Page 48 of Kat Bethel

So why was he answering the question as if I were looking for a human answer?

“What are you?” I clarified.

“The humans call me Ruin.”

I gritted my teeth together. Another deflection.

“Your fire is so…” His words turned into a needy groan that made my stomach flutter with desire that made shame course through me. As if he didn’t even have a word to describe me. His hand cupped my face, caressing my cheekbone like I was fragile instead of a hunter.

I narrowed my eyes at him, but his chuckle crawled under my skin and sank deeper inside me than I cared to admit. “What are you?”

“Something that destroys everyone he touches.” At least he gave me a small piece of information.

One that made me pause and my heart race. “Not me.”

“Except you.” The reverence in his voice touched that place inside me that quivered for more.

He stepped impossibly closer to me until there was less than an inch separating us. I tried to put a hand between us, but I went right through him. A thousand questions filled my mind, and it took a long while to settle on one. “Did a witch curse you?”

I avoided Margaret’s name, hopefully avoiding the same outburst as yesterday. It was hard to tell without a face, but I could swear disappointment wafted off of him.

“She would never hurt me.”

“My kind hurts a lot of people.” The Rinah name was a stain on this Earth.

The walls turned dingy yellow and the wood in the room darkened and crumbled. “She didn’t.”

“Yeah, right.” I rolled my eyes.

He grabbed my arm in a painful grasp that felt like a warning not to push it further. I yanked my arm, but he held firm. “One second I was a man being executed for murder, and the next thing I knew I was this.”

There was more that he was hiding.

He was a fucking liar.

“I liked you better when you were pretending you weren’t here.”

He chuckled darkly, “You don’t mean that.”

I hated that he was right.

“I’m not going to be her replacement.” I spat the words with more venom than I could have thought possible, and I wasn’t even sure why I said them.

I wasn’t competing with a witch from hundreds of years ago.

I shouldn’t have been competing. Period.

That didn’t stop the rage that boiled over.

Before I could say the next words full of fury, his lips landed on mine. I jerked away, but he held me in place. His lips encouraged my tense mouth to relax. I fought to hold onto my anger, even trying to bite him.

But my body melted into him when his arms wrapped around me.

Damn it.He was comfortable.

Which was the stupidest thought possible.

“Jealousy looks good on you,” he said once I was breathless. His voice carried the edge of a growl that made me shake with desire. “But ‘tis unnecessary.”