A Beautiful Crime

Chapter 20

Carina POV

We haven't said a word to one another.

And while I'm seething in my silence Constantine seems to be basking in it. Which only adds fuel to the fire coursing through my veins.

I've never known the true feeling of bloodlust before, but in this moment I'm consumed by it.

And I won't be satisfied until I have a pound of his flesh.

Dangerously I eye the steak knife placed on the right hand side of my dish.

"You haven't ate anything," Constantine says after biting into a piece of his rare steak. Even something as mundane as eating he proves can be an aphrodisiac. And while it may have affected me greater I'm still holding onto my anger.

And it comes out when I reply with snark, "I'm beyond pleased you can point out the obvious, Signore. Tell me, what more talents do you have?"

He hums without amusement. His head tilts to the side as his eyes assess me. I feel as if I'm under a microscope and he's picking my wings apart. "Careful, Carina," he warns me and I immediately want to defy him, "or you'll be seeing yourself over my knee with my handprint on your delectable ass."

White anger flashes through me like a live wire as I grind down on my teeth. "I'm not a child who needs punishment."

He hums again. "Then perhaps you should stop behaving like one." My eyes widen. When I go for a rebuttal, surely with my sharp tongue, he intercepts. "Except something tells me you would find pleasure in it."

Oh, I am vibrating with fury. To even suggest I would like pain after the brutality I've suffered. "You are no gentleman," I spit.

His eyes sparkle with mischief and the smirk on his face promises it. "I see pointing out the obvious is a talent of yours as well."

I've never known a man as infuriating as him. It's as if he knows every one of my buttons, buttons I don't even know I have, and succeeds in pushing them all.

The man is provoking me on purpose.

He's always provoking me. All to gain a reaction.

And I am giving it to him without resistance.

God damn him.

My hand without thought gravitates towards the steak knife. My fingers itch to wrap themselves around the handle.

And the most depraved thought crosses my mind. Would his flesh break easier than this tender piece of meat?

As he bites into another piece of steak I take hold of the knife.

To my horror it feels right. Holding this knife, in this manner, with my impure twisted thoughts, it feels like an extension of my hand.

"Unless you are going to do something with it I suggest you drop it." Constantine eyes the knife in my hand with a bored expression. Intuitively I know he's done calculated every move I can possibly make. He isn't afraid of a mere knife. He wouldn't even be afraid of a machine gun.

I eye the knife and then him. And although I tell myself I would never bring any harm to him I don't drop the knife. "Are you challenging me?"

He drops his own cutlery, pushing his plate which is only half eaten to the side. He raises a brow at me. "And why would I do that?"

My nostrils flare. "Don't attempt to be funny. You are challenging me. All you ever do is challenge me!" Unable to contain my anger I rise from my seat and tread across the hardwood floors driven by no plan but only by intense emotion.