THIRTY-ONE #3
‘Not enough,’ I countered, holding the papers tighter. ‘Neither of us has ever written about Vikings. I don’t know much about them. It might be risky.’
‘Risk is a good thing, sometimes,’ the reporter offered.
I ignored her.
Thoroughly.
Vinnie tapped his finger against his knee, his gaze calculative. He glanced at Cain, who didn’t move a muscle at his scrutiny.
‘Can I see those papers?’ Vinnie asked as he tipped forward in his chair and reached.
I sighed, leaning to the side and stretching to hand Cain the stack of papers, my dress pulling taut across my back. I winced as my sleeves inched up my arms, and a fleeting, unwelcome thought crossed my mind: have I gained weight, or had the dress shrunk in the washing?
Cain extended his hand to take the notes, the air between us charged with a tension like the moment before lightning struck.
His fingers brushed the edge of the papers, his arm shifting as he pushed up his sleeve against the rising heat in the room.
The movement was so natural – so mundane – yet it drew my eyes like a magnet.
Ice.
It climbed up my gullet, my lungs seizing mid-breath.
Bold, inked lines snaked over strong, veined skin, dark over sun-burnished flesh. An anchor. A helm. A memory.
Too familiar.
My heart misfired, every inch of my skin ablaze.
The air coagulated.
There was no mistaking it. I’d traced those symbols with my tongue, only at the time they belonged to the arm that had held me down, that had trembled when he came apart inside me.
Impossible…
No. No, no—
Time warped. My hand snapped towards his wrist before reason could catch it.
Cain’s entire body went rigid.
I turned his hands over. He let me.
But his breath stuttered. Just enough.
The muscle in his jaw ticked, the vein in his neck leapt.
Instant recognition detonated between us.
There it was – the compass on his inner forearm, every line and curve branded into my memory.
Every detail – etched into me by moans, by bruises, by the sound of a man who had once lost control.
Inside me. Upon me. Around me.
Air stuck into my throat until it burned, a soundless scream tangling somewhere between my chest and tongue as it begun to sink in.
His wrist slid from my palm.
The loss of it went off inside me like a bomb.
Cain’s shadowed eyes were fixed on my wrist at first. On the sparrow tattoo – the one Ghost had once worshipped with his lips.
His jaw dislodged, pure shock bleeding into his face, spreading, moulding into something darker.
Then those amber eyes met mine.
Not black. Not Ghost’s. Cain’s.
My employer. My friend.
My tormentor.
My Ghost.
Somewhere in my peripheral vision, I’d registered Vinnie taking the papers from him. I barely noticed anything else; the world had narrowed to the tremor between us.
The way he looked at me was no longer with pain, remorse and restraint.
He was now that demon that had carved his name into my skin, taught me the language of pain and turned my body into its script as he whipped it raw and kissed it better just before he vanished into nothing.
My ears rang. The room spun.
Vinnie’s voice distorted, the reporter’s too, the hum of aircon drowned in the roar of my pulse.
Our eyes stayed locked, the weight of memories crushing us.
Desire swirling between us wasn’t an ember any more.
It was eruption. Every nerve in my body was on high alert, every inch of me aware of the tremor in his jaw, the stiffness of his shoulders, the way his hand flexed as if he were fighting the urge to come at me.
The room pulsed. My heartbeat thundered in my ears.
‘What’s the matter with you two?’ Vinnie’s voice cleaved through like cold steel.
I blinked. The spell cracked, but didn’t break.
Cain didn’t look away.
His eyes held mine, locked in a quiet war of fury, hunger and guilt, all drawn taut and tucked beneath that mask of civility.
If he moved, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to stop myself from reaching for him.
Then, at last, he exhaled heavily and waved it off like it was nothing.
‘It’s been a long weekend,’ he muttered hoarsely, his stare dropping to the faceless hotel carpet beneath his shoes.
His knuckles were turning white. His throat bobbed.
Vinnie dragged in a breath. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry, Genevieve.’ He turned to the reporter. ‘Let’s take a little break. The café is downstairs.’
I moved to stand quickly – and a little too eager – but Cain’s head snapped towards me.
That glare.
It stopped me cold.
Like a command carved into my bones with a wordless threat I wasn’t entirely sure I didn’t want to come true. And judging by the strain in his body – he didn’t have much grip left.
‘Coffee?’ Vinnie cut in, clearly mistaking the tension for something else. He winked, all charm and misread timing. ‘Never mind. The two of them run on caffeine and bad decisions.’
I opened my mouth, but nothing came fast enough to stop Vinnie and Genevieve from walking out that door.
It clicked shut behind them, and the air changed.
Collapsed. Imploded.
Panic bloomed, hard and fast. I could barely hear anything over the rush of blood behind my ears. My knees locked, muscles at the ready for fight or flight—
‘Sit—’ Cain’s voice cracked through the air like a gunshot. ‘—down.’
I hadn’t realised I was hovering over the chair.
I dropped, heaving. No thought – just instinct. I plopped back into the chair as though gravity had sucked me into it – low, lower. Then shame and heat choked the last of me.
Was it him?
The phantom stretch of him inside me had my thighs pressing together, trembling.
It was happening again – layers peeling back until there was only her – Scarlett.
And his breath on my neck. The hiss of leather through air.
Dread. And fire. Both – always both.
With Ghost.
With Cain.
‘Show me the bird again,’ he whispered, as if fighting for air.
Deadly soft.
Painfully familiar.
I swallowed. Hard.
The room had no walls any more – only shadows, history…
And him.