Page 108

All the blades catch my vision, glimmering in the low light like twisted, evil comets. One hangs on the wall beside us, within reach—if he’ll only let go of my wrists for a moment. He heaves against me, breath sawing, muscles shuddering, heart pounding. As if he heard the thought, Gage’s hold loosens.

I don’t wait. I reach for the scythe, lift it from its hooks, and urge the handle into his grasp. Every ounce of his attention trains on me.

“I want to feel it,” I say, and touch my fingertips to my throat. “Right here. Show me, Gage. Show me how close you could get to ending my life. Then…prove to me how you never will.”

His free hand captures both my wrists and pins them back above my head. My left foot barely touches the cold floor, my right leg hooked high over his hip, his weight holding me to the wall.

Slowly, inch by inch, Gage brings the curved blade to the side of my throat. The metal is cold as ice, a single bright line kissing along my thrumming pulse. He doesn’t press. The hook of the scythe follows the line of my jaw like it was forged for it—close enough for me to feel the threat in every swallow.

He’s still buried in me, pinning my wrists to the wall while the other grips the stem of the scythe with the most powerful restraint. His eyes, black as weapons, wreck me, worship me, and something almost holy breaks open behind the devil in them.

His breath scrapes against my lips. I can see the war in his face: the part of him that could end this in a heartbeat, and the part that would burn the world before he ever would.

But I tip my chin higher, offering him the rest of my throat.

He doesn’t spare the blade a glance. Whatever mask he wears for the rest of the world is gone. He gives me every ruined, vicious piece beneath it—the man no one else gets close enough to see and survives.

“You would never see me coming.”

His head tilts, one lip curling off his teeth in a silent snarl. My breath snags as the scythe kisses a millimeter closer. I lock my throat. I don’t swallow. I don’t even try to breathe, because I can feel how little it would take.

“You wouldn’t even get the chance to scream.”

His hips press me harder to the wall, still shaking, the contrast extreme—hard heat of his cock, the hot slick of my cunt, and the cold curve of steel under my jaw.

“One clean line.” His voice almost sounds tender. “You’d choke on your own blood while I watched the life fade from your eyes. I’d memorize the sight of your soul leaving your body.” He leans in until his mouth hovers over mine, breath scraping my lips, the blade never wavering. “I’d kiss it farewell…” A ghost of that kiss, not quite landing. “…and sleep like a saint. Knowing I’d rid the world of one more killer.”

Then the handle goes still. The metal stays. His forehead finds mine. The snarl bleeds out of his face until what’s left is wrecked and raw and terrifyingly gentle.

The words scrape out of him. “I could. I could do it in a heartbeat, and I’d never hesitate if it were anyone else.”

His lips brush the corner of mine. “You asked me to show you how close. That’s as close as it gets, Princess. The only thing leaving your body tonight is going to be my name as you scream it. And if every blade shatters? Then we shatter together. I’ll take every cut meant for you and fuck you through the ruin until this floor is just us and a million shining smithereens.”

One deadpan look from those sinful, hooded eyes.

Gage drops the scythe. It clatters like a cathedral bell.

When he loosens his grip on my wrists, I reach for his neck, drag him closer, and hum against his mouth with a savage grin, “I love it when you talk serial killer.”

“Now I’ll fuck you like one.”

“Well,” I say with a soft laugh of disbelief. “That happened.”

“Mmm.” Gage kisses the side of my head, his arms around me from behind. “Happy it happened?”

I smile, silly and sore. Insanely sore. Threading my fingers through his, I sigh out, “Incandescently.”

The fire is going. The TV is a low smear of light. I’m wearing one of his shirts, which currently qualifies as both clothing and emergency shelter. Gage is sitting up against the pillows with me tucked warmly between his legs as his heart hums a contented beat against my back.

He puts a glass of water in front of me. “Hydrate.”

I let out a laugh but take it because arguing with a man who held a scythe to my throat and rearranged my insides seems like a terrible use of my remaining brain cells.

His mouth twitches. “Drink the rest, Princess.”

I do. His hand stays behind my neck, thumb idling over my pulse like he’s still reassuring himself that he didn’t cut it.

For a minute, neither of us says anything. Then another thought drifts through what remains of my brain. “So…how was it?” I twist sideways and set my head against his shoulder to look up at him.