A Thousand Cuts (Underworld Kings)

None of this made any fucking sense.

He—I still hadn’t gotten his name—got in first. The gentlemanly thing to do so I wouldn’t have to slide across the seat. He didn’t look back to see if I was questioning my decision, if I was lingering, waiting for an introduction, an explanation. He disappeared into the dark interior, cool air escaping to join the stifling blanket of heat that descended upon Manhattan in August.

There was a casual arrogance in that gesture, getting in the car without a word or backward glance. One that should’ve infuriated me. That should’ve had me turning on my heel and leaving this entire situation behind, writing it off as a near miss.

Yet there wasn’t even a millisecond of hesitation. Not a moment. Not a stutter in my step as I stepped off the sidewalk and into the car.

The second my ass was settled in the leather seat, the driver, who I hadn’t made eye contact with, out of shame or fear, slammed the door shut.

I couldn’t shake the feeling that the door closing was some kind of omen. The end of something. The beginning. But that thought didn’t last for long. Not once I realized the reality of my situation.

I was in a car with an older man, one with a lot of money, who the staff of the restaurant actively feared, and no one knew where I was. No one knew where I was going or who I was with. This was a decision I might’ve made ten years ago, when my thoughts weren’t on survival, weren’t on anything but feeding the beast inside me.

I was a different person now.

Or so I’d thought.

We didn’t speak in the car. Not a word. I did not ask his name, nor he mine. I didn’t blurt lines about how I never did this, how I’d been the victim of some kind of uber masculine spell. There were many, many things that could’ve been said. That should’ve been said.

If we were talking about ‘should’ves,’ then I shouldn’t have gotten in the fucking car in the first place.

But I did get in the car.

It smelled like leather and expensive cologne. He was loaded, this man. But I knew that from his suit, the way he walked, the five-hundred-dollar bottle of wine he’d had one glass of sitting at the table when he left. The one hundred-thousand-dollar car that was waiting at the curb, complete with driver, didn’t surprise me.

The weight of his presence in the enclosed space was what surprised me. I feared him. That fear was like a cloak, covering me, weighing me down, turning my limbs to lead.

Something instinctual inside of me told me that this was a dangerous man. I’d known that the second my eyes met his in the restaurant. But wasn’t that why I was here?

I feared him, yet I still got into this enclosed space with him, with no idea where I was going, not activating the app on my phone that was connected to my best friend and tracked my location whenever I was going anywhere with a man. Then again, that app hadn’t been used in years. But I’d kept it on my phone. That was telling me something. The fact I was in this car told me everything.

A thin sheen of sweat covered my entire body, even with the AC blasting.

It was five minutes before he touched me. I’d counted, not seeing the world moving around us, not taking note of what direction we were traveling. My eyes were on him, moving across every inch of his profile. I didn’t care how desperate it seemed, staring at him so openly. The time for façades had come and gone.

His neck was tanned, thick, corded. The first button of his shirt was undone, dark chest hair creeping upward. I ached to touch it. The thick stubble covering his jaw couldn’t quite be called a beard, but it was groomed to perfection, silvery white salting the inky black strands. Same with his hair, slightly longer at the top, styled effortlessly, more strands of gray distinguishing him. I was not in the car with some young guy, definitely not someone my age. This was a man. Unlike any kind of man I’d been close to before.

His eyes were glacial, a cerulean sea that juxtaposed the dark hair, the olive skin. Those irises flickered over me throughout the five minutes, sending flames to my every pore. Men had looked at me before. Men had looked at me plenty. In varying stages of undress. I was used to the male gaze. Used to the fact that my blonde hair, my long legs, my tits and my face meant I was something to look at because I was conventionally attractive.

But no one had looked at me like he did.

Like he really fucking saw me.