The Ripper (Infamous Guardians #1)

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 6

STITCHES

GRIMM

When I said that the day when I could text her whenever I wanted was not near, I didn’t expect to find Arella desperately crying her eyes out on her balcony after my month-long absence. I didn’t expect to find out that she’d started chain smoking, nor that the woman who brought serenity to my highly turbulent, slightly miserable mess of a life would be so broken.

I didn’t expect her response either.

I thought she was going to block my number as soon as it popped on her screen, that she would file a complaint with the police and get a fucking restraining order or a gun license.

I thought she would do anything other than what she actually did.

Take it as a thank you for the takeout, was what she texted me after I told her she exposed her beautiful body to my eyes.

While I had caught short glimpses of what she kept hidden behind her clothes over the years, it was never as clear as the show she put on for me. That robe seemed to fall off her shoulders in slow fucking motion, and my eyes lingered on every jaw-dropping curve until my mouth watered.

Perfection.

Every inch of her was fucking perfection.

I suppressed the primal need that had taken over me the moment she displayed those full, round breasts that I now had uncounted fantasies with. The mere memory of that image made me greedily lick my lips as I imagined her taste in my mouth, the texture of her skin against my tongue, the sounds she would make as I claimed her inch by fucking inch.

I refrained from telling her that I was on my fucking knees for her, that I was hers to do with as she pleased, that she could’ve walked all over me and still I would have worshiped at her altar for all eternity.

~ You’re pathetic. Here comes Grimm, the poet.

I suppressed the urge to storm into her house and see her naked body up close.

~ I still think we should have done it, but you never listen to me.

~ You’re not exactly giving helpful advice.

~ It’s not too late, we can do it tonight when she’s asleep.

~ No

.

We can install cameras around her place.

I smacked the side of my head to shake off the ideas, because every little suggestion seemed more and more appealing to me.

Soon.

Soon I would have her.

And soon came faster than anticipated, because later that evening — too late for a woman walking alone on the street in this fucked-up side of town — she left her building wearing that same white dress she was wearing on the plane.

She probably did it unconsciously, because she couldn’t have figured out who I was from a few text messages, could she? Either way, I liked to think that she dressed up for me.

~ I frankly think you’re delusional, but I’m just a voice, what do I know?

As I took in the sight of her walking in front of me, almost as if she was putting on a show — one I thoroughly enjoyed — I wondered if she remembered me, and that thought poured gasoline on the embers and started a fire so strong it would consume everything in its path back to the one who had stirred it.

She never looked back, not even for a second, which brought a shit-eating grin to my face, because that meant she wasn’t afraid of me or, even better, maybe she felt safe knowing that I was a few steps behind her.

~ At least, not scared yet.

I didn’t know why I liked the idea of her being scared of me, if only for a second. Maybe I just wanted to feed on the look of panic in her eyes before assuring her that I would never hurt her. Maybe I wanted to see her flinch, so I could soothe the fright away.

But someone stole the pleasure of being the one she feared from me, because as I followed her through the park, right when I was about to pick up the pace and call out her name, a man stepped out from between the trees and pointed a gun at her.

Pointed a fucking gun at my Snezhinka.

~ The fucking audacity.

She froze in front of the barrel of the gun, seemingly forgetting the act of breathing, as I stepped to the side and quietly made my way behind her through the trees.

~ Heads will roll tonight.

While I did like how terror looked on her otherwise serene features, I didn’t like when that fear was caused by some asshole who suddenly decided to play cops and robbers - minus the cops. If there was anyone who I would ever allow her to be afraid of, that would be me, and even then, it would never be just fright, as it would be mixed with arousal, passion, and anticipation. She would enjoy every second of fearing me.

Her hands trembled as she clutched the bag to her chest, as if that would protect her, when the soon-to-be-dead man called her a bitch. How could he call a creature so undoubtedly pure, such a filthy word? Justin had done it too, and now this piece of human trash.

Were they blind? Couldn’t they see that she was as immaculate as angels?

~ Those with rotten eyes are blind to purity.

I bumped the side of my head with the bridge of my palm a few times as the man yelled at her again, my anger growing thicker with each passing second as I scraped my nails against a nearby tree.

When she shrieked, slowly lowering the bag clutched against her chest, I finally stepped from the shadows behind her and encircled her waist with my arm, biting the inside of my cheek when a jolt of electricity sparked within me.

She didn’t even flinch, as if she was expecting me to show up, and I allowed myself a smile because she knew I wouldn’t have allowed any harm to come to her.

Her body heat radiated in my palm as I leaned down to inhale her scent, and her hand clutched my wrist like she was trying to make sure I was actually real, a sharp intake of breath filling her lungs as she pressed herself against me.

The fact that she sought comfort in my body made me mentally drool, and I had to suffocate the instinct of licking her neck just to get a small taste.

She was intoxicating. Addictive. Mine.

“You have until I count to ten to leave,” I spoke calmly as she shivered at the sound of my voice.

I licked my lips and stepped in front of her, gently pushing her behind me so she would be shielded in case the guy’s gun turned out to be loaded, and her hands clawed at my shirt, fisting it as she glued herself to my back.

Did she really feel that safe with me?

Why did I like that scenario more than that of her fearing me?

I looked him dead in the eyes, grinning like a maniac in the face of danger. I could smell his fear, I could see it emanating out of him, polluting the air as his fingers trembled on the trigger.

