Page 10 of Venomous Desires

The poor kid. He’d never see the snow outside. The sunrise. His own reflection. The thought alone was enough to make my heart twist. I swallowed the lump in my throat. No wonder they needed a caretaker. A quiet determination settled over me.

“I understand,” I said, nodding with more conviction than I’d intended.

If this child needed someone to make his world a little less lonely... I’d do everything I could.

Kyle gave me one of his unreadable nods before knockingtwice.

“She’s here,” he said in Russian. A beat of silence.

“Let her in.”

The voice on the other side sent goosebumps racing down my arms. It was deep and rough with sleep. Definitelynota child’s.

I blinked.

“Go in,” Kyle stepped away from the door and bobbed his head. “Thechildis in,”

Every instinct suddenly screamed at me not to walk through that door. Maybe I’d misunderstood. Maybe Kyle had meant someone young. Because the voice I’d just heard didn’t belong to a child.

Unless this kid had somehow gone through puberty at the speed of light.

Too late to back out now.

Ten thousand dollars.

That was all I needed to remember.

I stepped inside and the door clicked shut behind me. I nearly jumped.

The room was dimly lit and larger than I’d expected. As I stepped more into the room, I noticed it was split between a luxurious office and a private sitting area.

The scent hit me instantly. Leather and tobacco. And beneath it all...Oud.

It reminded me of the woods behind our house in Texas—the ones Mama had always warned me never to wander into.

Because forests looked beautiful from a distance. Until you realized something was watching you from between the trees.

Something shifted at the edge of my vision. I stilled, tightening my grip on my bag. Despite the new glasses, my eyes still struggled to adjust. I nudged the frames higher on my nose, feeling a strong presence that quickly grabbed my attention.

A dark silhouette of a man sat on a leather sofa with one ankle resting over his knee, half-drowned in amber lamplight. For a heartbeat, he looked like one of the statues.

My pulse stumbled as I limped another step closer; the light finally reached his face.

His mouth curved into the faintest smile, and I noticed a cigar in his hand.

I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was walking into the cave of a wild beast. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if this man suddenly kill me.

And to my dismay, or whatever we call it, there was no child in the room. I started to believe that Kyle lied to me because this man was definitely lookingdirectlyat me. Therefore, he couldn’t be blind. His eyes were anything but unwavering. He appeared anythingbutvulnerable.

I stopped about ten steps away, a coffee table acting as a safe little border between us.

He took a drag from his cigarette before exhaling slowly. Smoke curled around him, swallowing his frame until he looked less like a man and more like something lurking in the dark.

I wasn’t usually one to judge people by appearances.

But this one looked like he’d been handcrafted by my mother’s worst nightmares.

Carefully adjusting my glasses higher on my nose, I shifted my weight off my aching ankle and reached for the chair.