Page 99 of Villains Never Die

I lay in the crook of his arm, his forehead pressed to my temple, and both our pulses finally slowed from the last hour we’d spent fucking. We’d trashed the bedroom—a lamp broken, clothes everywhere, half the sheets hanging off the bed. There was nowhere I wanted to be more than in the middle of chaos with him.

“Thursday,” he said, drawing me back from idle sleepiness. “We’ll kill Emmett Thursday, and Monday, when the fights are off again, I’ll come help you with the Prague collection.”

“I said you don’t have to do that.”

“Sometimes you say stupid things.” He brushed his lips over my tense brow and sighed. “How do you want to deal with Emmett?”

“My power is the easiest way; how I killed the man at your club. I’ll be sick for a few hours afterward, but it will be cleanest.”

“May I suggest breaking into his house and waiting for him to come home?” Rook said.

I nodded against the pillow. “Too risky at the Council building, and maybe too many eyes in other places. I’ll get the address. It sounds like he’s been working late, but worst case scenario, he gets off at five, so we’ll have to set up mid-afternoon. Expect wards, maybe alarms and cameras. I can disable it all, and if you subdue him as soon as he walks in the door, we can use the element of surprise to avoid much of a fight.”

“It’s sexy when you’re all organized,” he joked. “I would tell you to shut that brain off and get some sleep, but you’re going to stay up all night examining every angle and possible setback for this whole plan.”

“Maybe not.”

He snapped his teeth over my earlobe and yanked. “Liar,” he whispered, his breath hot against my ear.

“Do you think I’m going to be cold forever?” I asked. Even with Rook next to me and a comforter pulled over my chest, I could feel the chill inside me fighting the warmth around me. “Literally. Ever since I predicted Gray’s death, I’m cold all the time.”

He shrugged. “No idea, but you’re going to be great company in the summer. I don’t have A/C here.”

I slapped his chest and glared at him. “It’s not a fucking joke. There’s something wrong with me. And why don’t you have A/C? You aren’t hurting for money.”

“I liked the apartment and the location, so I took the bad with the good.” He wrapped his fingers around my chin and tilted my head. “There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re perfect.”

I sighed into his mouth as he claimed my lips, but quickly pulled away. “It happened again.”

“A vision?” He slipped his arm from beneath me so he could prop himself up on it and see my face clearly. “Who was it?”

“I don’t know. It was vaguer this time, but I didn’t like the way it made me feel. It was just a heartbeat and blood, getting slower and slower, a clock ticking, and someone’s voice like I was listening to it through water.”

“Maybe it’s the next victim. The masked man is getting closer to you. You could be sensing what he’s going to do next.”

I closed my eyes and grumbled, “A lot of good that does me if I can’t see the person’s face.”

“You’ll figure it out. Maybe it’s the kind of thing that gets better with practice.”

“Practice?! I don’t want to practice predicting people’s deaths! I don’t want to be like this at all—”

He mashed two fingers into my lips to shut me up. “Maybe when you kill her, it will go away. Stay focused on what’s important. Now, you’re going to tell me every little detail of this Emmett plan that’s spinning in that pretty brain of yours until I fall asleep, and once you empty out all that anxiety, you’re going to doze off and not leave this bed until noon. Am I clear?”

“You want to go to sleep to the sound of me over analyzing?”

“Yep. It’s like a lullaby. Start talking.” He flipped onto his back and nuzzled deeper into the pillows, his lashes fluttering over his cheeks, and a small smile twirled in the corners of his lips. Ridiculous. That’s what he was.

And I loved him.

So I began.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Rain beat down in streams so thick they blinded me as I stared up at the white Renaissance revival where Emmett Graves lived. The house reminded me of its owner with its broadly arched entrance smiling and welcoming us toward the glass front door. It was bright, decorative, airy, refusing to be dimmed even by the storm, and I got the creepy impression that it would have extended a handshake, had it had arms to do it.

Rook whistled, and I whipped the water out of my eyes with my fingers before I turned to look at him. “And I thought your place was fancy.”

“You could live somewhere fancy too,” I reminded him. “You choose not to.”