Page 31 of Edge of Oblivion (Night Prowler 2)
“Please tell me,” she whispered. The look she gave him then, pleading and vulnerable, shattered the dull hunk of wood in his chest to pieces.
Glowering, he shoved his chair back from the table and strode across the patio, stopping only when it ended in a balustrade of pink marble lined with baskets of flowers. He had a wild thought to jump off. Somehow that seemed much preferable to answering her question.
How are you going to kill me? was what she was asking.
How, indeed?
He heard her walk up behind him, slowly, her step soft over the stone. He didn’t turn to look at her when she stopped just inches beside him. He felt her gaze like fire on his face.
“I’m not going to run away from you,” she said, very quietly. “You have my word, if that means anything at all.”
There seemed to be a steel band tightening in degrees around his chest with every breath. He crossed his arms over it and stood still as a rock, glaring daggers at a potted red geranium.
“And I want you to know that I’m sorry.”
That got to him. He looked at her, shocked. “You’re sorry. For what?”
She smiled, and he thought he had never seen anything so sad in his entire life.
“For us. I’m sorry for both of us. For the way things are. For the people we could have been, in another life. And I don’t blame you.” She shook her head. “I know it’s just your...”
She faltered, dropped her gaze from his, and turned to the view of the city, dusky rose and amber in the morning light. “I know it’s just your job.”
He was staggered. If this was a ploy to disarm him, it could not have been better planned or targeted more perfectly.
I know it’s just your job. She was granting him absolution for having to kill her. She was forgiving him.
“We’re going to find them,” he said roughly, only half believing it.
“Maybe,” she agreed softly. “But if we don’t, I have to know how you’re going to do it. I have to know. I can’t go on like this, imagining every possible thing you could...” She made a vague gesture with one hand, and it was so helpless and resigned and utterly sweet he wanted to scream in impotent rage.
But he didn’t. All he did was lift his hand, reach out to her, and place two fingers very lightly on the nape of her neck between the C1 and C2 vertebrae.
Her skin was warm and so very soft. Her hair was cool and heavy and silken on the back of his hand, as if he had plunged wrist-deep into water. She closed her eyes and bowed her head, and he couldn’t remove his hand no matter how many times he told himself to.
“A knife?” she whispered.
Wordless, he nodded.
“Will it hurt?”
“No,” he said, his voice suddenly hoarse.
She took a breath and seemed to gather herself. She lifted her head, and he allowed his hand to fall. The sudden loss of the heat of her skin was a cold shock against his fingers.
“Well then.”
She looked at him without fear or reproach, her eyes vivid and shining, almost relieved. She exhaled. She smiled. The change in her was immediate and profound, as if invisible shackles had been released and dropped to her feet. “Let’s finish breakfast, shall we?”
And she turned and walked back to the table, leaving him, once again, stunned and silent.
13
“The Vatican?” Morgan turned to Xander in shock.
He gave the cab driver instructions in Italian, then gave a curt nod, ignoring with great effort the view afforded him as Morgan’s skirt rode up over her knees and a pair of long, tanned legs emerged in all their toned glory.
Christ, he thought, gritting his teeth. This is a goddamn disaster. He sat back against the hard taxi seat and stared out the window.
