Kai
The bark under my palm is rough, damp, and vibrating with the frantic, staccato rhythm of her heart.
She’s in there. I can taste the ozone of her panic on my tongue, sharp and electric.
It’s better than any drug I found on the yard, better than the cheap high of the blood I spilled back in that villa.
My own pulse is a sledgehammer against my ribs, a heavy, primal thudding that matches the ache in my groin.
Every muscle in my body is coiled tight, screaming for the release of finally putting my hands back on her.
I lean my forehead against the ancient wood, closing my eyes, savouring the sound of a sob she’s trying—and failing—to swallow.
“Come on out, Scarlett,” I rasp, my voice sounding like it’s been dragged through a mile of gravel.
I roll my shoulders, the wet fabric of my shirt sticking to the scars on my back.
“Don’t make me do this the hard way. You know how it ends.
You’ve known how this ends since the second you saw me in that mirror. ”
Silence. Just the wind through the banyans and the distant, mocking roar of the sea.
“I’m counting, baby sister,” I growl, and I pull the folding knife from my pocket.
The snick of the blade locking into place is the only warning she gets.
“And when I hit zero, the gentleness stays in the dirt. I’m coming in there, and I’m going to take every single thing you tried to hide from me. ”
I start the clock. My voice is a low, lethal hum, vibrating through the wood and into her spine.
“Ten.”
I run the tip of the blade down a hanging vine, the plant fibre parting like silk.
“Nine.”
I can hear her scrambling inside the hollow, the sound of her knees dragging through the mulch. She’s looking for a way out. She’s looking for a miracle.
“Eight. Seven.”
I skip the numbers because I’m losing my fucking mind. The scent of her—salt, jasmine, and that sharp, metallic tang of the brand on her chest—is thick in the air, making my vision go hazy at the edges. I’m fucking throbbing, the pressure behind my fly a physical pain that only her skin can soothe.
“Six. Five.”
I kick the base of the tree, a violent, bone-jarring strike. “Are you getting ready for me, Scarlett? Are you thinking about how it’s going to feel when I finally stop chasing and start taking?”
“Four.”
The whimpering stops. She’s frozen. A rabbit waiting for the hawk.
“Three. Two.”
I grip the knife until my knuckles are white stones. My blood is pure adrenaline, a hot, rushing river of ‘mine, mine, mine.’
“One.”
Zero is a silent explosion in my skull.
The animal takes over. I don’t breathe; I just strike.
I launch myself at the curtain of vines, the blade in my hand a blur of silver as I hack through the thick, woody stems. I’m not just cutting; I’m tearing, my bare hands ripping the foliage away like I’m skinning the world to get to the prize underneath.
“I’ve got you!” I roar, the sound tearing out of my chest, feral and raw.
I drop to my knees and crawl into the dark, rotten heart of the trunk. The smell of old earth and her terror is intoxicating. I see the flash of her white robe, a ghost in the shadows. I lung forward, my hand snapping out to grab her ankle, but my fingers only catch air and the hem of her silk.
She’s not huddled in the corner. She’s found a split in the far side of the trunk, a narrow, jagged crack I didn’t see from the outside.
I see her shoulder disappear through the gap.
“SCARLETT!”
The scream rips from my throat as I throw my weight against the rotted interior, wood splintering and biting into my skin as I force my way through after her. I burst out the other side, staggering into the moonlight, my eyes wild and bloodshot.
She’s twenty yards away, a streak of broken white silk disappearing into the thickest part of the jungle, heading toward the cliffs.
“RUN!” I bellow, the word a jagged, possessive vow that shakes the very trees. “RUN, LITTLE SISTER! BUT WHEN I CATCH YOU, I’M BURYING MYSELF SO DEEP INSIDE YOU THAT YOU’LL NEVER FIND YOUR WAY BACK!”
I launch myself into a sprint, my boots eating the ground, the hunt no longer a game. It’s a war. And I’m going to win it in blood.
I see her through the breaks in the palm fronds, a flash of ruined white silk against the jagged, obsidian edge of the world.
She hits the cliff’s edge and stops, her chest heaving so violently I can hear the air rattling in her throat from twenty yards back. There’s nowhere left to go. Behind her is the drop—a hundred feet of jagged rock and the churning, black throat of the Atlantic. In front of her is me.
I slow my pace, stepping into the clearing with the deliberate, lethal grace of a wolf that’s finally cornered the moon.
