Page 3 of Sinful Promise
Maybe I was expecting a confrontation. For Fentone to run at us and fight for his life.
It’s worse, somehow, that he remains asleep. Slumbering so easily, with a grin on his face and a teddy tucked between his arms. He sleeps the way an innocent man can… and yet, two of his most recent victims are still in the fridges down at the George Stanley Medical Examiner’s office.
My office.
My victims to take care of.
Wandering closer to my target, I startle at Archer’s hissed, “Minka!” but I refuse to stop. I won’t stay away, now that we’re this close.
Moving to Fentone’s side of the bed, I lower into a crouch and study his face. Haggard with loose skin, jowls that droop to the side. His head is shaved bald, as is his face. Eyebrows. Lashes. Nostrils. Even his ears. All clear of hair.
His way of making sure he doesn’t leave DNA on a defenseless little girl’s body.
“Goddamit, Minka.” Archer charges closer and grabs me under the arm to yank me to my feet. “In and out,” he grits at a barely discernable volume. “I’m doing it.”
“So do it,” I challenge. “Or I will. Either way, he dies tonight.”
“W-what are you…” A croaked voice. A confused tenor. Then Fentone shoves up in bed so my heart jumps in my chest and adrenaline floods my veins. “What the fuck are you—”
I swing out with my blade, one fast strike. I catch his chest because of his movements, instead of his throat like I’d intended, and steel punctures his heart.
I feel the release of his veins, then I see the gush of blood that rushes to the top of his wound.
Archer grabs me around the hips in the same breath as Fentone’s words and my strike, so the three of us move at once. He spins me around, and my tight fist wrapped around the knife brings it loose again, until a murderer’s blood drips on the old carpet.
Archer sets me down, sending me stumbling on my feet, then he pushes forward to check our… victim.
Is that what he is now?
“Faint pulse.” He holds a hand to Fentone’s throat and closes his eyes, like that somehow helps him concentrate as he counts. Feels. Focuses. “It’s faint, but it’s still there, Mayet.”
“It’ll take a minute.”
I grab Fentone’s bear and set it back down, now that his owner has stilled. Placing the knife on the edge of the bed, I fix Laramie’s pillows so he lays comfortably, and then I wedge the stuffed teddy between his arms, so the dying man is once more in the position he began the night.
Then I take a step back, collecting my knife as I go.
I know the moment Fentone’s heart stops beating, because Archer’s head droops. I know when it’s official—a man is dead—because Archer’s shoulders come down.
But I feel no remorse as my husband straightens his back and turns to face me.
He’s a homicide cop who should probably slap cuffs around my wrists. But that’s not what he does. That’s not the urge that the glint in his eyes reveals.
Now that our target is dead—and us, safe—Archer slips his gun back into the holster wrapped around his thigh and stalks forward. Savage. Unforgiving. And when we meet, unrelenting as he pushes me to the wall and barely misses walking straight into my blade, he slams his lips to mine and takes. Takes. Takes so much, my pulse sprints and my stomach rolls with warmth I’ve never before felt when killing a man.
He crushes me against the wall so my breath comes out on an exhale, then he half lifts me, so I stand on my toes, but they barely even touch the floor.
“Minka…” He seduces my mouth and drags my tongue between his teeth. His hands scrape along my hips, and his heart thunders against mine. “Fuck.”
“It’s done.” Breathless, I pull my lips from his and fight for oxygen. But at the absence of my mouth, Archer’s tongue goes on a hungry expedition of my neck. My jaw. The warm skin behind my ear where my one and only tattoo is installed. “Archer, it’s—”
“We just killed a man, Mayet.”
“Well…” I drop my head back and close my eyes. “Idid.”
He shakes his head side to side and gently bites my collarbone. “We. It’s always me and you. Good or bad.”
“Okay.” I feel his cock pressed to my hip. The vicious lust that is no doubt the true addiction serial killers try desperately to satiate.
