Page 3 of Infinite Darkness (The Artmaker Trilogy #2)

Atticus

I stared at her, my Bluebell, those blue eyes glassy and dripping tears that clung to her lashes before sliding down her cheeks. Watching them break free did something to me I didn’t have a name for. It wasn’t satisfaction. It wasn’t excitement. It was worse. It was foreign. Heavy. Almost… concern.

Sympathy.

The word tasted vile on my tongue. Sympathy was weakness.

A useless, human indulgence that did nothing but rot the edges of control.

I’d never let it fester before, not for anyone, not for anything—but here it was, threading through my veins, wrapping around my ribcage like barbed wire.

And I hated that I couldn’t just turn it off.

Fine. If I couldn’t shut it down, I’d solve it at the source. Something was bothering her. Something was making her look at me like I was the thing she needed saving from, and for reasons I didn’t care to examine too closely, that thought twisted something inside me.

She shouldn’t be afraid of me—not like that. Not after everything I’d given her. My truths. My attention. My protection. I’d given her more honesty in one day than I’d ever given another living soul, even the ones who’d begged for it in their final breaths. They hadn’t deserved my truth. She did.

I ran my thumb slowly down the damp track of her tears, the salt smearing under my skin.

My voice came out low, softer than I meant, betraying the strange pull she had on me.

“Your skin’s so smooth, Bluebell,” I murmured, watching the way she trembled under my touch.

No answer. Just another tear cutting down her cheek, stinging me with the knowledge that she feared me.

And not the good kind of fear. Not the reverent kind I cultivated in my art. This fear felt wrong. Directed at the part of me that wanted to keep her, not destroy her.

I smiled, or tried to. It came out awkward, not my usual mask of charm and certainty, but something uneven, searching. I didn’t know how to fix this, but I needed to. “I’ve been nothing but honest with you,” I said, my voice firm but not cruel.

She nodded, but panic still swam in her eyes, her throat tight like words were trapped there.

“Listen to me,” I said, leaning closer, my hand tightening around her jaw, not enough to hurt, just enough to remind her she couldn’t look away. “Just… listen. No talking. Just nod. Can you do that for me, Gennie girl?”

A shaky nod. Blonde hair a wild halo around her face, strands catching in the sunlight spilling through the window.

She looked wrecked, vulnerable in a way that made something feral in me want to shield her from the world—and at the same time, ached to mark her all over again so no one else could mistake her for theirs.

“Good girl,” I said, and my cock twitched at the sight of her cheeks flushing at the praise.

I shouldn’t have noticed that right now, but fuck, I noticed everything about her.

The way her pulse fluttered under her skin, the way her lips parted on a shaky breath, the way her soul seemed caught somewhere between fear and craving every time I touched her.

“Alright,” I continued, my voice steady, clinical now, like I was laying out the facts of a masterpiece to a curious onlooker.

“I’ve always been fascinated by death. Even as a kid, I knew what I was, and I never regretted it.

I don’t lose sleep over the bodies buried on my land.

I don’t feel guilt or shame or any of the pretty little things society says I should feel.

Death isn’t ugly to me. It’s art in its rawest form. ”

Her throat bobbed, a tear slipping free, but she didn’t move. Didn’t even blink. I kept going. She needed to hear this. Needed to understand me.

“If I wanted you dead, Bluebell,” I said softly, deadly calm, “it would’ve happened within hours of you stepping foot in this house.

That’s how it’s always been. The unlucky ones who wind up here don’t get tied up for pleasure.

I don’t kiss them. I don’t speak truths to them.

I don’t… touch them the way I touch you.

” My voice dipped lower, sharp and intimate, meant for her ears alone.

“They breathe their last breath, and then I make them more beautiful than they ever were alive.”

Her eyes widened, the horror in them deepening, but she still didn’t look away. And fuck me, I liked that about her. Every other soul I’d ever stared down at that moment looked away. She held my gaze even as fear rippled through her. Brave little Bluebell.

