Page 63 of Reaper's Desire

I do. But she can't believe that any longer. She has to believe that I'm just the man keeping her alive, and nothing more.

Or I'm going to do something that destroys us both.

"You think you know me, but you don't. You don't know anything." I clench my jaw. "Go to bed, Isabelle."

Tears spill over her lashes. "Fuck you," she whispers.

I move back, maintaining the distance, my hands clenched into fists at my sides. "You need to stop this, Isabelle. Stop trying to make this into something it's not. Stop looking at me like I'm someone worth something to you. I'm not. Whatever there was between us, it's done."

"You don't mean what you're saying." She dashes the tears away with the back of her hand. "I don't know what you're doing, but you don't mean?—"

"I do." My voice is cold now, deliberately cruel, every word meant to push her away. To create the distance, I need to keep her alive. "I'm keeping you alive because it's the right thing to do. Because I made a choice and I'm seeing it through. But that's all this is. That's all it can be. I don't want you, Isabelle. If I get hard around you, if I lose control a little when you come on to me, it's because it's been a couple weeks since I got laid and I'm fucking horny, and I don't have time to go out and fuck while I'm watching your spoiled ass and trying to keep you from getting killed.That's all."

She stares at me, and I watch the hurt shift as she turns closed off and defensive. Her arms wrap tighter around herself, and I can see her retreating behind walls of her own. "I see." Her voice is flat, empty of the warmth and hope that were there moments ago. "So everything on that balcony—the things you said, the way you touched me—that was all just... what? A moment of weakness you regret?"

"Yes." The lie tastes like poison in my mouth, bitter and wrong, but I force it out anyway. I force myself to hold her gaze and not flinch from the pain I'm causing.

"Fine." She wraps her arms tighter around herself. "Message received. I'll stop throwing myself at you. I'll stop trying to make this into something you clearly don't want."

Her jaw clenches. "You've made yourself clear. I'm just an obligation. I don't know why you're helping me, but it's clearly not because you actually give a shit about me."

"That's not?—"

"Save it." She turns away, heading back toward the bedroom, and I can see the tension in her shoulders. "I don't want to hear any more."

She disappears into the room and closes the door, and this time I hear the lock click. I stand in the middle of the living room, my hands clenched into fists, and my chest aches. I feel like I've lost something I never really had. Something I didn't even know I wanted until it was right in front of me… that I'm still not sure what it is I want it to be.

And there's no point in trying to figure it out. If Isabelle hates me, fine. Then they'll believe that she's nothing worth using as leverage. They won't torture her to get to me or make her suffer to break me.

I sink back down onto the couch and drop my head into my hands, exhaustion crashing over me in waves. The video plays behind my eyelids of Katya's broken body, the blood, the knife. The message they sent with her death.

I can't let Isabelle become another message.

16

ISABELLE

Ilie in the darkness listening to Julian breathe on the other side of the locked door, and I hate him.

I hate him for making me want him. For making me feel safe and then ripping that safety away. For looking at me like I'm something he wants to possess and devour one moment, and then telling me I'm nothing the next.

For saving my life and then treating me like an obligation, he resents.

A moment of weakness.What we had on that balcony—his mouth on mine, his hands on my body, the way he touched me like he was starving for it—was just a moment of weakness he regrets.

The words echo in my head, sharp and cruel, and I feel the sting of them all over again. My throat tightens, and my eyes burn. I press my face into the pillow and try to breathe through the hurt, but it's everywhere. In my chest. In my stomach.

In my heart.

He said it like I was nothing. Like I meant nothing.

I've spent all this time since Ibiza watching him fight to keep me alive. I see the way his eyes follow me across every room, theway his body responds when I'm close. I've felt his desire. I know it's real. But he keeps pushing me away and telling me it can't happen.

I roll onto my back and stare at the water-stained ceiling, my jaw clenched so hard my teeth ache. My anger feels hot and sharp beneath the hurt.Fuck him. Fuck his rejection and his distance and his constant mixed signals. Fuck the way he looks at me like I'm everything and then tells me I'm nothing.

I don't need him.

I don't need his desire or whatever complicated bullshit is going on in his head. I'm Isabelle Montague. I've had men wanting me my whole life. I could walk into any bar in this city and have my pick of a dozen men who'd be thrilled to take me home. Men who wouldn't push me away.