The Reaper: Chapter 1

The rain was consistently coming down in sheets.

The drops splattered against the windshield and died an instant death, weeping down over the glass as occasional bursts of thunder rent the night sky.

Morana was still on the other side of that window, still looking out at the shower, still removed from the drops trying to penetrate the invisible walls and touch her.

This time though, she wasn’t untouched. She’d already been kissed by them, ravaged by them, made love to by them. This time, she was drenched and wet and shivering with the force of the memory of those raindrops caressing her skin for a moment frozen in her heart.

This time, as had been that night in the penthouse, she wasn’t alone.

She still hadn’t turned her neck to look at him in the car.

He wasn’t untouched either. Earlier, she’d watched with rapt fascination as he’d silently gotten inside the vehicle after walking away from her.

The clouds had rolled. The lightning had split. The winds had whipped.

And she’d stood outside, exposed for a long time while he’d gone behind his walls.

But not completely.

Though he’d turned on the ignition, he’d not made any move to pull the car out, soundlessly waiting for her as she’d stood to his periphery and let her eyes linger on the exact spot where she’d made her choice and forced him to make his. Their footprints had been washed away by the onslaught of rain, mud, and grass covering up on the outside what had been a turning point inside her. The deluge had also washed away most of the smudges on her body remnant from the blast and opened the graze wound she had on her bicep. That had worried her slightly, since getting it wet was something she’d avoided last night and now it was completely drenched.

Even as she’d stood feeling and contemplating the tautness in her arm, he’d not once honked the horn, nor opened the door, nor revved the engine. He’d not made a single move to overtly indicate that he’d been waiting for her. Yet, she’d known it simply because he’d still been there, a silent but magnetic presence lingering forcefully in the empty area – a sentient life amongst the death and destruction surrounding him.

Silently, he’d offered her a place behind those walls that sheltered him. Just as silently, she’d accepted. She’d made her way around that beast of a vehicle and climbed right into the passenger seat. He’d simply pulled out of the cemetery.

The warm air blowing from the vent felt good on her clammy, cold skin now as she thrust her palms directly in front of them, letting the heat from the circulation seep into her bones slowly. Allowing her eyes to roam freely around the interior of his car for the first time, she was not in the least surprised at the black leather seats that were now completely doused in moisture, thanks to both their clothes. It was her first time in his car, a gorgeous black BMW she was slightly envious of if she was being honest.

Shaking her head slightly, she turned towards the console, seeing ‘Play Music’ glowing on the digital dash and raised her eyebrows, wondering for a second what kind of music he indulged in if he even did. Did his taste in music lean towards Rock or R&B? Or was it as eclectic as her tastes? Simple questions that she’d never allowed herself to ponder about him rifled through her mind as she took in the objects surrounding them.

Her wandering, inquisitive eyes came to a halt at a small pendant. It was really small, feminine, dangling on a silver chain that hung around the mirror in the center, a tiny round disk on it.

Without seeming too obvious, curiosity getting the better of her, Morana squinted her eyes and tried to make out if there was an inscription on the flat disk-like shape.

There was.

‘Baby sister’

Oh lord… it had been hers.

Luna.

Morana felt her heart squeeze painfully, all her newly acquired knowledge making her fall back against the backrest, her gaze falling to the silent man beside her.

He appeared relaxed in his seat, neither of his hands clenching on the steering wheel or the gear stick when he shifted it, his breathing smooth and even. Everything seemed fine. Except for one little thing – he was looking straight ahead with a devout concentration that she doubted he needed to drive, avoiding her eyes since the moment he’d handed over her the fallen gun to her.

Since he’d kissed the bejeezus out of her.

Morana let her eyes flutter back to that simple, small pendant, weaving in circular motions with the movement of the car, and felt her chest hurt. That tiny piece of jewelry dancing freely between them – the silver that bore the imprint of and had once belonged to his beloved baby sister – said more about him than anything else ever could. So much pain, so much rage, so many scars…

And along with the heaviness in her chest came another epiphany – the car was his territory too. Or else that pendant would never have hung there, so exposed, so pretty, so vulnerable. Its very existence in the car told her it was very, very private.

And she realized – just like he’d done at his penthouse that first night of the rain when he’d decreed she would stay at his apartment rather than leave with Dante – he’d let her into his territory. Again. Even after making a choice she could not even begin to fathom.

