“So if I call IISS what happens again?” she fished.

He didn’t reply and she hadn’t expected him to, but nothing ventured nothing gained. Sometimes you could trick an answer out of someone. He’d already given her as much of an answer as he would and it had been a complete nonanswer: hope you never find out.

His finger moved slowly over a long thin scar close to her spine. “Knife?”

“Whip with steel points.”

He touched a spray of white bumps. “Shrapnel?”

“Blow-dart gun.” Filled with tiny crystalized rocks. Blown by a beast on a planet of eternal night.

“This?” He touched a messy, shallow one near her hip.

“Fell down a cliff. Did that one myself.”

“Stay or go?”

“The scars? Stay. I earned them.”

He laughed. After a moment she felt something very like the tip of a knife at the base of her spine. “I’m one inch away from ripping out your throat,” she said softly.

“Blood binds. I need some of yours to set this layer of the spell.”

“How much?”

“Minor.”

“You’re mixing yours with it.”

“Yes.”

Blood spells had nasty, pervasive side effects. This man’s blood in hers was not something she wanted. His tattoo, however, was. “Proceed,” she said without inflection.

He did, and she found herself slipping back into that strange, almost dreamy place she’d been in since he’d begun inking her. As he’d worked, his big strong hands moving with precision against her skin, the angry thrumming in her body had faded, her muscles had stilled, her tension calmed. She was having a hard time remembering what had driven her out into the streets today on such a murderous rampage. Languor infused her limbs and her stomach no longer hurt. Her psyche was beginning to feel drowsy and relaxed, as if she could just stretch out and sleep for a long, long time and not have to worry while she did because this man would stand guard and she could rest knowing that whatever predators were on this world, the world’s greatest predator was right next to her and she was sa—

She sat up straighter, flexed her muscles and snapped back into high alert.

There was no such thing as safe. Safe was a trap, an ideal that could never be achieved. And hero worship was pointless. There were no heroes. Only her.

Behind her, he said, “You don’t have to be on guard all the time. Nothing can hurt you here.”

He was wrong. Anytime there was another person in the room with you, the possibility for hurt existed.

“You’re doing something to me,” she accused.

“I can have a certain…agitating effect on a woman.”

He meant “whip her into a frenzy.” She’d seen him do it.

“I can also have a gentling one.”

“Stop it. I didn’t ask for it.”

He pressed his wrist to the base of her spine, held it a long moment, no doubt melding blood with blood, then said, “That’s it for tonight.”

“Finish it,” she demanded. “I know you can.” There was a sudden coldness behind her as the heat of his body vanished.

Her shirt hit her in the shoulder, and after a moment she yanked it on over her bra, knowing it was pointless to argue. She stood, stretched, and turned around.

“Tell me what happened to you in the Silvers and I’ll finish it.”

They looked at each other across the space of the chair. “I grew up,” she said.

“The long version.”

“That was it. You said you’d give me the map.”

He tossed it to her and she caught it with one hand, slipped it into her pack. Of course he’d give it to her now. He knew she’d return for the tattoo. She’d wanted the map for two reasons: to test theories on the smallest of the holes, and alert people of their precise locations to avoid inadvertent deaths. Of far greater importance was finding a way to remove the cosmic leeches from the fabric of their reality.

“Tomorrow night, same time?” she said.

“I’m busy tomorrow night.”

Fucker. He was going to dick with her about finishing the tat?

He herded her to the door with his presence, subtly yet irrefutably.

“Got a date with Jo?” she said coolly.

“Jo’s fucking Lor.”

She looked at him. “How did that happen? Lor does blondes. And I thought you and Jo were exclusive.” She hadn’t believed that for a moment. Jo wasn’t Ryodan’s type.

His cool eyes lit with amusement. “It was a getting-over-the-ex fuck. And now they’re both tangled up in it.”

She arched a brow. “You dumped her, so she pulled a revenge fuck?”

“She dumped me. And her take on it was ‘scraping the taste of me off her tongue.’ ”

No woman dumped Ryodan. Or scraped the taste off. If Jo had, he’d not only let her, but set the plan in motion. “What are your plans for tomorrow night? Cancel them. This is more important. I could get lost,” she ordered.

“I suggest you avoid mirrors until we complete it. Day after. My office in the morning. I’ll finish it.”

“Tomorrow. During the day.”

“Busy then, too.”

Why was he delaying? What was his motive? “I’ll just let myself out.”

“You won’t. You have the sword. I have patrons. I plan to keep them.”

She was silent a moment then said, “I won’t kill any of them, Ryodan. I’ll respect your territory.”