Hot for Slayer (Scared Sexy Collection) - 11

O ver the centuries, I’ve battled Lazlo more times than I can count. If there is one thing I’m certain of, it’s that when it comes to physical strength and fighting skills, he and I are equals.

That’s why it makes absolutely no sense that only a couple of seconds pass between the time I start running in his direction and the moment the blade of my dagger touches the ink wrapped around his neck.

Sure, he’s a little banged up. But I’m still bleeding profusely from where the vampire gnawed at me, which means that we’re both in poor shape.

And yet, here I am. Looking up at him with my knife at his neck, trapping his larger body against the wall with no difficulty. I have, at last, the opportunity to excise him from my life once and for all.

It would be so, so freeing. It might take fifty, even one hundred, years before the Guild finds someone else to hunt my bloodline. It would earn me decades of not watching my back. Of not having to move to a new continent because my hideout was discovered. Of peace .

And yet, I hesitate.

Do it. Do it now. He’s not the person who snored in your ear at two a.m. Who pretended to no longer understand the rules of cribbage once you started beating him. He’s not the man who kissed you. He wouldn’t have done any of it, not if he’d remembered what you are. He finds you disgusting. He hates you. His entire purpose is to eliminate you, which . . .

Doesn’t explain why his eyes, all of a sudden, seem so soft. Or the fact that instead of pushing me away, instead of hitting back with his own weapons and his own strength, he touches me tenderly. One hand lifts to cup my face, and he gently thumbs my cheekbone.

“What are you . . . ?” My voice trembles. I can’t bring myself to finish the question.

“Aethelthryth,” he says, calm. His voice is the same as it was before the attack, and yet completely different. He is the man who saved my life two days ago, the man who kissed me, the man who cleaned up the mess I made in my kitchen, but also something more. “If you want to kill me, I’m not going to stop you. But first, I’m going to need you to tell me something.”

I feel disoriented. As though someone is spinning me around blindfolded to make fun of the way I stumble to my knees. There must be something I’m missing. I certainly don’t know why I let him lean even closer to me, his own movements causing my knife to press against his throat and break the skin. The scent of his blood melts into me, tantalizingly sweet. His lips find my ear, and he asks, “Where do you think I’ll go once I’m dead?”

And then it’s my turn to remember.