Page 62 of Knife Thrower

Jules raps her knuckles against the counter. “Unacceptable.”

I blink. “Excuse me?”

“I said it’s unacceptable.” Jules slides off the barstool, her biker boots hitting the floorboards with a heavy thud. “You two are idiots. Highly lethal, incredibly attractive idiots, but idiots nonetheless. This stalemate ends tonight.”

Nova grins, a feral, wicked light sparking in her eyes. She leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “I like where this is going. What’s the play, Blue?”

“Sloane is an escape artist when it comes to her feelings,” Jules explains, pacing the narrow stretch of kitchen. “If we give her a door, she’ll lock it. If Cole gives her an out, she’ll take it. We need to strip the exits away. Force the issue.”

My pulse kicks a frantic rhythm against my collarbone. “You can’t force Cole Pike to do anything he doesn’t want to do.”

“I don’t have to force him.” Jules waves a hand dismissively. “The man is already entirely feral for you. We just need to trap you both in a confined space where neither of you can run, distract each other with sex, or hide behind the circus act.”

Wren taps her index finger against her chin. “The Haunted Mirror Maze?”

Nova shakes her head. “Too creepy. Cole would just start breaking mirrors.”

“The animal cages?” I suggest weakly, already dreading the sheer manic energy radiating from Elias’s wife.

“Rowe would murder us if we upset Caesar,” Wren points out.

Jules stops pacing. She stares at the blank wall of the trailer, her dark eyes narrowing as the gears turn in her head. A slow, brilliant, devastating smile spreads across her face.

“The Ferris wheel.”

I freeze. “The Ferris wheel.”

“Think about it.” Jules spins around, planting her hands flat on the island. “It’s the tallest point in the carnival. It isolates you from the rest of the crew. No screaming crowds. No blades to throw. No bed to hide in. Just two bucket seats and a spectacular view of the stars.”

“You want to put us on a ride,” I say, the skepticism dripping off my tongue.

“I want to strand you on a ride,” Jules corrects. “Ben operates the wheel. He takes his cues directly from Elias. Elias listens to me.” She taps her fingernail against the granite, hammering the nail into the coffin. “We send you and Cole up. The midway is dark. Ben stops the carriage at the absolute peak of the rotation and kills the engine.”

Nova claps her hands together, a delighted cackle tearing out of her throat. “Oh, that’s brilliant. He did that to you when you met, didn’t he?”

“He did.” Jules smirks, her fingers brushing the sapphire and ruby rings on her left hand. “It’s highly effective. You can’t jump. You can’t walk away. You sit in a metal cage suspended eighty feet in the air, and you finally use your words, Sloane.”

My lungs tighten.

The image flashes in my brain. Suspended in the dark. The cold night air. Cole sitting inches away, his long legs bumping against mine, those dark eyes pinning me down without a single weapon between us. The sheer, unadulterated vulnerability of the scenario terrifies me more than stepping into the trajectory of a speeding knife.

I won’t have control. I won’t have a task to focus my hands. I’ll just have the truth burning a hole in my chest.

Wren reaches across the counter. Her warm fingers wrap over my knuckles, a gentle, anchoring pressure. “You trust him, Sloane,” she murmurs. “You trusted him with your body. You trusted him with your darkest secrets. Trust him with this.”

I look at the three women surrounding me. They didn’t build their lives by playing it safe. Jules hunted cult-related disappearances. Nova stabbed her abuser and ran. Wren walked away from a safe, quiet clinic to travel with a man who couldn’t bear the brush of a sleeve. They survived by stepping directly into the fire.

If I want the life Cole offered me, I have to step into the fire, too.

I pull a long, deep breath into my chest. I square my shoulders, the iron returning to my spine.

“Do it.”

Jules’s grin turns lethal. She pulls her phone from her back pocket, already dialing. “I’ll call El. Wren, go find Cole and tell him Sloane needs him at the midway. Tell him it’s urgent.”

Wren slides off the stool, grabbing her jacket from the back of the couch. “On it.”

Nova leans back against the leather cushions. “I expect full details tomorrow over breakfast, Archer. If you don’t make that man cry, I’ll be deeply disappointed.”