BOUND

SHANNA HANDEL

BOUND Copyright © 2026 by Shanna Handel

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WELCOME TO YOUR NEXT OBSESSION

This is the Bachman Obsession Series. For the full emotional experience, the books should be read in order:

Author’s Note

The Bachman Obsession Series follows Lucian and Erin through one complete, four-book story.

He bought one night. She became his obsession.

One couple. Four books. A sweeping journey of high stakes, relentless conflict, and an obsession that only grows deeper with every page.

Bought

Betrayed

Burned

Bound

Book One: Bought

He paid for one night. He never expected to become obsessed.

I only needed money.

Enough to save my sister. Enough to protect my nephew. Enough to survive one impossible night and walk away with the cash.

So I walked into Lucian Bachman's penthouse with shaking hands, a fake name, and a secret that could get me killed.

He was supposed to be a transaction.

A dangerous, beautiful mafia king who bought my virginity like he bought everything else — with cold money, ruthless control, and the kind of dark promises no good girl should want.

His rules were simple.

But then I made him break them.

The Bachman Obsession is a dark mafia romance saga of obsession, betrayal, fire, and forever.

CHAPTER ONE

Erin

Iceland looks like the end of the world.

No…

It feels like we’re at the end of the world. We’ve been pushed so far from our lives in New York that it feels a bit like this trip signifies the end of our world as well. We’ve been chased around the globe by the past.

And now, we’re here.

Black land. White sky. Gray ocean splitting itself open against volcanic rocks. The house rises from the cliff like someone with a lot of money wanted a haunted getaway by the sea.

I’m guessing it’s gorgeous in summer.

Right now, it’s all cold and stone and wind and fog and jagged cliffs. Huge panes of glass face the sea. Wide black frames hold those windows together. A low dark metal roof slopes against the wind.

Lights glow inside, the only warmth against the endless gray sky.

Beautiful. Hard. Cold. Remote. Isolated. Lonely. Dark.

It is exactly the place a man like Lucian Bachman would build to keep his dark heart cold after almost burning in that fire.

But we bring the party.

We’ve more than survived our first full day here.

We’re thriving.

Cass and I mostly because we must hold it together for Ryan. And his sweet, sticky hugs are getting us through the day.

He brings a levity to the place I’m not sure we could breathe without.

Currently, his favorite pastime is flying around the place with that Superman towel tied around his neck in a makeshift cape.

We’re making it work.

Still, with the round-the-clock security, it’s a little suffocating.

Sometimes, I need air.

Right now, I’m standing in the cold, a scarf covering the lower half of my face as I brace against the wind. Cass and I came out here to let Ryan play and hopefully burn off some of his energy before dinner.

And we’re in desperate need of a sister debrief — a private chat. To our disappointment, a tiny army came with us.

There is no such thing as privacy in Lucian Bachman’s world.

Under the floodlights, I stand beside the armored SUV with Lucian’s oversized wool coat pulled tight around me and try not to shiver.

Lucian has not only trapped us in a bubble of security but also wrapped us in layer upon layer of protection from the weather. I’m wearing a couple grand worth of accessories from our shopping spree at Red Shutters: a tan-and-black Burberry checked scarf and glove set in a cashmere blend. Soft tan fleece-lined Hermès Norte boots cover my calves, and a black Moncler beanie Lucian pulled onto my head on my way out the door.

Cass is bundled in a cream coat with a pale orange scarf looped around her neck and a white hat with the largest pom-pom I’ve ever seen perched on the top of her head. She sits beside me as we watch a bundled-up Ryan try to make a snowball in his thickly padded gloves.

I stare out at the snow-scattered Icelandic beach below the cliff. “It looks like another planet.”

“Feels like it too,” she mutters, then glances at me. “No offense to your boyfriend’s kidnapping-vacation aesthetic.”

“He did not kidnap us.”

Cass gives me a look.

I sigh. “This time.”

Lucian stands several feet away, exchanging hushed words with Rafe and Bayne.

His head turns anytime Cass or I speak. His eyes find mine across the space between us.

Dark. Possessive. Exhausted.

Mine, those eyes say.

Yours, but free, mine say back.

The exchange is silent. Brutal in its intimacy.

Lucian has barely let me out of his line of sight since we arrived.

When I fell asleep last night, exhausted from our travels, I woke up three times to find him watching me.

Not sleeping. Not resting. Watching.

As if he looked away, I would vanish.

The first time, it broke my heart.

The second time, it scared me.

