Page 72 of Deliver us from Evil

But then a finger presses against my mouth, hard enough to push my head back. My eyes fly open, and I glare down at her as she puts her head to the side.

“No.”

A most familiar frustration rises inside me. “No?”

“I don’t accept your apology.” She shrugs. “That was a good start,” she says, and then clears her fucking throat. “But it’s not enough.”

“Christ, woman, what the hell—” I start.

She puts her finger back on my mouth. “Nuh-uh.”

I pull away. Bite down on my lip and pretend it’s hers instead.

It doesn’t work.

I want to rip her to shreds…and then plaster her back together with kisses. I’m trembling from the force of stopping myself lunging at her.

She puts that same finger to her own lips, purses them. Cocks her head again. Taps her lips once, twice, three times.

“What?” I growl, when she stays silent.

“You must be tired,” she says.

I shake my head. “Not even a little.”

“You should rest.”

She takes my hands, laces our fingers, and leads us toward the bedroom. And then my heart does that thing I hate so much—twisting in place before thumping around like a tooth in a loose socket.

“Why didn’t you just say you wanted to fuck?” I tell her as I leer at her ass through the silk robe she’s wearing.

She stops dead in her tracks, and turns to frown at me. “Who said that’s what I want?”

I blink, exhale hard. “What?”

She points at the bed. It’s a king-size, covered with pillows and furry blankets. A girl’s bed. “Sit.”

I don’t like the mischievous light in her eyes. “Or what?”

“Or you can leave, Zach.” She quirks an eyebrow. “Forever.”

At first I think she’s dead calm about it, her face not even twitching…but then I see her hands. They’re in fists at her side.

So I go over to the bed.

I sit.

And she smiles at me like I deserve a fucking treat.

Trinity turns her head without taking her eyes off me, and calls out, “Guys? I need a hand.” And then, with a twist of her mouth, adds a reluctant, “Please.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Apollo

“Shut it, would you?” I whisper, waving a hand behind me. “I can’t hear if you two keep yakking like that.”

“You shouldn’t be eavesdropping in the first place,” Rube says.

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