Killian Carson is a predator cloaked in sophistication. Composed with the poise of a gentleman and instinct of a predator, he walked unseen among society. He’s cold-blooded, manipulative, and savage. No one sees the devil crawling beneath his skin, digging its nails into his skin until it feels like a loose sheet against his figure.
Except for one: an unfortunate university student from the neighboring campus.
Killian’s empathy unraveled young—quietly, like thread slipping from a spool. By the time he was sixteen, he’d learned how to mimic smiles, script charm, and feign interest in things he’d never feel. People were puzzles to solve, not souls to care for.
But her—she disrupted the pattern.
He watched her like a starving thing watches a flame: mesmerized, dangerous, drawn too close. Not out of love—he didn’t understand love—but out of something far more primal.
When his girl asked him, ‘do you love me’, he could never reply with a simple, ‘yes’.
How could he reply ‘yes’, if he didn’t know what love is?
After a long night, she lay docile in his arms—quiet, trusting, unaware.
His bare chest rose and fell beneath her cheek, moonlight catching the inked crows that sprawled across his ribs, their wings etched in black and menace. His hand moved through her hair with a softness that didn’t belong to a man like him—measured, almost reverent.
As if, for a singular moment, the predator forgot what he was.