Page 9 of The Hand that Frays

“I had something to do,” I tell her vaguely.

Her brows furrow. “You had something to do that I couldn’t be a part of?”

Anger rises at her questioning me, and I snarl, snapping my teeth, only missing her nose by a few inches.

She straightens, her cuffs clanging against the metal shower rod above.

“I don’t need to take you with me all the time, stupid girl. One does need a chance to miss their vises.”

Her pupils dilate at my calling her my addiction, but I don’t let her pull me into her delusional world with her. If I allow her to drag me into her bubble of delusion, I won’t want to come back out.

I’ll stay here with her all day and miss the flight and change my plans if it means I get to watch her ass cheek with my name branded on it bounce as I fuck her hard and deep.

“Why do you look worried, stupid girl?” I ask her.

Her unease is painted on her beautiful eyes like words on the page of a book.

She thinks I’ve had my fill of her.

She thinks I’m going to kill her.

Even when she knows I’m obsessed with her.

If I could become the air she breathes to know how it feels to be inside of her lungs, I’d fucking do it.

Yet, this stupid girl thinks her time with me is ending.

Part of me wants to prod at the notion. Let her think it’s real.

“I’m not worried,” she says, her voice shaking.

I grin, leaning in.

She shifts, standing as straight as she can against the tub’s edge.

“Liar,” I accuse, my tone sounding foreign, even to me.

She pants, trying to keep her composure but failing. “I’m not lying.”

“You think I’m going to kill you.”

My words float between us like a discarded and dirty plastic bottle on the ocean’s surface.

“Are you going to kill me, madman?” she breathes, teasing into my space as her nose touches mine.

I growl, flicking my tongue against her closed lips.

They part, and a moan escapes.

“I am a madman. Do you know why?” I ask, grabbing her throat into my hand quicker than a Cobra’s strike.

This time, her moan is loud and guttural. I like that when she cries out for me, it seems to come from her soul.

“No. Tell me,” she manages.

“Because you made me so. I was a killer before you, Lyla. But you made me mad. You took me deeper into the depths of insanity with how you made me love you, how you forced me into obsession with you. You’re the reason Idon’t want to kill because I don’t want to do anything more than bury myself inside you and never come back out. If you’re darkness, Lyla, I want you to swallow me fucking whole.”

My admission quickens the speed of her attempts at breathing.