Page 8 of Sinner's Malice

Mainly, I couldn’t bear to look into his silver eyes anymore.

Walking out of the room, I turned left and entered the kitchen. Standing there, seeing how clean everything was, I knew I didn’t belong here. I didn’t belong anywhere.

I was dirty, tainted, soiled for all time.

There was nothing clean about me.

Never would be.

I was nothing more than a soulless body with no more fucks to give.

There was no scenario where I came out on top.

Where I walked away, unscathed from my past.

Walking over to the counter, I reached for a knife and pulled it from its block. I felt nothing when I held the cold steel in my hand. I looked down at my wrist. After everything I’d lived through, everything I’d survived, I thought it odd. Just when it seemed my luck was turning around, I was going to end it all.

Sliding to the floor, my back against the cabinets, I tipped my head back as tears rolled down my face. I just didn’t want to do this anymore. I was so tired of finding myself at the mercy of others. I didn’t want to be a burden to anyone anymore.

The knife clanked to the floor and my arms suddenly felt heavy. Laying them beside me, I closed my eyes and wondered what my next life would be like. Would I have parents that loved me? Would I find happiness? Would I be wanted? I hoped so.

Dear God, I hoped so.

A growl sounded just as I was yanked to my feet. “What the fuck did you do?”

Barely able to open my eyes, I smiled. “You should have let them kill me.”

“Shut up,” Malice said, gathering me in his arms as he took me back to my room. Laying me on the bed, he walked into the bathroom, grabbing several towels before returning to me. Reaching for one of my wrists, he tightly wrapped the towel around to stop the bleeding.

“Please don’t. Just let me go.”

“No,” he growled, wrapping the other as he ran from the room.

Laying there, I couldn’t move, even if I wanted to. My whole body felt heavy, weighed down, and when he returned, I saw he carried a medical bag.

Placing it on the bed, he dug around looking for something when I muttered, “Why are you saving me again?”

“Because.”

“That’s not an answer.”

Looking away, I closed my eyes and wondered why he was so determined to save me a second time.

Chapter One

Silver

I felt him.

I always felt him.

In a deliberate and unhurried manner, as though an unseen influence was coercing me, I cast a cautious glance over my shoulder, only to discover him standing by the entrance, his piercing stare directed at me, his eyes resembling glacial sterling silver spheres, devoid of any warmth or life.

It was a dance we had meticulously honed and refined throughout the years. Neither of us prepared to yield as we locked eyes in a battle of wills. It was a dangerous game. I knew that. I wasn’t stupid, but nothing I did could tear me away.

He wasn’t like the others. He was darker, stronger, more violent. Just plain dangerous in every sense of the word. After the life I lived, I would have thought I’d want nothing remotely similar, that I would steer clear of a man like him. Yet his darkness called to me. Beckoned me like a moth to a flame. No one here captured my attention like he did. No one sparked my fight-or-flight instinct like he did.

Gideon Scott was the man mothers and fathers warned their daughters about. The one to run away from, to never engage, to steer clear of. And yet, here I was, drawn to the very man who could destroy what life I had left inside me.