Page 40 of Craving Venom (The Venomous Beauty Trilogy #1)

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THE MONSTER

I never thought there was a downside to my photographic memory.

Not until now.

Until the image of Faith kissing that tool has been burned into my mind, playing on a loop I can’t turn off.

I roll a blade between my fingers, testing the balance, feeling the weight of it. It’s sharp. Good. But not good enough.

“Not your usual style,” Luke comments beside me, flipping a butterfly knife between his fingers.

I run my thumb along the razor edge of the blade in my grip. “Branching out.”

Luke snorts. “Never thought I’d see you go for a stiletto.”

I spin the knife once, catching it by the handle. “Maybe I’m feeling fancy.”

The shopkeeper eyes me carefully. This isn’t the kind of store with glass displays and helpful employees. This is the kind of place where a guy asks too many questions and he doesn’t leave with his fingers attached.

“You buying or playing?” the shopkeeper grumbles, his gaze flicking to the blade in my hand, as if he’s calculating how much damage I could do with it.

“I’ll take the stiletto,” I say nodding toward the sleek, deadly beauty on the counter. “And the Karambit.”

The guy nods, stepping forward to ring them up.

Luke leans in, muttering under his breath, “Do I even wanna know what you need those for?”

I smirk. “You don’t.”

“Why do I even fucking ask?”

The shopkeeper slides my new toys into a bag, handing them over. “No refunds. No complaints.”

I grin, taking the bag from him. “Don’t worry. I don’t complain.”

Luke huffs a laugh, shaking his head, and we step out onto the dark street. He’s barely gotten three steps before his phone buzzes. He pulls it out, glances at the screen, and sighs.

I don’t have to ask. I already know.

“Ella says to tell you to be careful.”

I scoff, rolling my shoulders as I adjust the bag in my grip. “She’s wasting her breath.”

Luke shoots me a pointed look. “That’s what I told her, but you know how she is.”

Yeah. I do.

Ella worries too much. She always has.

I don’t slow my pace, my boots kick against the pavement as I turn down a different street.

Luke stops, frowning as he watches me head in the opposite direction. “You’re not coming back to the hospital?”

I shake my head, barely sparing him a glance. “Got unfinished business.”

“Why do I feel like you’re about to do some really fucked up shit?”

I grin, tucking my hands into my pockets. “Because you’re smart.”

“Fuck’s sake, Zane.” He glances around, like he’s debating whether to follow me or let me go.

He chooses the latter, sighing heavily before shaking his head.

“Fine,” he grumbles. “See you at dawn.”

I wave him off, stepping further into the shadows, but before I get too far, he calls after me.

“By the way,” he mutters, “your body double is more annoying than you.”

I bark out a laugh, my steps never slowing. “Impossible.”

Luke chuckles under his breath, shaking his head, then turns back toward the hospital.

Faith sleeps like she has no reason to fear the world.

Like she’s untouchable. Like she doesn’t have a monster watching her breathe. I lean back in the chair I pulled into the corner. My arms are resting on my thighs and my fingers itching.

For what? I don’t know.

Maybe to touch.

Maybe to take.

Maybe to remind her exactly who she belongs to.

Instead, I watch.

Her face is relaxed, lips parted, chest rising and falling in slow, even breaths. The blankets are tangled around her waist, exposing her bare arms, the curve of her back, the soft skin of her thigh peeking out from under her sleep shorts.

Her cheek is squished against the pillow, making her look ridiculously cute. Like she’s dreaming about puppies instead of being watched by a man who’s killed more people than she probably realizes.

My eyes fix on the vein in her forehead, the one that shows up when she’s pissed off, when she’s thinking too hard, or about to say something that’ll make me want to bite her. It’s there now, even in her sleep, pulsing as if it’s mocking me. I glare at it.

Who the fuck obsesses over a vein?

Apparently, I do.

I watch her shift, and the sheet slips lower, dragging across the dip of her spine. The light from the window slices across her skin, catching on the fine hairs of her skin.

She doesn’t know what it does to me.

The smooth stretch of her stomach, the soft curve just above her hip bone, are all fragile places. Places I could bruise with my mouth or my hands if I wanted to. If I let go. If I gave in to the thing inside me that wakes up when she’s near and never fully sleeps when she’s not.

I drag my gaze down her legs. There’s a freckle high on her inner thigh and I want to press my mouth to it until she stirs.

Until she wakes up and sees what she does to me even in sleep.

Especially in sleep. I want to bite her where it hurts.

I want to mark her so deep she never forgets who watches her like this. Who owns this view.

Her shorts ride up just enough that if I moved an inch closer, I could fix it, but I don’t. I just stare, letting the want crawl under my skin, obsessed with every detail, especially the moles I’ve memorized like landmarks, each one driving me a little more insane.