The third time, I pretended to stay asleep because I didn’t know what to do. I can’t never leave his side, yet I’ll do anything in my power to save him from hurting any more than he already has.

Now he moves closer, standing between me and the house and every inch of him is in control.

Red Shutters was supposed to be impossible to find. A small place tucked into Scotland’s bones. Bayne’s land. Bayne’s men. Bayne’s rules.

Carlos found it anyway.

I feel his attention on the side of my face. I try to avoid his gaze.

“Erin.” One word. My name, spoken low enough that only I hear it.

A command, a warning, and a caress, all in one word.

The front door opens before I can say something that gets me carried over his shoulder in front of everyone.

Warm light spills down the steps.

A woman in a black coat with ice-blonde hair that falls to her waist, the air of a queen about her, strides down the front steps in high-heeled black leather boots.

Even her name is beautiful and strong. Freya. A powerful Scottish woman, a lawyer and member of Bayne’s clan.

A woman with a seat at the table. A decision-maker. She’s come here today to decide if she’ll approve of Bayne’s men staying longer to help guard us, or if the risk is too much and she’ll be pulling them today.

Two men in dark suits follow her; the first is her husband, Frederick. I watch as he follows her to their armored van.

Cass watches the back of Freya’s platinum hair as she goes. “Is this place haunted? Because I swear I’m seeing another blonde ghost.”

“Haunted?” Ryan’s eyes widen. “Really?”

We never think he’s listening. He’s always listening.

“Probably,” Blaze snorts.

“Blaze,” I warn.

“What?” Blaze shrugs, kicking a boot toe against an icicle hanging from the tire well of the SUV. “It’s Iceland. Everything looks like a ghost threw up on it.”

“He’s right,” Ryan giggles. “The sand is black.”

“Ryan,” Cass adds, looking at me.

We share an amused look, remembering Ryan demanding that the three of us get into the same bed in the apartment when something scared him.

Cass whispers. “The last thing we need is Lucian towering over the three of us like a sleep-deprived Ghostbuster.”

Bayne moves to say farewell to Freya. Lucian walks toward me.

The wind lifts the edge of his black coat. He looks impossible here, carved from the same dark rock as the cliffs. Wealth, violence, grief, and power arranged in the shape of one dangerously controlling, beautiful man.

He stops in front of me. “Inside.”

I narrow my eyes. “Do you ever get tired of saying that?”

“No.”

“Do you ever consider asking?”

“No.”

Cass coughs. “And they say romance is dead.”

Lucian does not look away from me.

His gaze drops to my mouth.

For one hot, stupid second, I forget we are standing in front of armed men, my sister, my nephew, and enough unresolved trauma to fill this ocean.

Then Ryan tugs at my sleeve. “Aunt Rin, I’m cold. Can I play in my room?”

The spell breaks.

I look down at him, and my heart twists.

He smiles up at me, oblivious to the fact that this situation is anything but normal. He tugs down his new favorite hat, the red one Lucian picked because apparently mafia kings can also be extremely aggressive personal shoppers.

“Of course you can,” I say. Lucian answers at the same time. “After security clears the family wing.”

Ryan sighs dramatically.

Cass pats his shoulder. “Uncle Lucian was born like that, sweetheart. We have to be kind.”

Lucian’s mouth almost moves. Then his attention shifts back to the second SUV.

The air tightens. I notice the way Lucian’s shoulders go slightly harder. The way his hand flexes at his side. The way they don’t look at one another feels almost more intimate than if they did.

History has its own language. I hate that I am learning to understand theirs.

Isobel and Lucian’s.

Now, the beautiful ghost from Lucian’s past who found us at Red Shutters has traveled with us to the end of the world.

A constant reminder that at one time, someone meant as much to Lucian as I do.

Her long blonde hair hangs down her back. She wears an elegant cream-colored down coat, leather gloves, and tall black boots that are far too stylish for the iceberg we’re standing on.

Cass sees her and immediately retreats.

She can’t stand Isobel.

I thought I’d hate her. I probably should. Instead, I find myself feeling sorry for her more often than not.

Empathy doesn’t mean that I’m not ready for her to leave.

I am.

“Come on, Ryan,” Cass says brightly, too brightly. “Let’s go see if your new billionaire Iceland prison cell comes with heated floors.”

“It does,” Bayne says.

Cass turns her chair toward him. “Of course it does.”

“And geothermal baths,” he adds.

She pauses. “Fine, I’ll allow us to enjoy ourselves.”

