Page 26 of Drawn to Death
“I need to draw it right.” I reach for my sketchpad, barely able to make it out on the table.
Talon’s hands tighten around mine. Not much, just a little squeeze, like he is trying to anchor me. His eyes search my face, and I wonder what he sees. Does he see the cracks? The places where I am coming apart?
“It’s all wrong,” I say. The words barely make it out, rough and broken.
“What’s wrong?” Talon’s voice is steady, low.
“The drawing.” My voice sounds strange, distant. “I didn’t… I wasn’t…” I can’t get the words out. They scrape in my throat. “I saw it through your eyes, and mine. I saw it twice.”
Nothing changes in Talon’s expression, but something flickers in his eyes. Maybe understanding. Maybe worry. “It's okay?”
I nod in a jerky motion. “I always see through your eyes. Always. But this time… I saw him myself. I was looking up at you. At the knife.” The last word comes out raw. “I saw you as you st… I saw you, but in my dream. I was you. Why did I dream it as you, not me?”
“None of this should be possible,” Talon says, but he doesn’t sound convinced. After everything, neither of us believes in the impossible.
“I drew it wrong,” I say, louder. “I drew it before it even happened. How could I do that unless… unless…”
I can’t finish. I can’t say it. Am I losing myself? Am I just a vessel for these deaths now?
Something hot slides down my cheek. A tear. Then another. I didn’t realize I was crying until I felt them, slow and steady.
Talon lets go of my hands, but before I can miss it, he is pulling me in. Arms around my shoulders, pulling me into his chest.
“It’s okay,” he says, voice rumbling against my cheek. “You’re safe.”
It is a stupid thing to say. Safe? With him? The man who kills for a living? The man whose murders haunt my dreams? The man who has just dragged a body across the floor like it means nothing?
But with his arms around me, I feel it. Safety. Solid and real. Warm. The danger feels far away, like it can’t touch me here, with my face pressed to his chest, listening to the steady thump of his heart.
The tears came faster, quiet and relentless. Not sobbing, just a slow release. My body shakes, and he only holds me tighter.
“I don’t understand what’s happening to me,” I whisper into his shirt.
His hand comes up, fingers threading through my hair, a gesture so unexpectedly gentle, I actually freeze. My breath catches. “We’ll figure it out,” he says. Like it is simple. Like we are just two normal people with a normal problem. Not a killer and his psychic prisoner, not two people haunted by impossible visions of death.
My body moves before my brain does. A tiny shift. A tilt of my head, just enough. My face is close enough to his that I can feel his breath, warm on my lips.
There is an ache in me, sharp and sudden. I need something that isn’t death. Something alive, something real, something to anchor me before I slip into whatever abyss is waiting.
Our eyes meet. In his eyes , I see recognition. No surprise. No confusion. Just a quiet, steady knowing, like he’s been waiting for this. Like he’s known it is coming.
Of course he has. He’s seen the drawing, too.
I lift my chin, closing those last few inches. My lips touch his, soft and uncertain. Just a moment, barely even a kiss, but it is everything.
He kisses me back. Not desperate, not rough. Gentle. Careful. Reverent, even. His hand cups my cheek, fingers in my hair, just like I have drawn it. His other arm tightens at my waist, pulling me closer, like I belong there.
He kisses me exactly as I drew it.
The thought drifts through me, strange and dreamlike. This moment, graphite on paper days ago, is now real. Is it comfort or prophecy?
Does it matter?
I surrender, not to Talon, but to whatever this is between us. To fate, to the dream, to whatever force dropped us into this exact moment, this exact kiss.
His lips move slowly against mine. Not a demand, but a claim. Not from lust, but from care. From recognition. Like he knows what this is, and he isn’t afraid.
When we break apart, there is no dramatic gasp, no rush of words. Just stillness. Just two people in a room where a man has died, kissing like it was always meant to happen. Like it was written somewhere… or drawn, maybe, in my sketchbook.
