Page 57 of Slay Me

I shake my head. “I need you to put out the word that, until further notice, all performances and activities have been canceled.”

“Oh shit, really? You’re closing the circus?”

I look to Bracken, feeling the weight of the words I’m about to speak. The fire was the first and only time I closed the doors. I’d sworn it would be the last, but with Liv nearly dying—twice, and two murdered shifters, it seems I have no choice. Not until I find out whether or not the threat has been dealt with. “Close up. The circus will remain shut down until I decide otherwise.”

Chapter19

Liv

Something warm presses against my lips. Liquid fills my mouth, and I cough, sputtering, but a hand covering my lips keeps them closed.Panic.I try to sit up, but a strong hand holds me down. I thrash, desperate to get free.

Did Ernesto find me? Is he going to drown me? In the span of a single heartbeat, my anxious mind conjures a dozen twisted realities in which he torments me. In which it was he who found me in my apartment. Broken. Weak.

“Stop fighting it.”

I still. That voice—it’s familiar. It washes over me, a deep grumbly baritone that sends my heart racing for another reason entirely.Dante.

“Swallow.”

I do.

“Good girl.” The hand releases me, and I open my eyes to find Dante sitting beside me on the bed. He’s shirtless, shadows dancing off his bare chest from the light cast by the fireplace in the corner. He sets an empty vial in one of his bare hands while the other touches my cheek. Soft, warm flesh stroking me.

“You touched me,” I croak. It seems ridiculous to notice that when every inch of my body aches, but everywhere his fingers touch, my body reacts. As though my blood is surging to that exact location.

A muscle in his strong jaw twitches, and he stands.

I try to sit up, to watch him, but each movement is pure agony.

“Don’t try to move,” he orders as he sits in a chair beside me. “How do you feel?”

“It hurts,” I manage.

“You’re lucky you didn’t fucking die,” he growls.

“I didn’t start it—” Surely he’s not blaming me.

Dante shakes his head angrily. “Valentina is dead.”

Tears blur my vision, not out of grief for the pixie. But as the memories return in a rush, I realize—yet again—that I’m so weak I found myself at a predator’s mercy. I’m a fucking fury, and I’m constantly being owned by others. “How much more time do I owe you for saving my life?”

His brows draw together, and he leans in closer. “You owe me nothing. Why did she attack you?”

“Because she thought I stole you.”

His eyes fill with pure hatred. They begin to glow as scales shimmer into view down both of his arms. “I fucking knew it.”

The potion he fed me begins to soothe the pain in my body, enough that I can sit up against the headboard. “Did I?” I question. “Steal you?”

His nostrils flare, and he shakes his head. “It was never a fucking competition,” he snarls. “And she never had a chance. It was always you.”

“That’s not what she thought,” I reply, taking a deep breath.

“Did she confess anything to you?” he asks.

“As in Thomas and Jenny?”

He nods.

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