My cock twitches at the thought, at the absolute fucking audacity of her to sleep so peacefully, so untouched by the chaos I’ve woven around her.

And the best part?

She has no idea.

The gift I brought her moves a little too close. My fingers curl around it, plucking it away from her. She doesn’t stir. Even with the movement, the slight but audible noise, she sleeps on.

A single strand of hair clings to her cheek. I brush it away, just barely letting my fingertips graze her skin. She shifts, a small noise slipping from her lips before she melts back into the pillow, lost to sleep again.

If I were a good man, I’d let her sleep.

Let her rest in peace before I rip it away.

But I am not a good man.

So I settle on the edge of her bed, watching her. Enjoying the way she breathes easy, blissfully unaware of what’s waiting for her the moment she opens those pretty fucking eyes.

I look around, admiring the arrangement I’ve made.

My father used to fill my mother’s room with flowers when he betrayed her, using beauty to mask his sins. He thought he could drown her pain in petals and perfume.

He was a fool.

He thought flowers could make a woman stay, but fear, fear makes her never leave. Because the mind never forgets what it learned to survive.

And survival breeds loyalty far deeper than love ever could.

I don’t want her to stay because of a fantasy. I want her to stay because she can’t escape me. Because no matter where she hides, I’ll find her. And if she leaves, I’ll drag her back myself.

My father tried to smother guilt with beauty.

I want to replace her remorse with power.

Instead of distracting her from betrayal, I will force her to confront it.

I press a kiss to her forehead and she shifts beneath me. It’s just the smallest flutter of her lashes, the faintest twitch of her fingers against the sheets.

Then she settles again, her breathing is still even, but… not quite.

A tremble rolls through her just barely, a subtle shake in her body that tells me she’s awake. Or at least, some part of her is. Maybe her subconscious is tricking her, telling her that if she just stays still, if she just keeps pretending, I won’t wake her up.

I brush my lips to the shell of her delicate ear. “Wake up, good girl.”

Her eyes snap open and she just stares at me. She’s probably trying to convince herself I’m not really here.

Then within a heartbeat, she’s scrambling back so hard that her body collides hard with the headboard. She yanks the covers up to her chest in defense.

“What—” Her breath catches. “What are you doing here?”

I drag my gaze over her, savoring every detail, the flush on her skin, the uneven rise and fall of her chest, the haze of sleep still clinging to her eyes, now wide with fear. A fear I put there. A fear that belongs to me.

Her fingers clutch the sheets as if the fabric could shield her from the inevitable. But it won’t. Nothing will.

“I told you,” I remind her. “Close your door tight.”

And she had.

She’d locked it tight, just like I’d warned her.

But there’s no lock I can’t break into.

And she knows that now.

I watch her fight for composure, watch her try to mask the fear, but the beast in me loves it.

“You look like you’re trying so hard not to be scared.”

She lifts her chin, glaring. “I’m not.”

I grin as my fingers skim the fabric of the sheets, just barely grazing her, but enough to make her flinch.

“Liar.”

Her breathing hitches, but she doesn’t move away.

“Get. Out.”

I close the space between us until our noses nearly touch and plant my hands on either side of her.

“Make me.”

“You know what?” she hisses. “I can.”

Faith’s glare hardens as her breathing stays uneven, but there’s a new fire in her eyes that pulls a grin from me.

“This isn’t like the shadow room or the back of the stadium where you ambushed me. This is my dorm room. I’m going to walk out and tell the authorities I have an unknown man in my room, invading my personal space.”

For a second, I just stare at her. Then I almost laugh. She’s silly if she thinks some college security guard or a dorm supervisor is going to scare me off, but I let her have her moment.

“Fair enough,” I push back and raise my hands in mock surrender.

Her lips part as if she’s waiting for me to retract the offer, to grab her, to ruin whatever plan she’s trying to form in that pretty little head of hers.

“Go ahead,” I say, nodding toward the door. “Do what you need to do.”

Faith steels herself, then throws the covers off and moves to stand, but stills when her eyes land on the surprise I left for her.

A visible tremor runs through her, her fingers twitch as her arms curl slightly toward herself. She’s one breath away from being hysterical. A wicked smirk tugs at my lips as I push off the bed, giving her space to absorb this nightmare.

“After tonight,” I say, watching the way she trembles under my words, “you won’t let another man look at what’s mine.”

A single tear slips from her eye, trailing slowly down her cheek before it falls, disappearing into the sheets.

Her fingers tighten around the fabric, clutching so hard that one of her nail breaks, the pain is so minuscule compared to the sheer horror coursing through her that she doesn’t even react to it.

“Let alone touch it.”