Page 66 of Reaper's Desire

Julian's other hand moves so fast I almost miss it. There's a flash of metal that it takes me a moment to recognize as a knife, and then he drives it up under Tomáš's ribs until only the hilt is visible against his skin.

Tomáš's eyes go wide. His mouth opens in a silent scream. Blood blooms across his bare chest, dripping down his skin and onto the carpet, and Julian holds him there for a long moment before pulling the knife free and letting him drop. Tomáš crumples to the floor, his hands pressed to the wound, blood seeping between his fingers. He makes a wet, gurgling sound, his eyes finding mine, and I see the moment the life leaves them.

I can't breathe. I stand there frozen as Julian wipes the blade on Tomáš's discarded jeans and then turns to me. The fury in his eyes makes me take an involuntary step back. "Get dressed," he says, his voice low and deadly. "Now."

I stare at him, my hands shaking so badly I can't imagine even picking anything up. "You—you just?—"

"Get. Dressed." Each word is hard, bitten off. "We're leaving. Right now."

I pull the shirt over my head with trembling hands, my eyes locked on Tomáš's body. There's so much blood. It's pooling beneath him, spreading across the cheap carpet. "He was just—we were just—" My voice breaks. "Why did you?—"

"Because he was going to kill you." Julian grabs my shorts from the floor and throws them at me. "Put these on. We don't have time for this."

"What?" The word comes out as a whisper. "No. He was just—he was a guy from the bar. He wasn't?—"

"He was an assassin, Isabelle." Julian's voice is hard and cold, every word cutting. "Sent to kill you. And you walked right into his trap because you were too busy being reckless and stupid to think about the consequences."

I feel like he's slapped me. I sink down onto the edge of the bed, my legs suddenly unable to hold me. "No. That's not—he couldn't have been?—"

"Check his jacket." Julian points to a jacket hanging next to the door. "You'll find a gun, I imagine, and a photo of you."

I don't want to look. But I stand up on shaky legs and cross the room, reaching into the black leather jacket hanging on a hook by the door. I feel the heavy weight of a gun, and then…

I feel a slick square. I pull out a photograph of me, walking down a street in Santorini, the sun bright on my face, completely unaware I was being watched.

The room tilts. I drop the photo like it burned me, my breath coming in short, panicked gasps. "Oh my god." The words are barely audible. "Oh my god, he was going to?—"

"Kill you." Julian's voice is flat. "Yes. That's what assassins do, Isabelle. They kill people. And you made it incredibly easy for him by sneaking out of a safe house in the middle of the night to go get drunk and fuck a stranger."

The accusation in his voice snaps something inside me. The shock and horror transform into rage so sudden and absolute that it takes my breath away. "Don't you dare." I turn sharply, my hands clenched into fists at my sides. "Don't you fucking dare blame me for this."

"I'm not blaming you for him being an assassin." Julian's eyes are cold, his jaw tight. "I'm blaming you for being so goddamn reckless that you walked right into his hands. What the fuck were you thinking, Isabelle? Leaving the safe house? Going to a bar alone? Bringing a stranger back to his hotel room?"

"I was thinking that I'm sick of being treated like… like…" My voice rises, all the hurt and anger and frustration of the past weeks pouring out. "I'm sick of you pushing me away and then acting like you have some claim on me! I'm sick of being told what to do and where to go and who I can talk to! You haven'teven found out who's doing this! You've had us running all over fucking Europe while you supposedly try to find the source of this, and you haven't found a fucking thing!"

"I've been fucking trying! The hit was contracted through a goddamn crime family, Isabelle. It's not as easy as just calling and asking! I've been doing everything I could, while trying to keep your spoiled ass alive!"

"I'm so sorry it's so fucking difficult!"

"Clearly, you're not. You could have died tonight." His voice is deadly quiet now. "Do you understand that? You were thirty seconds away from being fucking murdered."

"And whose fault is that? You're the one who keeps pushing me away! You're the one who told me I was nothing to you, that what we had was just a moment of weakness! You're the one who made me feel like I was going insane for wanting you!"

"So you decided to go fuck someone else?" Julian snorts. "That was your solution? To prove what, exactly? That you don't need me?"

"Yes! Yes, that's exactly what I was trying to prove! Because you keep telling me you don't want me, and then you look at me like—like—" My voice breaks. "I don't know what you want from me, Julian. I don't know what I'm supposed to do. You save my life and then treat me like an obligation. You touch me like you're starving for it and then tell me it was a mistake. You?—"

"I'm trying to keep you alive!" His control finally snaps, his voice rising to match mine. "That's what I'm trying to do! I'm trying to keep you alive in a situation where every single person who gets close to you becomes a target! Do you have any idea what they can do to someone I care about? Do you have any concept of the kind of torture they're capable of?"

My eyes go wide. "You—" I stop, my breath catching. "You care about me?"

Something flickers across his face before the walls slam back into place. "That's not the point."

"That's exactly the point!" I take a step toward him, my hands still shaking. "You care about me. You just admitted it. So why do you keep pushing me away? Why do you keep telling me I mean nothing when clearly I mean something?"

"Because caring about you makes this a thousand times more dangerous!" The words explode out of him. "Because if they find out, they'll torture you. They'll break you. They'll make me watch while they—" He stops himself, his jaw clenching so hard I can see the muscle jump. "I can't let that happen. And you are a fucking distraction.AllI need to think about is how to get you out of this before they… before I…"

He breaks off, as the confession steals the breath from my lungs. I stare at him, seeing past the anger and the coldness to the fear beneath. "So that's what this is about." My voice is quieter now. "You're trying to protect me by making them think I don't matter to you."