Page 80 of Ruthless Touch

I slowly obey, sliding back into the chair while trying to ignore my sensory reactions.

He draws a breath and takes a second to go on. “I realize asking you to run is like asking a pig to fly. It’s just not in your nature. But I also know what you’re dealing with. And the Cheongryong will not stop ’til they have Black Silk’s head on a pike. You’ve now been identified, Goyangi-ne. Which means I can’t protect you forever.”

“I’m not asking you to?—”

“It doesn’t fucking matter if you are,” he interrupts, dark eyes flashing with assertiveness. Yet another detail about him that draws a reaction out of me. A quickened pulse and ache somewhere I don’t want to admit. “It has nothing to do with what you want. It has to do with me… not wanting any harm to come your way.”

I’m speechless for a second, lost for words. “I’ve told you I hate you.”

“I know you have. There have been moments I thought I hated you too. But I was wrong—I don’t hate you. I never have. It’s more like... I’ve been impressed by you. Turned on by you. Fascinated with you. Obsessed with you. And I like you. Even as you hate me.”

“Gun.” I shake my head and snatch my hand back. I’m on my feet that quickly, a bubble of panic growing inside me.

It’s the need for escape. My urge to separate myself before… before…

“And you know what, Goyangi?” he goes on, the left side of his mouth tilting. “I think… you like me too. I think you keep telling yourself we have to be enemies because of our fathers. But if you truly hated me, you wouldn’t be here. You wouldn’t react the way you do when I touch you.”

No.

No. NO.

STOP. RIGHT NOW.

The words bounce around inside my brain as I take a step back and shake my head to refute his claims.

But as I back away, he rises to his feet like a predator in the wild that’s just spotted prey. He comes around the table and starts toward me.

Still so slow. Still so knowing.

His gaze hooking mine. The space between us diminishing. The air in the room evaporating.

I back up and he stalks forward ’til there’s nowhere else to go, even in this spacious loft that once felt so impossibly huge.

Rhee Gun-woo backs me up against the wall of exposed brick in such slow-motion you’dthinkI’d do something. I’d shove him away or duck out from under him.

I’d tell him to back the fuck up and leave me the hell alone.

I do none of those things.

I look him in the eye as he leans in close and cups my chin. He stares at me like he’s caught in a trance too.

He can’t bring himself to look anywhere else but at me. Then he bows his head and kisses me.

My heartbeat pounds in my chest. All thoughts are instantly wiped out.

Time, place, and circumstance cease to exist as I let myself be swept up by my enemy. By the man who I’m supposed to hate and even kill.

His mouth seals over mine and his tongue prods my lips open. I give in without a fight, melting into him in every way possible. I hold onto his arms, nails raking his skin as he kisses me so tenderly it sends shivers down my spine.

He makes his intentions clear. His kiss speaks for him, a declaration of where he stands. I can feel it as he takes his time and massages my tongue with his. He strokes my face and hip and holds me against him.

I’m trapped in a moment I never thought I’d be in—kissed passionately by a man whoactuallyseems to care about me. But even more than that, by a man who I’m unable to push away like the many others before him.

It seems no matter how hard I try, no matter how much I want to, I can’t escape Gun. I can’t shut him out like I’ve done my entire life.

…and that, more than anything I’ve ever encountered, is dangerous.

It’s everything I said I would never let happen.