Part One
HALLOWED GROUND
You must be dead, because I don’t know how to feel. I can’t feel anything anymore.
—Elliott, E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial, 1982
Riley’s not the same since she lost Eli. She’s . . . hardened. Closed down. She lets off just enough emotion to seem human. I can tell her brain has given up hope. But her heart hasn’t. And that makes her dangerous and unpredictable. If anything, I can read a woman. And I’m reading her right. Which means I’ll just have to keep a closer eye on her. She’ll either love me for it or kick my ass. I’m betting on the latter.
—Noah Miles
It’s cold here. Ice cold. The kind that burrows straight through your skin and jabs deep into your bones. I can’t shake it. I inhale, and that frigid air rushes down my windpipe and bangs into my lungs. It clings to my insides, and I puff it back out. Funny. No frosty air comes from my mouth. I’m more cold-blooded than warm-blooded, I think. My core temperature isn’t even human enough to heat my breath. What does that make me? Hell if I know. I don’t even know what I’m doing here. My eyes drifted shut, and the next thing I know, I’m here, in this place. Something wants me. That much I know. I can feel it.
As I jog up the darkened street, I notice how barren it is here, too. No trees. No grass. No shrubs. Not even a single bird. Only gray concrete, gray sidewalk, gray stone, gray sky. Even as I fine-tune my hearing, nothing happens. No beatings of hearts—not even a rat’s. Is there nothing alive here? Am I? Hell if I know.
I let my hands skim the building’s stone surface as I turn the corner. My body is pressed close to the stone, and I peer ahead. A heavy mist has crept in, fallen over the ground like some white vaporous blanket. It swirls around my feet as I walk, and the farther I go, the higher it climbs. Soon, it surrounds me. I see nothing. I hear nothing.
Then the stench knocks into me, full force. It’s many things, all rolled in one. Rancid old blood. Decay. Rotting human flesh. Scorched tissue. The more steps I take, the stronger the scent becomes. I follow it.
One second I’m on a cobbled road; the next I’m on the river’s bank. The mist rolls across the black water like a live thing, and the stench seems to come from below. The loch. I ease down the embankment. I stop at the water’s edge, and inhale. That horrible smell of death is coming from beneath the water.
“You’re so easy.” A voice sounds from behind me. “Too easy.”
That voice. I whip around, but the speaker’s strong arm has snaked around my throat and pulled me tightly against him. Yeah, a male. Big. Hard. The back of my head presses against his chest. There’s no heartbeat. What a shock.
Just as I move to raise my foot, his muscular leg traps mine. He drops his free arm over my breasts and pulls me closer. He thinks I’m thoroughly trapped. I let him think it. His head drops to my ear.
“I can’t decide if I want to fuck you, then kill you.” His graveled voice brushes against my cheek. “Or just kill you.” He pulls me closer, and I feel his hard cock press into my back. “Difficult decision.”
I look down at the arm holding me prisoner. Leather jacket, leather gloves. Vise as tight as iron. My head falls to the side, exposing my neck, and I move my ass seductively against his crotch. “How ’bout now?” I ask, my voice low, teasing. I peer into the loch, but it’s cloudy with mist. I can’t see his face. I can’t see anything.
His laugh against my throat is deep, more like a whisper. Edged with certain . . . hatred. Yet . . . there’s something about it. I don’t know. “Convince me,” he says. His teeth graze my skin. “Tell me what you’ll do to me if I let you live.” His lips move to the corner of mine, and it’s an achingly familiar gesture. “Make me want you.”
With slow, rhythmic pressure, I move against his groin, pushing against the thick bulge. His body tenses at my movement, and I know he’s turned on. I don’t know why, but I am, too. I gotta get my head back in the game. That is, to live.
“I can make you come without laying a hand on you,” I whisper, and I press my back into his chest.
His arm that is still banded over my breasts slides, and through the thin silk of my bra, his hand cups me. I press my ass against his crotch, and he hardens. “And how would you do that?” he whispers against my jaw.
“Because you’re going to touch me,” I answer, and before the words fully leave my mouth, his hand leaves my breast and skims my stomach. “And when you do, I’ll explode.” A moan escapes my throat, and my vision blurs. I blink. I gotta get it together. “And you won’t be able to help yourself. You’ll come.”
His gloved hand moves over my hip, over my groin, and I thrust against him. He cups me, his thumb pressing against me through my jeans. Just as the climax starts, his grip relaxes and he starts to turn me around. I go limp, and slide to the ground. In the next second, I leap, and I land, crouched, about ten feet away. Through the mist, I blink. The orgasm still lingers, and I will it away.