Page 32

It had been two days since the House where he killed mercilessly for her.

Two days since she'd watched a man's eyes be taken since the scent of scorched flesh invaded her lungs and her name was carved into another human's skin.

And yet-

Isolde couldn't stop hearing Dante's voice. "If someone ever touches you... I'll paint the street with their blood until the city forgets their name."

She sat in his penthouse now, on the edge of the balcony chaise, one leg pulled beneath her, the silk robe he'd wrapped around her shoulders slipping down one arm.

The night wind combed through her hair. Below, the city moved cars, lives, lights, all still breathing.

She didn't feel like she was.

She wasn't sad. Or angry. Or scared.

She was... quiet.

Empty in a way she couldn't explain.

Her reflection in the glass door barely looked human anymore big eyes too wide, mouth parted, pupils dilated.

She looked like someone sleepwalking through a nightmare.

Her body remembered pain. Her soul didn't.

Behind her, she heard the click of polished shoes on marble.

She didn't move.

Dante approached like a shadow with gravity. No sudden sounds. Just the weight of his presence.

He crouched beside her, his black slacks creasing cleanly along his thighs.

Bare forearms rested against his knees. He smelled like clove smoke and steel.

His voice came low. "Have you eaten?"

She shook her head.

"Drank anything?"

Another shake.

He studied her. Eyes narrowed slightly. Not angry. Worried.

But in his own twisted, possessive way.

He reached into the pocket of his charcoal vest and pulled out something small a piece of wrapped dark chocolate.

He unwrapped it slowly. Held it out between two fingers.

"Open." She did.

He placed it on her tongue like a communion wafer.

Watched her chew.

Watched her swallow. "Good girl."

Later, she sat cross-legged in the center of his bed, wrapped in white linen.

Dante stood nearby, leaning against the wall, arms crossed, head tilted as he studied her.

The buttons of his black shirt were undone to mid-chest, sleeves rolled to his forearms, exposing a thin scar along his wrist.

His eyes had gone unreadable.

"You haven't spoken in nine hours," he murmured. "That's not silence. That's dissociation."

She looked at him.

"Did you enjoy it?" she asked.

"What?"

"Hurting him. Blinding him."

Dante's jaw flexed.

"I enjoyed knowing you're safer because of it."

She didn't blink. "You scared me."

His smile came slow.

"I know." A pause.

"You're not sorry," she whispered.

He pushed off the wall.

Crossed the room in three smooth strides. Bent low.

Placed his hands on the mattress on either side of her body and caged her in.

"No," he breathed, "I'm not."

He leaned closer.

"You were never going to love a good man, Isolde. I was just the one who understood that before you did."

She trembled as his lips brushed her jaw.

"I know how to keep you."

That night, Dante left again.

Only for a few hours.

A "brief meeting with external distributors," he said.

But it felt like being abandoned. Again.

Isolde stared at the empty space he left behind, the sheets still warm, her pulse still echoing in her ears.

She curled into his pillow.

Breathed in his scent.

And tried to pretend it filled the hole inside her chest.

Then she heard it. A sound in the hallway. A shuffle. A creak.

Not his footfalls. Not his silence.

Someone else.

Her breath caught. The door to the penthouse creaked open.

She stood, barefoot, the silk robe sliding over her skin. She reached for the letter opener on his nightstand.

Pale gold. Dull tip. Still better than nothing.

She stepped into the hall. Empty. Dark.

Until-

A man's voice.

Low. Foreign accent.

"Pretty thing shouldn't be left alone like this..."

She turned.

A man in a security uniform stood there-tall, clean-shaven, smiling like a snake.

He wasn't one of Dante's men.

And he was inside.

She took one step back. Then another.

He moved closer.

And-