Chapter 2 #2
I liked that promise. It meant she wanted to see me again. Because, despite our already apparent differences, I could only bring myself to think of beginnings rather than endings. Reasons to stay instead of reasons to go.
“My name is Alek,” I said, voice low as I stuck out my hand.
She didn’t hesitate to accept it. “I’m Eva.”
Eva.
Eva.
Eva, Eva, Eva, Eva, Eva, my mind replayed over and over while my fingers lingered around hers, unwilling to let her go yet.
“That’s a beautiful name. It suits you.”
Soft. Delicate. Breakable.
Her cheeks pinked further, and she laughed quietly, tugging the scarf closer. “You’re very kind for someone I nearly knocked flat, Alek.”
My name on her lips did something violent to my chest.
“You didn’t,” I said smoothly despite the frantic beating behind my ribcage, the one that insisted I take her innocence and taint it with my sin. “I wasn’t watching where I was going either.”
“Still, I’m sorry. And grateful for the scarf. It’s really warm, and I can tell the fabric is expensive.” Eva giggled. “I might accidentally forget to give it back to you. No one’s ever given me something so nice.”
The thought of Eva walking around the city with something of mine—something to claim any little part of her that I could—made my cock harden in my pants. I wanted to use that scarf to tie her to my bedposts so she could never leave. I wanted to do a lot of things to this woman.
Like make her mine.
My soul had been marred by shadows for over a decade, controlled by demons who wanted to hurt the world around me.
But Eva? I wanted to find out what she looked like when her light was smothered by my darkness.
I wanted her to be trembling and sobbing for mercy.
I wanted her to be so addicted to me that she would do anything for another taste.
In the minutes I had known her, my soul had become obsessed. It didn’t care who or what she was. I craved her. And when I craved something, I would do anything to have it.
I reached forward and cupped her cheek with my hand, stroking her soft, petal-pink lips with my thumb. The sudden touch shocked both of us, though I couldn’t bring myself to stop, and apparently neither could Eva, whose breath hitched.
Yes, I thought. I want you breathless for me.
“They’re fools,” I mumbled.
“For?”
“Not giving you what you deserve.”
But I could. I had an entire empire at my disposal—hotels, bars, clubs, property management, shipping and logistics, weaponry, and many more. If I had to call upon that empire to get her, to serve her properly, I would.
Eva swallowed. “And how do you know what I deserve, Alek?”
I leaned forward, preparing to find out if she tasted how she smelled—like vanilla with a hint of sugar, warmth in winter. Something soft I could bury myself in.
But a laugh behind us made her blink before pulling back, looking apologetic.
I wanted to kill whoever interrupted us.
I would kill them as soon as I pulled her to me and finished what we never got to start.
Their blood would coat my hands while I took her to the underworld with me—the Persephone to my Hades.
“Sorry. I’d better get back to my friends. We were having a snowball fight. They’re probably starting to get worried.” Eva turned to look at the only other couple in the park, yet instead of going over to them, she frowned.
“What is it?” I asked.
I took a closer look and noticed her “friends” were not worrying, but making out against a tree. Her nose wrinkled, disappointment thinly veiled with amusement.
“Wow. Traitors.”
“They seem occupied. Is it like that a lot with them?”
She shook her head. “Well… no. Not really. Mia is my best friend, but this is our first time meeting Carmelo.”
Eva gave me a fake smile, and I’d never hated the sight of something more. It stirred something restless in me, something sharp and yearning to kill someone to bring back the real one.
“It’s fine,” she said, even though it was clearly not. “I hope this one works out. I’d better leave them to it. They don’t need a third wheel hanging around.”
“Can I take you home?” Say yes, Eva. “My car isn’t far.”
It would be much easier to convince her to come back to my home once I got her in my backseat, where prying eyes and idiot couples couldn’t interrupt what I had planned.
“Thanks, but no. I’m not far.”
“Can I walk you, then?”
To my dismay, she shook her head again. “Sorry, but my brother is pretty protective. I don’t think he’d approve of strangers knowing where I live.”
I bit back a scowl because the news was both irritating and relieving. I was glad she had someone looking out for her, but he was in my way, and I wouldn’t allow that.