The aftermath of that choice still clung to her muscles, still bussed in her blood, still hummed in every cell in her body. She could still feel the cold metal of that gun against the pounding of her beating heart. She could still feel the pressure of those lips throbbing against her swollen ones. She could still feel the slide of that tongue stroking against the inside of her mouth.

A shiver wracked her frame – from the chill or the memories, she didn’t know.

Questions swirled in her mind, words formed in her throat and came right onto the tip of her tongue, but she bit them down, unwilling to break the silence. She had just forced him to into a spot, and knowing what she knew of him, she understood that he wouldn’t respond well to being coerced to talk, not until he’d had the time to process it all.

Or well, at least that’s what she would’ve wanted had she been in his shoes. She was still uncertain about him, about where his brain was at, but she was alive and shivering beside him after giving him a chance to kill her. And that was enough. For now.

The sound of his phone buzzing on the dash cracked through the tensed silence.

Morana glanced towards the phone reflexively.

‘Chiara calling’

A slight frown wrinkled her brows before she could stop it.

Chiara? Who the hell was Chiara? And why would she call at this time of the night?

Turning her head towards the window intently, Morana focused on the raindrops cascading down the glass, at the other vehicles on the mostly-empty road, aware of him rejecting the call. Whether he did that because he was driving or because of her presence or simply because he wasn’t in the mood, she didn’t know.

But a tiny knot in her stomach unfurled, worrying her by its very existence. There shouldn’t have been that knot at all. There shouldn’t have been any reaction to beautifully named women calling him in the dark of the night. She didn’t have the energy for this. This was bad.

Shaking off the thoughts crowding her head, she chose to study his large hand instead as he shifted the gears smoothly, in a way she’d never had the time or inclination to. She took in the huge metallic watch around his strong wrist with a navy dial that looked expensive, the veins that ran at the back of his hand, the sparse dusting of hair that curled right under his sleeve, the long, strong fingers she’d felt inside her intimately. Squirming just slightly, she let her gaze travel lower, looking again at the broken skin over his knuckles, the flesh still tumefied. Though he could’ve easily done that damage last night on the shower wall, it looked freshly bruised.

She opened her mouth to ask him about it, saw the corner of his lips pull down infinitesimally, and shut up.

Not the time. So not the time.

The miles flew by as he drove, weaving the car expertly through the light traffic, and after long, tensed minutes, she saw the familiar gates of his apartment complex, the building rising high into the tempestuous sky, the sea a vision on the far left of the structure.

The two guards at the gates with guns strapped to their hips nodded at him respectfully and he drove down the small driveway to the underground parking. White lights lit the entire space, gleaming on the metal of all the dark vehicles sleeping there. Morana looked at all the cars and wondered for a moment who all lived in the building apart from him and Dante.

Before she could follow that train of thought, he maneuvered the car into his spot beside his beautiful bike. Morana looked at the dark muscle on it, a longing to ride the thing again echoing in her heart, coming from the treasured memory of that first bike ride, from that first memory of feeling truly free.

Her longing cracked open when she heard the door open and turned to watch him jump out of the car, slamming the door behind him, all before she could even undo her seat belt. She got the sense that he wanted to get away from her and again, while it made her a little mad, she understood. Had she been in his place, she would’ve probably ditched him in the cemetery itself and run away for her precious space. She’d honestly half-expected that from him as well.

And just like in the cemetery, though he reached the private elevators first, he didn’t go up but silently waited for her. Morana quietly opened her door and locked it behind her, letting her hand stroke the seat of the bike once, the cool air of the garage making her wet frame shiver as she made her way on brisk feet to where he stood inside the metal box with his foot beside the doors to keep them from closing.

Surprised by the gesture, she entered as he withdrew, and pressed the code for the penthouse. She watched as the doors slid shut, the mirrors on them reflecting both their drenched forms. Morana stared at the picture they made. While he looked put together, his tall, muscular frame encased in that drenched suit and dripping tie, those abs evident against the white shirt plastered to his torso, she looked like death warmed over. Her clothes were slightly torn from the blast, her light-colored top now an odd shade of brown, streaks of dirt and mud marring the fabric and in places, even her skin. Her hair was matted and tangled, half in the drooping ponytail and half out of it, her cheeks were the only spot of color on her face, her eyes huge and slightly red.