~ Amateur.

Slowly, I drew my gun out of its holster and pointed it at him. His eyes widened as I held Arella behind me, tracing reassuring circles over the material of her dress, meaning to soothe her nerves.

Okay, maybe the circles were for me, but she wasn’t moving from the spot, so I figured it was a welcome touch.

~ You were joking when you said he has ten seconds, right?

I gritted my teeth.

“One,” I grinned as I released the safety.

~ Are you fucking shitting me right now?

“Fuck off, dude, I was here first,” the guy spoke as he steadied his hand.

Bravery. Usually a virtue, but a game for fools when faced with the unknown. He wasn’t just a fool, but downright crazy, since he didn’t realize he was about to die for a handbag.

“Two,” I yawned as he released his as well.

~ Fucking shoot him already!

“Who the fuck am I kidding?” I mocked.

Two gunshots resounded in the space around us, and Arella pressed herself harder against me, her shivering passing through my clothes and touching my skin, a low whimper falling off her lips as the man’s body fell to the ground like a piece of meat, a hole between his eyes.

The euphoria of the release offered by his death didn’t last long, pain erupting in its place as I felt his bullet drilling through my shoulder, and my body involuntarily jerked back as my hand tightened around her so she wouldn’t fall.

When I released her and I turned to face her, my shirt was already soaked with blood.

Luckily, it was a black shirt.

~ What if it wasn’t?

~ She would’ve been scared of the blood.

~ She’s a doctor, dickhead.

~ I can’t wait for her to look into my eyes and make you shut the fuck up.

She was just as beautiful as I remembered, minus the shocked expression that wrinkled her features, but it didn’t stop me from smiling like a stupid teenager.

Arella blinked repeatedly before her gaze finally collided with mine, and the voice zipped it.

Silence, sweet silence.

A soft blush crept across her cheeks when she recognized me, her eyes widening in surprise, her mouth parting in a way that made me want to inhale that little gasp. She looked like she was revisiting our time together on the flight, as if that time was now developing in front of her eyes. She moistened her lips, her mouth opening and closing countless times, no words coming out. When she reached her hand up, seemingly unaware of the action, and pushed her finger into my cheek as if to see if I was real or a figment of her imagination, I felt myself getting hard at the feel of that brief, barely-there touch.

“We meet again,

Snezhinka

,” I half-whispered just before her eyes rolled to the back of her head, and her body went slack.

She swayed on her feet, nearly collapsing, but I caught her before she hit the concrete floor and picked her up, the effort making my wound bleed faster.

“That excited to see me, huh?” I shook my head, half-worried, half-amused, and headed out of the park.

I carried her in my arms all three blocks back to her apartment, weighing my options. I could either break into her home, so she would wake up in a place where she felt safe, and break her trust, or I could take her to my apartment and face the consequences.

“Fuck me, this is going to be a roller coaster,” I spoke to myself as I carefully put her in my car.

After buckling her in, I lit a cigarette and called Klaus.

“Santa’s Laundromat, how may I…” he began with his usual bullshit.

“Not today,

Santa

. I need you,” I interrupted him.

“Twice in less than twenty-four hours,” he chuckled, and I could feel the grin on his face through the phone. “Is this about your lady friend again?”

“Washington Park, as soon as possible. It’s empty now, but the laundry sits in the middle of the alley. Thorough cleaning, Klaus, I got shot there,” I admitted, passing to the driver’s side.

“Damn, you got shot? Man, how the mighty have fallen,” he snickered, “consider it done.”

“Thank you,” I bent down to look if she woke up. “

Blya, da ty krasavitsa

[2]

.”

I wanted to slap myself senseless for not being able to suppress the words.

~ She isn’t going anywhere, anyway. She’s ours.

~ She is mine, you psycho.

~ Semantics.

“She’s with you? Oh, bend me over and fuck me sideways, that’s huge. Should I take my tux out of storage? I hear wedding bells,” he went on and on in an overly exaggerated high-pitched voice until I couldn’t take it anymore and hung up.

I got into the car and pushed my hair back, then turned to look at her.

Her white dress, the same one that had been the star of my many fantasies, the same one that ended up shredded in all of them, was slightly stained with blood and some of it had spilled onto her skin, down her neck and into her cleavage. I was struggling not to think about how much I wanted to rip her dress off and see her wearing nothing but my blood.

Fuck, the simple thought sent a shock straight to my crotch, and I gritted my teeth as I scraped my nails over my jeans, then swallowed down the fist-sized lump in my throat, wanting to punch my dick for joining the conversation at such an inappropriate time.

~ It’s reacting to your thoughts, so maybe you should punch your head.

I reached my hand out to push back some of the long blonde hair that fell over her face, allowing my index finger to brush over her cheek after tucking the strand behind her ear.

~ How bad would it be if I pushed just a smidge of that blood into her mouth so she would carry my DNA inside her for a while?

~ Ok, you need to shut it, psycho.

I bit my fist as I caressed her petal-soft skin, a little cold to the touch, probably from the shock, and I shook my head and stopped touching her. Not that I didn’t want to keep doing it, but because I felt unworthy of these intimate stolen touches.

~ Oh, get down from that moral high horse, you have no business being on it.

I gritted my teeth and started the engine when Klaus sent me a confirmation text, then drove back to my apartment like a fucking saint. I wasn’t a law-abiding driver, but I didn’t want to startle her if I hit a bump or something, so I stuck to the speed limit.

