Page 7 of Bound in Ashes

Then he grabbed my chin, locking his gaze with mine for one long, breath-stealing moment.

I was struck again by what this man did to me.

Because the fear was still there, chased by something else.

Something addictive, dangerous, like Jack.

I hadn’t been blessed with the kind of parents who warned me away from playing with fire, but I understood that warning now.

Knew that I wouldn’t heed it.

So I stood, looking at Jack as he looked at me.

His gaze, sharp, intense, all-seeing, assessed me from head to toe.

Then he grabbed my shoulders and turned me, and even though I wasn’t facing him, I felt the piercing weight of his gaze.

He turned me back.

Met my eyes again.

Grabbed my chin again.

The tremble in his hands was gone, but he still looked at me with ferocious intensity.

“Do you want to fucking die?” he gritted out through clenched teeth.

He waited like he expected me to answer the question.

And knowing Jack, he did expect me to.

“Who are you?”

I was so distracted that it took me a moment to recognize it was Uncle Levi talking.

Jack ignored him, and I did the same.

My voice light, I answered his question with one of my own. “What kind of question is that, Jack?”

He still gripped my chin, his hold increasing ever so slightly.

I couldn’t help but think back to the courthouse.

I hadn’t been sure I wasn’t in a nightmare.

Hadn’t been sure that he wasn’t a monster, too.

Still wasn’t, but I continued to hold his gaze.

“I told you to go in the house, Asia.” His voice was quiet and all the more terrifying for it.

“And leave you out there alone?”

His nostrils flared, his dark eyes sparking with intensity.

He shook his head. “You’re so fucking stupid.”

“That doesn’t carry much weight coming from you,” I countered.