The contrast between their reflections at that moment – his darker skin to her pallor; his clean dark clothes to her dirty light; his tall, broad frame to her small, curvy one; the power radiating from his very being, even in a disheveled condition at a moment when he wasn’t even glancing at her, prickling against her skin – sent a shiver down her spine.

While the thought of having this man’s body against her had merely aroused her until a few days ago – although to a level she’d never understood – it was a chaotic frenzy inside her now. Fascination and lust, compassion and lust, anger and lust, mingled in an ardent concoction she could feel brewing in her stomach, knowing that while now wasn’t the time, she would have him again one day – this time as naked as she would be, this time with his flesh against her, his sweat, his scent, his scars rubbing on her as she marked him with hers.

He would be her ruin. And she would ruin him right back.

But now was not the time.

Taking a deep breath to center herself, to give both him and herself the time to process the events of the last twenty-four hours, she peeked at where he stood, remembering the first time she’d entered this elevator with him. He stood leaning against the back wall, mere feet away from her, scrolling through his phone, not once looking up or making eye contact with her. It was odd, this lack of eye contact between them. And now that he was denying her those magnificent eyes of his, she realized how much she’d come to rely upon them to read him.

She knew that he knew that she was watching him. Yet, he deliberately kept his gaze on his phone.

Blowing out a breath, she started rubbing her arms to warm herself, conscious of the slight pain on her wound, when the doors finally slid open, showing her the majestic view of rain and the city outside those windows she’d come to love so much, that always made her breath catch for a split second.

And, then, angry voices reached her.

One loud, masculine. One soft, feminine.

Reigning in her surprise – both at finding Amara there and hearing Dante sound so unlike himself, Morana stayed glued to the spot and looked at the silent man beside her, seeing him finally put his phone down and concentrate on the two people inside.

“You had no right!” Dante spoke, his voice higher than Morana had ever heard, his anger brimming in every word. “It wasn’t your story to tell.”

“I couldn’t just stand aside and let him destroy himself or her!” Amara retorted, her voice still low and raspy but firm enough to let Morana know she meant business. “I’ve seen him do that for years and I cannot stand it.”

“This isn’t about you, god damn it!” Dante yelled and Morana flinched. “You want to tell someone how you got that scar? Do it. Tell them all. But you don’t get to tell anyone how he got his, Amara! I told you all of that in strict confidence and you betrayed it. You betrayed him. How. The. Fuck. Could. You?”

“You accuse me of betrayal? God, I don’t even recognize you sometimes,” Amara whispered, the rage in her voice boiling over, her tone a whole world different from how it had been an hour ago speaking of this very man. “Yes, I told an innocent woman who had no part in any of what happened to him about why her life was at stake. I told the truth about him to a woman who makes him so alive, I’ve never seen him like this before. If by betraying you and him, he gets a chance at a better life than he’s had, then I’d betray you a hundred more times! She deserved to know and he deserves a chance!”

“Do not start with this again,” Dante whipped out. “It’s a fucking simple thing. We trusted you and you broke it. It was his story to tell and he would’ve told her if he wanted. He didn’t.”

“Because he’s scared it’ll change things!” Amara cried out, her soft voice straining. “And things need to be changed, don’t you get that?!”

“Not like this.”

There was silence for a second before Amara asked quietly. “Are you mad because I betrayed him or because I betrayed you?”

Atta girl.

Morana cheered silently on the woman who’d become her friend, who had knocked a yelling man down a peg with her soft, scarred voice. Something akin to pride filled her.

Before another word could be uttered in the apartment, the hulking man beside her – who’d stilled more and more with every word – stepped out of the elevator and turned right, striding towards the dining area where the voices were coming from. Morana followed quickly, a few steps behind him, biting her lips to keep her thoughts to herself.

She stopped at the edge of the living room, seeing both Dante and Amara frozen to their spots, inches away from each other but both looking at Tristan Caine with wide eyes. Dante’s gaze flickered to her for a moment, taking her in from head to toe, his observant eyes lingering on her lips for a long second that suddenly made her realize how swollen they were. Morana didn’t avert her eyes from his dark ones in his troubled handsome face. He shook his head once before moving away sharply towards the window and glaring out at the view.

Amara didn’t look at her at all, not for a moment. But stared right back at the man beside her, her spine straight and chin up, no remorse on her face for what she’d done. Morana felt her respect for the woman go up a notch – because being on the receiving end of Tristan Caine’s eyes drilling holes into you was intimidating as fuck.

