Page 60 of Killer Kiss

Just like he had years before.

Again, I only had myself to blame.

17

OPHELIA

Getting my own apartment had been the first thing I’d done when I’d come back home from overseas. My mother had bitched and moaned about it, complaining about the fact I could just live with her and save my money.

Her house was beautiful. All her houses were. She owned many of them, and we’d moved around a lot when we were kids, going wherever the work took us.

But I would have slept in the gutter rather than sleeping in the luxury of her spare bedroom. So I’d rented an apartment on the Saint View-Providence border that wasn’t particularly nice but wasn’t the ghetto either.

Despite what Augie thought, I wasn’t a pampered princess.

Not that much anyway. I did draw the line at living in Saint View.

I did really hate that my apartment had no elevator, though, and that when I came home with bags of groceries, I had to climb multiple flights of stairs to get to my top-floor apartment.

I gazed at the ground-floor apartment longingly as I passed it on my third trip, but no safety-conscious person in their right mind would rent a ground-floor apartment. Did people not realize exactly how easy they were to break into?

“Let me get that for you.”

I spun at the deep voice behind me, my heart smashing against my rib cage because I instantly recognized the man’s voice.

Riddick. Shit.

Without waiting for me to give him an answer, he took the bags from my arms and climbed the stairs, leaving me to trail along behind him.

Shit. Shit. Shit. I’d deliberately not told my mother where I was staying, because I’d wanted to avoid this entire situation. The only people who knew were my brother and Jezebel.

Scythe and Vincent would have stabbed someone before telling them anything about me. I was sure about that.

I pulled out my phone to call someone for help and found a message from my best friend.

Jez

SOS! SOS! Riddick is on his way over! I’m so sorry! He threatened to decapitate my fucking cat if I didn’t tell him where you lived. And you know he meant it.

I stared at the broad back of the man in front of me, and a shiver ran down my spine. I quickly texted Jez back a thumbs-up, letting her know it was all right. If she hadn’t told him, Riddick would have found me another way. There was no point in poor, fluffy Midnight meeting his Maker before his time, just because Riddick was in a mood.

“Which apartment is it?” Riddick called.

God, I so didn’t want to tell him. But what option did I have? My fingers twitched over the blade strapped to my thigh, but I also knew Riddick had reflexes as sharp as a cat and he’d see it coming, even with his back turned. All it would take was one swift push from him and I’d find myself with a broken neck at the bottom of three flights of stairs.

Not where I wanted to be tonight.

“Apartment twenty-five,” I told him. “On your left.”

He let himself in like he owned the place, which was my bad for leaving it unlocked after my last trip to the car. He added the shopping to the pile I’d already brought up earlier, while I looked back longingly at the door, wishing I’d bought more. Maybe I could pretend I had and then just get in the car and drive off.

The thought was appealing. Anything was better than dealing with whatever the hell Riddick wanted, which I already knew wouldn’t be anything good.

But there was no point in running. No point in hiding.

He’d find me.

And the repercussions would be so much worse.

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