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He spared my life once.

It was the honorable thing, to reciprocate.

Stop lying to yourself. This has nothing to do with honor and everything to do with your weak, weak heart.

Still holding the gun, I rubbed my forehead.

It was rare for an Infernarus to be reluctant to kill. Rare but not unheard of, and when it came to the art of death, I always choked. It made me weak. It had also saved my life.

So many others like me had been put to the blade. I’d been spared.

Spare the weak, kill the strong.

I lowered myself until I straddled Asher’s back. I threaded my fingers through his hair. Everything about this was intimate. And Asher couldn’t fight back. There was no honor in that. It wouldn’t be a victory in the heat of battle, it would be a cold-blooded execution.

I pressed the barrel of the gun against his temple and breathed in and out of my nose.

Pull the trigger, I ordered myself.He’s not an Infernarus. He wants you and all others like you dead.

Still, I hesitated.

Hehadn’tyet killed me. This man I was about to execute, someone somewhere at some point in time cared for him. Even the coldhearted humans loved.

I hung my head.

Gods above, Icouldn’t.

I wanted to scream. I was weak, weak and cowardly.

I pulled my arm back and slammed the butt of the gun against his temple. Then I threw the weapon far away.

He wouldn’t know how close he came to death.

I grimaced and released Asher’s head. It banged against the floor. I stood, still in Brad’s skin and his boxers.

Another will kill him.

I backed away from Asher. And then I ran.

Brad’s body washeavy.

I discovered this as I sprinted away from the house Asher kept me in, my bare feet digging into the wet grass. Most men’s bodies were. All that upper body strength bore down on his legs as I ran. Still, the guy was fast. Faster than me, and that was saying something.

I could feel the night in my bones. The cold wind bit against my skin and threaded through my short hair.

Night was not kind here.

But it didn’t bother me nearly as much as it should have. A heady mixture of excitement and fear coursed through my veins. I wasn’t yet free, thanks to the fact that I didn’t kill the one man I needed to, and there were so many steps I had to take to get home, now that one of the two gateways I knew of had been destroyed. The other was located a continent away. That meant folding myself into more human machines. Ones thatflew.

My stomach dropped.

Coward. Coward. Coward.

My feet hit the pavement, and I pushed this body harder, faster.

I heard the roar of an engine in the distance.

No.