She looked up at him to find him staring back at Amara, his jaw clenched.

Nobody uttered a word.

The tension between the two seemed to climb higher and higher, so much so that Morana debated interfering for a moment. But then she saw his lips move.

“Go home, Amara.”

His voice – that voice of whiskey and sin – spoke for the first time in hours, softly to the beautiful woman, a demand and a request rolled into one.

Amara nodded without any argument or explanations, picking up her bag from the counter and walked past them towards the elevator. She came to a halt beside the console and turned to look at Dante as he looked out the windows, her dark green eyes angry.

“Stop being a coward, Dante,” she spit out softly in his direction. “It’s high fucking time.”

Uh oh.

With that, she walked into the elevator and closed the doors behind her.

Okay.

But it wasn’t over, it seemed. Morana watched with her eyebrows up in her hairline as Dante fisted his hands beside him, before picking up a vase from the nearest cabinet and throwing it on the floor, smashing it to glimmering pieces. Flinching from the suddenness of the noise, the beautiful crystal shattering loudly, and the broken bits splattering all over the floor, Morana inhaled sharply.

She was too tired, too overwhelmed, to witness anything more emotional in any kind, not until morning. In a way, she was actually grateful to Tristan Caine for keeping his silence and not being the forceful whirlwind he could be sometimes. For now, she needed to unwind lest she resembled that vase on the floor – shattered from a force it could not withstand.

So, knowing it would be better for her to retreat and to leave the men to their mutual brooding and privacy, to go tend to her wound, she stepped back.

Retreating towards the guest room on silent steps, she opened the door and slipped inside, aware of the pin-drop silence in the apartment, the only noise coming from the torrent clashing with the glass windows. Letting out the breath she’d been holding since getting on the elevator, Morana quickly put her phone on charge, headed to the bathroom, and went about turning the warm water on in the bath.

Taking a seat on the ledge beside the sunken tub, she went about cleaning her wound again, hissing as the sting made her already sensitive eyes water, and closed it with butterfly bandages. Then, stripping her clothes, she threw them in the corner, knowing she would never wear them again. The water tested, the door shut, she dipped a toe in the large bathtub and finally sank.

It was like a full-body hug from the best warm water she’d ever dipped in.

The best hug.

Groaning at the amazing way the water caressed her sore muscles and kissed her little cuts, she dunked her head once before tipping it back against the tiles behind her, keeping her arms on the ledge beside her, her eyes closed.

She didn’t let herself think of anything – not her car, not her cold-blooded murders, not her father, not his attempt to kill her, not the man who’d come for her, not the choice they’d both made, and definitely not the kiss that still stung her heavy lips. She didn’t let herself relive it – not the rain, not the gun, not the man. She didn’t let herself remember it – not the soft caresses, not the hard hunger, not the silent choice.

She just lay there, letting the water be her tender lover who soothed her hurts, cleansed her, and relaxed her completely in its arms.

The thinking could wait until tomorrow. She ignored the string keeping her together, ignored the ache as it pulled taut on every thought, ignored it all. She just lay there.

After long, long minutes, when the water went cold and her skin began to prune, when she was almost lulled to sleep by the simplicity of a good bath after a hard day, she somehow dragged herself out of the tub, pulling the plug, her eyes stinging, the exhaustion and lack of sleep of the past few days catching up to her. All she wanted was to put herself in that comfortable bed, draw the thin blankets over her head, and sleep undisturbed for the next ten years. Minimum.

Sighing, she switched off the lights in the bathroom and walked out to the still-dark bedroom, without a stitch of clothing on, not caring because she was exhausted and not worried because she was pretty sure he wasn’t going to enter her bedroom tonight, not after all the avoiding he’d done since the cemetery.

Without another thought, she climbed into the bed, snuggling into the abundance of pillows, a groan escaping her at the plush comfort.

A buzzing noise from her phone made her peek one eye open. It had come to life.

Grabbing it from the bedside table and removing the charger, she unlocked the screen, to see alerts for 4 Missed Calls and 3 Text Messages from Tristan Caine.

Blinking, sleep fading from her eyes, she swallowed, clicking on the texts, seeing her last message to him.

Morana Vitalio: They should be. After all, I just blew up a car and killed two men in cold blood.

(Sent 4.33 PM)

Tristan Caine: Where are you?

