Page 68 of Slay Me

My head whips to the side. In the faintest light cast from the hall, I can make out Dante sitting in a chair, reading. He wears the same shorts he put on last night, his hair a mess. “Did you not sleep?”

“I never sleep for very long.” He pushes to his feet and crosses the room, then climbs into bed. I curl up beside him, resting my head on his broad chest. “What was your nightmare about?”

“Not a nightmare—or at least not a typical one. It was the night I escaped. The night you found me in that alley.”

Dante stills.

“I’ve never dreamt of it before. Honestly, I’ve tried hard to forget. Hell, you probably don’t even remember.”

“You’d been covered in your own blood,” he says, voice strained. “Your clothes lying in tattered shreds on your body. They’d broken your ankle, your wrist, and just before I showed up, they’d threatened to rape you.”

I pull away and sit cross-legged on the bed to face him. “You remember.”

“There is not a single thing about you I’ve forgotten, Liv. I can recall the rage that burned through me, the way you’d looked so terrified, so broken.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring it up—”

“You apologize too damn much.”

I know he’s not wrong. I spent years being forced to seek forgiveness for even the faintest slight against Ernesto or his men. If they touched my ass, I had to let them or face his wrath. If they wanted to watch us in bed—he let them. And if I showed even the faintest hesitation, I was punished.

Punished by being beaten then cast in stone to let my injuries marinate.

“Fine. I take it back,” I reply as I lean back against the headboard. It’s strange, how completely at ease I feel right now. Perhaps I’m simply too tired to care that I’m alone with a man everyone else fears. That I’ve had his hands on my body. His mouth. That he’s brought me more pleasure than I’ve ever felt in my entire existence.

Or, more likely, I’m far more familiar with what evil looks like. And it’s an earth fae with the ability to turn people to stone.

The air around us shifts. “Why do you think about that asshole?”

“Who?”

“Ernesto,” he snaps. “I told you before; your scent changes when you’re thinking about that fucker.”

“Occasionally, he crosses my mind. Though, I didn’t even realize.”

“Why? The cocksucker tried to have you killed.”

“He did so much worse than that,” I say, the words leaving my mouth before my filter can stop them.

“Tell me.” It’s not a request. The Ringmaster is demanding to know what was done to me.

“It’s not a pretty story, and I very much doubt you want to hear it.”

“Try me,” he replies then props up on the headboard and crosses his arms.

Every moment with him is dancing with danger. Climbing up to the crest of a mountain I know I’m going to fall from. Telling the Ringmaster my secrets is playing with fire. A man like him seeks power, and there is a shit-ton of that in knowledge.

Am I ready for that? To hand over even more of my soul? To bare more than my body to him?

Why the hell not? “Ernesto was the first person I met once my parents abandoned me here in No Man’s Land,” I begin. “After being cast from my house at the age of fifteen, I seriously doubted I would survive longer than a few days—at best. But then Ernesto showed up.” I smooth the blankets in front of me, looking everywhere but at the man beside me. “He was handsome, smiled a lot. And he promised me security.” I sigh as the memories assault me. “I’d been young and naïve, or else I would have seen straight through to the evil monster lurking inside.”

A tear slips from my eye, so I quickly wipe it away.

“What happened after he found you?”

Still, I don’t look at Dante. Instead, I focus on the hallway and the light barely illuminating it. “He promised me the world. Talked me into bed and used me for my body from the time I was sixteen until he sealed me in stone and forced me to watch as he fucked and killed women who’d trade their bodies for magic they would never see.” The truth burns as I speak words I’ve never said aloud. To anyone.

The Ringmaster’s rage is palpable as he stands and puts distance between us. He takes deep, steadying breaths, but I can see the barely leashed restraint as his shoulders tense and he straightens. “I could kill him,” he growls. “Track him down and wipe him out like the fucking pest he is.”

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