Page 172 of Craving Venom

I throw my hands up. “What are you even doing here? You’re not threatening me. You’re not touching me. You’re not even monologuing. Who are you and what have you done with the emotionally constipated psycho I’ve come to—ugh, not trust, but, like, expect?”

He flexes his hand as if it’s cramping, then balls it into a fist.

I squint.

“Wait… are you bleeding?”

His hand slips into his hoodie pocket, covering the damage and leaving me to wonder if I ever saw it in the first place.

“Zane,” I snap. “What the fuck is going on?”

“I got into a fight.”

“With who?” I press.

He doesn’t answer. Even if he did, it’s not like I’d know them. His world is stitched in shadows and blood and half-truths. His people are ghosts. Skeletons in cells. Men who only speak in fists and fuck yous.

“Why?”

His fingers stretch inside the pocket, haunted by the feeling he can’t shake.

“He hurt someone I considered like a brother.”

I almost scoff. The irony’s right there, begging to be dragged. Brother. Like the one he killed. But I let the sarcasm die on my tongue. He’s not in the mood, and weirdly, neither am I.

“Stay there.”

I cross the room, drop to my knees in front of the drawers. I yank one open and rummage through my stuff. I grab the antiseptic bottle, cotton pads, a clean towel, a roll of gauze, and the little silver tin I keep alcohol wipes in. I toss in the small scissors too, just in case it’s bad enough to need trimming.

My hands are full when I walk back toward him.

“What are you doing?”

I drop the supplies on the ledge and grab for his wrist. He jerks at the contact, a reflex born from being touched without warning. I don’t loosen my grip. I drag his hand from the hoodie. “If you’re going to bleed in my room, the least you could do is not drip on the floor.”

It’s worse than I expected, with split knuckles, blood crusted over raw skin, and swelling already setting in around the joints. It looks as though he hit someone hard enough to shake the ground.

“You need better hobbies,” I remark with a roll of eyes.

I press the cotton pad to the antiseptic bottle and tilt it until the liquid soaks through. I dab it against the edge of the wound.

He hisses as his body jerks in response. “Fuck—”

“Sorry,” I mumble automatically, then blow a soft stream of air over the wound. It probably doesn’t soothe the burn, but still.

He doesn’t say anything.

I glance up and see that he’s already staring down at me.

His eyes trail between mine and my mouth, then follow the curve of my shoulder before returning to my face.

I blink and look down. My fingers work faster, pressing gauze against the worst of it. My thighs graze his jeans as I shift closer.

“You’re lucky I stocked up.” I tape the last edge. “Most of this shit’s expired, but you don’t strike me as the tetanus type. Rabid, maybe.”

His lips quirk as I wrap the tape around the gauze and yank it tighter than necessary, a small act of payback.

“You didn’t have to.”

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