“Same reason,” I reply, tilting my head. “Because you’d escape if I didn’t.”
She sucks in a heavy breath. “You’re making assumptions.”
“Tell me I’m wrong then,” I retort.
She turns her head and raises her nose as if she’s better than me, but we both know she’s not.
“Why did you come here then?” I ask.
“To end what you started,” she replies. “Like I said, you threatened my family, and I don’t take that lightly.”
“Jill’s already dead. My death won’t fucking change that.”
She throws me a look, and her breathing momentarily stops, only to resume like a goddamn hiccup. “You could go after my parents too.”
“Why do you care about your parents?” I inquire.
“Because I love them,” she replies. “And they love me.”
“Bullshit,” I quip, retracting the knife.
She finds the courage to lean forward with a brazen response. “How would you know? Do you even remember anything at all?”
Her words sting like the knife I’m holding, and it makes me clench it even harder. “I remember … enough.”
“Do you even remember me?”
“Yes, I do,” I growl, my voice harsh and so loud it pushes her back into the corner. “You’re the only goddamn thing I remember.”
The silence that follows is deafening, even to me.
Because all I see are the unspoken words and pain in her eyes accumulated in a single tear droplet.
But all I know is what I feel inside, the desire, the hunger … for her. “I remember all the memories that involve you. And all the ways I wanted to make your body mine.”
Jasmine
* * *
I’m too stunned to even speak.
All I can think of are those words.
Make your body mine.
Every syllable, over and over, until my cheeks flush and my whole body begins to shake.
Fuck.
I can’t let him get to me. It’s a trap, and he’s trying to lure me in, just like he did with the net. I can’t trust him.
But then why is he looking at me as if he wants to eat me alive and then some?
His hand suddenly rises, and I brace for impact. But the second his fingers touch my cheek, my eyes open from the sheer gentleness in his touch. Whatever it was I expected, this definitely wasn’t it.
“You still look exactly like I remember,” he mutters, almost as if he’s lost in a daydream.
“You don’t,” I reply. “The Liam I knew was gentle. Kind. Not a monster.”