PROLOGUE #2
Slowly, I look away from Jensen and up to the man for whom I did all this.
Now that Jensen isn’t blocking the way, I can see him.
Finally. I can stare into the greenest pair of eyes.
Green like the grass, the leaves. Green like what I imagine moss must look like underneath the sea, all pure and pristine.
I see those eyes in my dreams, and up until this moment, I thought I’d imagined it all.
I thought I was exaggerating their sharp color, but I wasn’t. I was right.
My stalker has the most beautiful pair of eyes I’ve ever seen.
And they’re angry.
I can clearly see that. They’re narrowed and glinting, flashing with fury.
Not to mention the deep frown between his dark and thick brows.
I mean, what the hell? Why the fuck is he angry?
I should be the one furious in this situation.
He almost let me get raped because he couldn’t be bothered to come to my rescue on time. What kind of a stalker is he?
“What…” I begin, my heart stuck in my throat, but I try to sound stern. “What took you so long?”
In response, he takes a step toward me.
I press myself against the truck. “I could’ve been rap—”
A growl cuts me off, sounding as angry as the look in those stunning eyes.
As if he didn’t want me to even utter the r-word.
Despite my anger at him, my belly flutters and a rush goes through my skin.
I tamp it down, though. That’s not what this is about.
There’s a reason why I lured him out, and I need to see it through. Lives are depending on it.
Steeling my spine and raising my chin, I command, “Don’t come any closer.”
He keeps advancing, though, his boots hitting the concrete with determined, threatening thuds. I creep my right hand down my pocket—another reason why I chose this dress tonight; it has pockets—and fist my fingers around the familiar object I brought for just this occasion.
“I mean it,” I say, my voice stern. “Stop now or this is going to turn out very bad for you.”
Of course, he doesn’t listen. His eyes, as hard and pretty as ever, are locked on me as he keeps doing the exact opposite of what I want him to do.
Just when he’s within arm’s reach, I whip out my weapon—a pocketknife—and point it at him, at his abs.
The tip poking into his flesh. Fuck, it’s hard.
And muscled and a million different things I don’t want to think about right now.
Not when he’s finally come to a halt. He doesn’t break our gaze, however.
And I don’t either. Not only because I don’t want to show any weakness but also because for the first time in months, I get to see him from this close. I get to smell him, hear his breaths.
I get to see the scar on his face.
Like his green eyes, I’ve seen his scar in my dreams. It starts at the top of his forehead, on the left side, and runs through his thick eyebrow, bisecting it, leaving a sliver of a gap in its wake—before dragging along his eyelid all the way down to his high cheekbone.
I’ve wondered about it. About where he got it.
How he got it. How old is it? But most importantly, I’ve wondered about how far down his face the scar goes.
Because I can’t see his face, not completely. My stalker wears a mask.
A black-and-white skeleton mask that covers everything on his face except his startling green eyes and that scar. And now that he’s so close, my fingers itch to lower it, yank it down so I can finally see the man who’s been watching me for months. Whose eyes and scar haunt my dreams.
To curb the urge, I poke the knife in his hard-as-steel belly.
“Yeah, that’s right. I’m armed, asshole.
If you play with me, I’ll fucking stab you right here.
” I lean closer, adding, “And guess what, blood makes me nauseous. Which means I’ll cut you and then throw up on your bleeding body. So don’t test me, understand?”
Something flashes through his eyes, something that looks very similar to amusement. Or rather, reluctant amusement—and I tighten my grip on the knife. Probably because it makes my skin warm and my heart race, and I can’t lose focus.
“You’re kind of predictable, aren’t you,” I begin, flicking my eyes back and forth between his.
“You see me with another man and you have to piss a circle around me. What is it, some chauvinistic, caveman need to mark your territory? You think I’m a toy that no one else gets to play with?
” I poke the knife in his abs again. “News flash: I’m not.
I’m not a toy or an object or whatever the hell you think I am.
I also don’t like to be stalked. That’s what you’ve been doing all this time, haven’t you?
Stalking me. Watching my every move. But guess what, Phantom, I’ve been watching you too.
And your lack of manners and basic understanding of how to treat a girl actually worked out in my favor.
Didn’t it? Because I got you. You’re here and you’re not leaving until you answer my questions. ”
If I thought my taunts would have any effect on him, I was wrong.
I don’t see a single emotion flickering in his eyes.
Not amusement, not even anger. His eyes are blank, glittering in the night like sharp jewels but emotionless.
I don’t let it get to me, though. Or the fact that he hasn’t spoken a single word so far.
“You know what’s happening, don’t you?” I ask, trying to keep my calm. “You know what’s happened. You know. About my best friend. You know she’s missing.”
My heart squeezes in my chest. Squeezes and twists and I almost lose my grasp on the knife.
The churning in my belly, the fear I’ve been feeling for the last week, threatens to take me over.
But I tamp it all down. I have to. I don’t have time to be afraid.
I don’t have time to lose my focus. The most important person in my life, the one person who’s been with me for everything, has gone missing, and I need to bring her back.
I need to find her. She’s depending on me.
“It can’t be a coincidence,” I say, flexing my fingers around the wooden handle.
“That I have a stalker, a man who watches me from the shadows, and then my best friend goes missing. Is that why you’ve been stalking me?
So you could get to her. So you could…” I swallow the bile rising up in my throat.
“Whatever twisted plan you have, it stops now, do you hear me? It fucking stops now. You tell me where she is, or I swear to God you’ll regret ever laying your eyes on me. ”
His eyes betray nothing. It’s like he didn’t even hear me, or if he did, not one word I said made any difference to him. And it makes me hysterical. It makes me afraid. Of his intentions. For my friend.
My heart bangs in my chest, and I’m this close to losing my grip on the knife. “Did you hear what I said? You need to tell me where my friend is. You need to tell me where she is. I need to… Fucking say something!”
At this, he leans closer and I gasp. My eyes skitter down to the knife I’m holding.
I feel the pressure, his weight against the tip of the blade, and if he inches any closer, I’ll cut him.
The knife will break skin and oh my God, why isn’t he afraid of that?
Why isn’t he afraid of me when I’m holding the weapon?
I snap my eyes up. “What are you—”
“Close your eyes,” he whispers, only a hairbreadth away from me.
His words, low and raspy, slide down my skin and pool low in my belly. “Wh-what?”
He runs his green eyes over my face for a second before saying, “Sleep now.”
His scent makes me dizzy. “But—”
I feel a prick on the side of my neck and it feels like my heart slows down. I glance down to see a needle in his hand, the hand that almost killed Jensen. Panicked, I look up. “What did you…”
My words trail off because suddenly, everything feels heavy.
My limbs feel leaden and my head sways on my neck.
My eyelids flutter closed, unable to stay open, and the last thing I remember before everything goes black is my masked stalker, my Phantom, tilting his face to the side before he… smells my hair.