Chapter 27 – Lily #3
“I don’t take lives because I want to,” he grits out, throwing a hand against his chest. “It’s my job.
My responsibility.” His lashes flutter closed as he takes a calming breath.
When his eyes open, they’re dark and dangerous.
“The people I kill should fear death. They should wonder if today is the day I’ll find them.
And when I finally slice my knife through their neck, they’ll realize I’ve shown them far more mercy than they ever deserved.
” My body shudders as he steps closer, towering over me once more.
“These are very bad people. It’s going to take more than keying their car or leaving a bag of flaming shit on their doorstep to set a cosmic balance for the things they’ve done. ”
My body trembles with fury. “Well, sorry I try to help people get their revenge without resorting to murder!”
His eyes soften. “I never said you should stop what you’re doing.
I’m just trying to explain that not everyone deserves another chance.
Jail is not punishment enough for those whose lives I’ve taken.
And they deserved far worse.” He reaches out and tucks a hair behind my ear, and I suck in a breath.
“Vetrel was assembling a search party to find you when I returned to the bar that night.” Chills run down my spine.
“It took me sixty seconds to take his life. Fifty of them I spent torturing him for what he’d done to you, what he planned to have his men do to you.
” My heart hammers, the truth in his words tightening around my neck like a noose.
“The last ten seconds I spent slowly sliding the knife across his throat until it nicked the right artery.” The realization that I truly was in danger, and he protected me despite knowing the risks, sinks in.
“Why not just let them come for me?” I ask, skin buzzing. “Wouldn’t it be easier for you if there was one less person around who knew who you truly are? What you do?”
“The killing that…” He shakes his head. “That’s not me.” My brows furrow. “I mean, of course it’s me. But that’s not who I am. It’s something I do. It’s a curse.”
“A curse you’ve chosen for yourself.”
“If not me, then who?” His eyes are so sincere, so genuine, I almost understand. “These people can’t just run rampant with no checks and balances. No one to fear.”
Taking a mind of its own, my hand reaches up and touches his face. “What made you like this?”
He sighs, leaning into it. “Blame it on my daddy issues.”
He attempts humor, but it doesn’t break the tension of the situation. “You can’t just kill someone every time I’m in danger,” I say, but my voice comes out a whisper as he wraps his fingers around my forearm.
“I’d burn down the whole fucking world to give you one extra breath.” My stomach twists in knots, and his eyes hold mine as he brings my wrist to his lips, pressing them softly on the inside.
“Aster.” I exhale, biting my lower lip.
“I’m so sorry,” he says between kisses as they slowly make their way up my arm to my shoulder.
He nudges my head to the side, pressing his lips to the pulse point on my neck, and I sigh, my willpower running dangerously thin.
My heart jackhammers as he kisses my jaw, chin, cheek, then brings his forehead to mine.
“Please, don’t think I was discounting your work.
I’m in awe of what you do. Every single day you’re more concerned about everyone other than yourself. ”
“I get paid to care.”
“You give so much money away, I’ve worried you wouldn’t be able to eat at the end of the day.”
“How do you know that?” I ask, eyes narrowed. He’s not wrong, I do donate a significant amount of money each week. Liam says I have a bleeding heart. I’d argue I have an angry heart and a bleeding bank account.
Aster laughs, the sound deep and throaty, and it rumbles right to that spot between my legs. “You are well aware I know most everything about you.”
“Now where’s the fun in that?” I pout. “What will we even talk about on our first date?”
“I might know about Lillian Huxley, age thirty-two, born in Florida. Graduated from Crystal Bay University. Drinks dirty martinis and has an extensive library of thriller and murder mystery books.” His words should scare me.
The fact that he knows all these things I haven’t told him should scare me.
Yet I’m hanging on to his every word. “I know you take the long way home so you can pass the street with the homeless encampment to drop off money or supplies. And I know you feel it’s your personal responsibility to find the Kodak Killer.
” He narrows his eyes, tilting his head to the side, and brushes my face once more.
“But I don’t know what keeps you up at night.
What you’re thinking about when the world is dark and still, and it’s just you and the quiet humming of the street outside your window. ”
“I don’t know your favorite color or song, or type of food,” he continues, running his thumb over my lip. “I don’t know what you taste like. Sound like when you reach that place where I’m desperate to take you.”
“Aster,” I say once more in a false attempt to stop whatever the hell is about to happen. What I’m desperate to happen.
“I want to know what it’s like to kiss you when we’re not pretending.” He runs his thumb over my bottom lip, and oxygen evacuates the room completely. “Do you?” My heart pounds while my brain screams at me. Say no! Run! Do anything other than spread your legs and moan his name.
“Yes.”