“Of course.”
I lean in close enough to breathe on her cheek; even after all these months, it still sends her teeth crashing into her bottom lip. “You wanted to sit in on the meeting. It was nothing to do with Silentwitn3ss; you didn’t have to.”
She lets her eyes fall closed. Inhales.
“You were curious,” I say softly.
“Hardly the word I’d choose,” she retorts, swatting my hand away when I attempt to stroke her knee. “That’s not why I—”
“Morbidly curious, Leo. Come on. You know, you could’ve spared yourself the confederacy of dunces and just asked me for the pretty pictures.”
“But then you wouldn’t have his new name, would you?”
“No.” I cock an eyebrow at her. “Nice work.”
She mirrors me, arching a pale gold brow right back. A vague smile tugs at her lips, the reluctant kind. It hints at blood rushing beneath her fitted white shirt and plum leather pencil skirt, ushering heat to places she wishes it didn’t, causing delicate tissues to swell. My Leo never wanted to need me, you understand; she fought me with everything she had. But here she is, irrevocably mine. Tainted. And lovelier for it. Her orgasms are sticky echoes on my fingers, the memory of them a rough throb to my cock. I have an intimate relationship with death, undoubtedly, but my relationship with Leo is more than that. It’s alive.
Leo—who knows where my mind has wandered to, and is forever biting the hand that feeds her—taps my phone with a manicured finger. Jane Doe fills the screen once again, frozen in the middle of her final plea. “Christ.” She gulps and looks away. “She doesn’t even look real.”
“She isn’t, anymore.”
“Aeron, can we…can we not?”
“For now.” I catch the tip of my tongue between my canines. Pinch at my own flesh. “Later, though. At dinner.”
There’s a two-week-old wound barely healed on Leo’s right buttock, and I suspect it whispers to her. Froths at the mouth. Aeron likes to cut you, it must murmur while she’s sleeping; will he want to paint you with pretty words soon too? Let’s be honest—the insinuation I’m somehow impressed by that mess of a girl on a motel bed (been there, done that, avoided the pesky death part because I’m not a complete moron) is highly offensive. But then so is the image still bleeding from my cell screen, so I’ll forgive Leo, just this once.
“What time are we eating?” she asks.
“Around nine. I’ve got a bunch of shit to do before heading home.”
She gives a mocking tut. “When are you going to suck it up and get another assistant? You’d save yourself hours.”
I rise slowly, snaking a hand into Leo’s hair and squeezing a soft fistful as I go. “I already have an assistant.”
“You can keep calling me that for as long as you like. Doesn’t mean I’ll give in and start doing the job.” She peers up at me, rolling her shoulders back so her scalp rubs against my fist. “You know I could find you someone.”
“It’s fine, Leo. I’m fine.”
She hunches as I release her, exasperated. There are a hundred things she wants to say to me, but she’s wise enough to stay silent. I’m not sure I could tolerate otherwise.