Page 104 of Cruel Devil

I do as she says in the hopes she’ll reward me if I obey.

She snips through the wad of bandages I wrapped around my hand, growing more and more serious as the strips fall away. When they’re all off, she gently grasps my wrist and turns my hand around.

“Uh…”

“It’s right over there.” I point with my other hand, and she cranes her head to spot the small abrasion on the side of my index finger.

“Geez, I dunno, Vito.” She blows out a breath. “This is way outside of my wheelhouse. Maybe we should take you to the hospital,” she mutters dryly, glancing up briefly at me. “Does your liddle boo-boo hurt?”

“So bad,” I whisper mournfully. “But Doctor Andy will make it better won’t she?”

“Not a doctor.” This time I get a half-chuckle out of her before she slides back her serious face. She tears open an antiseptic swab and wipes it over the wound, giving me a flat stare when I hiss in pain.

“Sadist.”

“Wimp. How’d you get rope burn anyway?” Her gaze flicks me up and down. I’m wearing beige Brunello Cucinelli chinos, a pale blue button-up Tom Ford shirt, and one of my Rolexes. “Yachting?”

“Please,” I scoff. “Like I’d wear this—“ I cut off when she rolls her eyes. “I was practicing my rope work.”

She frowns at me. “Rope…” Then she pulls back like she really does think I have syphilis. “Like, shibari?”

I prop my free arm’s elbow onto the counter and cup my chin in my hand. “Marry me,” I sigh.

“Weirdo,” she says through a laugh.

“Saint,” I murmur, as she carefully applies a dab of ointment to the wound. “It was a very tricky knot. Been working on it for days. “

Her eyelashes flutter like she wants to look up at me, but she keeps her gaze focused on her work, silent.

“So exactly how does an EMT know about shibari? Did someone forget their safety scissors and you had to use the jaws of life to cut them free?”

“Don’t want to talk about it,” she mutters.

“I could really use a volunteer. It’s not the same when you’re using a mannequin, you know. Skin has better grip than plastic.”

She slaps a bandaid over the wound, and presses down hard as I wince, staring up at me with a vague smile on her face. “Why don’t you ask one of your whores? I’m sure one of the prettier ones will say yes. You’d have to pay her more, of course.”

Before she can take her hand away, I sandwich it between mine. She tugs once, hard, and then stills, her mouth shifting to the side.

“Andy, I am so, so sorry.”

Her face has as much expression as the mannequin I was trying to tie up this morning.

“There’s a reason I said all those things.”

“I know.”

“My father…I don’t even know how to—“ I cut off at an urgent signal from my brain. “Wait…you know?”

She looks up at the ceiling. It could have been worse. She could have rolled her eyes. “I figured you either have dissociative disorder and you’d woken up with one of your alters in the driving seat, or your uncle used to pull the wings off flies when he was a kid.”

I stare at her. It’s not often I’m dumbstruck, but I just realized how different Andy is to every girl I’ve ever met.

And I’ve met many.

“Pity none of it helped, because he still found out who I really am,” she mutters.

“He hasn’t…contacted you or anything, has he?”

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