Chapter 8

His fingers dug into me until my hand went nerveless, the knife dropping from it to fall into the lake. Filled to bursting with helpless rage, I shouted in his face. “Damn you! How? How can you be so perfect?”

He smiled that infuriatingly calm smile at me. “I’m hardly perfect. But if I let go, will you stop trying to murder me for the moment?”

I hissed in rage and threw my weight suddenly backwards, pulling us both over into the water. I immediately rolled, trying to pin him. Perhaps if I couldn’t stab him, I could drown him. He kept rolling, though, I couldn’t get him pinned. Instead I was the one who wound up on my back under him in the shallow water. He held me beneath it just long enough for panic to join rage within me, then sat back, pulling my head above the water. He still held both wrists firmly. I drew a deep breath, then cursed him once more.

He shook his head at me. “You don’t really want to murder me, you know. There’s no sensible reason for you to.”