Page 36 of Dark OZ

“That it?”

“No. The end of each tail had something shiny, like a cap.”

“Round like a bullet or flat?”

“Flat.”

“Fucking hell.” I knew exactly what had done this. It was the kind of weapon used to maim. I’d never seen it used to this extent. “It wasn’t a cap, Dorothy. It was a blade.”

“It was…” Her voice trailed off, the muscles now exposed to the air flexing.

“It’s the only way a whipping impact would cut this deep and cleanly with only a single strike. To place something like that at the end of a flail is a creative level of wicked, even for Eastin Witcher. Add in braids and facets; it’s amazing there was any skin left to stitch.”

Suture tape and stitches were holding several of the large cuts closed. Some of the longer ones looked to be deep too. But nothing looked infected, which was lucky. She’d been given two doses of heavy antibiotics already, but a third dose was probably wise.

“Eastin said she made it just for me. Figures the first gift I’ve ever been given would be a torture device. Kindness always was the worst kind of betrayal.”

That sounded like something Nick would say. I knew what he’d endured to think of kindness as a trick, but Dorothy? I turned her so that I could read the truth in her expressions.

“You’ve never been given a gift? Ever?”

“Not one that I can remember. In Em’s words, I was never‘worth it.’” A stubborn line hit the edge of her jaw, and she shrugged a shoulder. “Who else was going to give me presents, Henry?” She snorted a laugh. “Best present that asshole ever gave me was the face he made when he tipped over Eastin’s balcony.”

I smiled in sympathy and marveled yet again at the resilience unfolding before me. I reached up to brush the hair from her face so that I could see her clearly. My eyes landed on her bruised cheek. A lot of the purpled swelling had gone down. My heart slingshotted into my ribs as I realized what I was doing—gazing. I was gazing at Dorothy-fucking-Rosen. Not good, Danny.

In the worst recovery ever, I reached past her to grab the washcloth from the basin.

Dorothy gaped at me. “Careful, Danny, if you keep doing things like that, I might start to think you actually like me.”

“I don’t have to like you to imagine mounting you on this counter.”

Dorothy’s amusement slipped, replaced by challenge. Probably unwise to challenge a man like me when she was half-naked. A better man would ignore the arousing beauty, but I never pretended to be that man. If anything, she should be reminded of exactly who I was. I let the soapy water drip over her shoulder and tracked the stream as it ran from her collar line to the peak of her breast. With a single finger, I gathered the water beading on the tip.

Dorothy responded beautifully. Her spine involuntarily arched, forcing her breast to smooth against the palm of my hand. When the movement pulled at her no longer braced wounds, she bit down on her cheek, just as she had a moment ago. A tell that she was restraining some much larger emotion.

Because I couldn’t help myself, I gave her nipple a playful flick. “Now, turn around.” My voice sounded so much more lust-filled than I’d intended it to. There was a gravel to it that made Dorothy tremble. Seeing the tremor snaking down her spine made me want to whisper dark promises to her if only to see how her body responded.

This was a terrible idea. I wanted this too damn badly to be sane. At least it wasn’t whatever the hell I had been feeling before.

Her fingers curled along the marble, shifting her ass straight into my groin and fitting far too perfectly to be anything but a fantasy. I should have stepped back. Fooling around with Dorothy wasn’t a good idea for anyone involved. It would only confuse things more than they already were. She was a job. A means to a very long end, and I would see it through, even if it meant burning her alive along the way. She was a sacrificial pawn in this game. When she was moving against me, those pink lips curling in triumph, it was hard to see her as anything but that queen.

Despite how badly I wanted to, I resisted the urge to wrap my hand around her throat and pull her flush to my chest. Instead, my hands dropped to her hips, stilling her movements. “Stop playing around,” I chided. “Or this will hurt you far more than it needs to.”

“Me? I’m only playing a gameyoustarted.”

I dragged the cool cloth along the first several cuts. “I didn’t start anything. I was having a perfectly lovely evening, and then you started rubbing your ass against me like a cat in heat.”

Dorothy kept her breathing slow and even. She scoffed in disgust but didn’t pull away. Instead, she doubled down and rolled her hips so that my hardening dick notched perfectly against her ass. This girl was a damn enigma, a glitch in the fabric of the universe that defied logic and the exception to every rule I’d ever made for myself.

I went back to cleaning the remaining slash marks. Even though I was trying to be careful, more than once, my pressure increased when I became distracted by the flexing muscles beneath my hands or the rock of her ass against my cock.

“So you gave Crowe the key, and then what happened?” she said, between panting breaths. I pulled out the healing salve and eased it over the wounds. Dorothy sighed in relief. The tension immediately left her shoulders, and they sagged into the arms bracing the counter.

“Actually, I told him ‘No’ and refused to give him the key.”

“But I thought—”

“I know what you thought.” I moved on to the next strip of tape and eased the gauze away from her tender skin. This patch was even more inflamed than the last. There were areas where one strike must have overlapped with the first. Nick had done a good job, but this would leave scars. When I began cleaning these, she audibly whimpered. A tremor raked her body, and not like the delicious ones she’d done before. I knew this time she was trying to restrain a scream of pain. So, I opted to continue talking.

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