Page 32 of Little Blue

I could tell her. I could bare all of me to her, but she already looks at me with fear. I can’t tell her who I am. Not yet.

She needs to trust me first. And if not trust, then she needs to at least yearn for me—with even a fraction of how I burn for her.

My teeth grit. “Who hurt you?”

She leans in, rising up onto her tiptoes as she does. With her face tilted up to mine, the desire to crush the inch of space that burns between us and claim her lips with my own in a bruising kiss, she couldn’t mistake for the mark of possession it would be, grows impossibly, painfully, sharply difficult to ignore.

“You have your secrets, and I have mine.” Her breathy words are a challenge masked in a whisper.

I don’t miss the flash of a dare that ignites the sad blue of her eyes. I want to strip her of her secrets until she’s open and exposed to me. Every soft piece of her, every broken shard, ready for me to devour.

What the fuck is this obsession?

I tip my head until I can taste the sweet cream of her breath on my tongue.

I want to kiss her. I want to climb inside her until I’m rooted so deep, she’ll never be able to uproot me. She’s an untouched garden, blooming bluebells. I’m the invasive weed that will surely overtake her. Yet, I can’t seem to stop myself from invading.

I’ll protect her, I vow to myself.

Even from myself—from the monster who lurks beneath my flesh—I will protect her.

Her lips part as I begin to speak, my pitch low and uncharacteristically soft. “I have the power to uncover all your secrets, Little Blue. Every. Single. One. Don’t tempt me.”

That sad light flashes in her eyes, but she doesn’t sever my gaze. The scent of sugar cookie mingles with the fresh cold of the Russian winter. Warm and cold. Light and dark. Soft and hard. Her and me.

Finally, she shrugs. “Do your worst, Ilya. But be careful the skeletons you unearth. You might find you’ve kidnapped a harbinger of misery, and not the innocent damsel you think you’ve captured.”

Her words ping inside my brain, fighting to escape even as I lock them away for further dissection. If this is how she sees herself, as a harbinger of misery, I want to know why.

I will know why.

Before I have a chance to reply, to tell her she’s my salvation, the crunch of snow alerts me to another presence. My head whips up, my hand jolting for the gun tucked at my back. It’s a reflex I don’t see through, as I let my hand fall back to the woman. My woman.

Next to Misha, Luka stands. They’re both looking at me like they’ve never seen me before. Probably because I’ve never, not ever in my life, been so oblivious to my surroundings that someone—much less two people—were able to get this close without my realizing.

She’s messing with my equilibrium.

I’m going to have to be more focused. I can’t risk not being aware of my surroundings. Not when the price I could be forced to pay, is her.

I give my shoulders a roll, straightening my spine. It will never happen again.

“Misha, Luka, this is Irelynn,” I introduce, though they already know. “Irelynn, Misha and Luka.”

She offers them both a smile she’s never offered me. It’s bright, and wide, and beautiful. Misha’s brow rises and he rocks back on his heels, mouth hitching in a shit-grin that tells me without words, I’m going to have my hands full. As for Luka, he looks momentarily enamoured. Then his eyes flick to me, and I know by the way his face falls blank, he knows I’m pissed. Me pissed, is a dangerous, dangerous thing.

My hand twitches at my side as I fight the urge to lift it to my chest to rub at the burning ember there. What is this?

My eyes slide back to the little temptress currently wrapping my most trusted men around her little fingers with a smile that rivals the sun in the winter-gray sky.

She’s never smiled at me like that.

“It’s so nice to meet you both.” Is she fluttering her lashes at them? I stiffen. What the fuck? “You’re both so big and strong. Heroes, I just know it.” She steps away from me, toward them. For a moment, I’m incapable of movement. What the fuck is she doing? Hero’s?

Christ.

Misha laughs, the sound boisterous and entirely entertained. No, not entertained. Like Luka, he’s enamoured. With her. With my woman.

I growl. It’s an animal sound. A sound that promises death.

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