Page 74 of Boys Who Taint

“Knife play … now you’re talking. Is that what turns you on, Freckles?” He grabs a knife off the cabinet beside the door and slips it underneath my chin. “Two can play that game. You want a stalker? Someone to tie you up and fuck you like they hate you? I got you.”

My breathing is wildly out of control as I push as hard as I can to break his defense, but the knife won’t budge. “Are you or are you not the Ghost that’s been haunting me?”

He laughs again. “I’m more than happy to play along with your fantasies if that’s what gets you going.”

He directs my knife toward his shoulder and says, “Right here is where it feels best.”

I try to push him off, but it only digs the knife deeper into his skin until finally the blood begins to roll.

“Ah … fuck yes.”

“You’re insane,” I mutter, retracting the knife before I stab him completely.

But he suddenly drags me toward him with just one hand, the knife underneath my chin forcing me to look up at him and those wretched, haunting eyes.

“You make me insane.” He grins in a way that reminds me of my Ghost. “With all your fucking riddles that have nothing to do with me.”

“You said it yourself in the hallway! You asked me if I saw someone. Youknew!”

It has to be him. It has to be.

His half-mast gray eyes look amused. “I was talking about myself, Freckles.”

My eyes widen.

No, he wouldn’t be that pompous. This is all a ruse. Right?

I jerk free of his grip and rummage around his room, throwing open every cabinet, every closet, every fucking drawer to find what I’m looking for.

“It’s gotta be here …”

“I have everything you’re looking for right here,” he responds, completely ignoring what I said.

“Where is the mask?” I yell, throwing his bedding to the floor.

He stares at me, still as hard as a rock. “What mask?”

“The one Ghost was wearing when he told me he’d kill—”

I abruptly end my own sentence, shutting my mouth before I say something I’ll never be able to take back.

But Apollo’s mischievous smirk already warns me he’s not going to let this go.

“Killwho?” His bone-chilling tone gives me goose bumps.

His cousin.

Of course, he’d never say the words out loud.

No one would admit to killing their own family.

I march past him. “No one.”

I’ll find out who Ghost is. I’m not entirely convinced it isn’t Apollo, but is he really smart enough to pull something like this off? And would he truly kill his own cousin?

Goddammit.

I will find out the truth, one way or another.

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