Carrying her to my apartment proved to be an excruciatingly agonizing task because I had to feel her warmth seeping through my clothes and listen to her soft, sleepy whimpers.

Having Arella so close to me drove me feral with need; it turned me into an animal who wanted a bite out of her, and I had to lock that need up and throw away the key, because just a bite would never suffice.

Ignoring those animalistic urges seemed to be an impossible task, because as I gently laid her down on my bed, I cursed at how good she looked on my sheets. It was as if she belonged there, almost as if she needed to be shackled to it so she would never leave.

Pain shot up my arm when I remembered that I had a gunshot wound to tend to, but before I could care for myself, I had to care for her, because I couldn’t let her wake up covered in blood, could I?

I went to my dresser and pulled out a black T-shirt, not that I owned any other colors, then went to the bathroom to get a damp washcloth to clean her up with.

Very slowly, I removed her dress and gulped audibly when I realized that she wasn’t wearing a bra, flooring the brakes on my sick fantasies when I saw the contrast between her pale flesh and my sheets. Fuck, how I wanted to bruise her with my teeth, to stain part of her black so she could blend into my darkness.

I swallowed the dryness in my throat as I imagined marking her, then did everything in my power to not look at her.

Anywhere but her.

The fucking wall, the fucking nightstand, the fucking hideous red lava lamp that Klaus gifted me as a, and I quote, “

housewarming gift

”.

“Shit,” I looked at the wall as I started to carefully wipe the blood from her neck and chest.

This was torture at its finest, since I didn’t even have the voice to keep me distracted, because somehow the fucker decided it was time for a nap.

My finger accidentally brushed her nipple as I cleaned the swell of her breast, and I mentally slapped myself as I tried not to imagine all the nasty, disgraceful things I wanted to do to her.

I tried to think about the opposite of things that sparked arousal, like swamps, sewers, cinnamon, public bathrooms, all while forcing my eyes to stay fixed on the wall above her head. But when I finished, and I took the T-shirt in my hand, my gaze accidentally fell on her again, and I froze, then looked away, then back at her.

“You are going to be the death of me,” I whispered to her sleeping self as my eyes lingered on the small smudge of blood left on her collarbone. “But if I must die, I hope to die for you.”

Fuck it, I already broke every rule, what was one forbidden look going to change?

And look I did.

I allowed myself to watch her, unapologetically. I took in the way her lips parted with her breathing, the steady rise and fall of her chest and the way her full breasts slightly bobbed with the movement. Licking my lips, I raised my hand and hovered my fingers above the dip of her stomach, following the path of every curve, circling her navel, going down and over her mound.

So fucking tempting.

I wondered what it would feel like to cup her over the material of her white cotton panties.

It looked like it would be a handful, and in my twisted brain, I imagined she would be so wet that her underwear would stick to her flesh. It would be messy, and she would beg me not to stop.

~ She would probably bite your head off.

~ Oh, so now you’re awake. Just peachy.

I shook my head and snapped my hand away before going through with my plan, then clumsily pulled the T-shirt over her head, surprised I didn’t wake her up. While I was tempted to leave her naked, I wasn’t suicidal, and judging by how she broke those roses with Justin’s face, I was sure she would attempt at my life if she were to wake up only wearing panties.

Why was it that every time I saw her felt like the first?

~ Because you’re stupid and you forget things?

After I covered her with a soft blanket and pressed a feather-like kiss on her forehead, which I could not stop myself from doing, I finally went into the bathroom to clean up my bullet wound.

When I took off my shirt, I felt like I was going to puke from the pain. Shit, I hadn’t been shot in so long that I forgot how awful it was. I’d hoped it was just a graze, but I wasn’t so lucky.

Satan had a seriously fucked-up sense of humor. There was a doctor a few feet away from me and I had to remove a bullet by myself.

I didn’t mind, since I would take every bullet, every knife slash, every single burn in the world, if that meant she was safe and unharmed.

I grinned at the thought of another tattoo as I walked to the kitchen and took a bottle of vodka back to the bathroom with me. After taking a few heavy swigs, I poured a substantial amount over the wound, gritting my teeth as the burning sensation spread through my arm.

The alcohol flowed down my chest along with the blood, spilling onto the floor as I opened the first aid kit.

I took out bandages, a scalpel, a fucking pair of long tweezers that looked like a claw or whatever it was called, and everything else I needed, but I was overcome with dizziness, and my hands trembled on the box as I lost my balance for a moment.

~ You can do this. You did it before. Stop being such a pussy.

I dropped the box on the floor.

“Fucking hell,” I cursed, and bent down to pick up the utensils.

After spreading them out on the bathroom counter and sterilizing them, I took another long swig from the bottle, then shook my head and slapped my face to stay awake as the blood loss clouded my vision.

A warm hand gently grabbed my shoulder, and I froze for a second before turning around to see an angel who was reluctantly smiling up at me.

“Need a hand with that?” she asked, and I uncontrollably nodded as my lips slightly parted in awe, entranced by the gentle look in her eyes, and the spark of fear that burned beneath it. “Can you lie down on your back for me, G?”

I laughed like an idiot at what she called me, but she didn’t give me a second glance as she washed her hands thoroughly, up to her elbows, then inspected the tools I previously laid out.

