sources that are locked in the Ember Archives. Maritime records, navigation logs, and star charts, to name a few. I tried to get in myself, but I couldn’t, which is why I need your help. Because if Oliver’s out there, I need to know what he’s facing.”
“You tried to break into the Ember Archives,” he repeats, as ifthat’sthe most surprising part of what I told him.
“The wards nearly gave me frostbite.” I hold up my palm, where a red mark is still visible. “Even with the Crown’s amplification, I couldn’t breach them.”
He pulls a pair of black pants from his wardrobe, his fingers move to the towel at his waist, and every rational thought in my brain evacuates.
“Turn around,” he says, the command sharp.
I spin toward the wall so fast I nearly trip over my feet, my cheeks burning at the sound of the towel dropping, my brain supplying images I absolutely should not be imagining.
He’s your combat instructor. Stop it.
“You can look now.”
I turn back cautiously. Kieran’s fully dressed in dark tactical clothes, black from head to toe, a belt of weapons wrapped around his hips. His black hair is damp, pushed back from his face in a way that sharpens the angles of his jaw and cheekbones, and somehow the transition from half-naked to fully armed hasn’t made him any less distracting. If anything, it’s worse, because now the tattoos I was cataloging are half-hidden beneath fitted black fabric, and my brain keeps filling in what’s underneath like a map I’ve memorized.
He studies me for a moment, then nods once. “Give me your hand.”
I reach for him without hesitation, and his fingers close around mine, hot and steady.
“I’m guiding the travel, to make sure we end up in the same place,” he says, and then the world erupts into flames and dissolves into heat.
* * *
