Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 127484 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 510(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127484 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 510(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
She started toward the axe, but I stepped in her path.
She stopped, looking up at me. There should’ve been fear in her eyes. Terror. I could see shades of it now, but it mixed with that lightness that shouldn’t exist in my presence. My presence alone should’ve snuffed out every inch of light.
“I can’t let you use that axe,” I informed her. My muscles were taut, the effort it took to keep my form still, my expression blank, was more than I’d ever expended in a simple interaction.
She tilted her head to regard me. “Because you think I’ll try to hack you into little pieces and escape?”
I thinned my lips, answering her with a curt nod.
She laughed.
Laughed.
The sound warmed up the room that had previously felt frosty.
Her laugh cut through layers of steel and ice, penetrating right to the core of me, finding something soft and pliant, something I didn’t even know I had inside me.
Her face quickly turned faux serious, presumably because she realized I hadn’t so much as smiled. “I’m a little squeamish, so axe murdering is a little too grizzly for me,” she said dryly. “And the process of using an axe to cut up a human being sounds overly tiring. Especially since I doubt you’d go quietly.”
I struggled to keep my composure as she pointedly looked me up and down. Her eyes on me were a physical fucking thing.
Walking around each day, I felt lifeless. I knew logically that my heart was pumping blood to my limbs, my organs were functioning correctly, and I was medically alive. But despite that, I was sure I was dead inside, a sociopath. I didn’t feel things the way other people did. Nothing warmed me.
Except her smile.
Her laugh.
Her simple fucking gaze on me, bringing me to life. Like I hadn’t existed until she looked at me.
Whether or not she saw what she did to me was unclear. I hoped to fuck she didn’t because then I’d truly be fucked.
Apparently, she saw my silence as acquiescence since she skirted around me, grabbed the axe, hauled it over her shoulder and whistled as she exited the cabin, presumably to chop wood.
I didn’t stop her. Didn’t try to reassert dominance. A huge mistake since she needed to know I was the one in charge. But I was lost. I didn’t usually need to make an effort to exert dominance. I’d spent years, decades, honing myself into a weapon even the most obtuse people recognized and instantly submitted to.
Sure, I’d been challenged over the years, especially by idiots in Stone’s ranks, wrongly assuming my position was his right-hand, wanting to take that from me.
Few had tried to challenge me, and those who did had perished. The stories were now infamous in the ranks, and no one had dared go against me since. Not in a long while.
Except Piper. My fucking captive.
The low thumps coming from outside told me she was chopping wood.
I should’ve ignored it. Even if she accidently chopped a finger off. That wasn’t my problem. Stone hadn’t specified whether she needed all of her digits, though I supposed that he’d be unhappy to find her maimed.
He was all about appearances, so he’d want a shiny, flawless wife, which I understood he could get out of Piper. Once I sucked all the vibrancy and will to live out of her.
I sighed and went to the dirty window that looked out at the overgrown yard where I’d seen a stump the previous inhabitant had used to chop wood.
The place had been abandoned for years. In the scant amount of time I’d had, I’d scouted it then done my research on the locals. I’d found someone, recently out of prison—rape and aggravated assault—and had paid him handsomely to outfit the cabin with what was needed. Then, ensuring that he hadn’t had time to open his mouth about the job done, I killed him.
He’d done a subpar job—everything was still overgrown, and the linens for the bed looked cheap and worn. But he’d obviously gotten wood to be chopped, just not chopped it himself.
Something that would’ve irritated me if not for the vision out the window. Piper, fluidly moving the axe up and down, a thin sheen of sweat already shining on her brow, making her chocolate-brown hair stick to her forehead.
She was not petite, not with the hills of her curves. But her body appeared delicate, not seemingly strong enough to lift the axe over her head, let alone use it to cleanly chop wood in two.
But that’s what she was doing. With confidence that told me she’d done this before. I watched, fucking entranced at the window, like some voyeur.
I’d done basic research on Piper. Surface level. Her job—kindergarten teacher. Her finances—enough to pay her bills and survive in Manhattan. Barely. Her social life—friends, but none who would cause me trouble. No boyfriend.