Chapter 4 #2
Shoving his hand in my boxers and grabbing my shaft at the base, Kane rubs my length against his wrist, barely stroking, his voice rumbling in my ear. “Use your words, lover.” The endearment sounds wrong—harsh like cracking glass. Kane bites harder, the clench of his teeth on my throat painful.
I can’t think like this. Can hardly breathe. I’ve spent hours wondering what he’s doing, where he is, who he’s with, but the sudden onslaught of attention renders me speechless. My body burns for him, but my heart aches.
Why? Why does this hurt?
Finally, I choke out a response. “Were you with her?” I feel the tension shift as Kane freezes in place, suddenly shaking from head to toe.
“Were you?” Wedging my arms between us, I push him off of me.
“Did you kiss her?” I shove him square in the chest. “Touch her?” My gaze rakes across his body, looking for signs that they’ve been together.
He’s shirtless. Hard as a rock, tenting his jeans so much that I’m sure it hurts.
Jaw clenched. Eyes flashing like the sharpest shards of ice.
“Did you kiss her—” I wipe my mouth on my forearm—“and come home to me after?”
Outrage roars in my ears, but I see it reflected in Kane’s eyes. He’s just as pissed as I am.
“You fucking asshole,” he growls, grabbing my wrists.
“You think this is fun for me?” Spinning us around, he tosses me onto the bed and crawls on top.
By now, this is our normal. Kane likes to be in control.
He likes feeling me squirm beneath him. But this time, he hovers over me, barely touching my body with his.
Shaking. Gritting his teeth. Angry. Hurt.
Trying to make me happy, I think, in his own way.
Our eyes lock, and we glare at each other.
“You want me to apologize?” I scoff, stretching my arms over my head. The sheets are soft, contrasting the man nearly pinning me down. My knuckles knock against the wall. Rigid, just like Kane. “I won’t.” Jutting my chin out, I hold my ground. “I’m not sorry for anything.”
Not for his anger. Or what happened to Mercy.
Or my role in everything. I’m not sorry about the years we’ve spent together—the people we’ve killed—the pain we’ve caused.
Sometimes, when Kane is locked inside his studio finishing up a series of paintings, I visit the funerals of our victims. Studying their families.
Feeling their grief. Forty-three kills, and I’ve been to at least half of their services, hiding in the shadows like a ghost. I can’t bring myself to regret a single murder.
I’ve tried—begging the twisted chambers of my heart to pump an ounce of remorse into my soul—but it hasn’t worked.
Mercy is no different than the rest.
I don’t have any regrets about that girl.
“You’re not sorry for kissing her, so why should I be sorry for hurting her?
” I know the answer. I know that I should say it, too.
Because hurting Mercy hurts Kane. But I can’t form the words when they’re not true.
I’m a twisted, fucked-up man for everything I’ve done.
Our fallen angel makes no difference. She hasn’t changed who I am—and she hasn’t changed Kane, despite what he may think.
Kane’s jaw clenches and unclenches repeatedly. His nostrils flare. His muscles twitch as he strains not to touch me. Blonde hair a mess, icy eyes wild, lips a darker shade of red than usual.
A speck of blood hiding under his chin.
He’s fucking breathtaking.
No one deserves him more than me. I’ve been here by his side the entire time.
The only constant in his life. Supporting all of his fucked-up fantasies, from the endless stream of murders to the black market art deals that follow.
Reaper may be the face of the business, but I’m the one running it from the shadows.
Reaper wouldn’t exist without me, and I can’t breathe without the man behind the mask.
I close the distance between us slowly, running my palms up his biceps, across his shoulders, wrapping my body around his and tugging him down on top of me.
He collapses with a shudder, holding me so tightly that my bones ache.
The drag of his lips over mine is sensual but no less intoxicating, the two of us breathing in time with each other.
I feel his heartbeat beneath my palm and wish that it beat for me—and only me.
But I know that isn’t his truth, no matter how much I want it to be.
“I love you.” He sighs against my lips as he fists the sheets over my head. “Why isn’t that enough?”
Jealousy twists inside my chest, its thorns cutting into my heart. “I don’t like seeing you with other people.” I cling to him, scarcely able to breathe as I picture him and Mercy together. Panic rises like a tidal wave, threatening to take over. “I—” My voice catches. “I can’t lose you.”
Life without Kane is meaningless. I came to that realization long ago, when I nearly lost him to prison after our usual murder turned into a reckless double-homicide.
I’d rather get locked up beside him than live free on my own.
Shrinks would call it unhealthy, this dependency.
I know that. But it doesn’t change anything.
I want Kane more than I want life itself.
Maybe it’s because I finally have him that I refuse to let go. After years of watching from the sidelines, my heart filled with a hunger that’s impossible to satisfy. I don’t just want Kane—I need him like oxygen.
And if he gives himself to Mercy, I’ll have to survive off the leftover scraps. Clenching my fists, I scratch Kane’s back with my fingernails. It’s not fair that I have to share, so I won’t. I refuse. Losing any part of him, no matter how small, will ruin me.
Kane pushes himself up on his forearms, his gaze gentle as it sweeps across my face.
“I’m not going anywhere.” The divot between his eyebrows makes me feel guilty for saying my fears aloud.
He draws a steady breath and laces our fingers together, pressing my hand into the mattress.
“Zane—” My name falls past his lips like a sigh.
Is he disappointed? Tired? Exhausted from whatever he and Mercy got up to tonight—
“You paranoid fucking bastard.” He laughs, clocking me so accurately that I’m stunned. “You need to trust me.” Squeezing my hand, he smiles. Some of the warmth returns to his eyes, but it’s quickly doused by whatever he’s keeping from me. The thing that’s making him act all erratic like this.
Likely Mercy—or rather, what happened with her tonight. He still hasn’t told me. Technically, I haven’t asked. We dodge the issue, knowing that it exists, but unwilling to bring it to light.
I try not to let it get to me, but it does.
He may claim that he loves me, but he likes her.
I can see it, clear as day. He really likes her.
Thinking of her puts this little wistful smile on his face, like he knows he shouldn’t be so taken with her but can’t help it.
If he’s still interested in her after how badly she’s been broken, he’s falling in love with her, just like I feared.
Is it possible to love more than one person at the same time? Kane makes it look as easy as breathing, like he’s got more than enough love and affection for multiple people and himself. I barely have enough for him, let alone myself.
Maybe that’s why he needs her. Because I can only give him a fraction of the love he needs to survive. But that doesn’t answer the question of why.
Why does it have to be Mercy?
“I don’t understand you.” Gazing into Kane’s eyes, I search for answers. “I don’t know why you’re so infatuated with her.”
He returns my gaze but takes a moment to respond, thinking carefully about what to say. “Let me show you.” Kissing the corner of my lips, he murmurs a gentle please that spells disaster.
Facing what I’ve done to Mercy doesn’t scare me.
It’s the consequences—a fallout with Kane, a fistfight with Sam, a confrontation with the girl herself—that do.
Because no matter how black and white I try to make our situation out to be, everything falls into shades of gray.
Our relationships. Our feelings. And all the empty spaces in between where unspoken truths lie, waiting for us to shine a light on them.