She shut the door behind him. Made her way to the desk that sat near the window. She reached into the top drawer.
He looked around. “Quite the collection. Did it belong to your father?”
“Creditors took nearly everything my father owned the day after I put him in the ground. With the exception of that rather large, magical red box, these are my own collection pieces. That water torture chamber actually once belonged to Harry Houdini.”
Saint edged closer to the cell. He could easily imagine a magician hanging upside down in that chamber, bound, and surrounded by water. Twisting and turning to get free as the crowd watched. “Impressive.”
“Glad you think so.”
He glanced back at her. “Can you do any tricks?”
Her lush mouth tightened. “Don’t really like the term ‘trick’ personally.” She had something cradled in her hands. He caught a glimpse of silver. “You can call them ‘illusions’ or ‘effects,’ those words fit better.” She came around to the front of her desk. Propped her hip against it. Studied him.
His gaze fell to her hands. “Are those handcuffs?”
“Why, yes, they appear to be.”
His stare returned to her face. He quirked a brow. “Feeling kinky, are you?”
“I’m actually feeling like I’d enjoy answers from you.”
“And you think I’ll give them to you if you cuff me?” He closed in on her. More like stalked toward her. He seemed to be pulled straight to Alice. Saint didn’t stop. Not until he was right in front of her.
“Why tease?” She tilted back her head. “We both know it’s not the first time you’ve been cuffed, Sebastian.”
“Don’t really like that name. Much prefer Saint.” No one ever called him Sebastian. That was the name for another time, another man. Sebastian had died ages ago.
I killed him.
He tried to shake off the past. “How about this? I won’t call them magic tricks if you don’t call me Sebastian.”
“But we already agreed that the title of ‘Saint’ doesn’t fit you.”
He took the cuffs from her. Stared down at them. They were heavy. Solid. And, yes, too damn much like the cuffs that had once surrounded his own wrists. “I told everyone I was innocent. No one believed me.” The past rose again, even stronger this time. “Sure as shit not the other inmates. They made life a living hell for an eighteen-year-old kid, and they started calling me Saint just to mock me.”
Her lashes fluttered.
Why the fuck had he just told her all of that? Frowning, he glanced down at the cuffs. Not like it was the first time he’d seen cuffs since his arrest. Hell, he used cuffs all the time on the perps he hunted. But for some reason, this moment felt different. Because she was different?
“I bet they didn’t get to mock you for long.” Alice’s voice had turned musing. “I would imagine that even at eighteen, you were quite strong. A junior badass in training.”
He had been. Yes. “Each day was a fight.” More talking. More secrets that he hadn’t even told his own brother. “I’d get put in isolation and left there. When I’d get out, it would be the same routine. They thought I was prey, so I showed them that I wasn’t.” Until he’d gotten out for good. Until he’d been able to prove that he wasn’t guilty.
Until Memphis proved it for me.
“And now you hunt the monsters,” Alice concluded. “Like you were once hunted.”
He stretched out the cuffs. Tested them. They felt like the real deal, and he didn’t see any hidden mechanism to open them. “I hunt them because I’m a predator, and they’re prey.”
“Is that what I am to you? Prey?”
He reached for her wrist. Such a fragile, delicate wrist. He put one cuff around her. Closed it with a click. “I don’t know what you are.”
“But you have a suspicion.” She showed no alarm at being cuffed. Like it was a normal occurrence for her. “That’s why you’re here. Why you think you will take me down. Because I’m one of the monsters you like to hunt. You think you’ll get close to me, and you’ll trick me into spilling all my deliciously deep and dark secrets to you. Then you’ll lock me away.”
He reached for her other wrist. Didn’t cuff her. Instead, his fingers slid along her inner wrist. He could feel the beat of her pulse. Fast. She sounded so cool and controlled, but her racing pulse gave her away.
“You were innocent,” she said.
He’d leaned over her. Been pulled even closer to her by that crazy, invisible magnet she seemed to exert.
“If you were innocent…” Breathy. Soft. “How are you so sure that I’m not, too?”
He wanted her mouth. He wanted her. Stay focused. Keep her talking. “Is that what you’re telling me? That you didn’t kill those three men?”
Three men.
Three men who’d been drawn to her, just as Saint was now drawn to her?
Thinking about them had his body tensing.
Donovan Eldridge. The first man to vanish. Alice had been nineteen. He’d been twenty-one. They’d gone hiking together at Providence Canyon State Park. Only Alice had returned home. She’d told authorities that she’d gotten separated from Donovan. Saint had read the reports. She’d been tearful. Bruised. Cut. Dehydrated. Even had a broken rib. She’d stumbled onto a park ranger and said that Donovan had disappeared in the middle of the night.
Donovan—a skilled hiker, according to all accounts—had never been found again.
An accident. Tragic. Everyone agreed. And, at the time, Alice had been cast as the victim.
Until the second man went missing. Two years later.
Twenty-one-year-old Alice had been engaged. She’d been planning to marry—
“Usually when a man is this close to me, I have his complete attention.”
Saint blinked.
“But you are far, far away from me, and I find that rather annoying. And that’s why you’re cuffed.”
His gaze shot down. Sure enough, Alice had managed to unlock the single cuff he’d put around her wrist, and now both of his hands were cuffed. He hadn’t even felt the slight movements. Damn. He couldn’t help but be vaguely impressed. Okay, fine, more than vaguely.
“I guess I caught you,” she noted with an arched brow. “Now what do I get to do with you?” Her hand rose and her index finger tapped against her bottom lip as she seemed to consider the matter. “Oh, I have an idea. Like I said, I do like to have a man’s complete attention.” Then she curled her hands along his jaw, pulled him toward her, and put her mouth against his.
Chapter Three
The kiss wasn’t supposed to matter. Passion was just a tool, one she used if necessary. A kiss was a kiss. But…
This was different. Part of her had feared it would be.
The instant her lips touched his, she could feel the change in the atmosphere. The room felt hotter. Smaller. He felt bigger. Tension snaked through her body. His lips parted, so did hers, and when his tongue swept out—
Desire.
Lust.
Hunger.
She stopped playing a game. This wasn’t about seducing him. Manipulating him. For just a moment, it was merely about letting go. Feeling the rushing tide of need blast through her in a way that it hadn’t in so long. Suddenly, Alice couldn’t get close enough to him. Her hands dropped so that she could touch his chest. Feel his muscles. Absorb more of his heat and power.