We move toward the house as a group. Not family exactly. Not yet. Not completely.

Something messier.

Isobel moves into the shadows before we get close. She’s gone by the time we reach the foyer.

We all seem to breathe a little easier in her absence.

The new floors are hardwood with a honey-colored stain.

They’ve laid brightly colored rugs over the wood to add warmth.

Knowing Lucian? They’re here for traction. To avoid falls.

The house swallows us in warmth.

The main room is all stone and light. Pale wood floors—black iron fixtures. A massive fire is already burning. Tall windows showing the ocean beyond, waves crashing under a low sky.

The house is beautiful. I’ve learned that beauty can’t be trusted.

Cass wheels forward slowly, taking it in. “Well. This is cozy for haunted.”

Gregory steps inside, his glasses fogging slightly. His sandy hair is flattened on one side from the wind. He looks like a man who accidentally wandered in from an international criminal drama.

Cass catches his eye. “Your hair is doing something very interesting.”

“Thank you.” He runs a hand through it. “Interesting is very on brand here.”

Cass laughs. “Anything less would be underdressed.”

Gregory smiles back.

Cass confuses me.

At one time, I thought she might be interested in her massive bodyguard, Mack.

Cass is bold, sarcastic, and generally pretty fearless.

Gregory is, awkward, nerdy, less traditionally alpha…

But genuinely brave.

Staying even when he’s scared. Even when it’s terrifying.

Even when he could walk away unscathed at any moment and never look back.

And no one would fault him for it.

But he doesn’t leave.

He stays and does the hard things.

That’s Cass.

I watch them now, the way Gregory puts his hand on her shoulder. The way she looks up at him and laughs.

He always makes her laugh.

And while we’re being hunted by a psychopath?

Humor is a wonderful trait to have.

Could romantic chaos be happening out here in our snow globe?

I call her name, ready to set a gentle tease out in the world, to say something witty about the way the two of them get along so well, just to see their reaction. “Hey Cass⁠—”

Lucian leans close to my ear. “No.”

I stiffen. “No what?”

“No matchmaking,” he says. “Things are complicated enough.”

I turn my head, staring up at him. “I didn’t say anything.”

“You had a look.” He stares down, heat in his gaze.

I say, “I have many looks.”

“That one means trouble,” he says.

“Every look on your face means trouble, Lucian.”

“Everything about you is trouble.” His hand presses more firmly against my lower back.

Possessive. Warning. My body, a traitorous thing, responds. Wet and warm and wanting.

“You’re exhausted,” he says.

“So are you,” I counter.

“You need to go rest,” he growls.

“So do you.”

He lowers his voice. “Do not start with me in this hallway, Erin.”

Heat curls through me, sharp and immediate. But I hear the fear at the edge of his voice as well.

That is what stops me from pushing too hard.

I see it in the tightness around his mouth. In the way he has placed himself between me and every exterior door since we walked in. In the way his eyes keep returning to my body, my face, my hands, checking for injuries that aren’t there.

He’s fraying. I grab his hand in mine. “I’m here,” I say. His eyes close for half a second.

Rafe approaches before either of us can say more. He’s reporting back after Freya’s visit.

“The house is secure,” he says. “Isobel is contained in the east guest suite under watch.”

I can’t help but stiffen at the sound of her name.

Lucian notices.

Again. Always. “Erin.”

“I’m fine.”

“You are not.”

“No one here is fine.” I use Gregory’s words. ‘Not fine’ is kind of on brand here.

Bayne moves to the fireplace and holds his hands out toward the warmth as if he owns the place.

He probably could if he wanted to.

I’m not sure Lucian will be summering in Iceland after this.

Now, his voice shakes as he looks at Rafe. “And the outer perimeter?”

“There’s only one main access road,” Rafe says. “Two service tracks, both monitored. The weather is closing in by midnight. After that, unless Carlos has learned to ride storms, no one approaches unseen.”

“Comforting,” Cass says. “Nothing says relaxing family getaway like weather as a security measure.”

Rafe’s tablet chimes.

Everyone stops.

One sound, and every room becomes a battlefield.

Rafe looks down.

His face gives away nothing.

Then he says, “It’s clean. Confirmation from the second perimeter team.”

The pressure valve releases, only a bit.

Gregory looks at Cass. “Can we eat now?”

“Hell yes.” Cass starts toward the kitchen. “Come on, Oxford. You can chop veggies.”

Gregory blinks. “Can’t I watch and taste-test your biscuits instead?”

