Page 26 of Alluring Darkness
“Watch your mouth, princess,” I warn, leaning down so close that I’m almost breathing the words against her lips.
“Or what?” she retorts, glaring up at me.
“Or I might gag you.” I stroke my thumb over the side of her neck. “Or decide to fill your throat with something else.”
She shudders, either at my words or at my touch, and something flickers in her eyes. But I don’t think it’s anger.
“Would you like that, princess?” I push.
She bites the inside of her cheek, but only continues glaring up at me in silence.
“Which one?” I shift my hand so that I can draw my thumb over her bottom lip instead. “For me to shove my cock down your throat again? Or for me to force a massive ball gag into your mouth and secure it behind your head with a lock that only I have the key to, so that you can’t speak unless I allow it?”
Another shudder courses through her body, and her eyes shutter briefly.
I smirk. “Or both?”
She draws in a shaky breath.
My cock aches. Fuck, I shouldn’t have spoken all that out loud. Because now, doing both of those things, and more, to her perfect body is all I can think of.
Her chest heaves, and she stares back at me with eyes that burn with a whole host of emotions. Then she drags in a deep breath, and a wicked smile slides across her lips instead.
“Try it,” she taunts. “And I’ll kill you in your sleep.”
A huff of amusement escapes my chest. I shift my hand back down to her throat and give it a firm squeeze. “Threats, huh? You just watched me send one of the best hitmen in the entire senior year scurrying away with his tail between his legs after just one word from me, and you think threats is your best course of action here?”
“Yes, why is that?”
“Why is what?”
“Why is it that everyone backs away when you so much as glance in their direction?” She shakes her head, and genuine confusion swirls in her eyes. “It makes no sense. Everyone here is training to be an assassin. So why is everyone so damned scared of you?”
I raise my eyebrows in surprise. “You don’t know?”
“No.”
Releasing her throat, I take a step back and cock my head as I study her. “How can you not know?”
A hint of annoyance and embarrassment flickers across her features as she crosses her arms defensively and glances to the side. “My family didn’t want me to become a hitman. So I’m… not exactly familiar with all the politics in this world.”
For a few seconds, I just watch her in silence. Is this the reason why she doesn’t fear me like everyone else? Not because she somehow sees through all of my bullshit and doesn’t care that I’m violent and volatile. But simply because she doesn’tknow.
Disappointment blows through me.
Once she understands how this world works, she will probably start acting like everyone else and stop challenging me the way she does.
A heavy weight settles in my stomach.
But if that’s the case, then I need to know, so I block out all of those feelings of disappointment and instead ask her a question that I know she will say yes to.
“Would you like me to show you?”
13
RAINA
Eli strides up to the driver seat of his now once again spotless Range Rover. I branch off, heading for the passenger’s side door. I’ve barely gotten the door open when a hand appears on it, shoving it closed again.