(Received 4.34 PM)

Tristan Caine: This is not amusing, Ms. Vitalio. Where are you?

(Received 5.00 PM)

Tristan Caine: I swear to god… WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?

(Received 5.28 PM)

Then nothing.

Nerves balled up in her throat, stomach heavy with the very roil of emotions that she’d been trying to avoid, Morana closed her eyes and put her phone back on the stand, turning on her side.

It was almost 10.30 now. Which meant she’d seen him in the cemetery at roughly 9. What had he been doing since that last text?

No. Deliberately shaking herself out of it, she inhaled deeply – the light citrusy scent of fabric conditioner on the sheets filling her nostrils – and told herself to just sleep for the night. There was a lot of time in the morning, to think, to process, to plan. For now, despite the day, she was alive and tired and her brain could wait for a few hours.

Nodding to herself, she almost closed her eyes again when the voices from outside broke into her consciousness. Frustrated, she covered her ears with the pillow.

And then put it down.

The men were talking.

Tugging her lower lip with her teeth, she wondered what they were talking about when the silence in the penthouse aided her, their voices, though not loud, still drifting to her well enough that she could hear it.

“Father called when you were out,” Dante spoke.

So, no questions about the emotional health of either, then. Men.

The sound of crystals clinking together against plastic told her either of them was cleaning up the mess on the floor.

“Things are escalating back home, Tristan,” Dante stated, in the calm, collected tone she’d come to associate with him. “It’s getting worse. We need to return.”

Tristan Caine didn’t speak for a long moment.

Then, his voice rolled over her naked skin.

“Yes, we do.”

Morana indulged in his gruff tone for a second, before the words broke through. He was leaving?

That knot in her stomach tightened, an odd kind of panic filling her for some reason. After the past few hours, the past few weeks, after making certain she wouldn’t run away when she’d wanted to, he was going to leave the city behind? And her? Right after she’d made the gamble of her life?

Her heart sunk.

Gripping the blankets in her fists, she tried to keep her head quiet and focus on what they were saying.

“Are we going to address the very big elephant in the room?” Dante.

“I don’t see one.” Blase. Indifferent. Him.

She heard Dante sigh. She was pretty sure that sigh had been his friend for a long time. “What were you doing at that bastard’s house tonight, alone of all things?”

That had so not been the elephant in the room she’d imagined. But who were they talking about?

“Paying him a visit,” Tristan Caine answered.

Her eyebrows went up at that tone inviting challenge.

Dante didn’t disappoint.

“Things are already fucked up for you at the moment, Tristan. In case you’ve forgotten, someone is out for your blood-”

“Someone always is.”

“-and you just keep feeding it fuel. We do not need Gabriel Vitalio going cocky-assed on us right now, not when we’re here.”

One.

Two.

Stunned.

Morana looked up at the ceiling, stunned out of her freaking mind. He’d visited her father? At his mansion? Alone? Was he insane?!

Her brain supplied her the image of his hands on cue – those bruised, broken knuckles that had told her, even as he’d kissed her, that he’d made someone’s night hell. She’d vanished and he’d gone to her father’s mansion alone and yet made it out? And now had broken skin on his knuckles?

What. Had. He. Done?

Breathing heavy, heart racing like a wild horse out of control, Morana couldn’t even begin to grasp the implications of this. She just couldn’t.

And yet, there was something else too. A novelty. Because she had fallen down the stairs and he had punished her father. Because she had gone missing and he had walked into the lion’s den and burned it and made it out unscathed. The novelty of feeling like this, for the first time in her life, dampened her eyes. Having been alone for all her existence, with the knowledge that nobody would break a sweat if she disappeared, the fact that this man – the man who had hated her for twenty years of his life – had broken flesh made her heart clench in a way she’d never experienced before, in a way she could not understand. Only feel.

Taking a stuttering breath in, she kept listening, her knuckles white from gripping the sheets.

“It’s a good thing we won’t be here for long then, isn’t it?”

A long pause.

“Does that include Morana?” Dante asked quietly.

Morana’s heart battered in her chest, hammering with a force that mingled with the inexplicable emotions inside her, as she waited for a response from him, to understand what he would do. Because while he’d given her silence, he’d also given her actions. She needed his actions now.

When he didn’t say anything for long moments, Dante sighed again, and her heart slipped. “Tristan, she’s his daughter. As much as I understand why she’s been here, we can’t let this go on. Vitalio might retaliate. And it could end nasty. You know that.”