I lay down on the bathroom rug, feeling even dizzier than when I was standing, but I did my best to stay awake while she pulled on a pair of rubber gloves.

“Do you have any rubbing alcohol?” she asked, and I shook my head and pointed at the vodka bottle.

She giggled as she took the bottle in her hand and poured some onto a piece of gauze.

At that moment, when Arella dropped down to her knees next to me and began to slowly dab at the wound, her eyebrows drawn together, that lower lip clamped between her teeth, I knew there would never be another.

She seemed completely detached from all the blood, unaffected by the fact that she was cleaning up a bullet hole, and I was dumbstruck.

~ She’s a fucking surgeon, you moron.

“You’ll live, tough guy,” she said, sounding like she was mocking me a little. “It isn’t very deep, and it doesn’t look like it hit the bone. I’m going to make a small incision so I can reach the bullet, ok?”

She sounded calm, clinical even, as though her emotions played no part in her work, but I knew for a fact they did.

“Do what you have to, beautiful,” I answered, my eyes fixed on her face, and no matter how much she tried to hide any emotion, I saw the way she licked her bottom lip after hearing my voice.

That flicker of emotion was gone when the blade cut into my flesh, and I could have sworn I saw white stars dancing in front of my eyes, even if I knew the cut wasn’t even an inch long.

Is that how my victims felt when I carved them, or was it just the torture of her being the one holding the blade?

I struggled to sit still and let her work, gulping when she picked up that tweezer-looking thing, and it didn’t take long for her to pull out the bullet, tossing it into the sink, a clang echoing in the bathroom.

With one hand, she pressed the gauze onto the wound with a force I wouldn’t have given her credit for, while her other hand reached for the sewing kit on the counter.

“Can you put pressure on that for me?” she asked.

I would do anything for you.

I nodded, then placed my palm over hers, savoring the feeling before she pulled it away to thread the needle.

“We have got to stop meeting like this,” I joked as I admired her.

How was she even real?

She didn’t answer my comment, but a small smile betrayed her thoughts for a second before she put on her stern face again. I bit the inside of my cheek when she poured some more alcohol on the open wound and prepared to stitch it up.

“That’s what you get for playing hero,” she said as the needle pierced my skin.

“I’m not the hero, Snezhinka,” I groaned at the pain. “I’m the villain.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Not in my story,” she whispered, so softly that I might have imagined it.

I didn’t say anything after that, and neither did she.

After she finished stitching me up, she bandaged the wound, then stood up, took off her gloves and started cleaning the utensils and the sink. Her movements were now rushed, frantic even, as though she was finally realizing where she was, who she was with, and what she was doing.

With difficulty, I got up from the floor, still dizzy from the loss of blood, and swore as the pain spread through my arm. I stepped closer to her, and for the first time, she flinched in my presence.

I thought I would love to see her scared of me, but I fucking hated it, because that little jump broke my stupid heart in half.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” I told her, using the softest tone I could muster.

“You’ve been stalking me for years,” she replied as she packed everything back into the kit, doing everything in her power not to look at me.

I tried to suppress the grin her words brought out of me, but my mouth moved before my brain could get involved.

“I don’t see it that way,” I explained as I leaned against the counter and took another sip of vodka.

“Then what the fuck do you call what you’ve been doing,

G

?” she pronounced the letter mockingly. “You’ve been sending me food and pictures of—”

“Grimm,” I said.

She froze, her hands shaking as she finally raised her eyes to look at me. Fear and excitement played on her face, her expression a mix of the two emotions as she seemed to put everything together now that she had all the pieces to the puzzle.

“What?” she asked, her voice unsure.

“My name,” I explained, “is Grimm.”

She blinked, her anger slowly subsiding as I looked at her with the gentlest expression I’d ever given anyone.

“Do you mean that you’re the…? No fucking way,” she began pacing the floor, her bare feet slapping against the marble as she ran her fingers through her hair.

My eyes fell briefly on the tattoos on her wrists, and she seemed to notice, because she suddenly hid her arms behind her back.

“Yes, I’m the guy in the Grim Reaper costume whom you danced with at that Halloween party, I’m the guy you met on the plane whom you clung to when you were scared, but beyond those two, I’m the man who’s watched you from the dark since the first time I saw you.”

“This is crazy,” she whispered. “What am I supposed to do with this information now? Why did you even do all that stuff? How the… I have so many fucking questions that my brain is about to explode,” she spoke so fast I could barely register everything.

She was overwhelmed, confused, and slightly furious.

I loved that image.

“I know, and I’ll answer every single one of those questions with the truth, but you have to know that nothing I’ve done these past six years was meant to hurt you, Arella. I would never hurt you.”

“Six… six years? You mean we met before that Halloween party?” She took the bottle from my hand, muttering some unintelligible words before she raised it to her mouth and gulped down some of the alcohol, wrinkling her nose when it burned down her throat.

“We hadn’t technically met before the party, no. I noticed you,” I said calmly.

“You noticed me…”

“Yes.”

“And you decided to stalk me instead of coming up to me?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know how fucked-up that is?” she almost yelled, and I was seriously struggling to hold in the laughter bubbling up inside me.

“I’m aware.”

“Why are you so calm about this? Aren’t you afraid I’ll go to the police and report you?” She arched an eyebrow, crossing her arms over her chest.

I copied her stance.

