Page 33 of Kiss Me Honey Hone

Still Kenny didn’t.

“Your kisses are toxic anyway,” Aaron panted, lips curling into a wicked, knowing smirk, as if to say he knew Kenny was keeping him at a distance and it was spurring him on.

Aaron could readhimas well as Kenny could Aaron.

Then something snapped in Kenny and he held Aaron by his hips, dipping away. “What did you say?”

“I said your kisses are deadly.Poison. I don’t want them.”

Kenny held his gaze. “Liar.”

“Fuck you.”

Kenny tangled his fingers in the back of Aaron’s hair, gripping tightly. Then, with a swift pull, he guided Aaron off his lap, forcing him onto his back on the sofa. Aaron sprawled beneath him, chest heaving, eyes wide, the hypnotic blue darkening withintensity. Not with fear. Not with concern.Lust. And Kenny leaned over him, bracing one hand on the cushion beside Aaron’s head, lips dangerously close to Aaron’s, so close they shared the same unsteady breath. And Aaron stared up at him, trembling, body a live wire beneath Kenny’s weight, relenting to him, his vulnerability and intensity a potent mix ready to explode.

“Iwillkiss you.” Kenny glided his free hand up Aaron’s torso.

“You’re all talk.”

“When I’m ready to let you destroy my life.” Kenny then sank down beside him and bit around Aaron’s piercing, licking the warm metal of the barbell. And it took all his effort to clamber away from him, but he did and rushed around to gather up the papers spilled on the floor.

“What are you doing?” Aaron asked from his precarious position on the sofa.

Kenny clutched the papers in his hand, Aaron’s voice barely cutting through his racing thoughts. He turned back slowly, mind no longer in the chaos Aaron had caused, but delving somewhere far darker.

“Deadly kisses,” Kenny said, almost to himself.

“What?” Aaron’s smirk faltered, confusion replacing the teasing.

Kenny lowered to his knees, shifting through his hastily gathered notes, flipping through pages of pathology reports and scribbled observations. His pulse quickened, connecting dots he hadn’t seen before. “The toxin. Fuck, the toxin!” He almost laughed. “Quick-acting. No visible entry wound. No needle marks. Ingested somehow. Absorbed…”

Aaron swung his legs off the sofa, sitting upright. “If this is your idea of foreplay, I’m not sure I’m on board with it.”

Kenny turned to Aaron. “It’s this…” He waved the papers. “The case Jack asked me to look over.”

“And now you’re mentioning your ex. Will Heather pop up too, in a bit? Hat trick?”

“Connie Bishop.”

“Thenetballer? That’s what you’ve had your face buried in?”

“Metaphorically.”

“I should hope fucking so.” Aaron dipped to the edge of his seat. “I’m your only dirty little student, thanks very much.”

Kenny shot him a glare, then moved on. “There were other victims. Months apart. Died in similar circumstances. Both reports showed no evidence of how the toxin entered their systems. No struggle, no signs of them fighting back. One girl had an empty stomach. No food or drink ingested. But you said it…” He pointed a finger at Aaron.

Aaron furrowed his brow. “Please don’t say someone else is pinning shit on me again?”

“‘Your kisses are toxic.’” Kenny scrubbed a hand down his face. “What if the toxin wasn’t slipped into drinks or food? What if it transferred…during akiss?”

Aaron grimaced. “You’re saying… someone’s going around killing people bykissingthem?”

Kenny’s mind spun with possibilities. “It would explain the lack of struggle. If the victims knew the killer. Or if it happened in a moment of perceived intimacy, their guard would be down. A kiss is disarming. It’s vulnerable. You don’t expect death to come from something so… intimate. Or quick.”

Aaron shivered, folding his arms. “That’s fucked up.”

“It’s methodical,” Kenny said, almost to himself again, and he stood, shirt flapping as he paced the floor. “The killer has to be meticulous. They would need a precise knowledge of the toxin—how much to apply, how quickly it acts. They’d have to be confident. Practiced. They would have tested this in several ways, finding one that worked for what they wanted. This isn’t impulsive.”

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