Page 36 of The Ripper

“Thank you for stitching me up,” I said, giving her a short nod and a last longing look before leaving the bathroom.

It was the hardest thing I’d ever done, but precisely because I wanted everything from and with her, I had to give her the necessary space to process everything I’d told her. I had to give her space to breathe, and the time she needed to accept me, to choose me for herself the same way I had chosen her, because she wasn’t a woman who could be forced into anything, let alone into a relationship with a criminal.

I couldn’t pressure her or smother her with attention.

Just as I had waited six years to approach her and have this conversation with her, I could just as well wait a while longer for her to decide.

But whatever her decision would be, whether she wanted me or not, I would never stop being her shadow.

CHAPTER 7

UNCERTAINTY

ARELLA

Choices.

As humans, we are confronted with them every day.

Ultimately, our day-to-day choices determined whether we were good or bad. They also determined what we would become in the future. Happy, sad, successful, unaccomplished…

Alone.

As a religious woman, I saw life in black and white. If you did the right thing in the eyes of God, you would go to heaven, and if you did the wrong thing, you would burn in hell.

But Grimm was neither black nor white, and although his beautiful light blue eyes would beg to differ, he wasn’t any of the other colors either. He belonged and lived in shades of grey.

He blended into the background like a chameleon, abiding by his own set of meticulously chosen laws.

Grimm was purgatory personified, where no behavioral rules applied. He was a glitch in the system, because while his intentions seemed good, his methods were cruel. He reminded me of my past, in a way, and I had yet to decide if that was a good or a bad thing.

I chose to become a doctor to save and preserve life, to help people, ease their pain and, when possible, prevent said pain.

So, how could I even consider choosing a man who had so little regard for human life? But also, how could I not? Even if our present values were so different and we were a contradiction in terms, it felt like we were predestined to meet. Otherwise, why was he the only one who had ever sparked this burning desire in me?

I looked at myself in the mirror of his luxurious bathroom and found myself unable to recognize the woman staring back at me. She was utterly confused. She contradicted herself as she weighed the pros and cons, as if it was a “Should I buy this vacuum cleaner or not?” kind of question.

I had never been so at odds with myself before, so unsure of my choice.

My whole life since I moved to the United States was thoroughly planned out. I allowed myself no room for error along the way. My school, my hobbies, even my career, were all carefully thought out beforehand and meticulously acted upon.

Then this man came along and decided to take permanent residence inside my head, refusing to leave my thoughts.

I brought my hands together and looked at the words tattooed onto my skin. The Grim Reaper’s words, which were apparently also scary tattooed guy’s words. The men I had been obsessing over, the men I had been touching myself to. Those men were the same person.

Said person was now a few feet away from me, and his name was Grimm, as he had told me at the party all that time ago, but I thought it was just a reference to his costume.

Holy shit.

This was the worst night of my life.

Was it really? Didn’t I want it?

I mean, I technically asked for it all this time.

I often wondered what I would have said to him if I ever saw him again, but while I fantasized about him, I never considered that he might have been a criminal. I thought that the aura of danger surrounding him was solely in my head, caused and supported by his image. I never considered it might be real.

Not even for a second did I think that he would be so similar to…

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