“Back when we first met, I told you that you had to own me or I would own you. You’ve been thinking about what that would be like ever since then.”

“No, I haven’t.” My voice shakes so bad I sound like a terrified little girl. Zeth tuts.

“You did so well just now when you told me the truth. Don’t ruin it now, Sloane. And that wasn’t my question. I was telling you that because I know it’s true.” He lowers himself down so slowly as he speaks, until his face is a mere inch away from mine. He tips his head to the side and dips lower, buzzing his nose along the side of my jaw, inhaling slowly and then exhaling, so that his hot breath sends a shiver through my body so powerful that I have to lock my muscles to stop it. “You haven’t been able to get me out of your head. You think about me all the time, wondering who I am, where I am, what I’m doing, who I’m fucking.” He breathes that last word directly into my ear, and my legs clamp together. “At night, when you’re alone, when you touch yourself, I’m the one you’re wet for. And this whole time you’ve been wondering…wondering what it would have been like to have me own you that night. What I would have done to you. How I would have made you mine. So my last question for you, Sloane, is this: are you strong enough to admit that this is what you want? Are you brave enough to find out?”

I feel stripped bare. It’s like Zeth has somehow found a way inside my mind and read all of my most personal thoughts. He has no way of knowing those things about me, but he says them with such an unequivocal certainty that I know he knows it’s true. And it is. Fuck. I close my eyes, trying to breath through the panic. Panic due to Zeth hovering over me, pure sex and malice wrapped up in one blisteringly hot, tattooed package.

“I—I don’t want that, Zeth.”

If he’s disappointed, he shows no sign. He sits back, giving me some space. “Fair enough. It’s been a very pleasant visit, then, Sloane, but it’s time you were going.”

I sit up, watching him. He’s serious. He really is going to let me go. I slowly swing my legs from the bed, tensing, ready, just in case this is all some kind of trick. He stands and picks up his dress shirt, slipping his arms through the sleeves. It hangs open as he collects his cuff links from a dark, anonymous piece of furniture. The outline of him, the tattoos, the face, the open shirt…he has every right to the animalistic and deeply sexual way that he moves. It’s not an attitude. I can tell that already. It’s just who he is.

“Well?” he asks.

“What…” I can’t wrestle the words out. I hate that I’m even thinking them. “What are you going to do after I leave?”

Zeth walks back to the bed, comes to stand right in front of me. My eyes are level with his belly button, which is just about goddamn perfect (how the hell does a man have a perfect belly button?). He curls his index finger and tucks it under my chin, lifting my face so that our eyes meet across the length of his torso.

“I’m going to go out there and drink some champagne and then I’m going to find someone who wants to play.”

“Play?”

“Yeah. Not fucking chess, Sloane. Someone who wants me to fuck them until they can’t see straight. Someone who’ll let me sink my tongue into their pussy. Someone who’ll let me taste them. Someone who’ll let me restrain them and scare the living shit out of them. Someone who likes that. I was hoping it was going to be you tonight, but…”

I swallow.

I swallow again. My throat feels like I’ve inhaled the fucking Sahara Desert. I have to get out of here before I do something stupid. I stand up so quickly, Zeth has to step back to avoid injury. “I—I have work tomorrow. I—” I hurry to the door, fighting for…what? The strength to leave?

“Ahem.”

He’s washed in pale yellow light when I turn around. “I think you’re forgetting something.” He bends and picks up my medical bag, lifting it in front of him. He smirks when he sees the look on my face. “Y’know…you can stay if you want to, Sloane. You don’t need to actually say the words. It doesn’t mean you’re weak. It means you’re strong.”

I walk back to him, staring him straight in the eye. I can’t…I can’t do this. I’m not this type of person. Am I? Do I even know who I am? He offers me the handle of my bag, arching an eyebrow at me. “What’s it gonna be, brave girl? You want the bag, or you want me?”

He said I didn’t have to say the words. He said it didn’t make me weak. But maybe…God, maybe, just for a second I want to be weak. I’ve been strong for the past two years. I was strong when Lexi was taken. I was strong when I gave up my virginity in order to find her. I was strong when I realized I wasn’t going to be able to save her. I am so sick of being strong. I take a deep breath and close my eyes, already regretting what I’m about to do.

I shift around him and sink down onto the edge of the bed.

Zeth’s low voice breaks the silence, a rich, electrifying sound.

“Yeah. That’s what I thought.”

This girl’s a ticking fucking time bomb, and she’s about to go off in this bed. I’m gonna make sure of it, if only to reward her for not pissing her pants when I told her I killed someone less than a month ago. Most girls would have reacted, but not her. I’m not blind—I know that I scare her. That just means she’s not a fucking moron, though. There are a small percentage of women out there who wouldn’t care that I take people’s lives when the occasion calls for it; they’re the ones I like to term fucking mental. Why would I want to screw an unhinged person?