“All right. But at least let me walk you to the gates.”
Where I would follow her home, learn everything about her, and use it to make her mine.
Poor Eva. She had no idea she’d walked into the spider’s web. Into the cave of a vicious monster who decided he wanted to savor the taste of her.
Eva smiled gently—that damned smile had me on my knees—and nodded. “Fine. But only to the gates. And only because you are loaning me such a nice scarf.”
I held out my arm and relished the feeling of her arm slipping through mine, her petite body brushing against me with every step. Eva giggled to herself as she attempted to catch snowflakes.
My lips almost curved upward watching her. I couldn’t remember the last time I smiled, yet she made me want to.
I brushed back a lock of hair that had fallen out of her ribbon. Eva startled, her brown eyes coming back to me with curiosity. My gaze held hers, and I allowed some of the desire I’d been attempting to hide peek through the cracks, the demons that had begun to crave her. “You’re very beautiful.”
Something softened in her eyes at that, something fragile and real. She ducked her head, a smile curving her mouth. “Well, thank you. That’s kind of you.”
I had never been described as kind. A killer, a monster, death maybe.
But I wasn’t interested in saving her from my world.
I wanted to drag her into it. I wanted to see if her tears tasted delicious.
If her pain sounded as sweet as her voice.
Eva would call the things I planned to do to her kindness.
By the time she realized the truth, it would be too late for her to escape me.
“I’m glad you weren’t watching where you were going, Alek,” she whispered as we neared the gates.
“So am I.”
We stood there a moment longer than necessary, each drinking the other in. Finally, Eva looked above and smiled to herself. I followed her gaze and almost smirked when I found a bough of mistletoe dangling above us.
And maybe it was too hasty of me, but I shot forward and grabbed the back of her neck, hauling her lips to mine.
Eva gasped, her hands wrapping around my middle, gripping my blood-stained shirt with all her might. Her open mouth was an opportunity that I greedily took, thrusting my tongue inside and groaning at the taste of her.
Sweet, like candy.
She was soft and warm, everything I imagined her to be. My other hand, the one not gripping her neck, found the curve of her waist and pulled her impossibly closer. Stray locks of hair brushed against my nose, assaulting me with the smell of vanilla shampoo and pure temptation.
Mine… mine… mine… I wanted to growl when I lightly bit her lip, giving her a taste of pain with her pleasure. She was going to be all fucking mine.
I ended it when I decided I’d taken enough, when my control frayed just enough to make me consider trapping her under me.
But I had to be smart about this. Games of chess were not won by irrational first moves.
To own the board, I would play as the white knight.
And then I would reveal myself as her dark king.
Eva took a step back, eyes dazed, fingers tightening around the scarf as if anchoring herself back to reality.
“I’ll return this,” she said, voice cracking. “I swear.”
“I’ll hold you to it, solnyshka.”
And before I could say goodbye, before I could order one of my guards to silently follow her, Eva leaned forward one more time and placed a brief but searing kiss on my lips, pulling away with amusement dancing across her face.
I reached up to touch my mouth, smirking to myself when my fingers came away covered with faint traces of her pink lip gloss. The same color as her ribbons, her coat. It was becoming my favorite.
I turned to my guards, my face once again cold.
They studied me unnervingly. I couldn’t blame them.
After all, I’d spent my entire life completely uninterested in women, unlike my soft, sweet, gentle Eva.
She wore her naivety like a diamond necklace, her innocence shining, calling to the parts of me that wanted to break her into submission and show her how good darkness tasted.
One guard, Ilya, cleared his throat. “Sir… that was—”
“Not another word,” I said quietly, the threat more than apparent in my voice. “Follow her.”
Their eyes widened with panic as they looked to the dark path Eva had vanished down. I followed their gazes and found nothing. No pink coat, no sign of the silhouette I just held in my arms. It was as if she’d never been there at all.
And then Ilya voiced the words I hadn’t dared to think. The ones that had the potential to ruin everything.
“Sir. W-we can’t. She’s gone.”
I turned back to them, jaw clenched to the point of breaking, eyes cold with fury. She didn’t get to disappear. Not from me.
“Then fucking find her.”