“End of the road, little sister,” I rasp, my voice vibrating with a dark, triumphant heat. I’ve got her. I’ve fucking got her.
She spins around, her back to the abyss, her bare feet inches from the crumbling ledge.
She looks wrecked—covered in dirt, salt, and the blood I put on her.
It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
My pulse is a riot, a heavy, primitive thudding in my ears, and the pressure in my jeans is a physical agony.
“Now fucking come here,” I command, my hand tightening on the hilt of my knife.
“Let me taste your fucking fear, Scarlett. Fuck, I have never been this fucking hard in my entire goddamn life. Do you even know what you fucking do to me? Every time you run, every time you scream, you’re just fucking lighting me on fire. ”
She takes a small, trembling step backward. A few pebbles break loose under her heel, skittering into the dark. My heart skips—not out of fear, but out of a sick, possessive thrill.
“You going to jump?” I let out a jagged, breathless laugh, my eyes raking over the way her robe is clinging to every curve I’ve spent four years memorising in the dark. “You think the ocean is more merciful than me? You think the rocks will be gentler?”
“Kai, please,” she begs, the words breaking over a sob. “Please, just let me go. You’ve done enough. You’ve ruined everything.”
“Get on your fucking knees and beg,” I snarl, stepping closer, my boots crunching on the dry earth.
“I want to see it. I want to see the tears slide down those pretty cheeks while you tell me exactly how much you need me to stop. Beg me, Scarlett. Beg me to take you back to the dark where you belong.”
I watch a tear track through the dirt on her face, the moonlight catching the wetness. She looks down at the water, then back at me, her eyes filled with a desperate, fractured light.
And then, she tilts her head back. One foot slides off the ledge, her body beginning to lean into the empty air.
“NO!”
The word is a roar of pure, territorial fury. The world blurs into a streak of grey and black as I sprint. I don’t think; I just launch. My boots tear into the dirt, and I bridge the gap in a heartbeat, my arms snapping out like steel traps.
I catch her by the waist just as gravity starts to take her.
I haul her back from the brink with enough force to knock the air from both of us, spinning her around and slamming her back against the nearest tree.
I crush my body into hers, pinning her against the rough bark with the full, heavy weight of my obsession.
My hands are everywhere—tangling in her hair, gripping her hips, marking her skin until she’s a map of my touch.
“You didn’t think I’d let you fucking leave me, did you?” I hiss into her mouth, my lips ghosting over hers, tasting the salt and the terror. “You didn’t think I’d let you take the easy way out after what you did to us?”
I grind my hips into hers, forcing her to feel exactly how far gone I am, how much I’ve been starving for this moment. I’m shaking, my teeth bared in a feral, jagged grin as I look down at her.
“You’re mine, Scarlett. Every breath, every drop of blood, every fucking thought in your head. You don’t get to die until I say so. You don’t get to leave until I’ve burned every trace of that other life out of you.”
I lean down, burying my face in the crook of her neck, inhaling the jasmine and the raw scent of her skin.
“I’ve got you,” I whisper, a low, lethal vow. “And this time, I’m never letting you go.”
I pull her hair back, wrapping the wet, tangled silk around my fist until her throat is bared to the moon, and I just breathe her in.
“Fuck,” I groan against her skin, the sound vibrating from my chest straight into hers. “I’ve missed you. I’ve missed this fucking scent. It’s been four years of concrete and piss, Scarlett, and all I could smell was the memory of you.”
I press my nose into the hollow of her neck, inhaling deep, greedy lungfuls of salt and jasmine and terror. My hands are shaking—not from weakness, but from the sheer, violent effort of not snapping her in two right here. I’m feral with it, drunk on the fact that she’s finally back under my skin.
“Please, Kai,” she whispers, her voice a broken thread of sound. She’s trembling so hard I can feel her heart hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. “Just let me go. If you ever loved me, just let me go.”
I pull her head back further, forcing her to look at the wreck of my face. “Love you? Scarlett, I’m fucking obsessed with you. There’s no ‘letting go.’ There’s only this.”
I don’t give her a chance to breathe. I don’t give her a chance to lie.
I crash my mouth onto hers.
It’s not a kiss; it’s a collision. It’s four years of solitary confinement and a thousand nights of wanting to kill her and fuck her at the same time, all bleeding into one desperate, jagged moment.
I taste the copper of the blood on her lip, the salt of her tears, and the underlying heat that she can’t hide no matter how hard she tries to pull away.