Page 275 of Flirting with Darkness

The squelch as Dex’s fist went into the wolf’s chest made her entire body seize up, and when he ripped out the still beating heart, she jerked as if it had been her heart in his hand instead.

Nova didn’t move, realizing very quickly that whatever Dex was, she was no match for him. Sure, taking out these two wolves would have been easy enough. Nova had tried to spare them, and that had been a mistake.

But Dex? Dex was far more dangerous than a shifter or a vampire.

“Are you okay?”

She looked up and there he was, standing right in front of her.

When had he moved?

Before she could respond, Dex dropped to a crouch and narrowed his eyes. He reached out and Nova was proud of herself for not flinching. The clean hand took her wrist gently and pulled it away from her throat.

There were two dead shifters in this sketchy-ass alley with her and whatever Dex was, but still all Nova could do was stare at the man in front of her.

How the fuck was he so beautiful?

“Can you speak?” he asked, inspecting the bruising she could feel.

She reached out and brushed a drop of blood from his flawless skin, just under his eye.

The way Dex froze, she would have thought the man couldn’t be shocked, but apparently, she was wrong.

He just…stared at her.

If only she could get her mouth to form words, Nova would have told him she was fine, that she hadn’t needed his help, and that it was actually kind of creepy that he’d been following her. But she couldn’t stop looking at his face.

Was that why he hid in shadows? Because he didn’t want people noticing how fucking gorgeous he was?

“Nova?” That deep, soothing voice was back to normal once more.

“I’ll be okay,” she murmured.

Dex stood and offered her his hand, coat flapping around his ankles like some kind of dark hero.

Nova considered that gloved hand, and then the one still covered in blood. She hesitated for a moment, but then gave him her right hand – not her left. Dex yanked her up hard, and she slammed into him.

He stared down at her, arm around her back, and Nova couldn’t fucking breathe as she stared into those golden-brown eyes with a hint of something behind them.

Dex reached out with his bloody hand and brushed back her hair, never once actually touching her face.

Her heart was pounding as she looked into his eyes, knowing what he saw – knowing what he would ask her. Nova couldn’t calm her breathing; she couldn’t do anything trapped as she was. Her hands gripped his very muscular arms and she gritted her teeth.

She should have run instead of waiting to see what he would do. There were a million things her training had taught her to do, but here in this dark alley with him, all that training had disappeared.

“I know it’s ugly,” she finally said. “But it’s rude to stare.”

Dex jerked as though she’d slapped him, eyes widening. Then he released her, blinking like he hadn’t even realized what he was doing.

Nova didn’t waste the opportunity. She went toward the shifter she’d killed and yanked her knife out of his chest.

Her first kill as a Council employee.

Her father and grandfather had spent years training her, teaching her how to efficiently kill in the most painless way possible and then to strip and dispose of the body. Something the University of Morgana hadn’t taught her.

Kneeling, she studied the wolf and then wiped the bloody knife off on his clothes.

This was the last thing she needed on her first night.

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