“Not in the slightest,” I laughed. “If you wanted me out of the picture, you would’ve gone to the police the second you figured out you had a stalker, but you didn’t, because deep down you knew that my intentions were good, or maybe…” I paused, the corner of my mouth slightly tilting up. “Maybe you liked knowing there was someone watching over you, maybe you liked the thrill. I would even go as far as to say that it aroused you, but I’m still debating on that last one,” I chuckled.

“It didn’t arouse me,” she scowled, and I grinned.

“Funny how that’s all you took out of my entire speech. Are you brave enough to prove it?” I raised an eyebrow, carefully analyzing her features.

Her stern exterior faltered a little as she started fidgeting, a blush creeping up her cheeks. She sucked her bottom lip between her teeth and averted her eyes.

Damn, red looked so good on her.

“Why me?” she asked, changing the subject.

I took a step towards her, but she stepped back, so I stopped and sighed, searching for the right words as she waited for my answer.

I promised honesty, and I hoped she wouldn’t be scared when she found out the truth, so I took a deep breath and gave it to her.

“My brain is wired differently, in a way. I obsess over things and people easily, and when I become intrigued by someone, I make it my mission to find out everything there is to know about them, and you awakened that need inside me the first time I saw you. I thought I would get bored after I knew more about you, as has happened with everyone else before you, but that wasn’t the case… With each new thing I learned, that need grew thicker. When I sleep, you’re in my dreams, and when I wake up, you’re the first thing I see. Every day for the past six years, you’ve been the only thing on my mind. I ache for you, I fucking ache. Fuck, I yearn for you as if you’re air and I’m suffocating.”

I barely took a breath between words, the last sentence draining the last of my oxygen, and I had to inhale deeply once I finished, because I was, in fact, suffocating.

She seemed shocked, overwhelmed, intrigued even, her emotions running wild on her features, and she took another long sip straight from the bottle, wrinkling her nose in such an endearing way that I wanted to kiss every crease.

How did she do that? How could she allow her feelings to be so legible on her face? Why wasn’t she trying to conceal them like she did when she patched me up? What made her so in touch with her emotions outside of work?

“I’m not going to lie, everything you’ve done scares the crap out of me, Grimm,” she said as she rubbed her thighs together.

I grinned.

My name sounded like a prayer on her lips, and I wanted to answer it.

“It shouldn’t, because, as I said before, if I wanted to hurt you, I would have done it by now.”

“I know,” she whispered.

She couldn’t stop it anymore, and I couldn’t either, because this pull was stronger than both of us. I knew she felt exactly the same as me, and my words tattooed on her wrists were proof of that, no matter how much she denied it right now.

Even if she didn’t want to admit it to herself, I could see the struggle in her body language, how much she fought herself not to give in.

“Tell me you haven’t thought about me at all,” I baited her, taking a step forward, watching as she took one back. “Tell me you don’t feel this pull between us as strongly as I do.”

“Why didn’t you make yourself known sooner?” I took another step towards her, and she took another step back.

It went on like that for a few more steps until her back touched the tiled wall behind her, and I pressed my palms on either side of her head.

“I wanted to, but I couldn’t, because I’m not a good man, Arella,” I said with a sigh, shaking my head. “I promised to tell you the truth, so if you don’t want to know and go back to your life, I’ll understand and go back to being nothing but a ghost. It’s your choice,” I whispered over her face. “What will it be, Snezhinka? The truth, or the shadows?”

This was it.

This was the choice that would either set her free or shackle her to me. She could say no and leave, accepting that I would always be a shadow looming over her life, or say yes and leave, knowing that I would stop at nothing to make her come back.

A sharp inhale filled her lungs as her eyes seemed to get lost in mine, and her body shivered as I ran a finger down her naked arm, goosebumps covering her skin in the wake of my touch. She seemed to weigh her options, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, her gaze never leaving mine.

“I want the truth,” she nodded.

An ominous grin coated my lips, one I couldn’t stop.

Welcome to purgatory, little angel.

“I kill people,” I deadpanned, “a lot of them, every day, and most of the time I enjoy it,” I confessed, and she didn’t even flinch.

Her breasts rose and fell in sync with her breathing, and my eyes were drawn to their movement for a second before a slight whimper fell off her lips, pulling my attention back to her face.

“Like, that’s your day job or something?”

Bless her fucking heart.

I rolled my eyes. “That’s my life, Arella. I’ve been brought up into it and there’s nothing I can do to get out of it.”

She nodded as if she understood, and that gesture shook my entire belief system. Why the fuck did she understand?

“Do you kill good people?” she swallowed audibly.

“No.”

“Innocent people?”

“No.”

“Children?”

“Never,” I frowned, my voice low, menacing even. “I may be a monster, but I would never hurt children.”

A sigh that sounded a lot like relief escaped her, and my eyebrows drew together as she pressed herself harder against the wall. My body responded without any permission and closed the space between us, gluing itself to hers.

“What do you want from me, Grimm?” Her warm breath brushed across my chest as she avoided looking at me.

~ Let’s tie her to the bed, she’ll get used to it eventually.

~ Go to hell.

~ I’m taking you with me.

“Everything,” I exhaled, squeezing my eyes shut for a second.

My palms balled into fists next to her head and my jaw clenched as I pushed myself off the wall and stepped away from her, even though every fiber of my being itched to go back.

“Thank you for stitching me up,” I said, giving her a short nod and a last longing look before leaving the bathroom.

