Chapter 30

THIRTY

For the first time, meeting in a sleazy motel room didn’t annoy her. She didn’t question it and he didn’t offer all his usual excuses. They couldn’t be seen together. There was less chance of them getting caught here. It was for her own good. That was usually the point where she tuned him out and shut him up using her body. Now, she was happy to be hidden here, tangled in the scratchy sheets, her cheek against his sweaty chest. The sound of his heartbeat soothed her, blotting out the ever-present fear she’d been carrying around since that day in the car with the monster. She was pretty sure he had figured out where she lived. She hadn’t actually seen him. It was just a sense, the hairs on the back of her neck rising each time she left her apartment. Sometimes she felt it in the supermarket or in the parking lot at work. His intrusive, evil gaze caressing her against her will.

“Hey.” Her lover’s hand grazed her spine. She shivered when he pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I wanted to ask you something.”

Her heart leapt. She hated that the first thing she thought was that he might propose. They were so far from that, it wasn’t even funny, but it couldn’t be helped. “What is it?”

“I saw bruises on your thigh.”

Stiffening, she nestled deeper into his embrace, mind racing to come up with any other explanation than the truth.

“Tell me,” he said, an edge to his voice. “Who did that to you?”

“It was just this witness. At work. Things got out of hand, but everything is fine. I handled it.”

He lifted her chin with his index finger. Intensity burned in his eyes, setting her heart aflutter. “If you tell me who he is, I’ll kill him.”

A breath caught in her throat. She willed her body to keep breathing. God, how she loved it when he was like this. But he couldn’t know the truth. Licking her dry lips, she said, “What if I told you it was a woman?”

“Do you honestly think that would stop me?”

A shiver ran the length of her body, goosebumps erupting on her bare arms. “You wouldn’t really kill someone.”

“How do you know I haven’t?”

She was going to laugh it off but something about the way his expression darkened stopped her. “Who?”

“I can’t say. You already know too much.”

Pressing a hand to his heart, she promised, “I would never tell. I hope you know that.”

“It doesn’t matter. Now I know what I’m capable of and nobody’s going to stop me.”