Page 179 of Boys Who Hunt

I raise the knife and chuck it right at him. No hesitation. But the moment it leaves my fingertips, a pang of regret instantly hits me sharper than the tip of that knife as it flies toward him.

He catches the knife midair, inches away from his chest, not by the handle, but by the blade.

Droplets of blood slowly roll down the palm of his hand.

“A twig that breaks easily under pressure …” The deadly smirk on his face could make any girl’s heart stop. “Turns into the sharpest weapon.”

Including mine.

“Beginner’s luck,” I retort.

“No. That’s what determination looks like,” he says, squashing the knife even farther in his hand, speeding the bleeding. “You actually thought for a moment you could kill me.” The killer smile on his face only widens. “Youwantedto kill me.”

After everything he’s done … maybe I did.

For a moment.

But that moment passed as quickly as the knife flew through the air.

“I’m not a murderer any more than you’re a savior,” I murmur.

We are who we were born to be.

And he … he’s just what he said, a monster.

He deserves it.

But then why didn’t I actually want him dead?

Is it pity?

“I thought the same thing, twig …” He brings his hand up to his mouth and actually licks the blood off his skin. “So then tell me why I need to kill everyone who even thinks of putting their hands on you?”

I can’t stop staring at those lips caked with blood as he steps closer and closer while my heart beats faster and faster.

“Why I want to give you the skills to defend yourself, even against someone like me?” He points the knife at my belly, right where he created the scar.

“Why I can’t stop thinking about having you, over and over again, until I’m so sick of it that I don’t evenwantto kill anymore?”

My heart skips a beat.

The tip of the blade pushes aside the slit in my dress until my skin is exposed, along with the word he carved into me.

“You’re a thief …” he mutters, bringing the knife up to my heart. “Through and through.”

My downturned lips curl. “A thief … who needed it more than you did.”

His eyes narrow as the knife slides up toward my lips, but I stay put, unafraid.

Even as the knife pushes my lip down and slowly slips inside my mouth until it’s sideways between my teeth.

I can taste the tinge of blood on my tongue, but it’s the hungered look in those piercing green eyes of his that haunts me the most.

“Do you, now?” He bites his lip. “All you had to do was ask.”

Suddenly, he grabs my throat, drags me toward him, and smashes his lips onto mine, kissing the knife as harshly as he kisses me. The blade cuts into both our lips the deeper his kiss becomes, mingling our blood together, but the sharp pain doesn’t even compare to the throbbing heart in my chest as he licks each droplet of blood right off my lips, groaning into my mouth.

His tongue wraps around the blade, stealing it from my lips, before he chucks it aside and growls, “Fuck it,” slamming his lips back onto mine.