Chapter 27
HARPER-RAYN
Knight’s lips linger on my temple as his warm arms surround me, holding me to him as we spend the day in the comfort of his warm bed.
I stayed up for hours, crying into his chest as I told him about Laith and the target now painted on his back, and after the tears ran their course, I’ve been feeling numb.
It’s barely been twelve hours since I found Laith on my table, and despite having been the one to perform the external portion of his autopsy, I’m still in disbelief.
How can he just be gone? It doesn’t feel real.
“I promise you, doll,” Knight murmurs, his big hand claiming my thigh. “I’m going to find this bastard. He won’t get away with this.”
I attempt a small smile, but it falls flat. “I wish it were that easy, but there is no ending this. He won’t stop until there’s nothing more to take,” I say as the numbness begins to morph into emptiness. “He’s going to take and take until everything I love and care for is gone.”
“I won’t let that happen.”
I appreciate him, I really do. But how am I supposed to respond to that? There’s no doubt in my mind that Knight would go to the ends of the Earth to end this thing, but I don’t think catching this guy is even possible. We know nothing about him. His name. His purpose. Even why he’s doing this.
He’s too careful. Every scrap of evidence that’s dangled over our heads is quickly taken away. It’s as though the bodies he leaves behind are just part of the twisted game, used as a tool to torment me, to prove that he’s always ten steps ahead.
“If something happened to you because of me,” I say, my heart already breaking at the thought of Knight being next. “I . . .”
Knight takes my waist and rolls us until he’s hovering over me, his hips pinning me to the mattress while he holds both my hands above my head in just one of his.
“That’s not going to happen, Harper,” he vows, that dark, delicious gaze locked on mine, and for just a second, I believe him.
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m riding this bullshit right to the end with you. ”
I swallow over the lump in my throat, my emotions nothing but a train wreck right now. “Why?” I breathe. “Why do you care so much?”
He shakes his head, a slight smirk pulling at his lips. “Even if I knew, I probably still wouldn’t tell you.”
A stupid laugh bubbles up my throat, recalling the very moment I hit him with those exact words. “You’re an asshole,” I tease.
Knight grins. “I’m well-fucking-aware, Morticia.”
As I hold his powerful stare, I realize without a doubt that I’m quickly falling in love with this man.
On any other day, that thought would terrify me, and I would have already raced out the door, but today, I welcome it.
Love has only ever brought me pain, and sooner or later, Knight will bring the same, but I need it.
I need to loathe myself, need to be punished for the lives that have been lost in my name, and what better way than to have Knight rip my soul right out of my chest?
I don’t know when it happened, but at some point, this has gone from a wild fantasy to needing so much more than that. Something has changed. We’re no longer just curious about one another, we’re in deeper than we ever anticipated.
Lifting my chin, I let my lips brush across his. “Make me forget,” I beg.
His dark gaze holds mine for a moment longer before he finally drops his lips to my neck, still holding my hands hostage above my head. I open up for him, tilting my head aside as his warm lips skate across my sensitive skin.
His hips drive between my thighs, and I lock my legs around his waist, desperate to feel him slide deep inside of me.
His other hand braces against my thigh, holding me so gently that I didn’t even realize it was possible.
Knight has always been so rough with me, not afraid to throw me around.
He knows my limits and exactly what I’m willing to handle, but it never occurred to me what I’d find at the opposite end of that line.
The agony swirling through my chest immediately begins to fade, replaced with nothing but pure need and desire, and just as I feel the tip of his cock pressing against my entrance, his phone rings from his bedside table.
“Fuck,” he groans, his lips moving against my skin, both of us recognizing the particular tone for the station, knowing he’s being called out. “I’m sorry, doll.”
“It’s okay,” I whisper, feeling the exact moment the desire dies inside of me, allowing the pain to come soaring back.
Knight releases my hands and reaches for his phone as he rolls off me, already getting to his feet. When he answers the call, I can’t help but watch him stride through his room and into the closet, already reaching for his uniform.
Knight finishes with his call, tossing his phone down on a shelf in the closet as he pulls his shirt over his head. “Active shooter situation,” he explains. “I’ll be gone a few hours, but I need you to stay right here where I know you’re safe.”
