The Darkest Touch

No, not sexy!

“Yawn,” was all she allowed herself to say.

“Yawn?” The bars rattled much harder. “Did you just yawn me?”

“Just so you know, I’ve eaten warriors like you for breakfast.”

He didn’t miss a beat. “Well, did you spit or swallow? Never mind. Don’t answer. Your sexual kinkiness has no bearing on this situation. I’d appreciate it if you’d focus.”

Heat flamed her cheeks. “I wasn’t talking about that!”

“Hey, I’m not here to judge. I’m here because I’d hoped to—” He stopped, a palpable sense of amazement thickening air that never quite lost the stench of unwashed bodies and filth.

What was going on? “You hoped to...what? Help Mari? Well, too late. You didn’t. She’s gone, and—” Keeley’s chin quaked so violently she had trouble getting out her next words. “And someone has to pay. Several someones.”

“Trust me. I’m—” click... “—paying.” The groan of rusty hinges accompanied the last word. Then...pounding footsteps sounded?

She frowned, confused. Had he just—

Escaped!

Keeley jumped to her feet, the shiv falling from her hand. Torin stood in front of her cell, a backpack hanging from his shoulder. Oh...my. He was everything a girl could want—and more. Mercenary-tall and cold-blooded-killer honed. My favorite. My weakness.

She’d gone centuries without seeing another person...without touching one. Why did Torin have to be so magnificent? His hair was snow-white, but his brows and lashes were night-dark, and the contrast was a sensuous delight. But, oh, his eyes...they were his most startling feature. They were the rarest of emeralds, intertwined with different shades of green, all without a single flaw.

Nerve endings she’d thought long deadened stirred to life and tingled. Moisture flooded her mouth. The blood in her veins turned molten.

Close the distance...touch him...

Definitely not...well, maybe. There was a rip in the collar of his shirt, causing the material to gape over a massive, muscular chest completely healed from his impromptu self-surgery. Taste...

“How did you escape an inescapable prison?” she demanded. I’m deprived. That’s all. An aardvark would have had this effect on her.

“A secret I forgot,” he replied.

“That’s not an answer.”

“Wasn’t meant to be.” His gaze raked over her, the intensity of it staggering—aggression in its purest form. His pupils dilated, black quickly overshadowing green. The most exquisite eclipse. One caused by...lust? Did this bad boy find her attractive despite her oddities?

The blood in her veins utterly boiled with desire.

What about his crime?

The boil tapered to a simmer. “You had best run while you can, warrior.”

“Or what, princess?”

“I’ll hurt you worse.”

He flicked his tongue over an incisor. Struggling for the tranquility he’d seemed to display so easily before? “I will warn you once. Only once. Never again threaten my friends. You do and I’ll end you. I won’t want to, and I’ll even hate myself afterward, but I will do it. Do you understand?”

Oh, yes. She understood. “You’re even more of a protector than I’d realized.”

For a moment, she experienced a keen jealousy directed at his friends. They were loved by this man wholeheartedly, nothing held back. With Mari gone—razors in my chest, slashing at me—there was no one in the world who would defend Keeley. Not that she needed defending. I am, and will forever be, a powder keg without equal. But the gesture would have been welcome.

He rattled the bars. “I said, do you understand me?”

So fierce...

She breathed in deeply; the leather and musk of his scent should have been a welcome reprieve from aeons of rank, but the goose bumps breaking out over her arms aggravated her. If he’d been any other man, she would have called the reaction animal attraction. But he wasn’t. And if she’d possessed a weaker will, she would have given in to her craving and moved closer. She would have remembered how it felt to be a woman rather than a prisoner.

But she was the Red Queen and she didn’t possess a weaker will.

She planted her feet and remained in place. The male disturbed her. Noted. There was no reason to make the situation worse by flirting with temptation.

Such beautiful temptation.

Nothing would stop her from avenging Mari.

“Keeley,” he prompted. “Pay attention to me.”

Orders? “Tell me what to do again and I will rip out your spine through your mouth.”

He didn’t even blink. “That’s harder to do than you probably realize.”

“Oh, I know. It takes experience—which I have. In spades.”

Again, not a blink. “Hubris is never a good look.”

“I’m not wearing hubris. I’m wearing truth.” Calm. “Here is what I understand, warrior. Once I vowed to hurt anyone who hurt me, and I never lie. Especially to myself.” She raised her chin, knowing she was the picture of stubborn female. “You, Torin, have hurt me.”

He sighed with dejection, and yet excitement glowed in his eyes. The juxtaposition confused her. “So we are to war?” he asked.

She offered him a cold smile. “We’re already warring, warrior.”

“In that case, I would be wise to kill you now.”

“Please. Try it.” He’d have to open her door the same way he’d opened his own...something she’d attempted a thousand times. How did he do what I could not?

He frowned at her. “You actually think a woman like you can defeat me?”

A woman like her? What did that mean?

Beads of anger rolled through her. “I’ve taken down bigger and better than you.”

“Bigger maybe, but better? Doubtful, considering there is no one better.”

Hubris certainly looked good on him. “Have you heard of Typhon, the supposed father of all monstrosities? Half dragon, half snake. All attitude. Zeus likes to brag about defeating him, but I am the one who ripped him into a thousand pieces and stuffed him under a mountain. And do you know why? Because he frowned when I walked past him.”