Chapter 19
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
“She didn’t like that I know about your past.” Delilah pouted, barely waiting for Rowan to close the door of Bronwin’s office. The officers—silent as ever—fell into step behind them as they returned to Delilah’s room.
“How did you know?” Rowan asked, keeping her voice low but unable to resist the bait now that the secret was out.
“Tell me about your first kill and I’ll tell you,” Delilah whispered, leaning her head on Rowan’s shoulder only to be promptly shaken off. Delilah sighed. “She doesn’t like me talking about you at all, does she?”
“No.”
“Do you?”
Rowan side-eyed her, again refusing to answer. This time, Delilah didn’t fill the silence, waiting instead until they were back in her room and Rowan was removing her cuffs.
“Why doesn’t she like me talking about you?” Delilah asked, shaking her hands out and rubbing her wrists even though the cuffs weren’t tight enough to cause discomfort.
“Because she thinks you’re obsessed with me.”
Delilah tilted her head to one side, studying Rowan. Rowan stepped back but hadn’t made a move to leave yet. “I am obsessed with you,” she admitted eventually, smiling then sauntering up to Rowan and pressing a hand to her chest. “You should be flattered.”
Rowan swallowed, grabbing Delilah’s wrist and pulling her off.
“I don’t want you obsessed with me,” she hissed, taking a step forward, forcing Delilah back until they hit the wall and Rowan was entirely too close.
Since they were being honest with each other now, she didn’t see the harm in telling an admission of her own.
“I want you addicted,” she whispered in the small space between them, her eyes flicking to Delilah’s lips before returning to meet her piercing gaze.
“Obsessions die. They don’t last. But addiction?
It’s a disease that stays with you for life.
It alters your brain chemistry and sinks its claws into you and never lets you go.
It’ll always be there, lingering in the back of your mind. ”
“That’s where you want to be?” Delilah asked, her pupils dilated and her smile wicked sharp. “Always with me?”
Rowan didn’t answer. Just stood there, too close but too far away. She wouldn’t do anything, not yet, and the lingering hint of regret teased in the corner of her brain. Her admission was too intense, too sudden in the space of Delilah’s reply.
“How can I be addicted to something if I’ve never had a taste?” Delilah whispered, leaning in, almost closing the distance between them but stopping just short—begging Rowan to meet her.
Her mind screamed to back up, to claw herself free of this hold Delilah had over her. They stood this way for too long. Rowan didn’t know how much time had passed before she finally forced herself away and fled the room.
There was no other word for what she’d done. She fled, and Delilah watched her go with a mocking laugh that lodged into her brain and followed her all the way to her office.
How can I be addicted to something if I’ve never had a taste? The words swam through her thoughts, paired with the image of Delilah so close. So painfully close that it had taken every ounce of self-control she had to pull away.
Her phone buzzed just as she opened the door to her office and she stopped short, silently hoping Delilah was already demanding her return. But it wasn’t Delilah. The number was unknown, though the short, simple contents of the message were clear.
No fingerprints on the knife, only the victim's blood. Sorry for your loss.
She wasn’t surprised. She’d forgotten about the whole knife situation entirely, too wrapped up in the chaos that unfolded in its wake.
Too obsessed with the idea of Delilah wanting her—needing her.
It was too consuming for her to care about the knife.
Her mourning period for Mariana had been short, shorter than was proper, but Rowan couldn’t find it in her to care about that either.
Because the only thing racing through her thoughts now were those taunting, tempting words that had caused all logic to temporarily flee from Rowan’s mind. She quickly stepped inside her office, closing and locking the door as she stuffed her phone back into her pocket.
Addiction. Would Delilah fall for it? Would she go that far and succumb if Rowan gave her a taste? Just a little taste. She bit her lip, head collapsing into her hands as she sat in the rarely used padded office chair. Just a taste, a hint, an idea.
And Rowan was tired of waiting. Tired of hoping that Delilah’s obsession would morph and twist in the same way hers had over the years. She didn’t want to act rashly though. Not after all the planning it took her to get here. The sacrifices she’d made. But it was just a taste…
With Rowan’s resolve made up—or disintegrated entirely—she tried to push her unwanted thoughts to the back.
She’d finish out her banal work day and then allow herself the freedom to think about Delilah.
She’d decide how far she wanted to take it.
What the taste would look like. How to reel Delilah in and hook her.