It was the hardest thing I’d ever done, but precisely because I wanted everything from and with her, I had to give her the necessary space to process everything I’d told her. I had to give her space to breathe, and the time she needed to accept me, to choose me for herself the same way I had chosen her, because she wasn’t a woman who could be forced into anything, let alone into a relationship with a criminal.

I couldn’t pressure her or smother her with attention.

Just as I had waited six years to approach her and have this conversation with her, I could just as well wait a while longer for her to decide.

But whatever her decision would be, whether she wanted me or not, I would never stop being her shadow.

UNCERTAINTY

ARELLA

Choices.

As humans, we are confronted with them every day.

Ultimately, our day-to-day choices determined whether we were good or bad. They also determined what we would become in the future. Happy, sad, successful, unaccomplished…

Alone.

As a religious woman, I saw life in black and white. If you did the right thing in the eyes of God, you would go to heaven, and if you did the wrong thing, you would burn in hell.

But Grimm was neither black nor white, and although his beautiful light blue eyes would beg to differ, he wasn’t any of the other colors either. He belonged and lived in shades of grey.

He blended into the background like a chameleon, abiding by his own set of meticulously chosen laws.

Grimm was purgatory personified, where no behavioral rules applied. He was a glitch in the system, because while his intentions seemed good, his methods were cruel. He reminded me of my past, in a way, and I had yet to decide if that was a good or a bad thing.

I chose to become a doctor to save and preserve life, to help people, ease their pain and, when possible, prevent said pain.

So, how could I even consider choosing a man who had so little regard for human life? But also, how could I not? Even if our present values were so different and we were a contradiction in terms, it felt like we were predestined to meet. Otherwise, why was he the only one who had ever sparked this burning desire in me?

I looked at myself in the mirror of his luxurious bathroom and found myself unable to recognize the woman staring back at me. She was utterly confused. She contradicted herself as she weighed the pros and cons, as if it was a “Should I buy this vacuum cleaner or not?” kind of question.

I had never been so at odds with myself before, so unsure of my choice.

My whole life since I moved to the United States was thoroughly planned out. I allowed myself no room for error along the way. My school, my hobbies, even my career, were all carefully thought out beforehand and meticulously acted upon.

Then this man came along and decided to take permanent residence inside my head, refusing to leave my thoughts.

I brought my hands together and looked at the words tattooed onto my skin. The Grim Reaper’s words, which were apparently also scary tattooed guy’s words. The men I had been obsessing over, the men I had been touching myself to. Those men were the same person.

Said person was now a few feet away from me, and his name was Grimm, as he had told me at the party all that time ago, but I thought it was just a reference to his costume.

Holy shit.

This was the worst night of my life.

Was it really? Didn’t I want it?

I mean, I technically asked for it all this time.

I often wondered what I would have said to him if I ever saw him again, but while I fantasized about him, I never considered that he might have been a criminal. I thought that the aura of danger surrounding him was solely in my head, caused and supported by his image. I never considered it might be real.

Not even for a second did I think that he would be so similar to…

I shook my head, throwing that thought to the back of my mind and refusing to compare them.

If you’re so disgusted by him killing people, what are you still doing in his bathroom?

I splashed cold water on my face, then looked back at the floor where he lay as I took care of his wound. A wound he had because he shielded me from the bullet, because he protected me when I froze.

Goosebumps covered my skin when I imagined what my life would have looked like with him in it.

What? Taking care of patients during the day and cleaning up gunshot wounds and God knew what else during the night?

I pushed my hair back, then slowly made my way out of the bathroom, and found him lying in bed dressed only in a pair of black boxers.

Motherfucker

.

He had his arms crossed under his head and only lazily opened his eyes when he heard me come in, a subtle smirk playing on his lips as he shamelessly allowed his gaze to roam over my body.

I wanted to walk away, but my eyes finally had a chance to look at him again, and that froze me in the doorway.

God, why did the devil have to be so beautiful?

Tattoos covered his body from his calves to his chin, and I unconsciously bit my lip as my gaze fell on his abdomen, more precisely on the trimmed section of hair that disappeared under the elastic of his underwear. I swallowed the fist-sized lump in my throat when something visibly awake twitched beneath the material and quickly moved my eyes to his taut chest. It rose and fell in sync with his breathing, and he didn’t move a muscle when my legs finally decided to walk.

Only they didn’t walk towards the exit, but towards his bed.

I want to stay

, were the words I wanted to say. “I want to leave,” were the words that fell off my lips.

He nodded, seemingly unsure of my words, just as conflicted as me, but he slowly rose from the bed and walked to his dresser, not bothering to hide the effects my presence had on him.

I licked my lips while I unconsciously watched the way his back muscles rippled as he moved, and bit down on my tongue to stifle the whimper that threatened to escape when his fingers curled around the handle and opened the drawer.

He didn’t have to say or do anything to get me wet, because his image was stimulant enough.

“I’ll drive you,” he whispered in a low tone, coated with a slight rasp that sent shivers down my spine.

“I can call a cab,” I offered as he pulled on a pair of sweatpants. “You’re hurt, and you’ve been drinking. You should get some rest.”

I couldn’t help the worry that coated my voice, because my instinct, namely the part that wanted to help and cared about people, was much stronger than my intrinsic need to punish him. And although I wanted nothing more than to see him squirm a little, to have him feel as helpless as I did, the tall man in front of me continued to put on his clothes, ignoring my comment.

