Page 75 of Craving Venom (The Venomous Beauty Trilogy #1)

How he filled my room with them just to teach me a lesson about loyalty. About who I belong to. And in his own fucked-up logic, he thought that was romantic.

Tria’s hands are balled into fists on her lap. “Faith, that’s not just bold. That’s fucking terrifying.”

“I know.”

“Then why the hell did you kiss Trevor?”

The question punches me in the chest.

I lift my eyes to hers. “To drive Zane away.”

She stares at me, trying to connect dots that keep rearranging themselves.

“I panicked,” I confess. “Zane was getting too close. I didn’t know what to do. I thought maybe if he saw me kiss someone else he’d back off.”

“You didn’t just put yourself at risk. You put Trevor in danger.”

“I know,” I breathe. “God, I know. I was a stupid bitch, okay? I didn’t think it through.”

“Did he hurt Trevor?”

“No.”

“Well, at least that proves he’s harmless. So you think the shadowy figure I’ve been seeing…” Tria says, circling us back to where this conversation started. “Is Zane.”

My throat tightens. “Yes.”

It comes out flat. Ugly. Final.

“But he’s in prison,” I add, rubbing my temples, massaging logic back into this mess.

“I mean, no matter how lax the security is there’s no way he can keep slipping out unnoticed.

There’s no way the guards would cover for that.

He’d have to give excuses, create distractions, manipulate entire shifts. ”

“Faith.” Tria turns her head to face me. “This is the same man who burned down a prison to fuck you.”

I open my mouth, then close it, because yeah—when she puts it like that...

“And don’t forget,” she adds, “his grandfather built the prison. The man grew up inside the goddamn blueprints. If anyone knows where the cracks are, it’s him.”

My stomach drops straight to hell.

I bury my face in my hands. “Oh my God.”

“What?”

“What the fuck have I gotten myself into?”

My words crack on the last word because now that it’s out loud, now that it’s real, my brain can’t wrap itself around the scope of what I’ve done.

What I’ve invited in.

“I’m so stupid,” I whisper.

Tria nudges me, bumping her shoulder into mine. “No. You’re not stupid.”

“You literally just agreed I was.”

“Well, yeah, but that was ten minutes ago. Different context.”

I let out a strangled laugh, one hand still covering my face.

She pulls it down gently, and her eyes are softer now. “Look. You’re not the first girl to get pulled into something way over her head. But this?” She gestures vaguely around my room, to the clean surfaces, to the silence hanging like a question mark. “This doesn’t have to own you.”

“I slept with a man who might be watching me while I sleep.”

“Yeah,” she nods, “but you also slept with a man who folded your laundry. Let’s not forget that.”

“Oh my God.”

“I’m just saying,” Tria grins. “Stalkers don’t usually come with full housekeeping benefits.”

I groan and shove her.

I don’t even notice how long I’ve been lying on Tria’s lap until I blink and realize my neck’s stiff and Tria’s fingers are absently running through my hair, her other hand scrolling through some article on her phone.

Somewhere along the way, I’d curled into her lap like I was twelve again and she was the only person keeping the monsters out of my closet.

We’re talking about the Nighthawk, of all things.

Tria hates true crime. Calls it “murder porn for people with anxiety.” But she’s still here, listing off Reddit theories and quietly mocking the ones that think he’s a former Navy SEAL turned trauma cleaner.

“That one guy said his boots are military-grade,” Tria hums, amused. “As if Amazon doesn’t sell knockoffs for like thirty bucks.”

I grin against her thigh. “You hate this stuff.”

“I do,” she admits. “But you like it. And you needed something that isn’t… you know.” Her hand stills in my hair. “Throat hands.”

I groan. “Never say ‘throat hands’ again.”

“Okay, but like, you were into it.”

“I will smother you with this pillow.”

I laugh. It’s soft, but real. And it’s been too long since something didn’t feel heavy.

Tria glances at her watch. “Shit. I should start getting ready.”

I frown and shift to sit up. “Why? You start at midnight.”

“It’s not midnight today,” she says. “It’s eight.”

“Why?”

“I’m covering for Corrine.”

I pause, mid-stretch. “Corrine? Why?”

“No idea. Wes texted me earlier, asked if I could take her shift.”

Wes. Their manager. Bit of a control freak with a god complex and a God-awful mustache.

I rub the back of my neck. “That’s weird. Doesn’t Corrine live for her shifts? You’ve told me, like, fifty times she once worked through a stomach flu just to pay for her stats textbook.”

“Yeah,” Tria nods, already standing and pulling on her hoodie. “Girl’s got more debt than moral boundaries. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her call out.”

“That’s why it’s weird. And Wes didn’t say why?”

“Nope. Just said she was out and he needed someone to fill.” She glances at her phone again. “But she hasn’t shown up the last two days, now that I think about it.”

I watch her tie her shoes as tension sinks back into my shoulders like a warning crawling under my skin.

It’s probably nothing.

Probably.

My phone pings.

I don’t even look at it right away. I don’t want to give the paranoia more fuel, but when I finally glance down, the name stops me cold.

