Page 27 of A Cruel Kindness

But he’d spoken, which had drawn my attention to his lips. My gaze snagged there, caught like prey in a spider’s web. I had never felt something like this before, the intense pull in my stomach. If I thought I’d felt attraction before, I was sorely mistaken.

This was an entirely different beast.

My eyes flitted up to Soren’s, seized when I found him staring at me. So much, yet nothing at all, passed between our stares.

I could feel him daring me to walk away, while simultaneously challenging me to stay right where I was and drown in the blue of his eyes.

As strong as the Bond was, and as alluring as Soren was even without it, I’d spent my whole life working to resist impulse. It was only my training that helped me drop my gaze to the floor and take a measured step away.

I heard Soren’s scoff hit the top of my head, then watched his feet stride away from me. Helpless, my chin lifted so that I could watch him walk away.

Everyone was staring, something that would clearly be common for us. One poor kid got in Soren’s way while he was trying to leave the gun range.

“Um, you ne—need to … you can’t leave with a gun. No loaded firearms outside the ra—ange,” the kid stuttered, his eyes dropping to where Soren still carried the gun he’d carefully taken from my shaking hand.

Soren lifted it, looking at it like he hardly realized it was still in his hand. In a few quick moves, he discharged the ammunition, unscrewed the silencer, and placed the gun in the kid’s hand. As he scurried away, fear on his face, Soren turned over his shoulder to me. There was something searching in his gaze, and the Bond made me think it was me.

I had to grip the thin wall separating stalls behind me to stay where I was instead of giving into the urge to run towards him.

Soren scanned the room quickly for something, making me watch in some mixture of awe and horror. His eyes landed on something in the corner of the room, then marched over.

People made way for him like waves parting for a ship. Only one person didn’t move, and it was a soldier who clearly had a large chip on his shoulder. His expression was one of someone who had been convinced the world was against him, yet accepted no responsibility for his own actions.

Soren walked up to him and ripped the gun out of his hand. “Didn’t your mommy teach you not to use a weapon that’s not properly assembled?”

The soldier folded his hands over his chest in indignation. “It’s just a silencer, Soren. It’s not that serious.”

Soren laughed bitterly, shaking his head. I couldn’t see his expression, but I figured it was one that would make anyone with wits wither. “Rules are rules, Charles,” he said to the solider. “Break rules, and there are consequences.”

Charles scoffed right in his face. “Since when did you give a shit about rules?”

Soren took a step towards him, tapping him on the shoulder with the still loaded gun. “When they give me an excuse to dole out punishments.”

Charles’s face fell, right as Soren lifted the gun right next to his ear, aimed it at the target and shot it. The loud bang rang through the room with force, though the jolt it gave my system was nowhere near as bad as the pain Charles was suffering.

He fell to the ground, holding his hand over his ear. I was sure the drum was ruptured.

Soren simply stood over him and said, “Silencers on.”

Then he turned as if nothing had even happened and strode toward the door.

Unfortunately, the Bond was panting like a happy puppy in the face of that move. So when Soren walked out, I followed.

Chapter 8

Soren

For the first time in my life, I was nervous to Cross.

The Bridge was an old friend, and Carson and I had jumped across it like rowdy kids hundreds of times. I’d lost count when I was twenty-two. Four years ago, so surely the number had at least doubled since.

But sitting here, crouching in the corner of the training room, twirling a knife so that it balanced on the tip, I found myself nervous.

Despite the rumors swirling around the base—on both sides— that I was a psychopath who was excited by little else other than bloodshed, I actually did have emotions. I was intelligent enough to call them what they were when I felt them.

It was nerves. The urge to consider the worst possible outcome the likely one. The rapid heartbeat. The small bead of sweat building on my brow.

Every single one of those symptoms swelled when I looked at Bellamy. Right now, she was running circles around a soldier thirteen years deep into enlistment on the sparring mats.