I nod, not having any plans to take off just yet.
Plus, after last night, I don’t know if I’ll be safe in my apartment.
My stalker has been biding his time, and now that there’s a creepy message telling me the clock is ticking, I don’t know if trapping myself in my apartment is really the smartest idea.
“Okay,” he finally says, stepping up to the edge of the bed. He grips my ankle and drags me across the mattress until I’m right in front of him, his eyes locked on mine. “You call me if you need anything and I will come.”
I swallow over the growing lump in my throat, hating how emotional his words are making me. “Promise.”
He watches me a moment longer, and after deciding that I’ll probably be fine, he turns on his heel and strides out of his bedroom, taking his tactical belt with him.
His footsteps pound down the hall, and the front door opens, closes, and the lock clicks into place.
A wave of loneliness crashes over me, and I scootch down into the blankets and drift in and out of sleep for the next few hours.
By the time I wake, it’s almost four in the afternoon, and I let out a frustrated groan, knowing that I’ll have to start getting ready for work soon.
I’m really not sure that I can be at work right now, knowing Laith’s body is right there in locker thirty-six—knowing one of my colleagues spent their day opening him up, cracking his chest, and looking over his body.
Just the thought that someone would have had their hands wrapped around his heart . . . fuck.
My stomach twists, and I grab my phone, trying to distract myself from the pain. One thing is for sure, if this asshole has started coming after my friends and the people I care most about, then it’s time that Izzy and I have a serious conversation.
I told her about my stalker the very first night I felt his presence in the morgue, but she insisted that it was all in my head, and now I have to tell her that she was wrong, but more than that, she needs to know that she could be caught in the crosshairs just from being someone I love.
Hell, how am I supposed to explain Laith? How am I going to break her heart like that? Sure, she wasn’t as close with Laith as I was, but that doesn’t mean that his death isn’t going to destroy her just as it has me.
Blowing out a shaky breath, I bring up her number, knowing I need to do this now rather than later, and before I’ve even put the phone to my ear, her too chirpy voice is coming through the line.
“Girl, where the hell have you been? I’ve sent you like a billion messages today.
I need to tell you . . . wait. I know exactly where you’ve been!
” she laughs to herself. “Tell me you’ve been getting dicked down by Knight fucking Slater all day! ”
“I . . .” I let out a heavy sigh. “Iz, I . . . fuck.”
There’s a slight pause, and it’s as if she’s waiting for me to figure out what the hell I’m calling for, and honestly, I’ve got no fucking idea. How am I supposed to put any of this into words?
“Harper?” she murmurs, her tone shifting, clearly picking up that something’s going on. “What’s wrong?”
“I need to tell you something,” I murmur, my heart breaking for a whole new reason. “It’s important, and really fucked up, and I need you to have an open mind, but . . . damn it. I don’t know how to tell you this.”
“Tell me what?”
“It’s Laith,” I say, getting choked up. “Something—” A noise sounds from deeper in the house and my words fall away as my blood runs cold.
“Harper?” Izzy questions, urgency in her tone. “What’s going on? You’re starting to freak me out. What happened to Laith?”
My chest heaves as the sound comes again, followed by a distinct creak of the floorboards in the hallway. Fuck.
“Knight?” I call out, knowing he wouldn’t try to sneak up on me, not now. Not ever. “Is that you?”
I get no response, and just as I convince myself that I’m hearing things, heavy footsteps make themselves known in the hallway, one after another, coming closer toward Knight’s bedroom.
Fear grips me in a chokehold, and I scramble off the bed, my phone clutched tightly in my shaking hand. This can’t be happening. Not again. I was supposed to be safe here.
“What the fuck is going on?” Izzy demands.
“I . . . I think there’s somebody in the house.”
“What?”
My eyes remain glued on the open bedroom door, my pulse pounding so heavily in my ears that I can’t hear a word Izzy is saying, and yet every step down the hallway feels like a vibration right through my soul.
I start backing up, my gut telling me what I already know to be true. He’s come for me, and this time, he’s taking no prisoners.
As if on cue, the masked stalker appears in Knight’s bedroom door, a single black rose dangling from his fingers, and as I stare back at him, my hand falls away from my ear, my thumb skimming over the red button, ending the call with Iz.