dragged in. I liked her full attention and smart mouth. But what I really liked was her heart—the pliable organ in her chest I could mold to fit my hand like Play-Doh. Her tears, her trusting eyes, her fucking existence—all of it made it impossible to imagine her walking away from me while I watched from a distance, my palm containing a remnant of sticky yellow Play-Doh I’d never be able to wash off. My thumb pressed down on her lips, smearing my inner turmoil across the soft pout of her mouth. Her lack of self-preservation used to amuse me; now, it made me want to keep her locked in a bulletproof room only I had access to. And I didn’t currently have one of those. “Stupid kotyonok,” I growled in frustration. Those cat-shaped eyes that originally gave her the nickname narrowed, and she jerked free from my grip. “You’re the stupid one lying here bleeding out.” Now, she was moy kotyonok because she was sickly sweet until she bared her claws. Grabbing her by the throat, I tugged her lips to mine. She exhaled into my mouth, the slide of my tongue cutting off her protests. She braced her hands beside my head in an effort to keep her body weight off mine. Pd been shot in the arm, not the chest, though somehow, it felt like the latter when she was around. I nipped at her lips and feeling the wetness on her cheeks that belonged to me, I grew harder. “No,” she breathed into my mouth, trying to pull away from me, but my body took it figuratively—as in, fucking forever—and my grip tightened, the chaos inside me rising to the surface. She turned her head. “Ronan .. . no.” “What did I say about that word?” “You’re bleeding. Badly.” She sounded so distressed, I relaxed my grip but couldn’t stop myself from running my mouth down her neck, leaving a mark on her in the only way I knew how. Releasing her flesh with a scrape of teeth, I said, “That’s what happens when you get shot.” “You need to go to the hospital.” She struggled against me. “Seriously, what are you doing lying here?”