Page 38 of The Hellkeeper

Her lips part in protest, but I use that moment to slide the bite between them. She chews with her brows furrowed, like she’s trying to convince herself she doesn’t like me pampering her.

This.

This is how I want her.

Mine to feed. Mine to care for. Mine in every possible way.

We fall into easy banter: her trying to resist, me pushing until she gives in. I make her taste everything, watching her reactions like they hold the secrets of the universe.

But her tone shifts in an instant.

“Remember last time,” she says, twirling the stem of her glass between her fingers, “you told me you ran away.”

A flush creeps up her neck. “From what?”

No secrets between us.

I force the words up my throat, past the barriers I’ve spent years constructing, past the wounds I’ve stitched closed with iron will and cruelty.

“I was born to addicts,” I say. But I’m detached, like I’m reciting someone else’s history. “They left me on the doorstep of some orphanage. I never knew them. Never wanted to.”

She’s silent, hanging onto every word.

“When I was fourteen, a man adopted me.”

She exhales, relieved, like this part of the story might be better.

It isn’t.

“He trained me,” I continue. “Not to be a son. Not to be a boy. To be something else entirely. Something ruthless.”

I feel her move to pull her hands away.

No.

Panic grips me, fast and brutal.

I lash out before she can slip from my grasp, my hands clamping around hers.

“If you run after what I tell you, I don’t know what I’ll do with myself,” I hiss. My voice is sharp, almost venomous, but there’s a plea underneath. A desperation. “Don’t be scared of me, little flower. Please. Don’t be scared of me.”

She nods, her hand squeezing mine in return as if to comfort me.

“That man was cruel. He trained me to be a killer. If I missed a hit, if I hesitated—” I pause, jaw clenching. “I went to bed hungry. Or beaten. Sometimes both.”

Her eyes flood with tears.

I hate it.

I love it.

Her pain, her empathy, it’s a sickness in my veins. Something I crave. Something I never knew I needed until she came along and showed me what it was like to be completely enamored by a person.

Her fingers tremble before she lifts them to my face. Soft. Careful. Reverent. She traces the scar across my cheek, and I nearly stop breathing.

“Is that how you got this?” she whispers.

“It was when I refused a hit.”

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