Page 70 of Craving Venom (The Venomous Beauty Trilogy #1)

“Why are there so many monitors?” Mark finally asks, snapping me halfway out of it.

“We track targets.” Terry cracks open a can of something fizzy. “Movements, threats, leverage. Some of these feeds are high-risk zones. Others are insurance. You know. In case someone needs watching.”

I tune it all out.

My body moves before I can stop it. I drift toward the monitor, believing somehow that being right in front of her image could erase the impossible distance still keeping her out of reach.

Her jacket sleeve is falling off the bed.

Her lip is chewed red.

I could walk into that room right now. Pull her shoes off. Undo her tights. Slide the hoodie over her arms and tuck her beneath the blankets she forgets to use. Wipe the mascara from under her lashes. Clear the water bottles and Advil wrappers from her floor.

I’ve done it before.

She doesn’t know that. But I have.

Terry’s beside me now. I don’t look at him, but I know that silence. That watchful curiosity that only comes from a man who’s already done everything once before and still chooses to stick around and see what happens next.

“There are seven stages,” he starts. “To love.”

“Uh huh.”

I don’t ask him to explain.

But he’s in his mid-thirties, and guys his age can’t help themselves.

“First is attraction . It’s chemical, instinctual, and impossible to ignore, like gravity with a hard-on, pulling you in whether you’re ready or not.”

I glance at him from the corner of my eye.

“Then comes addiction . The high you chase when you’re not near her. The ache in your cock when her voice is in your ear and her pussy’s not under your tongue.”

He ticks off his fingers.

“ Possession . The one that makes you jealous when someone else says her name. The feeling that makes you fantasize about slitting throats for just looking at her.”

“Then comes love ,” he says, dragging the word out. “Which is just the eye of the hurricane, really. The false peace between explosions. The shit poets try to sell, but it’s really just another step before the collapse.”

He counts another off on his fingers.

“ Trust . That’s the brutal one. That’s when you let her near the parts of you no one sees. The memories. The trigger points. The guilt. That’s when she could stab you in the chest and you’d still pull the blade in deeper just to feel her hand again.”

He lifts the can to his lips and raises it slowly as though the taste might drown the truth he just spoke.

“ Devotion . That’s when her pain is your pain. When her tears burn your lungs more than smoke ever could. That’s when you’d rather lose the war than watch her bleed for your choices.”

“Wait,” I stop him. “If it’s seven stages of ‘love’”—I air-quote the word with a crooked finger—”shouldn’t love be the last one?”

“What is love if it’s not madness ?”

I glance at him, but his eyes are already on Faith through the screen.

My fingers brush the corner of the monitor.

Stupid thing buzzes under my palm like it wants to reject me.

But my hand stays there, hovering over her cheek.

She slides deeper into the mattress like she knows someone’s watching, and trusts that they won’t hurt her in her sleep.

“What do you think…” My thumb trails her jawline through the screen. “What stage am I at?”

“Love.”

That one-word hits harder than any punch I’ve ever taken.

It shouldn’t surprise me. I’ve tasted every stage. Chewed through attraction, burned alive in addiction, branded her name into my fucking ribs with possession. Love was inevitable.

But hearing it out loud?

From someone else’s mouth?

It rips a hole straight through the part of me that still pretended I had control.

And then Terry says the part I already know but can’t admit.

“And you’re in love with a girl you can never have.”

That part does hit. Somewhere ugly.

Because he’s right.

I’ve already swallowed every part of her that she’ll never willingly give. Her moans, her fear, her fight, her silence. I’ve memorized the way her breath catches when she thinks I’m going to hurt her and the way she falls apart when I don’t. I’ve made a home inside her fucking pain.

But I’ll never have her heart.

She’ll never hand it to me in that gentle, breakable way the good ones get. She’ll never lace her fingers through mine and say I make her feel safe. She’ll never say my name like it means home instead of threat.

Because I’m the reason she can’t sleep without locking the door, the shadow she checks twice for, the burn she likes too much to stop, and the bruise she can’t explain to anyone else, and that’s all I’ll ever fucking be.

She might come in my arms. She might fall asleep in my scent. She might even cry with her head on my shoulder.

But love?

That soft, pure, red-ribboned thing?

She’ll never give it to me.

Because I don’t inspire love.

I consume it.

So yeah, maybe I’m in love.

But it’s not the kind of love that writes vows.

It’s the kind that digs graves.

Something slides across the counter breaking me out of my reverie.

I look down. It’s the newspaper.

The one with the black-and-white photo and a smudged headline that reads:

MARCUS LEISTER, 19, FOUND DEAD IN PRISON CELL.

“Might want to tell me why you lied and said that the kid was in danger from Frank.”

I don’t answer right away, just stare at the grainy grayscale image of the suicide note before tapping it once.

“Frank made him want to do this.”

Terry nods slowly. “Yeah. You beat him up real good, Zane. I saw the footage. Frank’s not coming back from that. But you and I both know that’s not the whole story.”

I finally look up at him.

“What are you implying?”

“Mark reminds you of Alex.”

Everything in me goes very, very still.

I don’t respond.

Because I don’t need to.

Instead, I shift my gaze to the far-left monitor. Davis Adams. Next name on our list. Top floor of an executive hotel downtown. Room 1711. I zoom in on the building’s thermal overlay, track the heat signatures. Elevator stopped at 17 two minutes ago. He’s alone.

I watch him for a full minute.

“You know,” Terry says quietly, “it’s okay to let yourself feel. Maybe that kid is your shot at redemption.”

Redemption’s for the ones who think they deserve a second chance. I never did. Not after Alex. I’m not looking for clean slates. I’m looking for fire. For screams. For something that hurts loud enough to drown the rest out.

“Terry, I don’t need redemption. What I need is destruction.”