all her years as a cop she’d never once seen a criminal act as though they were frightened. Even more startling was the whimper she heard fall from his mouth. In that moment her action s faltered. She just couldn’t do it. How could she hurt a man who had shown her more gentleness in one day than her husband had in their entire relationship even if he was a criminal?
Vicky suddenly felt as though she was being split in half. Every inch of her ached to follow the law and turn him in yet there was something in the back of her mind that made her hesitate. It was like a small voice in the back of her head that told her there was more to the story than would be explained if she handed him in and let the law take its toll. She needed to know the truth.
With a deep sigh she dropped her hands to her sides, placing the safety catch back on the gun before placing it back on the kitchen counter. Tristen remained where he was for a few moments. When he finally looked up at her with an expectant expression as though he was still waiting for her to hit him, his eyes grew wide. She pulled her pyjama top tighter around her naked body as she felt him staring at her.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Get up,” Vicky told him as she headed over to the mattress and threw herself down onto it. She no longer cared about the sanity of the apartment. She still felt weak from their encounter earlier that morning and all she wanted to do was close her eyes and sleep.
“I’ll give you two choices,” she explained as she turned over to look up at him, “You can either keep me here and follow through with whatever crazy plan you had for me or you can let me go.”
“What? Why would you do that? You had the gun,” Tristen’s voice became high with disbelief, “You could have killed me. You could have turned me in and gone back to your life.”
“You’ve seen my life. It’s not much worth living for. Besides I’m fed up of violence. I give up.” Vicky threw her hands in the air and huffed as they collapsed back onto the mattress beside her. Tristen leaned back against the wall and ran his fin gers through his dark hair.
Chapter Six
Shortly after Tristen grabbed his jacket and headed back out of the apartment. He locked the door behind him leaving Vicky wondering what the hell she had just done. She could have been free by now. She could have taken him straight to the police station and he would have been in a cell within minutes. Instead she’d let her emotions get the better of her. It was the first time in her career that anything like this had ever happened to her. Ian had been the only one to ever have this kind of effect on her. Yet now as she thought about it she realized that even Ian never made her feel this way.
As she lay thinking she found herself drifting off. Her uncomfortable night on the bathroom floor had taken its toll almost as much as Tristen’s attack. Before long she had slipped into a deep sleep.
A hand stroked down her bare back. Her breath caught in her throat as a burning sensation lingered where the soft finger tips had been. She closed her eyes and fought to hold on to the feeling. When she felt the caress of lips on her shoulder she turned over slowly letting out a small groan. Tristen leaned over her with a bright, handsome smile that was filled with happiness. His hand rose to her cheek and for the first time in five years she didn’t flinch at a man’s touch. His fingers twirled a strand of her wavy blonde hair as he leaned down and placed a chased kiss on her parted lips. His tongue ran along her top lip and she her whole body shivered as his teeth gently dug into her flesh. A groan escaped her throat as every nerve under her skin begged for his touch. Her long finger nails dug into the soft satin sheets of the bed as his hand
Learning to Kill: Stories