Page 34 of Unethical

I love that she thinks she has a choice.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Sarah

Iswirl some Thai noodles around a fork as I stare down at the plate. I admire the colors, the size, the texture, anything besides the man sitting across from me. The man who has my panties in his pocket.

“You gonna ignore me when I still have your come on my tongue?”

I look around to be sure no one heard him, but the other diners are blessedly oblivious. For now. “You said I had to go to lunch with you. You didn’t say I had to talk to you. I’m not rewarding your behavior, Maxim. You stalked me—again—and took advantage of me in that dressing room.”

“Took advantage of you? That’s a bit of a stretch. You were wet before I even sank my fingers inside you. You didn’t look too taken advantage of when you were whimpering as you came.”

He doesn’t even lower his voice as he speaks, and heat flushes my cheeks as I drop my face into my hands and hide from the invasive glares of the food court patrons who definitely fucking heardthat.

“If I talk to you, will you stop talking about that stuff here?”

Maxim smirks, and it’s sinfully attractive. That’s the problem with him. He’s clinically insane but visibly perfect.

“What do you want to talk about, doc?” he asks, and I cringe at having to endure that nickname in public. All I need is for people to connect the dots and realize I’m on a nonconsensual date with a patient.

“What is all this?” I ask through gritted teeth. “What. Is. This?”

“It’s cold-blooded obsession. It’s the closest I’ve been to another human. You did that, doc.” His smirk widens, and his eyebrow rises.

“The only thing cold-blooded here is you. I haven’t been able to do anything for you. I haven’t gotten through to you in the slightest.”

“That’s not true. You’ve gotten to me plenty. Like a destructive little bug that’s infiltrating every structure of my home, you’ve destroyed the integrity. You’ve infested it.”

“Wow, paint it in a grimmer light, why don’t you?”

He leans forward and puts his elbows on the table. “What is this to you, doc?”

“I . . . I, um . . .”

I can’t even answer the question. It’s fucking stupid, that’s what it is.

I should have stopped it by now. I should have thrown him back into prison to rot. But Maxim makes me feelsomething. He makes me feel wanted and, dare I say, special. A murderer like him shouldn’t make someone feel any way but horrified and disgusted. Someone like him shouldn’t make me shudder against his palm.

But I have. And I probably will again.

Andthat’sdisgusting and horrifying.

Is coming on a murderer’s hand just as sinful as the man who committed the murders in the first place? Especially now that I know what he’s done.

I don’t know what’s worse.

“Listen, Maxim,” I finally say after my thoughts have run haywire. “I don’t know what this is. You’ve transformed me into something I simultaneously hate and love.”

“I’ve fucked you like only a felon can,” he says, and those words send an unexpected shiver through my body. “But seriously. You like that I stalk you. That I pursue you so goddamn hard. You love that I’ve learned your body like a blind man learning braille. You’re enjoying letting loose and being used and fucked like someone who didn’t spend half their life in fucking college to become the woman who’s not allowed to come on my dick.”

Him explaining what I begrudgingly feel is equally maddening and vindicating. I havealwaysdone the right thing. I’ve always sought positive affirmations from my parents, my professors, and my bosses. I strived to be the good girl everyone wanted me to be.

Maybe that’s why I’m drawn to the imperfect. The people brave enough to be openly bad. The men and women who don’t care how society views them. Maybe I want to shove them into my perfect little box in my mind. Maybe that’s why I want so badly to fix them.

Be. Fucking. Good.

Be good, Sarah.

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