Nina.

“I’m home. Don’t worry.”

Tria’s already tying her laces when she glances up at me. “What’s wrong?”

I open my mouth to lie.

But it slips out too fast. “Nothing—”

Fuck.

I swallow hard, thumb still hovering over the screen.

“Nina just messaged me,” I say quietly. “She said she’s home.”

Tria pauses mid-knot, frowning. “Okay… isn’t that good?”

I shake my head, eyes still glued to the text.

“Sebastian told me… a kid saw the Nighthawk two nights ago.” I don’t meet her eyes. “Same night I—” My breath sticks. “Same night I fucked Zane.”

Tria goes still.

“And Corrine’s been missing since then,” I continue, because now that I’ve opened my mouth, everything’s pouring out.

“Maybe that was a coincidence.”

I snatch my phone off the nightstand and pull up the Veridian news archive. My hands are shaking so bad it takes me three tries to type the right keywords.

“There.” I spin the screen toward her. The headline blares in harsh white font:

ROBERT GAILE, CITY COMPTROLLER, MAULED TO DEATH IN SUSPECTED ANIMAL ATTACK

“Night of Halloween,” I whisper. “Same night Celine said she was going home.”

Tria swallows. “Okay. That’s... fucked.”

“Eleanor texted a week later, remember?” I look up.

Now, that I think of it, it was right after my prison video call with Zane.

“I remember.”

brIAN KELLER, INVESTMENT BANKER, FOUND DISEMBOWELED OUTSIDE A MOTEL ON ROUTE 6.

Same goddamn date.

Tria’s eyes widen.

My thumb shakes as I hit the last thread.

“Maya said she was leaving too. The night after…” I pause, bile rising in my throat.

The night after Zane was in my room.

Tria doesn’t ask me to complete my sentence.

I find the article.

DERRICK VOSS, CHIEF LEGAL ADVISOR TO THE VERIDIAN PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE, FOUND MURDERED IN HIS HOME—SIGNS OF STRUGGLE

Same. Fucking. Night.

My blood feels like it’s moving backward.

“Tria,” I whisper, staring down at the screen like the truth might eat its way out.

She wraps her arms around herself, trying to compress her own rising panic. “Don’t do this. Don’t start spiraling.”

“It’s not spiraling if the dots are connecting.”

“No—” She grabs my wrist, hard. “Listen to me. If Zane was The Nighthawk, if he really was some serial-killing boogeyman, you think Trevor would still be breathing?”

My throat closes.

“Think about it,” she goes on. “He watched you kiss Trevor. Right? That would’ve been the first body you found. Head in a blender. Dick in a blender. Something. But Trevor’s alive. So maybe… maybe this is just all a fucked-up coincidence.”

I want to believe her.

I really fucking do.

A knock slams into the front door and both of us jump.

Tria’s hand shoots out, grabbing my arm. I clutch the edge of the desk, ready to throw it at whoever’s behind the door.

“Do you think it’s him?” I whisper.

“The Nighthawk?” she hisses back. “Oh yeah, because if I were a serial killer, I’d knock politely before skinning someone alive.”

I glare. “Not helping.”

We school our expressions the moment we hear a familiar voice on the other side.

“Tria? Are you in there?”

Tria crosses the room fast, already unlocking the door. The second it swings open Xaden’s standing there with his shoulders hunched.

“Fuck,” Tria breathes, pulling him into a hug.

He doesn’t just hold her. He clings. One hand fisted in the back of her sweatshirt, as if letting go will make him fall apart on my ugly welcome mat.

And for a second, watching them so close, makes me feel… weirdly calm.

They fit. Effortlessly. No secrets. No stalking. Just arms and warmth and steady breathing. Something I don’t have.

When they finally separate, Xaden offers me a tired nod and a crooked attempt at a smile.

And that’s when Tria gasps.

Her eyes zero in on the side of his hoodie, on the dark stain spreading near the hem.

“Is that—” she reaches out, “is that blood?”

Xaden flinches back just a little. “It’s not mine.”

“Jesus, who’s is it then?!”

“Trevor’s. I found him in the alleyway, all bloodied and beaten.

His lip was shoved so far down his fucking throat I could see teeth in his stomach.

His nails were ripped off, one by one. Like someone sat there and peeled him open piece by piece.

One of his eyes was hanging by the optic nerve. Just… dangling.”

“Oh my God.” Tria’s hand flies to her mouth.

“I found him with seconds left,” Xaden croaks. “He was choking on his own blood. I held his head up and he just looked at me, like he recognized me, but not really. He was already gone.”

Xaden wipes his mouth with the back of his shaking hand. His eyes are red, raw, unfocused.

“He mumbled something,” he whispers. “Before he died.”

My spine stiffens.

“What did he say?”

Xaden looks up. Straight at me.

“The Nighthawk.”

The room spins.

Everything inside me collapses, all at once. My lungs don’t work. My legs don’t feel real. The blood in my veins turns to ice.

I did not just sleep with a stalker.

I slept with a wanted serial killer.