I knew nothing about Arlo, but if I looked hard enough, I could see his entire story written right on the surface.
“You’re a bad man,” I said as I stared at his reflection. He was looking down at me, his dark brows pulled low. He lifted a hand and ran it over his mouth, the sound of his palm moving over the stubble that created a light shadow across his cheeks and jaw loud right beside my ear. It was masculine. Arousing. It shouldn’t have turned me on, but it did.
“I am.” That word was final. So final that I felt a chill race up my spine as he said it in that low voice.
“Are there worse men out there than you?” I didn’t know why I asked the question. Because truthfully I knew the answer.
“No.”
I wanted to say I didn’t believe him, but I’d be lying to both of us.
“But there are men out there who would hurt you, Lina… simply because you’re associated with someone.” I knew he meant associated with him. “They’d hurt you to make a point, to take a perceived weakness and snuff it out.” His gaze was so fierce.
My heart hiccupped. Was he saying I was his weakness? I didn’t even know him. How could I control someone that much? But my words were thrown back at me because the feelings I had when I was in Arlo’s presence were soul-searing.
What Arlo unknowingly made me feel was hot enough to burn the wings off an angel.
My breath caught at the cold calculation, what he implied. What he’s saying.
“And it’s taking every single ounce of self-control I don’t even possess not to go back there and kill any bastard who would take your life as if it meant nothing.”
I didn’t know why I turned around, didn’t know why I faced the predator head-on. But as he took my now-empty glass from my hand and set it aside, his eyes never leaving me, there was nothing on this earth that could have forced me to look away.
I moved my arms behind me and pressed my palms flat against the window. The glass was cold and smooth beneath them. Hard. I curled my fingers against it, even though I knew it wouldn’t give me any purchase.
I stared into his eyes that looked so dark with the shadows gently caressing him like a lover. And I knew the absolute truth the longer he stared at me, peeling away bit by bit, exposing me inch by inch.
“Did you kill that man in the alley?” I knew I wouldn’t have to specify what and who I meant.
One.
Two.
Three seconds passed before he moved in an inch closer. “Yes.”
He said that word as if it was the easiest thing to admit. As if killing was the simplest form of pleasure. I held my breath, his truth like a sledgehammer to my chest.
“Ask me why I did it.” Low voice. Deep words. Tearing me from the inside out.
“Why did you kill him?” There was a hitch in my voice that I knew couldn’t go unnoticed.
He leaned in until his lips were close enough to my ear that his answer would brush along the shell. “For you.”
My heart was running a race in my chest. Bu-bump. Bu-bump. “What are you?”
His smile was slow. Evil. He moved a step back, and I sucked in a breath.
“I told you.” One. Two. Three seconds. “The bad guy.”
12
Arlo
I didn’t want to frighten her. I wanted to pull her against my body and hold her head to my chest, tangle my fingers in the long fall of her hair, and whisper all the words that would let her know how safe she was.
I wanted to know everything about her. I wanted her to trust me.
She hid things about her life, her past, present, and future. I wanted to tear those secrets away until she was just as vulnerable to me as she’d made me to her. I didn’t even know how or why or fucking when it happened, but this woman had changed something monumental in my life. I hated it.
I couldn’t live without it.
Months. It had only taken a moment to look into her innocent eyes to know there was something light and different the world could offer… something that could shape me. Only a handful of months to turn my world upside down without her even having to utter a word.
A. Fucking. Look. That’s all it took to go down this rabbit hole where, for the first time in my miserable life, I questioned my very sanity. For the first time in my life, I want something just for me.
And as I stared into her blue eyes that looked so dark right now, not because of the shadows or lack of light but because she was vulnerable in my presence, I told myself there was no going back.