My mouth was dry.
“I need it. Gavriel, please, I want it so badly. You don’t know—”
“I know it quite well,” he said brusquely. He stood up, and I saw his eyes flatten, cover his emotions. “You’re the one who doesn’t know.”
He walked to the bathroom door and I nearly screamed.
“Just touch me, just a bit,” I begged, hating myself for being so weak. “It won’t take long, I’m almost there.”
“No, kitten,” he said. “Your decision, your choice. It’s a trade, of course. Always a trade.”
I bit my lip.
“I gave you what you wanted—” I started to say, but his dark look cut my words off on my tongue.
“No,” he said. “I’ve already given you what you asked for. Now you’ll see a bit of what I have to face each day.”
He paused, and looked down at me with pity in his eyes.
“I don’t get to kill, and you don’t get to come.”
Gav
Breathe in, breathe out. Water splashed on my face, cooled my heated skin.
I couldn’t believe what she was making me do. The shadow left me alone for a moment, but as soon as I left her side it was back, sliding in at the corners, uncurling its tendrils around my center of vision.
She’d saved the man for one day, that was all. If I wanted to, I could kill him tomorrow. The thought calmed me somewhat. Imagining the man on my table, my knife slicing down through the layers of skin and muscle and fat. Exposing his insides to the air. Blood isn’t red until it meets the oxygen in the atmosphere, and then it changes color instantly.
Yes, I could kill him later. It soothed me, and I played out his death in my mind like a tape, rewinding, replaying, changing parts around. Would I cut off his fingers first? That sometimes made it better, to hear their screams as I popped the joints one by one. Fingers weren’t lethal, and I could keep him conscious throughout. Yes, that’s what I would do.
I returned to the bedroom in a better mood. She lay staring at the ceiling and would not look at me when I came and sat beside her.
“I’m going out for the afternoon,” I said.
She whipped her head back towards me.
“You said—”
“I won’t kill him today. We made a trade.”
“A trade.” She whispered it.
“Not sure if it was worth it? Well, kitten, you can always change your mind.”
“No.”
“I’ll bring you back a present. No trades, just a gift.”
“Untie my hand, please,” she said. “One hand, that’s all I need. That’s all I—”
“Later,” I said. “But not when I’m gone. I can’t leave you untied. Surely you understand that.”
The rejection rippled through her body. I put my hand on her stomach and she winced.
“Don’t,” she whispered. “Not if you’re going to leave me.”
I lifted my hand away from her.
“I’ll be back,” I said. “And… thank you.”
She looked up at me, confusion quirking her beautiful arched eyebrows.
“For giving me a measure of relief. It’s not enough, not for me, but you tried. I—thank you.”
I turned and left before she could respond.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Kat
He came back later and threw a few books down next to me on the bed. Then untied my hands and feet. An hour earlier, I would have been ready to throw myself at him in a desperate attempt for either an orgasm or an escape, but I had calmed down a lot since then.
He had, too, it seemed. He smiled comfortingly at me.
It was his thank you that had really made me look at him differently. Strange that such a little thing could make me feel so much better. But I felt that I’d given something to him that he couldn’t take himself. In a way, he needed me.
That was good and bad at the same time. There was no way he would ever let me go, but maybe I could convince him slowly to give me more space. More freedom. And then—
Then what? I couldn’t risk trying to kill him again. I would take it slowly, I decided, rubbing my wrists. Try to gain his confidence back. Then I could decide on my next move.
I picked up one of the books. The Billionaire’s Courtesan. The cover was one of those pink and gold numbers with raised lettering. I always wondered why they didn’t do the bumpy lettering over the woman’s breasts. It would be a heaving bosom. Get it?
Yeah, I didn’t make myself laugh, either.
“I thought you might like these,” Gav said.
“Romance novels?” I tossed the book down and looked at the others. The Cowboy and the Bride. Her Last Virgin Night.
“There was one on your cart when we first met.”
“That’s… sweet of you.” I picked up the cowboy one and rifled through the pages. The second chapter started with him “exposing his throbbing member” and only got worse. I giggled, cupping my hand over my mouth. The word member seemed so funny at that moment that I had to suppress a burst of laughter.
“You don’t like them?”
“No, it’s just...We make fun of these.”