Page 41 of Temptation
“Sloane?” His frown deepened as he eyed her reaching fingers.
“Trying to…” Ah, there. She touched him. Patted him. “Comfort you.”
“The fuck?”
She nodded. “If you were closer, I’d give you a hug.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re hurting.” Obviously. “And I made you hurt. So I want to make it better.”
“You just told me that my own father tried to kill me.”
It hadn’t just been his father who tried to kill him. But she could not tell him those words even as she remembered Mary Jean’s trembling voice telling her, “I had the baby, and I knew he was a monster. He had to be. Just like his father. I thought…I have to stop him. I can’t let him grow up to be as evil as Mitchell. He’ll kill. He’ll hurt. He’ll destroy…just like Mitchell. So I…I put the baby’s head under the bath water…just for a moment. A moment too long and then…”
“Sloane?”
Dammit. She was crying. But Sloane couldn’t help it.
Horrified by her own actions, Mary Jean had rushed the baby to the fire department. She’d left him there. Right outside the bay doors. Never looked back. Or so she claimed.
“Nature or nurture,” Sloane whispered. “That’s always been the big debate. And if nature didn’t do the job, then your father wanted to step in and nurture you.”
He was still staring at her outstretched hand. “He…wasn’t my father.”
“He killed at least seven people. You were the only one to survive. You had to wonder why.”
“He wasn’t my father.”
“I came to town because I wanted to talk to you. I wanted?—”
Preston took a step back. One, then another. “You wanted to research me. You wanted me to be a rat in a cage for you.”
No.
“Instead, you became a rat in a coffin with me.” A cold smile spread across his handsome face. “How does it feel to be part of the experiment?”
It feels like shit.
“Or was that part of the experiment? Were you in on my attack? Did you help plan what happened? Was trapping me in a coffin and burying me alive sort of immersion bullshit?”
Her eyes widened.
“Come on. Don’t look surprised. I survived a serial killer’s attack. You think I haven’t done my own deep dive into psychology? You think I haven’t explored all the darkness out there?”
“I—”
“I know the dark, and the dark knows me.”
This was getting out of control. Hah. Getting? It had been out of control from the beginning. “I had nothing to do with the attack.”
“No? You didn’t arrange to give yourself a firsthand view of my potential descent into madness in that coffin? You didn’t plan it all out so that your friends could save you before things went too far and we both died?”
“I did not. I had nothing to do with our burial.” A big stress on the our part of that sentence.
“If you didn’t, then who did? Because the Last Breath Killer is dead in the ground, Sloane. I’ve lived for years without any threats. But the instant you show up in town, I’m targeted. Tell me how that shit makes sense. Tell me. I am dying to hear your answer. Tell. Me.”
She couldn’t. “Maybe it’s really unfortunate timing?”
