Page 85 of Callum

“Why did Dodge send him after you?”

“You sound jealous.”

“Should I be?”

“Of O’Brien?” Rosalind snorts, shaking her head. Then, a small smile plays across her lips, and I feel something break loose in my chest. “Maybe.”

“You’re asking for trouble, kitten.”

“I think I am, Doc,” she purrs the name, taking another step toward me. Her earlier curiosity has turned into something much darker, and I want to drown in it.

I want us to drown in it together.

“Get on the counter.” She stops halfway toward me, confusion flitting across her brow, but she slowly turns around again. It’s the cleanest surface around, with only one bloody handprint slapped across the edge. Rosalind carefully lifts herself onto the bartop that separates the kitchen and dining room before her attention falls on me.

My eyes land on Turner as I step back around the table. He died at some point during the scuffle, and I don’t care enough to try and bring him back at this point.

I keep my movements slow so Rosalind can see each one clearly from her spot on the counter. Grabbing two metal bars from my kit, I carefully bend one against the table’s edge until it molds into the rough shape I’m looking for.

The travel-sized blowtorch is probably my most useful tool, and I watch Rosalind’s eyes grow wide when I pull the trigger. Fire dances along the second bar, allowing me to bend it into a graceful curve. It burns my fingertips, but I appreciate the pain.

Rosalind’s chest heaves as she watches me but doesn’t ask questions. Her eyes are locked on the bars in my hand when I approach her. “Do you know what these are?”

“Yes.” Her voice is so breathy, the pulse pounding in her neck and her pupils blown wide. My kitten wants this.

“Where would you like it?”

Her eyes snap to mine momentarily before dropping back to the bars. She shifts on the counter, a poorly hidden squirm that has her thighs pressing tightly together. “Here,” she points to her chest, just above her left breast.

“Give me a color, kitten.”

“Green,” she sighs, pulling her shirt far enough from her chest that I can clean the skin beneath. “Very green.”

I flick the torch on again, watching her eyes widen in the too-bright light. Holding up the first bar, I pass the flame along the curved edge until the metal turns an angry orange color. “You know why I’m doing this?”

“Because I’m yours. No one else’s.”

Fuck. I should have waited to ask until I was done. There’s no way I’m going to be able to focus enough to do this properly with all my blood redirecting to my dick. My hand tightens around the base of the metal rod, the heat pooling against my skin. “That’s right, kitten. Mine.”

She takes a deep breath, but the air is immediately forced back out of her lungs in a scream. Her skin bubbles against the metal, the soft sizzling sound lost beneath her pained shout. Rosalind doesn’t pull away or tell me to stop. She leans into my touch until the rod returns to a deep gray color.

“How’s that feel, kitten?”

“Good,” she mumbles, swaying toward me again. Her forehead bumps against my shoulder before she leans away, almost as if she hadn’t realized she was drifting toward me. “So good. Thank you, Callum.”

Dammit. Rosalind would choose this moment to be good. The one time I need her to piss me off, to make me angry enough to light the second bar on fire and stamp it into her perfect skin. “You’re making it hard for me to be mad at you, kitten.”

“Then don’t be mad at me.” She reaches out, running her fingers along my arm until they’re pressed against my wrist. She taps the second metal bar twice before moving her hand to her chest and repeating the taps next to her fresh burn. “Be nice to me.”

“You think this is me being nice to you?”

She hums happily when I click the torch on again. “Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re keeping me.”

I almost drop the torch at her words, the flame flickering in and out as I adjust my grip. Is that what I’m doing?

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