More silence.

“You haven’t been focused as much as you usually are on the threat and weeding it out. We cannot afford a full-blown war like this, Tristan. You’ve been distracted–”

“It’s not her fault–”

“Isn’t it?”

A pause.

Dante continued. “Look, I don’t want her under that jerkwad’s roof any more than you do. We have a safe house we could move her to. Maybe get her fake passports, get her out of the country as we did with Catarina and the girls. I will stay back to ensure it all goes smoothly and she’s not harmed and—”

“She comes with me.”

Four words.

Soft. Guttural. Irrefutable.

The breath she’d been holding in her throat escaped in a rush, her heart pounding so hard she felt faint. Putting her hand on her naked chest, she felt the fast thumping under her palm and took a few steadying breaths, relief and something else filling her.

She comes with me.

Did she want to go? To leave behind the only home she’d known, the only city she’d known, the only life she’d known? She knew she could fight him on this, but did she want to?

No.

Dante stayed silent for a long minute and Morana wondered what they looked like right then, how closed off they were to each other, how hard they challenged the other’s stare.

“Father will retaliate,” Dante warned in that quiet tone.

Tristan Caine snorted. “Like I give a fuck.”

“It’s not retaliation against you that I worry about,” Dante clarified. “It’s her. For doing what he couldn’t ever do.”

Which was what exactly? she wondered.

“Leave it, Dante,” Tristan Caine uttered, his voice a dangerous blade. “He’ll know the exact score once we land. Just get the plane ready for the morning.”

“Be ready at 8,” Dante stated.

“Done.”

Okay.

Taking a deep breath, she heard the soft ding of the elevator, indicating Dante had called for it.

“By the way,” Tristan Caine called out, “Chiara called.”

Chiara Mancini. The phone call. Who was she?

“What for?”

“I didn’t answer. Nor will I,” Tristan Caine replied. “But if he gets her to–”

“I’ll take care of it before we board,” Dante responded and the elevator dinged another time, telling her he’d left.

Who the hell was this woman?

Morana turned on her side, looking out the smaller glass windows in her room, watching the rain, and marveled at how drastically her life had changed since the last time she’d been in the same bed in the rain like this. She’d been contemplating jumping beyond those windows then, even hypothetically. Now, she couldn’t fathom letting go of something so precious inside her – something that made her feel everything so acutely, something she’d begun to fight for.

Life.

She was alive and she’d never felt it more viscerally as she’d done over the last day. She absorbed the new facts she’d learned about him since the cemetery – that he had a pendant of his sister’s still hanging in his car after twenty years, that he’d gone to her father’s mansion for some reason alone and beat up someone and still made it out to tell the tale, which told her how utterly feared he was. She didn’t know many men, hell any man, who could claim to walk into the enemy’s house alone, have a fistfight, and come out breathing.

A shiver rent her spine, and she closed her eyes as the newest fact lingered – that he was willing to take her with him, away from this place that held nothing for her anymore, away from this hell, testing the wrath of not only her father but Lorenzo Maroni. And that he was certain she would be unharmed. She knew it in her bones she would be unharmed. Because even though he’d always talked about killing her, in hindsight she realized he’d not reacted well to her being harmed – both when she’d come to him after her father let her fall down the stairs, and when he’d shot her in the arm to save her. Or when he’d thought her gone and stroked her beloved car.

Her heart clenched at the memory.

Before she could let herself drown, she heard a soft swoosh as the air in the room changed.

The door opened.

Surprise filled her as some instinct, some deep-rooted voice, told her not to move a muscle or open her eyes lest he left without doing what he came to do. What had he come to do? Watch her sleep, as he had once before? Or to talk, which she didn’t think was plausible quite yet?

She suddenly became acutely aware of her arms exposed out in the air, of her breasts barely concealed by the blankets, of the one bare leg she’d forgotten to cover, bare to the hip. She felt something electric thrum through her body, her arms breaking out into goosebumps, her toes tingling, making heat travel up that exposed leg, her nipples pebbling hard, one of them almost peeking out over the covers.

Despite that, she didn’t move, didn’t do a thing to cover herself better, didn’t make a motion to indicate she was anything but sleeping peacefully, her breathing even as she regulated them through sheer will, keeping her body deliberately lax.

