Chapter 15

Stubbing out my cigarette, I lean against my forearm, fogging up the window as she kicks those heels off and drops her bag onto her bed. I take in her appearance—mussed hair, smeared lipstick, and tired eyes.

Fury lights up my veins, a heated wickedness that demands retribution in the form of slicing that fucking prick’s lips off for daring to touch her.

It’s not hard to imagine what they did for two hours at his place.

Two.Fucking. Hours.

I stood in the cold, waiting for her, like I do every time she leaves the house. It’s getting obsessive at this point, but I don’tcare. She’s my heart, walking this world without protection, and I’ll be damned to let her go off while people hunt for her.

The damn woman doesn’t even think about the assassins. I found two outside herboyfriend’sapartment. One tried entering the front, but I was in the shadows, waiting. It was easy to slide up behind him and snap his neck before he could touch the handle.

The second was an hour later, sulking through the backyard. I would’ve missed him, too engrossed with trying to see into herboyfriend’splace, but he was loud.Fucking amateur.Who steps on patches of broken ice and frozen twigs? Whoever is training these dickheads needs a better curriculum.

A silent bullet to the head was an easy fix. I called her second, Hayes, for a clean-up crew. I wasn’t leaving my post to get rid of some fuckers. It took a bit of convincing—he wanted to know why I was atReese’shome—but after I threatened to come into his bedroom in the middle of the night, he agreed.

He didn’t need to know I was following Maeve.

Unfortunately, the fucking pricks are getting bold. Last week, I grabbed one before he entered the small boutique shop she stopped at to buy a pair of black boots. Dragging him off into the alley, I sliced his neck, let his blood spray the wall, and then tossed him in the dumpster for the trash collectors.

No longer hiding, they are actively seeking her out whenever she leaves the compound.

The Board made its threats—and they aren’t backing down.

The fucking problem was, this five-foot-nothing vixen, whom I want to throw onto the bed and fuck until her pussy was sculpted to only fit my cock, and strangle her until her lips turned purple, was walking the streets of Boston, alone.Withoutguards.

She wasn’t taking this seriously. Or if she was, she has a death wish. And I’ll be fucking damned if I let her die.

She flitters around her room like the moths she loves, and I track her movements, compelled to watch. The worry in my chest, the hissing snake of dread, eases with her back at the mansion. She’s safe here—protected.Ican protect her here behind thick walls and security cameras.

This is also where I watched her slay her abuser and fucked her in a puddle of his blood.

She begged me to do it.Begged.Me. That was the first nail in the coffin of how completely, utterly owned I was by her. If she asked me to live my life on my knees at her side, I would happily—gleefully—do it.

She turns toward her table and finally sees my latest drawing.

As a kid, I’d doodle. Sketches of birds. A few drawings of flowers. Painting and drawing were an easy escape when I couldn’t kill something. My mother embraced it—often bringing me to museums before we went on the run. She thought it would be a better outlet than the rage I inherited from my father.

For some reason, I started leaving them for Maeve.

We would hold knives to each other’s necks all day, but at night, under the cover of shadows and secrets, I’d leave her a picture. I always waited, spying on her as she looked at it. It became my new hobby, garnering her approval based on her reactions.

A soft squint of her eyes—not very good.

Raised eyebrows—pleasantly surprised.

A small smile—the highest compliment. It became my nightly goal.

If I knew then how rare her smile was, I would’ve done more. Tried harder. Enjoyed them more.

Picking up the paper, she scans the garden, the ravens in flight overhead. It’s our secret place behind the house. She traces one flower carefully, lips twitching, before shoving it into herbedside drawer. I see all the papers sticking up—all my love notes there, kept close.

Dangerous hope flares in my heart. She’s kept all my pictures, hidden from view. Which means, try as she might to ignore me, hate me, my girl still wants me.

Maeve is mine—onlymine. No one else is going to have her.

I might want to fucking wring her neck first. Hold her down and make her listen—make her understand. I know it’s like fighting a wall—a stubborn wall, with thick barbs ready to draw blood out of self-preservation. But I’m willing to try.

Because in the last year, we haven’t spoken. Not after I came back, bruised and broken. Not after I killed her father—mymentor—for her. Not after Sloane was married to Alessio De Luca. Not after we put on the Games to find her a second, and her best friend won.