“You think some alcohol will stop me from making sure you get home safely?” he asked, his eyes scrutinizing me from top to bottom, then a subtle smirk curved the corner of his mouth.

He leaned against the dresser and crossed his arms in front of his chest, as his eyes roamed shamelessly over my body. I had no idea what he was looking at, or why he was staring at me like I was naked.

I realized what the problem was when I looked down at myself and saw that I was wearing a black T-shirt that barely covered my butt.

I wanted to crawl into a hole and stay there until the embarrassment passed, because I didn’t realize what I was wearing when I woke up, because I was too focused on the groans coming out of the bathroom, and I ran in that direction without noticing that my dress was missing.

Fuck, I didn’t see it when I looked in the mirror either, since I was too overwhelmed by everything else around me.

“You… when did… how… explain,” I stomped my foot on the floor like a spoiled child.

“Your dress was dirty,” he began, taking a few steps towards me. “And as much as it turned me on to see my blood on you, I couldn’t let you wake up covered in it.”

He stopped in front of me, his eyes searching my face for something.

I couldn’t figure out what exactly, and my cheeks caught fire at the knowledge that he undressed me while I was unconscious, and part of me throbbed when I wondered what else he did. My knees knocked against each other as I rubbed my thighs together, and the corners of his mouth tilted up as he brought his hands to my face and pushed my hair back, his fingertips lightly brushing over my neck with the motion.

“Does that excite you, Snezhinka? Knowing I have undressed you and washed my blood off your skin?” he asked, his voice coated in mischief as his index finger traced an invisible line from behind my ear down to my collarbone.

My breath cut off.

“No,” I lied as I struggled to hold his intense gaze.

He chuckled as his finger pressed to the side of my neck. “You’re a doctor, Arella,” he whispered as he kept me captive in his gaze. “Could you tell me what this line right here is?”

“My CP,” I replied as my heart hammered in my chest.

“What does CP stand for?” He continued without moving an inch, still with that half-amused, half-playful voice.

“Carotid pulse,” I explained.

I bit my lip, peeling the skin off as I wondered why he was asking about arteries.

“Do you know what your pulse is telling me?” he grinned, leaning down until his lips brushed the shell of my ear. “That you’re lying.”

He let me go as his touch still buzzed on my skin, then he moved away, giving me a moment to think of an answer that didn’t sound stupid, but my brain felt like it was shackled, unable to come up with something as disarming as his words.

“Maybe I’m just scared of you,” I countered as I turned to face him.

He raised an eyebrow, but somehow decided to end the argument there and walked out of the bedroom.

I wanted to thank God for that, but my relationship with the man upstairs had hit a bump in the road yesterday. I looked around for something to cover myself with, but other than my sneakers, which were carefully placed at the foot of the bed, there was nothing.

After putting on my shoes, I took a moment to analyze the room, and while it was clear that he had impeccable – and expensive – taste, it was lacking one key element to make it a home.

Soul.

Everything seemed almost clinical, from the paintings on the walls, to how neat and clean it was, as though he had copied a photograph from a magazine and pasted it into his bedroom. It looked like a presentation, a mask, devoid of personality and so… empty.

I rolled my eyes and walked after him, wondering if it was a wise choice to allow a drunken criminal to drive me home, then I saw him standing by the elevator doors, so upright and lucid, seemingly unscathed by the pain in his arm.

It was as though all that vodka had been water for him.

“I can’t go out like this, people will see me,” I said as he handed me my purse.

“No one will see you,” he said, a little too sure of himself.

“You don’t know that.” I crossed my arms in front of my chest.

“The elevator goes straight to my garage.” He pushed the button.

“What about when I need to get out of the car and go into my building?”

“I’ll go upstairs and bring you a pair of pants,” he rolled his eyes.

“As if I’m going to give you the keys.”

“What makes you think I need keys?”

“Oh, you sneaky b…”

I couldn’t finish the sentence, because his palm wrapped around my throat and his body pressed to mine, pinning me against the wall. He was so close that I could feel his erection digging into my stomach, and I swallowed the whimper that threatened to escape me as his hand tightened a little, realizing that what was happening between us… was turning me on.

Fuck. Me.

“Cut the crap, Arella,” his breathing fanned over my face as he gritted his teeth. “You and I both know this isn’t about you being seen, since you keep parading yourself in a towel or that flimsy robe on your balcony…”

“What do y…” his palm squeezed tighter.

I was too wet to put together a coherent thought.

“You even dared to show your breasts, to me and whoever might have passed by at that moment, so what’s this about?”

His grip loosened, but he didn’t move his hand away as his body was still very much glued to mine. I lost myself in his eyes for a brief moment, in the storms raging beneath his surface, but I managed to shift my gaze to the side, then swallowed audibly.

“Nothing,” I lied again, not caring if he could tell or not.

Why was it so easy to give in to him? Why wasn’t I running for the hills? Why was I allowing him to touch me and why was I fucking enjoying it?

Maybe because there was a certain dominance to his actions, a confidence to every move he made, as though he knew exactly what he could provoke inside me.

I knew he could have killed me with his bare hands without much effort, even if I fought him, but he didn’t want to. His touch was a contradiction to his profession, because while it was rough, it was also coated in a subtle gentleness that made my brain spin. Also, because he was the man I had been dreaming of, fantasized about, and craved like a starving beast for the last nine fucking years. The fact that he was a murderer couldn’t top that.

