Page 50 of Sweet Venom

Azariel

“Cupid’s arrow missed me, but at least I got a coupon for 10% off Sneakers bar.” – P

Isat in darkness in my office as the afternoon light tried—and failed miserably—to creep through the blinds. The only real light came from my computer screen. My fingers hovered over the lighted keyboard, but I’ve not gotten any work done. There are a few contracts I needed to look over, ones my accountant had sent for my approval, but instead of keeping myself busy with that, I was completely fixated on the same damn video I’d replayed for the hundredth time today.

Poe. Poe, in the middle of a meltdown, throwing an adorable tantrum because she couldn’t seem to come up with a new story that would impress me.

I had known this would happen. MyLittle Foxhad always been, at times, as predictable as she was stunning. I had been certain she would take my critique of her writing as a challenge—and she hadn’t disappointed. The scene unfolding on my screen was proof of that. I can’t look away. I haven’t been able to do anything but sit here watching her all morning.

It feels like I’m watching a wild animal in her natural habitat. She looks terrible, but again I can’t look away. This obsession, day after day, is becoming more absurd, but I can’t give a shit about it now. I’m too far gone. I’ve been neck deep in all things Poe Nicolasi since she quietly creeped into my dark heart the day she sat with me and not only offered me her friendship but a peace I’d never known until her.

She’s so deep in my skin that I’ve tried—and failed many times—every damn way I can think of to rid myself of this obsession. For the first time in my life, I failed at something. I wasn’t successful.

I’ve given into the madness. I’ve let her consume me. Now, I’m reduced to this. To watch her through a screen when she’s not near, and I have zero shame. Hell, I’ve lost the ability to care about anything but her.

I hacked her computer and got hold of her camera footage. Clicking on the play, the first video is of sitting on her sofa like a battlefield survivor. Her blue hair’s a mess, her eyes look red, there are papers scattered around her like confetti. I can almost feel her frustration through the screen. I know that if she doesn’t figure out her story soon, she’s going to smash her laptop on top of her asshole cat.

“This is the one, Prince. I know it. This is the story that will make Azariel eat crow.” She leans back with a mischievous smile on her face, while her frenemy of a cat jumps from the couch and leaves her as if he’s done with their talk.

My lip curls in a smile as I watch her mumble curses against me.

I can’t stop watching. Yes, she’s stubborn. At times highly annoying. Infuriatingly sharp. Too sharp for her own good. Butdamn it, when she scowls and her plump lips press into that tight, no-nonsense line of defiance? It drives me insane. I just want to grab her by the throat, haul her against my body, and kiss the ever-loving fuck out of her.

The second video starts. Somehow, she’s managed to pull herself together. She’s still tense, but at least she’s not about to throw her empty wine glass across the room. What has me leaning in closer, giving her every ounce of my attention, is the fire in her voice as she talks with her cousins through the screen. “I hope the grumpy jerk approves this one. It’s a journey about loss and love—the kind of love that fucks you up, you know? A love that’s too real, too dangerous. Not some fairytale fluff like the ones I’ve written before.”

I lean back in my leather chair, running a hand through my hair. I stare at my reflection in the dark window and replay her words in my mind.

I hope the grumpy jerk approves this one.

The kind of love that fucks you up, you know? A love that’s too real, too dangerous.

Serial killer?

She’s always been so intuitive, even when I only offered her silence and indifference. She’s always seen beyond the ice and iron walls around me. At times, I wish I were like most men. That I acted and thought like the men she deserves, but I’m not and I won’t. Her anger and frustration should soften my heart, but it does the opposite. It makes me crave more of it. I want to challenge her, push her to the edge, see how far I can take her before she snaps. But, fuck, I also want to protect that fire in her. The second she loses that spark? I lose too. And I don’t know which part of that scares me more. It has always terrified me. Poe is the only human alive that terrifies me.

I stared at the computer screen again, where I paused the footage. Poe’s face is frozen, her green eyes cold with frustration.It makes my blood run hot and my heart spikes. If only she knew the power she held on me. I could look at her for hours and not get tired. She’s so goddamn beautiful, even when she looks like a walking disaster. But it’s not just her looks. It’s the things that she doesn’t see. It’s the way she carries herself—like she can take on the entire world and not even break a sweat. Like she’s daring me to try and stop her. Not that I ever would. I want her to have the world. Fuck it, I’m trying to give it to her for years now, but she’s been stubborn.

Because I’m obsessed with her fire. I’m obsessed with her fight. I’m obsessed with that sweetness she keeps hidden because I once made her hide away when I broke her heart. I’m obsessed with all that is her. I knew it the very first moment I laid eyes on her. I knew she was the one for me, even when I tried to convince myself that she was a nuisance and nothing more.

The truth has always been in front of me and all around me while she was close. The tension between us has always been thick, like two magnets that shouldn’t be near each other but can’t help snapping together anyway. Like ice and fire. Water and oil. Somehow, we made sense. She made me better and I well I brought out the most beautiful side of her… the dark.

I glanced at the screen one last time, Poe’s face still burning into me. I hit play again. Her voice fills the room, and another small, twisted smile tugs at my lips.

I’ve been obsessed with Poe since we were kids. I pushed her away every damn time, knowing she was too good for me, too pure, too full of life. She was a light in a world full of shadows, and I couldn’t let myself be the one to drag her into those shadows. I wasn’t good enough for her then, and I sure as hell wasn’t good enough for her now. But then we grew older, and I started seeing her differently. That sweetness she had as a child? Gone. In its place, a cynical, sharp, magnetic force of nature.And that’s when I started to wonder if maybe, just maybe, she was meant for me after all.

For a while, I thought I could let her go. Let her drift away and be nothing more than a distant dream I’d never reach. But then I found out she was going to give up her dream of writing for a while. She’d failed to get her books noticed by any of the damn publishers, and now she was planning to backpack across the world with some idiot friend of hers from college. That was it. I couldn’t let her walk away from her dream—or my chance. So, I did what I had to do. I used every damn resource at my disposal. I hacked, I stalked, I planned. And in the end? It worked. I bought the publishing house that had rejected her. I fired everyone involved. Took ownership of it. And then I offered Poe a deal.

That was the moment everything changed.

I was harsh with her when she pitched that plot idea, but it wasn’t because I didn’t think it was brilliant. It was because it wasn’t the story I needed her to write. It wasn’t dark enough. I need her to write the kind of story thatgripspeople, thathurtsthem. A dark romance, the kind that’ll have readers on the edge of their seats, aching for more. Her plot was brilliant. But it wasn’t the one I wanted.

And now? I’m getting what I want.

And she’s getting what she needs.

I’ll break her down. I’ll challenge her until she gives me what I want. Until she’s writing the dark stories I know she’s capable of. Until she realizes she’s not just writing for herself anymore. She’s writing for me.

And trust me, my beautiful poetry. I always win.

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