Page 92 of Deadly Knight
She chose for us, and it’s believing in that warrior strength, I pull out my phone and find the pictures of every kill, revealing the bloodshed, gore, and pain each experienced before being granted death.
I watch her face as she takes in the first kill before swiping to the next, repeating until we’ve gone through all of them.
“They’re all gone,” she whispers, so low I barely hear her. “You did it, like you said you would that day on my porch.”
“All of them. I got the first within months of you leaving. The second figured out they were being hunted and nearly escaped the country, but I caught him on the anniversary of the event. Found the third living in Romania by the fourth year, and months later, the fifth in Australia. By then, he realized the entire group was being hunted and hid far away.”
Her eyes are locked on my phone, but they’re empty, staring through the device rather than at it. Her mouth moves, but no sound comes out. After only a moment, I slide the phone away and grasp her face, tilting her head back up to look at me.
“What’s in your head,moya dusha?”
“This whole time, I thought—assumed…” Tears line the edges of her eyes, her mouth slipping open again. “Dimitri…you—” She gives a rough shake of her head before her final whisper. “T-they’re gone. This whole time, you’ve…”
“Been hunting them, like I promised I would,” I finish, my hold tightening around her face. “Katya,everythingI’ve everdone has been for you. From the minute they kidnapped us, my sole mission has been to end them. I promised it then, and it’s a vow I’ve kept. When they touched you, hurt you, made you shed a single fucking tear that I was prevented from wiping, they signed their death warrants. There could be no life for them after that, only pain.”
Her hands come up to cover my wrists, fingers wrapping around the ribbon that misses its owner. When I expect her to push me away, she instead crumples.
I haul her upright, lifting her onto the desk and stepping between her legs. My thumb brushes over her bottom lip, revelling in how soft she is. How she feels in my arms. How she’s allowing me—a known killer, after showing her the gory evidence from four of my murders—to touch her. How she remains mine, no matter what she claims. No matter what she thinks or believes. She’s mine and never stopped being mine.
“Thank you,” she whispers, and it’s those two little words that mend every fracture inside me. Fuck distance and time being what I need;thisnearly wipes that night away.
“Never thank me for protecting you. I do so because you being harmed is like cutting a piece of my heart from my chest—the little I manage to retain, because you own the rest.” My hands drop from her face to her hips, dragging her closer until she’s perched on the edge of the desk. “You seem to underestimate exactly how much you mean to me. How much you’vealwaysmeant to me. I’d burn cities alive before watching you cry. Destroy thousands of souls to see you smile again. Crawl over lava if you asked me to. Cut off my own hand if it meant being able to kiss you again.”
She smiles weakly. “That’s a bit much.”
“Nothing is too much when it comes to you. There is nothing in this world I wouldn’t do for you, give to you, or giveupfor you.” I pause, repeating,“Nothing.”If it destroys me but makesher happy, then I’ll do so with a fucking smile on my face, exactly like I have for every second the past ten years.
“Dimitri…” Her whisper is agony painted with a tone of regret.
“I’ve never stopped loving you, Katya. You may have left me, but not once have I left you. I loved you then, I love you now, and I’ll love you until the dayAdis destroyed. Because death… Death won’t end my love for you. Death won’t stop me from caring for you. And when I die, only a fraction of my soul will be in the afterlife, because you own the other half. Always have, always will.”
She crumbles.
Her head falls forward onto my chest, her small breaths blanketing my cold soul. I keep my hands on her hips, pinning her as close to me as she’ll allow.
I give her the moment, and after two of them, she turns her face into my shirt, wiping her tears on my clothing. I hate being the source of her pain, but at least she knows the entire truth. Showing her those pictures lifted a weight I didn’t realize my body had been carrying.
I lean away slightly to wipe her tears with my thumbs. Her cheeks are blotchy with emotion, and I cup her face, tilting it up, but she quickly turns away, eyes reflecting pain. Not hers anymore, but mine.
“I, I don’t think I can…”
What little is left of my sanity is destroyed, becoming a pile of dust at her feet. I step back, intending to scrape it beneath the desk and out of view, but she follows me to her feet, sticking close.
Indecision flits across her expression, but she reaches for me, pulling me down to her, this time initiating the kiss I’m aware I should end before it begins. She doesn’t want this; she’s merely acting on her emotions.
It’s what I should be doing…but not what I do.
Instead, I grasp her hips, looping one arm around her waist to replace her on the desk, kissing her with everything I have. Everything she doesn’t already own. My hands climb up her back, fingers tangling in her hair and giving light tugs, exactly how I know she used to enjoy. With a firm grip, I tilt her head.
She fists my collar, keeping me close. When my tongue strokes her bottom lip, my teeth catching it, she parts her mouth with a light, breathy moan that’s now embedded into my mind until the next noise I’m lucky enough to get from her.
Her head falls back, breaking the kiss but consenting to my lips continuing down her neck, tracing every inch of her she’s allowing me to. A dirty prison isn’t the place I ever envisioned doing this with her, but I’ll take whatever she’s giving.
Somehow, it’s appropriate. Past and present have collided through the monitor behind her and the paper now crumpled on the ground, and so, we are as well.
When I reach the edge of her shirt, she stiffens, and I know it’s over before she speaks. With a lingering lick against her pulse, I pause, waiting until she makes the ultimate decision to deny me paradise.
She straightens, leaning away, her gaze locked on the table at her side.
