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And I sat there and wondered whether I was the only person alive who had ever been given this side of him. Then he put his hand flat on my chest, over my heart, and left it there for a second. Because his care wasn’t over.

“You are crashing,” he said.

“I’m fine,” I said automatically, like I always do.

“You’re pale, your hands have not stopped shaking and you have not eaten since lunch.” He was already going into his pocket.

“Do not fight me on this, Anna.” This came out firm enough that I didn’t have it in me to fight him as he brought out a fun-size bar and peeled the wrapper back with his thumb.

I took it with hands I still couldn’t hold still, so he covered them with his own, enveloping them completely and keeping them steady.

“Good girl,” he praised as I took my first bite and he didn’t look away once until the color started coming back into my face.

He fed me chocolate minutes after he killed for me.

I swear, I will be carrying that one to my grave.

“Up,” he ordered suddenly the second I was finished, taking the empty wrapper from me and tossing it into the trash. He also didn’t wait for me to ask why or for me to make a move on my own. As the next thing I knew he got his hands under my arms and stood me on my feet and held on until he was satisfied that my legs were up to the task.

“Your keys.” His next demand had me frowning up at him and when I wasn’t quick enough, he held his hand out expectantly. And that was all it took for me to reach into my pocket and unclip them from the material and put them into his large palm. I didn’t even ask why.

“And your lanyard.” He nodded to what he knew was hanging around my neck because he had seen it when taking off my top.

So, I gave him that too and again, didn’t ask when I knew I should have. He put both in his pocket and had already decided the next thing he wanted to take. Which was why he took my face in both hands and tipped it up and kissed my forehead like he was proud of me for trusting him without question. Foolishly, I closed my eyes as the warm feeling rolled through me.

“What happens now?” I whispered, because we were still standing in a room with a dead man on the floor and a shit load of evidence. Something he didn’t seem in the slightest bit concerned with, which perhaps made me question his sanity for the first time.

Especially when his thumb moved once along my cheekbone.

“Now… now is when you trust me,” he replied, and I opened my mouth with a but already on my tongue when suddenly…

The lights went out.

All of them.

The whole corridor, the whole wing, the sensor lights, the strip over the cabinets, everything gone between one breath and the next. And the dark that came down was total and scared the crap out of me. Yet he didn’t make a sound, as if he had been expecting it and as for me, I grabbed onto the monster in the room as he was the only thing that could protect me.

“What’s happening?” I asked in panic as both hands gripped his bare arm and held on for dear life.

And in the black, very close to my ear, his lips lowered to my neck. He was perfectly calm.

“Change of plans, little bird,” he told me softly and before I could ask what he meant, he got there first…

“It’s time to say goodbye to this life.”

38

TOUCH HER AND DIE

ANNA

“Goodbye to this life.”

I heard it the way you hear a word in another language and understand it about a second later.

“What does that mean?” I asked pulling back slightly, something he didn’t like as I felt him step back into my space in the dark.

He also didn’t answer me, and it only managed to freak me out even more. Instead, he ran his hand down my arm and took my hand. Then he laced his fingers through mine the way you would with somebody you were taking home, and he pulled me toward the doorway.