Page 77 of Into Pitch

Not wild or even sloppy, but clean and controlled. The crowbar whistles through the air with every inch of strength that I can muster. He moves at the last possible second and the metal slams into the wall where his head had been with a crack that rattles my teeth.

“Sadie,” he breathes carefully.

“Shut up,” I snarl and swing again.

He blocks it with his forearm and I wince at the impact. Even if I hear nothing break, I know it will leave one hell of a bruise. His eyes darken, but I pull back and head for another round. It’s clear only one of us may leave this cabin, and I’m going to be the one who does. Even if it breaks me a little bit to be.

He grabs the crowbar mid-swing this time and wrenches it sideways, momentum dragging me forward and into him. I don’t let go, but dig my heels into the floor and yank back. Teeth bared like some kind of rabid animal.

“I should cripple you,” I spit.

He smirks, “you won’t.”

Oh?

I surge forward, closing the distance and smashing the end of the crowbar into his ribs. He grunts this time—a real sound—and that satisfaction hits me far hotter than his fingers had just earlier.

“Don’t tell me what I won’t do.”

He catches the bar again, closer this time, hands overlapping mine. His grip is iron and familiar in the worst way as he yanks me into him. Our faces inches apart, breaths colliding.

“You’re not aiming to kill.” He annoyingly points out.

“And?” I challenge.

“And that tells me exactly where you are.”

He twists the crowbar out of my hands in one smooth motion and tosses it aside. I flinch as it clatters uselessly to the floor and decide to go at him bare-handed.

He catches my wrist mid-lunge and slams me back against the wall, body pinning mine with terrifying ease. The impact knocks the air from my lungs and simultaneously lights me up everywhere he touches.

Fuck.

My knee drives up between us on instinct, but he blocks it with his thigh and the contact sends a sharp pulse straight through my core. A hard reminder of what he had done before I decided to go crowbar-killer on him.

“I should have hit you harder.”

“You hit exactly as hard as you needed to,” He muses.

I switch tactics and try shoving at his chest, weaker now and a whole lot of breathless. “I don’t want this.”

“You do,” he murmurs in amusement, and it’s worse because he isn’t wrong. “You’re shaking because you do.”

I swallow and his thumb brushes over my wrist, right over the bracelet that bares his charm. It clicks faintly against the chain and his mouth curls.

“Let’s both agree that you came inside not to escape, but to confront. Very different things.”

“To hurt you,” I clarify.

“Same thing, but it wasn’t to end this.” He grins.

My head tips back against the wall, needing just a few inches to breathe. A few inches to get my head back on straight because now all I have is this gaping play by play of earlier.

“Move,” I whisper, barely audible.

He doesn’t, of course. Instead, he leans in just enough that his breath ghosts my cheek, his voice low.

“Why don’t we pick up where we left off against this exact wall just a little while ago?” He murmurs.