Page 141 of The Beautiful Dead

He wouldn’t have to lift a goddamn finger for the rest of his life if he didn’t want to. I hung up before Ghost could say anything else. I had better things to do.

The scent of coffee filled the air as I poured two cups, carrying them back into the bedroom.

Remi lay exactly where I left him.

Not quite awake, not quite asleep. Trapped somewhere in the in-between. That hollow, broken place I’d pulled him from the night I followed him into his own hell in the cemetery. That night, I told him three words I’d never truly understood.

I love you.

Did I even know what love was?

All I knew was that I had killed for him. Would burn the world down if he asked me to. Would slit my own throat and let him bathe in my blood.

And if that wasn’t love—then I didn’t want to know what was.

I set the cups on the nightstand and reached into the drawer, fingers brushing against the small black velvet bag. A strange sensation twisted in my gut—something like nerves, like hunger. Razor-winged wasps, beating against the inside of my ribs.

I slipped under the covers, molding myself to his back, pulling him into the cage of my arms. Mine.

Remi stirred with a slow inhale, voice thick with sleep. “What time is it?”

“A little after ten.” I combed my fingers through the black-and-white strands of his hair, my touch dragging the tension from his body. “I have something for you.”

He turned to face me, and at this close distance, I could see the silver flecks in his ice-blue eyes. They shimmered like shattered glass in the morning light.

“What is it?” His lips twitched, fingers curling against my chest. He vibrated with barely contained anticipation.

I toyed with the bone hanging around his neck, drawing his attention to where it rested between his pecs. A memento from his first kill. My gaze was transfixed by the bruises in shades of black and blue that bloomed under his skin, fading too quickly into a yellowed green. I wondered if I could tattoo my marks onto him—add a sense of permanence. My teeth. My hand. My name.

I sat up, pulling him into my lap. He straddled me, wrapping his legs around my hips. Warmth radiated from him into my chilled skin, but it was the temptation of his ass grinding against my quickly hardening cock that had me gritting my teeth hard enough to crack them.

My hand wrapped around his throat, collaring him with a tight squeeze. “Behave,piccolo agnello,or you won’t get to see what’s inside.”

Remi rolled his eyes, huffing in frustration—but that little shit still circled his hips, teasing, testing. His pupils blew wide, dark and dangerous, as he felt how hard I was beneath him.

“Behave,” I warned, tightening my grip. His pulse fluttered against my palm, a beautiful, delicate thing.

His breath hitched, his lips parting slightly. “I will,” he whispered, eyes flicking down to the bag in my hand. “Can I see it?”

I adjusted his position before passing him the bag, watching as an unfettered smile illuminated his face.

He didn’t smile often.

None of us did. We weren’t wired that way. But when he did, it was devastating.

“Open it.”

Remi carefully untied the drawstring and tipped the contents into his hand. His fingers traced each carpal bone with quiet reverence, the way he always did when he studied something he found beautiful.

His tongue flicked out, wetting his lips. “Who?”

He liked to know. He needed to know. Like the bone around his neck, this was from one of his kills. These bones belonged to the last man who tried to jump him. Federico was growing desperate, sending low-level street rats to attack us.

He sucked in a sharp breath, his chest rising and falling in shallow, erratic movements. “Oh.”

The bracelet’s bones were set between silver I’d had shaped like barbed wire. The same way the man had died. Remi wrapped a length of barbed wire around his throat and tightened it until the steel cut through his skin.

Asphyxiation. Blood loss. Who knew which killed him first?

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