Page 111 of Crossfire

I was enthralled by the raw carnality in his features as he pumped his hips harder into my thighs. Stretching me as my growing ache rose higher and higher.

“Do you know what I want to do to you?” He squeezed my neck tighter. “All the ways I want to take you?”

I could only moan brokenly, fingernails scoring down his sweat-slicked back as I hurtled toward another shattering climax.

“That’s it, Kitten,” Grayson commanded. “Let me feel you fall apart.”

His words sent me flying. With a guttural scream, I climaxed hard enough to see stars, my release triggering Grayson’s. Hethrust into me one last time with a harsh groan, pulsing deep in my core.

In the aftermath, we clung to each other, chests heaving. Grayson brushed damp tendrils of hair off my face with a tenderness that made my heart sigh. I knew, with bone-deep certainty, that nothing would ever be the same.

49

GRAYSON

“Have you ever felt guilty?” Ivy asked. “About what you do for a living?”

We lay nude on the bed, wrapped in each other’s arms, the scent of cologne mixed with sex.

“No,” I admitted. “The opposite, actually.”

As she looked up at me, a realization struck that there were no other eyes I’d rather be looking into than hers. In my life, I’d had my fair share of one-night stands, but this was the first time I found myself cuddling with a woman. With Ivy, I was experiencing a series of firsts, each one surpassing the last. Our connection was a magical elixir that transformed ordinary acts, like lying in bed, into enchanting and profound moments, and I found myself lost in the depths of her eyes, feeling like finally—after years of assuming I didn’t need anyone in my life—I might’ve found someone that proved that theory wrong. Someone I was meant to be with.

“Each time I get an assignment, I feel excited. Because there’s a dangerous person out there somewhere and I have the power to stop him before he does something terrible.”

Ivy considered this. “So, you feel good afterward?”

“I do.”

“You don’t think they should be captured and imprisoned instead?”

“Many of our targets either already served time in prison or escaped conviction.” I played with her hair between my fingers. “Sometimes, to fight monsters, you have to become one yourself.”

“So, when you look them in the eye, you never hesitate?”

I rubbed her back. “Only to get the perfect shot.”

“How do you go through with it? Ending someone’s life?”

I trailed my fingers up her soft arm.

“Once I’m told someone is a target, I guess you could say a switch flips. In my mind, it’s them or a room full of children.”

Her shoulders relaxed slightly, as if my profession had eased some remnants of conflict still raging in her heart.

“How many people have you killed?” She was trying to hide it, but I could hear the tightness in her voice, the fear that maybe she couldn’t live with the answer.

“A lot.”

She was silent for too long.

“That bothers you,” I deduced.

She collected her thoughts before answering, “I’ve dedicated my life to saving people, so it’s difficult for me to get my head around having a profession where you end people’s lives. I don’t know how that ever feels normal or okay, even.” She sighed. “But at the same time, I’m grateful for people like you because if you didn’t have the courage to do what the rest of us can’t or won’t do, many innocent people would die.”

I hated her struggle with this, and I hated that I was having one of my own. I should let her see me as a hero, take the win and ride off into the sunset with her. But it wasn’t fair to her. She deserved to know me, the real me, down to my core. Ivy needed to understand how deep my darkness ran.

“I’m not a good guy, Ivy,” I warned. “I do this for the right reasons, but I kill people for a living. I don’t pretend that makes me a good person.”

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