Page 30 of Beyond Hate

It had nearly driven me crazy. Ithaddefinitely driven me to follow him back into this room and commit murder when there was a very real chance that someone might walk in.

I’d have to kill the entire club and everyone in it.

And I realized without missing a beat that I would do it—for a chance to touch London, for the sight of him in the lingerie he wore, his body trembling as he tried to find the rhythm of the music again, I’d kill everyone in the building. I’d burn it down.

For him, not for Nikki.

ForLondon.

My fingers were careful when they reached up, brushing the skin of his exposed hips like I was admiring a piece of art. It made him shift, brought his eyes up to look at me, and I could see the way his pupils were slightly blown—even though I’d just killed someone—as he stared at me beneath him like he wasn’t sure I was real.

Was this what they’d been talking about in the facility? The shit I’d found in the files I’d been going through the last few weeks?

Fate? Soulmates? Two people meant to meet each other over and over again? It made sense. The body I was in had been drawn to his exact physical type until it finally found London… and I…

I wondered what would have happened if Nathaniel West hadn’t found me, hadn’t brought me back… But that curiosity was pointless, because I knew. Iknewwhat this body would have done to him.

It made my fingers on his hips spasm, and he let out a small moan as my nails dug into his skin.

Right. Londonlikedpain.

My eyes drifted up to meet his, and the shame and fear burning in the depths of his stare was too intoxicating for words.When I splayed my hands and spread my grip across the span of his waist, his body practically melted into mine.

“Look at you, though… you’re trembling.” My thumb stroked the jut of his hipbone and another small sound caught in the back of his throat. “Are you going to tell yourself later it’s because you were afraid… or are you going to admit it’s because something inside you isbroken, London?” The pain that wrenched across his features at the accusation didn’t stop me. “It’s fucked up enough to remember the way you used to pretend to want me.”

“I didn’t—” He cut himself off when my hands pulled him closer, so the slow gyration of his pelvis was suddenly pressed against me. The heat of his body soaking into mine made my lids flutter shut.

He feltgood.

He felt…

Different.

That difference was the whole reason we were here to begin with. Because he wasLondon…not Nikki.When I opened my eyes, London was who I saw looking at me with a half-pained, half-confused expression.

“Come on, rabbit,” I murmured, stroking against his smooth, soft skin again. “Dance for me. Maybe if you do, we can both forget what I’m actually here for.”

Like it was on my side, his playlist switched to a different song. It was a little faster, but the words were just as evocative. He’d been such a scared, terrified thing when I’d had him trapped at the facility, but I’d watched him enough while he was here to know that there was something almost powerful about his presence when he gave himself over to music.

I wanted that power beneath my fingers.

I wanted to feel it rocking against my body…

I wanted…

“You’re really here, aren’t you?” he whispered. I was caught up in the way the question was filled with some emotion I couldn’t wrap my head around.

“I never left.”

He stared at me for a beat, then nodded. I watched the decision as it formed on his face, the knowledge that he was going to do exactly what I said… and I wondered if he was only doing it because he wanted to get out of this alive.

I could have told him I had no honor—no obligation to be truthful. If I wanted to, I’d still kill him, whether he danced or not.

But at this point, I was pretty sure we both knew I wanted more than that.

He moved then, and all thoughts fled my mind. It was just London, his hips rocking, his lithe body writhing in perfect time with the music. It was just him when he turned, twisting so he half straddled me on the chair while keeping himself an inch away from me.

Was this what he did in this room when he led men back here? Touched without touching? This almost pantomime of sex?

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