I wanted him either way.

“Are you lying to me?” he asked as his tone softened.

“No,” another lie. “Yes,” the truth. “I don’t know.”

I shook my head and put my palms on his chest to push him away, but then I felt his heartbeat hammering against it, and I couldn’t. Maybe it was the thrill of the unknown, maybe it was the alcohol I drank, but I was the bystander who couldn’t look away from the car crash, so instead of letting go of him, I fisted his T-shirt, my body shivering against his.

A sharp intake of breath filled his lungs as his calloused hands cupped my face, raising my head to look at him, his eyes piercing me with the intensity of a thousand blades.

Such beautiful eyes, so bright, so at odds with all the black surrounding him, so intense they made me wet my lips and whimper.

“You didn’t ask me to stay,” I whispered, my feet shaking when the truth fell out of my mouth.

He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it just as fast. He seemed to carefully think about what he was going to say next, and I wanted to slap myself for being curious. It almost hurt to read all the emotions that crossed his features as he processed my words.

Confusion, happiness, anger, they were all mashed together, so much so that you couldn’t tell where one ended and the other one began.

“You’re going to be the death of me, woman,” was all he said before lifting me up and wrapping my legs around his waist so that I was now at eye level with him.

His palms felt warm against my bare thighs as he carried me to the couch in the living room, where he sat down with me on his lap. I tried to get up, but he didn’t allow me to move away, as one of his arms wrapped tightly around my back and the other rested casually on my thigh, his fingers digging into my skin.

It felt so wrong to enjoy his touch, but so good.

“What… what are you doing?”

“I’m talking some sense into you, now shut up and listen,” he almost groaned, but I blamed it on the pain in his shoulder. “I don’t want to take you home,” he began.

I opened my mouth to tell him that I didn’t want that either, that I wanted to stay, and talk, and figure things out, but the look he gave me stopped any sound.

“If it was up to me, I would keep you here forever. I would love nothing more than to take you back to my bedroom and do all the things I kept wishing I could do to you. Fuck, Snezhinka, the things I want to do to you, even the devil would blush.”

He paused as the hand on my thigh crept up, grabbing my ass tightly, possessively, then he pushed me down on his erection, making me feel everything I was provoking, and that elicited a strangled moan out of me.

“But I can’t,” he sighed. “I can’t, because this, you and me, will only happen when and if you accept me completely. I don’t care how much it fucking hurts me, I have to let you go. I have to allow you to choose me the same way I chose you. The way my body, my fucked-up brain and my heart chose you.”

He pressed his forehead to mine and breathed heavily, his lips inches away from mine.

So close.

Kiss me.

If I tilted my head a little further, our lips would have touched.

I didn’t move, and neither did he.

He sighed deeply, his warm breath brushing over my mouth, then he slowly got up and set me back down on my feet before his hands stopped touching me altogether.

My body froze when his warmth abandoned me, and I hugged myself to rub away the goosebumps his touch left in its wake. I watched him as he walked to the elevator and pushed the button again.

The doors opened automatically as he held out his hand, waiting for me to grab it.

“Come on, I’ll buy you one of those blueberry smoothies you like so much on the way,” he smiled.

Maybe he was bipolar, because what the fuck was that?

I wanted to take his hand, but I didn’t. Not because I was afraid or because I didn’t like it, but because I could see how much it hurt him to touch me, how much it pained him to be close to me when I wasn’t sure of him.

Especially when he seemed so sure of me, as if all the years he had been watching me had been a slow burn that had led him to the brink of absolute desperation. He seemed intent on letting me go, almost as if he was sure I would come back, and after the few hours we had spent together, I wasn’t sure I could stay away from him either.

On the drive home, my body felt numb.

We barely spoke, other than the small talk we had after he kept his promise and bought me a blueberry smoothie, which I drank quietly next to him as he drove, unintentionally moaning after each sip.

“Jesus, woman, stop that already,” he almost growled, without raising his voice.

“Stop what?”

“You’re moaning as if you’re having a fucking orgasm,” he rolled his eyes, stopping the car in front of my building.

“Who knows? Maybe I am,” I shrugged and shoved the straw between my lips, looking straight at him.

His eyes widened when I swallowed and moaned again, then he swore through his teeth and bumped his head against the headrest.

That’s it. Squirm.

He asked for my keys, and I gave them to him, all the while holding the straw between my lips.

Grimm narrowed his eyes, as if promising I would be sorry for toying with him like this, then he got out of the car and went up to bring me a pair of pants, even though we both knew I had no issues getting out exactly as I was.

After he came back and I put them on, he held the car door open for me, but didn’t offer his hand again, probably because I’d refused it earlier.

“I’ll be here when you make a decision,” he said, pushing his hands into his pockets as if he had to keep them occupied so he wouldn’t touch me.

“Will you keep watching me if my decision won’t be the one you’re hoping for?” I asked, biting my lip after the words left my mouth.

“I will never stop, not even if you marry another man and I have to be a mere spectator in your life.”

“Wouldn’t that hurt?”

“Not seeing you would hurt more.”

I nodded, not knowing what to say to that as my insides seemed to liquify, then I turned and slowly made my way towards the entrance.

“Arella,” he called my name when I reached the door.

“Yes?”

“If you choose to return to me,” he paused, his eyes darkening as my heart began to pound even harder in my chest, “there will be no turning back.”