Page 112 of There Are No Saints

I shake my head. “I tried, trust me. The material alone cost me a fucking fortune.”

She runs her hand lightly down its spine, making me shiver, as if she were stroking my own skin.

“You were making a figure,” she says.

God, she’s perceptive.

“Yes. I considered moving away from abstract. But I’m no Rodin, clearly.”

“You could be,” Mara says, looking at me, her hand still resting on the meteorite. “You could be whatever you wanted to be. That’s not true for everyone. But I think it is for you.”

My jaw tightens, resentment swirling inside me.

“You have too much faith in people.”

I leave her, striding back out to the main room. Where my table waits, and all my tools.

Trusting as a lamb, Mara follows after me.

She sees the table under its surgical spotlight. She sees the tools laid out next to it: the chisels, mallets, hammers, knives. And she sees the bare space where the raw material ought to reside.

I turn to face her, wondering how long it will take her to understand.

Mara crosses the space slowly, not looking at the table. Only looking at me.

“I really don’t,” she says. “I don’t have any faith. I learned early that some people have no kindness inside of them. No mercy. They’re broken and twisted and cruel, and they can’t feel anything but malice. My mother is like that. She’s the scorpion that would sting you, even if you were carrying her on your back. Even if it meant you would both die. She just can’t help herself.”

I’m standing right by the tools. My fingers inches from the knife.

“I’m good at seeing, Cole. I saw who she was at an early age. And I see who you are, too.”

Mara steps directly into the brilliant beam of light. Every detail of her person is illuminated: every freckle, every glint of silver and thread of black in those wide eyes.

“I know it was Alastor Shaw that took me. He dumped me in the woods for you to find.”

My hand freezes above the blade.

How does she know that?

“He wanted you to kill me, but you didn’t. You didn’t kill me that night or any of the nights that followed. And it’s not because you haven’t killed before. It’s because you don’t want to do it. You don’t want to hurt me.”

My fingers twitch, the tips brushing the handle of the knife.

“You’ve been watching over me. Protecting me. Helping me. You might have told yourself it was for your own enjoyment, for your own fucked up reasons. But you care about me, Cole, I know you do. I’ve seen it. Maybe you don’t want to care. Maybe you’d like to kill me right now to stop it. But I don’t believe you will. Too much has happened between us. You’ve changed too much.”

Slowly, she slides the sleeves of her dress down her arms. Baring her delicate shoulders and her small, round breasts. She lets the dress drop all the way to her feet and steps out of it. She’s naked underneath, her body glistening under the light, the silver rings glinting in her nipples.

The wild garden runs down her right side, ending at the point of her hip. She wears it proudly, my mark on her skin.

And I wear hers: the white snake and the black. I thought the snakes were her and I, good and evil, locked in battle. Now I wonder if she meant them both to be me…

She takes another step toward me. Naked and unafraid.

I never get used to the sight of her body. The tightness of it, the wild energy that courses through it. The moment I touch her, that energy will pulse into me. Sliding my cock inside her would be like strapping into an electric chair.

Her eyes locked on mine, she says, “You won’t hurt me.”

Now it’s me who licks my lips.

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