Page 3 of My Vigilante Valentine

We were watchinghim.

I hadn’t seen how the hooded figure got in… I just knew he wasn’t there a second ago, and now he was.

One moment, the bank was in the grip of terror, and the next?Hewas there, primed and ready to save the day.

He was exactly what the news footage never quite captured—an actual superhero heartthrob, wrapped in black, his hood low with a fitted jacket that emphasized the broad shoulders I really didn’t need to notice right now.

The Blade.

Slate Harbor’s infamous vigilante was a living shadow, his movements impossibly fluid. Almost inhuman, like someone had hit fast-forward on reality while the rest of us were stuck in slow motion.

My brain completely malfunctioned trying to process it.

And then, because apparently that wasn’t enough, the universe decided to gift him with lean muscle and a barely-there swagger that said he knew exactly how intimidating he was.

I was still reeling, still trying to comprehend how someone could move like that, when—oh, cool, now he’s throwing knives.

Sure, why not? Let’s add ‘deadly accuracy’ to the growing list of reasons I was completely unprepared for this man’s existence.

In fact, one of the robbers likely hadn’t even registered the whisper of air before a slender blade embedded itself perfectlyin his gun hand. He screeched in pain as his weapon skittered across the floor, clattering loudly as it spun out of reach.

The sound was jarring, and it must have startled a few of our fellow hostages based on the tiny whimpers that followed.

My eyes were locked on the sleek throwing knife deeply lodged in the guy’s hand as he clutched it tearfully to his chest.

Chris let out a shaky breath. “Okay. So that just happened.”

It did, like something out of a fight scene that should’ve required CGI.

I eyed the two swords in the shape of an X strapped to The Blade’s back. Did he ever use them? Because if this were about to turn into a Quentin Tarantino movie, I’d appreciate a warning.

The very thought sent a shiver down my spine that had nothing to do with the fact that my bare knees were pressed against the cold tile, my legs way too exposed in my favorite denim cutoffs.

Let’s just hope it won’t come to that.

Sure, all of Slate Harbor knew our resident vigilante had some serious skills with his blades—hence the name the media had given him. But he rarely killed anyone. He simply did whatever he could to subdue and restrain the criminals so the cops could take it from there.

Still… this?

Actually witnessing The Blade mid-crime-fight was way more intense than in the random security footage they played on the news. Those clips looked like movie scenes, so maybe it was easy for my mind to write it off as no big deal.

As a society, we were used to it, right?

Except now that The Blade was standing in the middle of all these freaked-out hostages in the light of day and in 3D, doing his save-the-day thing?

I had a feeling the line between fiction and reality would never be the same for me.

An older lady to my left yelped as another knife whipped through the air—this one slicing through the second robber’s sleeve just as he’d raised his gun. Dude never saw it coming, and now his arm was pinned to the wooden counter.

The knife quivered with the force of the impact, a silent, creepy testimony to The Blade’s throwing power.

Take that, sucker.

Number Two cursed wildly, struggling to wrench free, but The Blade didn’t spare him a glance.

Calm and methodical, he just slipped another throwing knife from the stash he apparently kept in the lining of his jacket, cool as a freaking cucumber, as he turned to Number Three.

I swallowed hard, my mouth desert dry as the guy dropped his gun and put his hands up.

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