Page 24 of XOXO, Little Butterfly (The Storyteller’s Bodyguard #2)

Butterfly Man

“Got you, little butterfly.”

The rain washes over us like a baptism. My little butterfly, sprawled before me, drenched, her eyes wide with recognition. With fear.

“Tristan!” she screams, and I drop to my knees and place my palms on either side of her head.

My body hovers over hers, caging her beneath me.

She scrambles backward, but I move with her, my knees now bracketing her hips, trapping her against the muddy forest floor.

The rain cascades down my mask onto her face, our breaths mingling in the narrow space between us.

“Don’t be afraid.” I caress her cheek with the back of my hand and watch her flinch. So fragile, so beautiful in her terror. “I would never hurt you, Raegan. Never you.”

“I have every reason to fear you. You’ve left trails of blood in your wake,” she whispers.

“For you. And you like it.” Can she argue with that?

“How did you find me?” Her voice trembles.

I tilt my head, studying her, my hand sliding down to her throat.

The rain slicks her hair against her face, dark tendrils framing those eyes that haunt me.

Her pulse flutters at her neck like that of a captured animal, her chest heaving with each panicked breath.

“I’ve always known where you are. Every moment. Every breath.”

“No. You couldn’t.”

“Couldn’t I?” I lower my face closer to hers.

I want to kiss her so badly. God, she’s beautiful.

But she’s never been more beautiful than in this moment of surrender, this perfect culmination of our chase.

The fear in her eyes ignites something savage within me, something primal.

Predator and prey. Hunter and hunted. “And yet here I am, darling. The question is, why did you run from me? Don’t you know I’ll always chase after you?

It makes me hard as fuck.” I push my hips forward, letting her feel the proof.

She whimpers a gasp, and I smile behind the mask.

“You like it, too, don’t you, darling? You told me so the last time we met.

Being chased by a masked man, your stalker, in the woods…

The moment he catches you and you lie helplessly while he fucks you like a hungry beast.” I press my cock harder against her and hiss.

“On the scale of one to ten, if I slide my fingers now inside your pussy, how wet will you be?”

“Get the fuck off of me.”

“That wet, huh? I bet wetter than when I put a gun to that sweet little cunt. I know I’m harder. Nothing compares to the primal thrill of capturing you, my little butterfly. Nothing compares to watching my prey tremble beneath me, caught at last after the pursuit…and vice versa.”

“Tristan!”

The distant shout of her bodyguard echoes through the trees. I have minutes, perhaps seconds.

“Why are you calling for him? You’re the one who ran into the woods away from him. He doesn’t understand what we have, what I’ve done for you. He can’t give you what you really need, so you came here, looking for me.”

“You’re insane. I didn’t know you were lurking in the woods.”

“Didn’t you, darling? Didn’t you, at least, hope I was?”

Lightning flashes across the sky, illuminating us in stark white light. In that moment, I see her completely, vulnerable, terrified, mesmerizing. Her hands are pressed against my chest, neither pushing me away nor pulling me closer. Suspended between rejection and acceptance.

“Tell the truth, Birdie. Isn’t there a part of you that hoped I was listening? Who else would solve your little problem? You want more of the gifts I’ve been giving you.”

“Gifts?” Her chest rises and falls rapidly beneath me, rain droplets clinging to her eyelashes like tears. “You mean the people you’ve murdered.”

“The people who hurt you,” I correct her with a surge of pride.

“The ones who deserved their fate. I’ve watched them all, Birdie.

The ones who used you. The ones who think they own pieces of you.

I couldn’t let that happen anymore. They had to pay for what they did.

They had to know the truth. You are mine. All of you. Mine.”

The shouting grows closer. Her bodyguard, crashing through the underbrush. “We don’t have much time.”

“You can’t kill Blake.”

“Your husband,” I say the word like poison on my tongue. “He thinks he can control you with his threats. But don’t worry, little butterfly. I will take care of it.”

“I’m serious. You can’t kill him now.”

“C’mon, darling. Drop the act. We both know that’s not really the message you’re trying to give me.”

“What are you talking about? The things that will come out about me after his death will ruin my life.”

“Whatever he has on that app is retrievable and easy to destroy. You already know how good I am with technology…and finding people.”

She shakes her head in disbelief. “How did you know about the app? You couldn’t have been listening to us in the woods. I’d have noticed. Tristan would have noticed if someone was there eavesdropping.”

