I’m not sure what replaces it, but unlike before, there’s nothing ice-cold about the link between us.
He sees me.
At last.
I raise my hand, and let my tongue flicker along my finger, watching as his pupils turn into tiny pinpricks.
His nostrils flare in response, almost like I’d flicked my tongue along his cock.
The taste of his blood comes as no surprise. Metal. Iron. Dull. Dry.
But it sings inside me as my body and his collide in the simplest way imaginable.
I watch as he gulps, his Adam’s Apple bobbing, and for a second, I know I’ve robbed him of words.
I’m glad.
I want him to be affected.
I need him to feel this as much as I do.
This madness can’t affect only me. He needs to be infected with it too.
My heart, for the first time since I saw him, is finally on an even keel. Like, because he’s been stunned, because he’s in shock, I can be calm.
And I am.
“Dirk Benson. Maria Santiago. Lucas Reisling. Sara Cinnabar. Jose Gutierrez.”
He flinches at each name.
“I’m a writer,” I tell him. “I had nothing but time on my hands this year. You’re lucky no one else connected the dots. Especially if you’d added Paulo to the list.”
His mouth tightens. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His stony reply has me smiling. “Don’t you? Each one was a parishioner in your church. Each one died from an unusual suicide.” I arch a brow. “It’s the makings of a mystery novel. Or an angel of death...”
“I don’t prey on the innocent,” he snaps, before he brakes to a halt, his teeth grinding as he realizes the imprudence of what he’d just admitted.
Although, to be honest, I’m not sure why he thinks he can deny it. After all, I just saw him.
With a knife in his hand and Paulo’s wrist vulnerable to the blade he wielded. There’s simply no avoiding what he was doing. No ignoring it.
“What did they do?” I question, my gaze flickering to my hand. “What makes you do this to yourself? Do you self-flagellate after each one? To what? Atone?”
I don’t say ‘after each murder,’ even though that’s what it is.
Instead, because I know something deeper is happening here, because I know I wouldn’t have been led to him if he didn’t need my help, if he wasn’t on a righteous path, I wait for him to answer.
When he doesn’t, I muse, “Let me see. Paulo touched his niece.”
“You heard his confession?”
Our conversation had taken place in English thus far. But at his sharp reply, I murmur, “Si.”
“You speak Italian?”
“I do.” And I carry on in that same language. “He confessed to—”
“Molesting her. Use the appropriate word. ‘Touch’ means nothing in this instance. And he’ll get worse—”
“I know he will. Unless you help him.”
“How can I help him? He’s perverted. Wicked,” he snaps, his tone seething, his eyes dancing with a light that exposes the chasm in his sanity. “He needs to be stopped.”
“There are other ways.” I reach out, nuzzle the edge of his shirt aside, exposing his pec, and press my hand to his chest. The blood stains his flesh with my prints.
Staring at it, then looking up at him, I watch his eyes dilate as he rasps, “What do you want?”
My answer is simple. “You.”
He rears back, but not far enough to avoid my touch, because, in all honesty, the door is behind him and he can’t go far.
“What do you mean?”
“I want you.”
“I’m a priest.”
“Aren’t you also a man?” I counter instantly. My fingers flutter, and I press the tips into his chest. “A man with weaknesses. A man who sees weaknesses. What did they do?”
My urging, the reply I gave him, astounds him. I can feel it. The darkness in him recedes somewhat before he whispers, “They were murderers. Rapists. Evil that needed scourging because the police never caught them.”
“And all of them were beyond redemption?”
My question confuses him enough for him to whisper, “Of course. I wouldn’t take their lives otherwise. A life for a life.”
“I’m ex-Catholic—you don’t have to go all Old Testament on me for me to know what you’re talking about.”
“Ex?”
“I lost faith in the church. As much as you have.” My head tips to the side. “You’re not a priest anymore. You wear the collar, you go through the motions, but your heart? It’s not in it.”
“And how would you know that? After watching me for one service—”
His sneer doesn’t hurt my feelings. “Priests don’t kill their parishioners.” My words aren’t exactly simple, but Christ, do I need to spell it out?
“Some parishioners are beyond redemption.”
“And are you?” I query, hurting at his wooden tone.
“I’ve been beyond redemption for a long time.” His eyes are stark before he shutters them with his lashes. “Call the police if you must—”
“I have no desire to call the police. You did no wrong—”
“I took lives. Whether or not it is Old Testament, that isn’t the law of the land.”
“No, it isn’t, and thank God for that,” I say dryly. “Still, I see no need to call the police. I’m not here for that. I didn’t track you for that.”
“Then why did you?” His eyes opened again when I uttered ‘track you,’ his curiosity clear, but what he reveals with that look?
Stuns me.
The striations in those obsidian orbs seem to fluctuate, flickering and surging with dark browns. It’s impossible, a trick of the light, I know, but still, it affects me. Makes warmth flood me in response to his visceral reaction.
“I already told you that,” I whisper huskily.
“You can’t want me.”
His flat reply has me quirking a brow at him. “Why can’t I?”
“I’m a priest.”
“You’re not a priest.” I snap my hand out and cup him through his pants. He’s hard. “See? You’re a man. My man.”
“You’re crazy,” he breathes, his hand darting to mine. He shoves my wrist, trying to pull it away, but my grip tightens around his cock. A hiss escapes him, and he grinds out, “No.”
Because I have no need to force anything, I back off. Even move a few feet away.
“I was just reminding you of what you are,” I tell him calmly, and ignoring his scowl, I retreat, wandering back into the building where I find a kitchen. The light’s on, like he forgot to turn it off, and I spy the busted kettle on the ground.
What happened between that and now?
I move over to the kettle and start to bend down to pick it up, but when I do, my knees buckle and I almost slam into the floor.
He’s there.
Like I knew he would be, even if I hadn’t anticipated falling.
My damn body, letting me down again.
His arms sweep under mine, and he catches me before I can collide with the tiled ground. Within seconds, I’m sitting at the table, on one of the small stools that circle it.