Page 101 of The Masks and the Dancer (Their Obsession 2)

CHAPTER22

CHRISTY

Konrad tastes of fire and smoke, iron and metal, blood and carnage.

He tastes of pain, agony, danger, rage,suffering.

He’s a dichotomy.

A victim, and an assailant.

Fear bubbles inside my chest as we kiss, but I force it aside and let his monstertake.I open myself up to him, knowing it’s the only way to get him to heel, and that fear inside of me... It makes way for a growing sense of empowerment.

It flows through my blood. It tingles beneath my skin. It gives me strength.

Me…

A girl who once hid from the world and all the people within it.

A girl who covered her scars and her birthmark so others could feel comfortable.

A girl who cowered from life.

That girl slowly disappears as another stronger version of herself steps forward in the face of this monster...

ChristyDálaigh.

I kiss Konrad with the same intensity as he kisses me. I push off the wall and clamber up his body, my fingers sliding into his hair, my legs wrapping around his waist.

I take what he gives.

I inhale him into my lungs. I breathe him in.

“Zero,” he grinds out, the violence of his kiss splitting my lip from the force.

The metallic taste of blood bursts over my tastebuds, but I don’t whimper in pain, I growl in challenge. Then I bite him back. Hard. A roar rips out of his mouth as he yanks his head away, blood seeping from his split lip. Nostrils flaring, chest heaving, eyes blazing, we face off.

“Monster,” I retort, meeting his gaze head on, refusing to back down in the face of it.

Pressing his body even harder against mine, he pushes me into the cave wall, pinning me there. I see the battle raging in his eyes, and the way he fights to hold back. I feel the heat of his passion, his need in every quivering inch of his body. I hear the indecision in every shaky breath he takes. I taste it in our kiss, in our combined blood that sits on my tongue.

We’re on the cusp of something destructive or life-changing.

Either I tame the monster or it destroys us both.

“Kon,” Leon warns from somewhere behind him.

“No, don’t,” I bite out because whilst Leon sees danger, I see a turning point.

You see, Konrad is a different beast to his brother. With Leon his monster was tamed by my pain, my tears, because our bond was forged the very same way all those years ago when we were kids. It was the key to unlocking the man, so he could lock up the monster, but that’s not something that will work with Konrad.

I understand that instinctively.

Konrad needs someone who’s willing to face his monster. He needs someone who will live and breathe and fight back in the face of it,despiteit. If the vision of Konrad as a kid has taught me anything, it’s this: his true nature is the boy who saved a woman, not the monster he became that day. So I face the very same monster his father brought to life in order to find the boy buried beneath, to show Leon that he still lives within Konrad and to heal a wound between them that was inflicted purposefully by a man who was evil, manipulative and cruel.

I do this without any thought to my safety because IknowI’ll survive what happens between us. I will survive it and I will survive them.

And because a tiny part of you wants to help him,a small voice inside my head says.

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