Ryder

twenty eight

Ryder's POV

There was a single, hesitant pause before the insistent knocking resumed, and I knew without needing to move that it was Rafael on the other end of the closed front doors.

Of course, it was Rafael. I was the one who'd made the call. Though he still had an infuriating tendency to show up whenever I was about to do something highly questionable, in his words. Something that I shouldn't be doing, which were also words he'd said to me.

Because he thought he knew me, and maybe he did in that regard at least. Him showing up here right now still didn't mean I wasn't already thinking of ten ways to make his death quick and the least distracting--in seconds maybe and without any more obstructions from him.

Can't kill him, I reminded myself. Rafael was a pain to be around but he was useful. I couldn't just kill him, could I?

I looked away from the door and back at Alice, who I'd noticed had stiffened, although not in a way that told me she was about to push herself away from me.

I found myself staring into her eyes once again, the warm brown of them so addicting, and reminded myself that I was going to be the one to let go again. Like always. It is better that way, I told myself because that was a rational thought, one that made sense, as my fingers loosened around the soft, velvet strands of her hair. I let them fall against my fingers, just for a second, and cradled the back of her head.

She gazed up at me, still staring at me with her lips parted, waiting, worried--a temptation I didn't think I had in me to just brush past. How was I to--

"Wait," she blurted out, the hand on my shirt that was clenched into a fist tightening in response.

I'd only just started to mentally pull myself away from this tiny predicament, not even doing it physically, yet Alice had somehow known. I frowned, confused.

"Wait." She said it again, eyes pleading. "Just...just promise me we'll talk about this later and not ignore it entirely."

I have been ignoring it entirely, I almost said, but that wouldn't be the truth and I'd never lied to her before. I didn't want to start now.

"What is there to talk about?" I asked her and loosened my grip on her hair even further, reminding myself to be careful near the bandage on her neck. She hadn't wished me to be careful a few minutes ago, I remembered, so I pulled her closer by the neck until I felt her press against me--the sweet, warm press of her body against mine. "What is this?"

Why don't you ever let me touch you, she'd asked. How was I to tell her that touching her, the way I wanted to, the way she needed me to, might only end with her seeing all the ruins? My ruins.

Her eyes widened and the worry in them was slowly washed away by something else. Something soft and pliant and so goddamn innocent. Something like pure, selfish need. I gripped her near the base of her neck, tracing my other hand down the curve of her back, her waist. I could touch her and I could give her anything she wanted in that moment. I could've selfishly taken anything from her. But maybe only that moment. I'd give it all to her and I'd pull her in with me, into me, and when the dark will catch up to me, because it will, it would also claw its way inside her.

Did I wish for it to end that way, knowing that my life had never really been my own?

"What is this, Alice?" I asked her again, felt the way she refused to look away from me, wished I could give in and trace the red heat creeping down the pale skin of her throat, needing to know how far it traveled. It was a wild need, a dark hunger growing inside me and I'd fucking known deep down how terrible of an idea this would be from the moment I'd laid my eyes on her. On her honey-brown eyes that had held me still like no other.