Sacrifice Me: The Darkness (Episode 3) Read Free Page A

Franki.”
    “He said things,” I repeated. I hadn’t
wanted to mention my mother, but it was becoming impossible to hide
from him. “He told me my mother was dead.”
    Rend’s eyes snapped to my face, questioning.
“What?” He shook his head. “Your mother? How would
a guy like that know your mom?”
    “I have no idea,” I said. “I
haven’t seen her in three years. She took off on my eighteenth
birthday without so much as a note to say goodbye. Now this creepy
guy tells me I look like her and that she’s dead. He threatened
me, Rend. He told me his associate had his eye on me and that they
were going to play games with me. He told me I’d make a good
sacrifice. I couldn’t just let him walk away after that. I
wanted answers.”
    Rend grabbed his hair into his fist and paced the
floor in front of me. “This doesn’t make any sense,”
he said. “What kind of sacrifice?”
    “I don’t know. He said I would have to
die.” My voice came out like a scared third grader’s,
high-pitched and terrified. “I couldn’t just let him
threaten me and then walk away. I had to follow him.”
    “Dammit, Franki, he wanted you to follow
him. He was playing with you,” he said. “And you just
walked right into it. He could have killed you. What if he had taken
you out of here? I might not have been able to find you.”
    “I didn’t say it was the smartest
thing I ever did, but he really got to me.”
    “You should have come to find me before you
went after him,” he said.
    “Look, I know you said you want to protect
me, but you can’t possibly keep an eye on me at all times,”
I said. “And just because I agreed to work here does not mean
you own me. I am still free to make my own decisions, even if they’re
stupid ones. Even if I end up dead, it’s my life to lose.”
    I was yelling at him. Here he was sticking his
neck out for me and I was yelling at him. The guy got under my skin
in more ways than one.
    Anger flashed in his eyes and he moved so close,
my back pushed against the wall. He placed his palm flat against the
wall beside my head, leaning in.
    “Why are you so determined to drive me
insane?”
    “Why do you care what happens to me?”
I asked, breathless.
    “I don’t know,” he said, his
eyes locked on mine. “I haven’t been able to get you out
of my mind since the moment I first saw you standing there at the
bar.”
    My heart pounded in my throat and I couldn’t
help myself. I looked down at his lips again, just inches from my
own. There was no denying how much I wanted him.
    “I don’t let women get to me like
this,” he said, his voice low and rough. “You’ve
got me all mixed up.”
    His hand traveled slowly down the wall, grazing
the edge of my shoulder and arm. I could feel the heat of him even
through the jacket.
    I never wanted a piece of clothing gone so badly
in my life.
    “I want to protect you, Franki,” he
said, softening. His hand moved to my hip. “You’re making
that incredibly difficult.”
    “I’m sorry,” I whispered.
    His eyes were as black as night, the silver
running through them like stars, flashing in the near-darkness.
    “I’m in a very dangerous position
here,” he said. “I run this place with a strict code.
When a woman comes to work for me, I vow to protect her from the
dangers she may encounter here. In order to do that for the entire
staff, I have to keep my head on straight. I have to watch out for
them at all times, the best I can. I can’t get involved on a
more... intimate level.”
    I shivered at his words.
    “Then why are you standing so close to me?”
I said.
    The air in the space between us was electric. I
wanted so badly to touch him. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and
close that small space that kept us apart.
    “Because I can’t seem to help myself
around you,” he said, his eyes darting across my face, studying
every inch of my expression.
    My body ached for him. How could such little space
feel like a cavern between