Page 11 of The Stalker
And I mean it.Because with Thomas inside me, I don’t feel weak.I don’t feel afraid.I feel unstoppable.I stalk toward her, slow and deliberate, like a predator savoring every second before the kill.
Her back hits the church wall and her hands splay against the stone, trembling.She’s trapped.Exactly where I want her.
Chapter Six
To Flee Or Not To Flee
Bianka
The wall is cold at my back, rough stone biting through my sweater as I press my back against it like I can disappear into the church itself.My chest heaves, my breathing sharp and frantic, each inhale cutting like glass.
And he’s there.Griffin.Only it isn’t him.Not completely.
The boy I knew in high school, the one who carried my books, who smiled when I caught his eye across the cafeteria, who made me feel like maybe I mattered ...he isn’t standing here now.
This man is darker.Sharper.His eyes burn like coals, too bright, too wrong, and when he smiles, it’s not just him.It’s something else.Something inside him.Something just beneath the skin.
I saw it.Ifeltit.The way his voice layered over itself, two tones tangled together.One was Griffin’s.The other...God, I don’t even know.
“Stay away,” I choke out, though the words sound weak even to my own ears.
He steps closer.The shadows bend with him, swallowing the streetlight, cloaking him in darkness until it feels like he’s part of it.
“You don’t mean that.”His voice is low and rough, and it slides through me like smoke, coiling in places it shouldn’t.I shake my head, squeezing my eyes shut like that will make him vanish.But when I open them, he’s still there.
Closer.
Always closer.
My nails scrape against the stone wall, fingers trembling.My scar burns under my sweater, hotter and hotter, like it knows he touched it, like it’s branded now.
“I’m ruined,” I whisper before I can stop myself.The words spill out, broken and raw.“You should hate me.Everyone else does.”
His expression shifts, sharp and fierce.“Don’t you dare.”
The intensity in his voice makes me flinch, but not from fear.From something else.From the way it sounds like he believes it.