She didn’t know if he still stood by the door or if he’d stepped into the room or if he’d come closer to the bed. She didn’t know if he had a better view of her leg or her breast. She didn’t even know if the heavy gaze she felt on herself was real or just a figment of her imagination. What she did know, however, was that he’d watched her sleep once before, for how long, from how far, she didn’t know. She’d been asleep then. This time, she wasn’t. And she wanted to see what he would do if he would reveal something else about himself when he thought no one was watching.

Keeping her inhale soft, her heart thundering in her chest as a clap of thunder sounded outside, Morana kept herself from curling her fingers into her palms, from biting down on her tender lips, from keeping her tremors contained. Her lips felt on fire, the weight of his gaze resting upon them, stroking them with his eyes, opening them in his mind. It could all have been fanciful on her part, but somehow, someway, that same deep-rooted voice told her he was watching her, and that same deep-rooted instinct made her want to arch her back wantonly and let the blankets fall away.

She didn’t.

She let her lips feel the singe of those eyes, felt the hunger deep inside her gut, felt the memory of his mouth right upon hers.

Something feral, fervent invaded her belly.

Her heart slammed, pulse throbbing in her ears, an ache blooming in her core, right between her legs, making her skin prickle, making her feel unduly warm under the covers that she wanted to kick off, sizzling her blood with rapture without him even laying a finger on her.

But she stayed still through it all – through that fire coursing through her body, through the lump on her chest, through the emotions in her heart. She stayed still and relaxed on the outside, with the perfection of the mask she’d donned with ease over the years.

Moments passed.

Long, loaded moments.

Short, sinful moments.

With the ease of sand slipping through the fingers.

With the difficulty of a broken clock.

Moments passed.

With heartbeats.

With breaths.

And the air changed again.

He was there.

She knew, with sudden clarity, she knew – he was right before her.

He stood between her and the window from what she could feel, her body turned towards him, her face breaths away from his thighs. She could feel the nearness of that gaze, the proximity of his heat, the musky scent that wafted off his body, that scent – magnified by his wet clothes – that was all him.

The curve of her stomach trembled, hidden beneath the layers, her heart thumping in the anticipation that hung between them, her palms becoming sweaty as she drew all her strength to keep herself relaxed, to see what he would do.

A part of her was disturbed by how deeply he affected her, over the power he had over her body. The other part, however, reveled and gloried in the sensations, on feeling so alive, in a way she’d never thought herself capable.

She didn’t understand this. And at the moment, she didn’t want to.

She just lay breathing softly.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

In–

A finger.

His finger, ghosting over her wound.

It wasn’t a light touch. It wasn’t a touch at all. It just was.

Hovering right over her skin, on the precipice of a cliff but never truly falling, a ghost touch, almost tentative, tracing the butterfly bandages with a butterfly stroke she would never have detected had she been anything but intensely conscious of his every move.

Her heart almost stopped, the skin of her entire arm cackling, perspiring, straining.

The ghost touch disappeared, and Morana almost opened her eyes to call it back, when it reappeared over her jaw, light as the air. That ghost finger, never really touching her, pushed back a strand of her hair and exposed the entire line of her throat and naked shoulder to his perusal. She could feel the pulse fluttering at the base of her neck, a drop of sweat beading on her upper lip as that finger ghosted over the line of her jaw, like the way his gun had traced it hours ago.

The memory of that solid, insistent, cold metal, and the reality of the light, barely-there, soft digit sent a bolt of electricity straight to her core. Her entire being strained towards that almost touch. Her entire body was famished to feel it on her flesh. Her brain was tripping slowly, her control over her faculties getting dazed, her lungs starving for a gulp of air she refused to take.

Only instinct, that bothersome thing, told her that he would vanish if she showed any indication of being conscious. And she didn’t want that. Not yet.

This… this was… enlivening her.

The ghost finger traced the shell of her ear.

Her toes almost curled.

It traveled over the terrain of her heated skin, going over the line of her jaw again – and she both cursed and blessed the fact that he didn’t touch her, or her skin would have betrayed her charade. It was like eavesdropping on the most private, most intimate of conversations. Her heart thudding, beating almost too fast for her to keep up with it, she pressed her thighs together to find some purchase.

And then, the ghost touch stopped at her lips.

Fragile purchase lost.

Those sensitive, swollen lips, that still bore the mark of his mouth, trembled.

Just minutely, but they did.