I leaned in closer, close enough to feel her tears dampen my own lips when I whispered, “But you? I can’t make you more beautiful, Gennie. There’s no version of you that needs to be transformed. Which is why you’re still breathing.”

I studied her face, every twitch of her mouth, every quiver of her lashes.

She wasn’t blinking, caught between terror and something else she didn’t want me to see.

Shock, maybe. Or maybe, just maybe, the flicker of understanding that no one else on earth would ever get this version of me.

No one else would ever hear these words.

And even if she hated me for them, she’d never forget that truth: She was the only one I’d chosen to keep.

I let the words hang between us like a blade, sharp and final. I can’t make you into something more beautiful.

Her blue eyes locked on mine, bright and broken all at once, glassy with tears that paused for a moment before sliding down her cheeks. She sat frozen, her fork untouched, her chest rising too slowly, like breathing had become optional. Like one wrong move from me would finish shattering her.

Then, rough and quiet, “You… can’t?”

The sound of it scraped raw against my ribs.

I leaned closer, elbows braced on the table, voice dropping into something low and deliberate, every word honed like a scalpel.

“No, Bluebell. I can’t.” My thumb caught a tear as it fell, smearing it across her soft skin, savoring the way she trembled but didn’t pull back.

“You’re already the most exquisite thing I’ve ever seen.

There’s nothing to cut away, nothing to add.

You’re a masterpiece I could stare at every day for the rest of my life and never need to change. ”

Something ugly and unfamiliar clawed its way up my throat. I pushed it out before it could rot there. “You were made for me—for my hands, my black fucking soul, my hunger. I didn’t think I was capable of giving a damn about anyone. But here I am. Giving a damn about you.”

I wasn’t about to say love. Love was fragile, breakable, a glass cage waiting to crack. What I felt was heavier, darker, stitched into my bones.

“This isn’t love,” I rasped, letting the truth drag its teeth over every word. “It’s need. It’s addiction that digs deeper every time you look at me with those blue eyes like you see too much and not enough all at once. You’re my masterpiece, Bluebell, and I can’t stop wanting you.”

Her lips parted, but no sound came out. Her chest stilled.

“Breathe,” I ordered softly, the command curling out of me like smoke, “now, Gennie girl.”

She gasped, lungs dragging in air like it hurt. Relief hissed through my teeth, my smirk edging slow and dangerous as I leaned in, my nose grazing hers. “Good girl,” I murmured, savoring her flinch, her fluttering lashes. “Think you can do that without me reminding you?”

A shaky nod. “Y-yeah… I think so.”

I caught her hand where it trembled against the table, my thumb brushing over her knuckles, grounding her, grounding me. She didn’t pull away. Didn’t reach for me either. That hesitation—that invisible battlefield between trust and fear—set my blood on fire.

“I will never hurt you,” I said, my voice steady but laced with steel. “I don’t want you to leave. But if you do…” My lips ghosted over her knuckles, my words a low, dark promise meant for her alone. “…you’ll never stop wanting to come back.”

Her hesitant, barely-there, “I’m trying, Atti,” tore through me like a bullet.

Fuck. The sound of my name on her lips, soft and uncertain, stripped me bare in a way nothing else ever had. A real smile cracked across my face before I could stop it, sharp and aching. “Thank you for trying,” I said, and it felt like bleeding and breathing all at once.

Her blush bloomed, pink creeping up to her ears, making me want to lean in and taste it, to mark her where no one else could see. Instead, I tilted in close, brushing a kiss over her cheek, inhaling that soft, sinful scent of coconut and vanilla that already haunted my lungs.

Pulling back was a war with every instinct I had, but I forced it, because if I didn’t, I’d drag her onto this table and show her what belonging to me really meant—and she wasn’t ready for that truth yet.

Instead, I leaned close enough for my words to graze her lips, low and reverent. “Such a good girl, my Bluebell. You screamed so fucking pretty for me last night… one day, you’ll understand what it truly means to be mine.”

I didn’t stand this time. I just sat there, staring at her, every muscle locked in restraint, because for the first time in my life, I wanted something I couldn’t simply take.

And that want was eating me alive.