Page 85 of They Break Beauty

“A chance at peace, you mean?”

“Very possibly.”

She pulled her hands from mine and sank against the side of the Charger. “You’re dangerous, Levi.”

I joined her, settling beside her, and turned my head to tell her, “As are you. You’ve just been hiding it in those shadows you’ve gotten far too comfortable immersing yourself in.”

Her lips quirked as she noticeably avoided eye contact. “No idea what you’re getting at.”

I laughed. “Actually look at me when you say that.”

She did, turning her head. “I may have flexed that dangerous muscle while you were gone.”

I cocked an eyebrow. “Seriously?”

She nodded. “I struck back against Hex. Twice.”

Christ. “How soon after they hit at you?”

“Quickly. I couldn’t allow escalation without punishment. They were seeing me as a victim, thinking they were winning the battle they started. I couldn’t accept that.”

“I get that, but with the timing, Mason will know it was you. This gas siphoning is just a warmup, he’s just hitting the on-ramp.”

“Then it’s a good thing I am actually dangerous then, isn’t it?”

I reached out and slid my fingers into her soft, silky hair, playing with the black strands. A calming serenity took me over as she sank into it and angled her head toward me, a little sigh of contentment escaping her.

“You don’t need to worry about this. I’ve got it from here. I also have the means to reverse what was done to your laptop.” Off her incredulous look, I explained further, “When I discovered that my dad’s company had created something so devastating, I worked on an antidote of sorts to the tech. As for the data taken from you, I’ve already put something in place that will corrupt it once Mason opens it on any device within our home.”

“That’s… a lot to absorb. As for the data protection, are you telling me you wrote a program to flag any intel related to me and destroy it from others’ view?”

I winced because with her knowledge being similar to mine on such things, I knew she’d understand how I’d been able to go about it. “Yes.”

“Shit, breaking into my apartment was just the tip of the iceberg when it came to your stalking tendencies toward me, huh?”

“I couldn’t take any chances—either with messing up things between us, or with Mason getting wind of who you really were to me and interfering.” I ground my teeth. “As it is, he’s already interfered in another way by coming after you.”

I expected her to pull away, to tell me to go to hell again, to scream and curse me out at the very least.

But, instead, she drew closer to me and a little smirk spread over her face. “I would’ve done the same thing.”

“You… what?”

“You said we reacted to what happened in polar opposite ways. Well, if things had been reversed and I’d responded like you, I would have done things the same way in my pursuit of you.”

I couldn’t believe it. She was bringing out the person I remembered, the person she’d buried for far too long, but whom I’d still seen in spite of that attempt.

“Wildflower.”

“Hellraiser,” she responded, all breathy.

The surprises kept on coming as she pushed into me, grasped my nape, then dragged my mouth down to hers.

It wasn’t an out of control explosion of passion like it had been the first time I’d kissed her.

No, this time it was intense in a whole other way.

Slow, easy, soft, and so incredibly raw that I felt it down to my bones.

---