Her heart stopped.

Did he feel it?

Still.

Everything inside her stayed still – like a prey scenting a predator.

Everything about him stayed still – like a predator scenting a prey.

But who had been who in the past few minutes?

And had he felt it?

She had her answer within a split second.

The finger withdrew.

He left as quietly as he’d come.

She heard the swoosh of the door. And then it shut again.

She let go.

A huge shudder wracked her entire frame, her chest heaving with pants as though she’d run a marathon, her hands shaking as she threw the covers away from herself, her entire body lit from within with a blaze she couldn’t control.

She felt ravaged. On the inside. On the outside.

And he’d not even touched her.

Digging her head back into the pillow behind her, her nipples aching in the cool air, she took her breasts in her small hands and squeezed them, gasping as her nipples pebbled harder against her palm, shooting sparks down to the tips of her toes.

He’d never touched her breasts. But for that stolen moment, she imagined his hands – those big, rough hands, strong against her soft flesh, skilled against her nipples. She imagined the callouses on those fingers rub against her nipples when he tugged them, imagined his hands completely engulfing her sinuously, imagined him squeezing her breasts together as she did the same with her hands, her lips parting as little breaths left her.

Feeling liquid, limber, her muscles coiled on the threshold of an inferno ready so consume her, she let her trembling fingers travel down to between her thighs.

And she was soaked.

In a way, she’d never, ever been.

Completely, utterly soaking wet.

A little moan left her lips and she turned her face into the pillow beside her, so on the edge, she knew it wouldn’t take much to send her careening into that abyss of ecstasy.

She slipped a finger inside her, easily. Pushed another in.

The hunger in her walls gnawed at her, spinning out of control. She remembered how he felt inside her – big, heavy, powerful. She remembered how he speared her walls – with focus, ferocity, and fire that set her aflame. She remembered how every stroke hit that spot inside her, how every thrust made her spine curve, how every slap of flesh against flesh drenched her even more.

Panting, she rubbed her clit with her thumb, just once.

And exploded.

Gloriously.

Her back arching as she bit into the pillow to muffle her cries. Her entire body coming off the bed for a split second as fire raced through her veins and coiled in her core, blasting in the most dazzling of explosions, blinding her for a second.

It was rapture.

It was ecstasy.

It was delirium.

She fell back into the mattress, even more exhausted, limp, no strength in her body to move a single muscle, slight shivers running up and down her frame in the aftermath.

God, how had this even happened? He’d not even touched her, not made a sound, and yet she’d been dripping wet.

It frightened her. It thrilled her. It enlivened her.

He enlivened her.

Slowly calming herself down, her body much laxer, much more susceptible to sleep, with the tension in her body released, she flipped and pulled the blankets over her again, her eyes going one last time to the window to look at the rain.

And her heart stilled.

He was there.

In the darkness.

Leaning against the wall beside the window.

Hands in his trouser pockets.

Tie undone, hanging over his collar.

And those magnificent eyes blazing on her.

He was there.

He’d been there through it all.

Her heart stuck in her throat, she looked at that blaze for the first time since the cemetery and felt seared, her entire body flushing under that intensity, upon realizing what he’d seen.

He’d known she’d been playing him earlier, and he’d played her right back.

Blushing till her roots, she held his gaze, her eyes drifting down for a moment towards the big bulge tenting the front of his trousers, before coming back up to his, the knowledge of having aroused him while taking care of herself electrifying her, titillating something reckless inside her.

She knew he wouldn’t break that silence, not tonight.

But he was watching her again, despite himself.

That brought a small smile to her lips.

She saw as his gaze follow that smile before she flipped on her back again and cuddled into her covers, closing her eyes deliberately.

She felt his eyes on her for long minutes, but this time her heart didn’t pound harder. This time, her heart lay beating in her chest, nestled in an odd kind of comfort she couldn’t understand, only feel. She had made it through the day and seen right through him, and he’d made it slightly through his past and seen right through her. And that, for some bizarre reason, comforted her.

She felt him leave as softly as he’d entered, leaving her completely alone in the room this time, the knowledge of his interest, his desire within her.

Almost to the edge of sleep, Morana tried to get her mind to shut down and get as much rest as possible. Because anxiety and anticipation mated in her stomach.

In the morning, the start of something new would begin.

In the morning, her life was going to change.

In the morning, they were going to Tenebrae.