“Guess he just sucks at his job.”

Her eyes narrow at me. “Or you had the same training and know exactly every procedure, every security measure to counter it, because you work in the same company.”

This is cute. “Or I’ve been tailing your lawyer, listening to her calls, reading her emails.

I’ve done it before. I followed her to get Saldana’s book.

Or, unlike your lousy bodyguard, I didn’t lose your husband’s trail and know exactly where he is and what he’s been up to.

These are more believable scenarios than my being Morrison, don’t you think? ”

“Morrison? How the hell did you know about Morrison? I only had this conversation with Tristan in the cabin. We’d only just arrived. There is no way you could have already known where I was then or had the time to bug the cabin.”

“Then it’s Brandon. He’s too young to be your stalker, but he could be an accomplice. You trusted the wrong bodyguard, the one who has been working with me all along. He let me in your house that night, and he told me about Morrison.”

“That’s impossible. We never told Brandon which bodyguard I suspected.”

“Then, my darling butterfly, the only explanation left is,” I trace the line of her throat down and back up, “I’m not really here, and all of this is happening in your head.”

She bares her teeth at me. “Don’t you dare. Last time we met you punished me for telling the world you were a lie, a prank. You are real, as real as the blood you spill in my name.”

“You’re right. Last time we met was amazing, too good to be true, but it was real.

A memory branded on my soul. But now… Your bodyguard did his job this time.

No cell service. He didn’t tell anyone where he took you.

No trails. Nothing to track, even the internet proxies route your location to…

Where was that again? Hmmm… It looks like I don’t remember that… because you don’t remember it.”

A new terror blanches her face. “I’m not crazy. I didn’t hallucinate you.”

“ But there is also always some reason in madness . Isn’t that what the man with the motorcycle said to you the night he saved you from me?”

She looks like she’s about to cry. “How did you know that?”

I chuckle. “Don’t worry, darling, you’re not crazy.

You just tripped and hurt your head. It explains a lot, like how the hell he hasn’t shown up yet.

You’ve been screaming for him, and he’s been calling out to you for so long.

He should have found you by now.” I lean closer and rest my head on her shoulder.

“But you don’t want him to. You want me here now, the man who would sacrifice everything for you, who sees you beneath all the masks you wear for the world, and I know why. ”

“Why?” That shaky whisper isn’t a question. It’s more of a necessary evil.

“One, you want to send me a message, remember? And it’s not about postponing your husband’s demise.

What you really want me to do is kill Blake and Shane.

” I tilt my head to meet her gaze. “And you’re absolutely right.

Putting him behind bars for life isn’t enough.

I heard you, my queen. Loud and clear. He, too, must die. ”

“You’d do that?”

“Of course. I made you a promise. I always protect what’s mine.”

“What’s two?”

“Huh?”

“You said, ‘one I want to send you a message.’ What’s two?”

I lift my head and pull up the mask just enough to let her see my smile.

“Two is…you’re a horny little slut, and you want me to make you come again.

This time, here in the woods, and maybe not just with my fingers…

Why else would you lie beneath me, like a little bunny about to be devoured by a big bad wolf? ”

“What? No. No!” She squirms.

“There’s nothing to be ashamed of, little butterfly.” I slide my thumb over her lips. “I’ve been missing you so much, too. I know I still have to earn you, but since that night, I can’t stop myself from wanting more.”

Her breath trembles and crashes on my skin. “Get off of me now. Tristan!”

I wrap my fingers around her neck and pin her head down to the ground. “He’s not here, darling, and there’s nothing you can do to stop me from taking what’s mine.”

“I’m not yours.”

Her eyes, her breath, every fiber of her being, betray her lips. Her resistance is a performance, a compulsory pretense when the truth is too dark to bear.

“It’s just us now,” I murmur, my lips brushing against her ear, my hardness digging into her pelvis. “No one to perform for. No one to pretend for.”

“This isn’t real,” she whispers, but her body arches beneath mine—an involuntary confession.

“Isn’t it?” I challenge, my fingers still wrapped around her throat, applying just enough pressure to remind her of who really owns her. “Your mind creates what you truly desire, little butterfly. And here I am.”

A tear escapes the corner of her eye, mingling with the raindrops on her cheek. Beautiful consummation. “I hate you,” she says, but there’s no conviction behind it.