Page 72 of Saint

My vision darkens with his gaze, and I can’t fight it. I can’t think. I can’t breathe. My body unravels, and I’m leaves in the wind, breaking free and floating away.

And Saint is my forest. My maze. My purgatory.

I come on the handle of his knife when I should be screaming for help. Instead, I scream for him. A man who wakes up my dark side.

Saint pulls the knife handle out, lifting it and licking the length. His tongue drags slowly, like he wants to savor my climax. And the sight of him watching me while he tastes me has my thighs clenching.

He groans when his tongue reaches the top. Leaning in, he lowers his mouth to my ear.

“Ask your one question now, Violet.” He drops the knife to the ground, wrapping his hand around my throat and pinning me with his gaze. “Because when I’m done with you, you aren’t going to be able to speak.”

23

A Place For Judgment

Saint

One answer. It’s somethingI don’t have to give her, but I’m too curious not to.

Violet’s mind no doubt has a hundred questions swirling around, and I want to know which one she values most. While she probably thinks I’ve offered to tell her something to give her a peek behind the curtain, she doesn’t realize it forces her to do the same.

I need to know what’s important to this girl with the black hair and sapphire eyes that brand themselves into my brain.

Violet sinks against the tree as I let her go, and she shuffles back.

She’s smart, so she doesn’t blurt out what’s on the tip of her tongue. She thinks about it. Her wild mind works like it does when she’s sitting in the library studying.

Finally, her blue eyes flick back up to me. “Why was there blood on your shirt that first night we slept together?”

Slept together.

Of all the ways she could have defined her first time, she chose that. Almost as if it was sweet and innocent. She would rather live in the delusion that what happened between us was normal. That this relationship is consensual.

She might have given in to me, but even if she hadn’t, I wouldn’t let her go. Violet is mine whether she likes it or not.

Lucky for me, she does. Because her morals are as bent as mine are, even if she’s never acted on them. I saw the truth when I slit Nixon’s throat, and her entire chest flushed with excitement.

My kitten is as sick as I am.

Reaching forward, I grab the top of her jeans and pull them up. She lifts off the tree so I can slide them up to her waist and button them.

The plan was to throw her in the dirt and fuck her senseless, but her question gives me a better idea.

Pulling her sweater closed, I reach up and brush the smeared mascara from beneath her eye. “That’s not something I can tell you.”

Violet’s shoulders deflate like this is the worst I’ve done of all the terrible things I’ve acted out on this girl.

“I’ll show you instead.”

“What?” Her eyebrows pinch.

Curiosity flashes in her gaze when she doesn’t know what she’s asking for.

Her blind faith in me is what gets her into trouble.

Most people think chaos is unpredictable. But that’s only because they aren’t smart enough to read patterns—to understand cause and effect. Chaos never looks like chaos at first. It starts as something simple. Something sturdy. Chaos is stability tipped an inch too far in one direction.

That’s what I did with Violet.

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