Page 67 of His UnBearable Touch

Breathe, Allegra. Breathe.

“So, you thought my little messages were from my mother.” She heard glass touching a hard surface. “She would be insulted, Allegra. She always said you were a waste of time.”

“Then why,” the question burst from her lip, “why come back? Why bring me here? Let me go.”

“You know that I don’t listen to her much. She wanted me to go into finance like my father.” He sighed, a long-suffering sound that turned his voice bitter. “But, I just did what I wanted. And where did that get me? An ungrateful bitch of a girlfriend.”

“You got your revenge, Lance. You took away my sight. You gave me scars. I didn’t take anything from you.”

“You took our future!” The walls echoed with his scream of rage. The voices of the firefighters droned on, but she could hear Lance’s heaving breaths underneath it all. “You took my dream away, Allegra. You deserved what happened to you.”

No. She wanted to scream at him. Tell him that he was crazy.

She stayed silent.

“You even took my home from me, but my mother found a way to bring me home.”

“And how did that work?”

Wood scraped against the ground and she heard his footsteps drawing closer. She tensed up waiting for a hit. Instead she felt his breath in her face. “That same top-dollar plastic surgeon that kept you from looking like a stained-glass window gave me a new face. And she paid some penniless scholarship student a mint to take my place in Geneva. I never did like living there.”

“And this place?” She swallowed hard, struggling to keep calm with him so close to her. “Where are we?”

“This?” He laughed and the high-pitched scratch of it felt like nails on a chalk-board. “This is home for us until further notice. I thought we could hole up here until I’m sure you won’t ruin things for us again. Until I’m sure you know the way things are going to work.”

“So, I’m a prisoner.” She tasted bile on the back of her tongue.

“Karmic justice as far as I’m concerned, my love.”

“I have a life, Lance. I have a job. I need to go back.”

He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her until she begged him to stop.

“You’ll go back, over my dead body.”

* * *

There were times throughout his life that Valerio and his bear couldn’t see eye-to-eye. His bear wanted action. His bear wanted everything at the moment he wanted it. Valerio has been the voice of reason and patience.

But not today.

Not when Allegra needed them both.

Today, he wanted his mate and he wanted blood.

And when all was said and done he was going to feast on them both.

A growl rolled through his body and fangs broke through into his mouth. He got a taste of blood and inhaled the dank air of the abandoned subway station.

His bear scented the air and recognized Allegra. It also smelled her fear.

Fur pushed out through his pores and the air rushing through it spoke volumes about the space surrounding him. His eyes bled black and he saw into the darkness as if he was outside in the middle of the day.

It didn’t matter where Lance Singleton took Allegra. He was going to find him.

The only thing up for debate was how much he would suffer before he died.

* * *

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