“Too late,” my bossy older sister says. “You’re hired.”

He follows. Happily.

Definitely interesting.

I turn back and find Lucian watching me with a look that makes my breath catch.

“What?” I ask.

He gives me ‘the look.’ “You need sleep, baby.”

“Then come with me to bed.”

His eyes darken.

A stupid, hot thrill goes through me. I should not be flirting when all our lives are in danger.

Sadly, I appear to lack survival instinct.

Rafe clears his throat. “Before anyone disappears into a room and makes the rest of us single people jealous⁠—”

“Or humans living off nothing but sexy texts while I’m away from my beautiful wife.” Blaze lets out a heavy sigh. He’s lounging against the wall in that panther-casual way of his, staring down at a phone that’s been dead for two days.

His hands on my shoulders, Lucian turns me toward the hallway. “Let’s go.”

“Before you leave, Lucian, we need to discuss Marina.”

Marina Vale—the woman tied to messages and old Bachman routes and the no-longer-existing Village.

Lucian goes still. “What about Marina?”

“Her courier pattern stopped, which means she no longer needs to hide,” Rafe looks up from his tablet. “Or she is no longer moving.”

Blaze snaps his burner flip-phone closed. “Marina always moves.”

Rafe nods once. “That’s the reason that her silence matters.”

The fire snaps in the hearth. A chill runs through me. Lucian’s hands tighten around my shoulders.

This time, I let him hold on too tightly. Maybe Iceland is the end of the world. But Carlos is still somewhere beyond it.

Watching. Waiting.

“We didn’t come here to hide,” Lucian says. “We came here because the board has gotten smaller.”

“Marina disappearing. Another pawn bites the dust,” Blaze says.

“Which most likely means Carlos is preparing his final move,” Rafe agrees.

Lucian’s voice is ice. “We need to make ours first.”

CHAPTER TWO

Lucian

I built the room before I knew whether she would forgive me for needing it.

That was possibly optimistic.

Or arrogant.

With me, the two have always shared a bed.

The lower west wing of the Iceland house is the only part I left open when the house was built. I stand outside the door with Erin at my side and feel, absurdly, more exposed than I did the first time she saw the scars on my chest.

She’s fed. She’s rested. She’s wearing a black dress I bought her, and I can only hope she wears other purchases I made underneath.

She looks at the black door. Then at me. Then at the door again.

Finally, she says, “This is either where you keep bodies or where you keep something ridiculously expensive.”

“Or” I counter, “it’s the room I had built last night.”

Her brows lift. “What? I thought you were joking when you said that.”

She has no idea the reach our wealth has.

“Lucian.” My name in her mouth.

Warning. Invitation. Exasperation. Need.

Always need. No matter how angry or frustrated she is with me, she’s never stopped wanting me.

I place my palm against the biometric lock. The panel glows blue, then gold. The door releases with a soft click.

Erin’s eyes narrow. “Did you put my handprint on there?”

I open the door before she can decide whether to be furious or not care.

The lights come on slowly. A warm, sensual glow. Low lines of illumination hidden behind dark wood panels and black stone arches. The room opens wide and quiet before us, carved into the lower level of the house with one wall of glass facing the black Icelandic coast far below.

No one can see in. I threatened men with death to ensure no one would ever see what is mine.

The glass is reinforced, tinted, shielded, and wired to enough alarms to wake the dead. The view beyond it is all storm and sea and jagged rock.

Inside, the room is heat. Leather. Velvet. Silk. Dark wood.

A wide bed sits against the far wall, lower and broader than a normal bed, covered in black sheets and a deep red throw so soft even I touched it after it arrived. A chaise curves near the fire. A cabinet of drawers lines one wall. Beside it, shelves hold candles, oils, folded silk, soft restraints, blindfolds, toys chosen with obsessive care and more restraint than I deserve credit for.

A copper bathtub sits in an adjoining alcove behind a screen of smoky glass.

There are no cages. I almost added one. Then I thought of Erin’s face when she told me something along the lines of me not getting to make control sound romantic.

There are no cages. Only choices. Like now, when she doesn’t choose to step inside.

I wait. She looks at the room for a long time. I have stood in rooms with guns aimed at my head and waited with less difficulty.

Finally, she says, with that wicked little mouth that ruined me for all other women, “What would the Airbnb listing be for this? Sex dungeon with ocean views?”

She’s nervous but smiling. Aren’t nervous and excited the same emotion?

“It is not a dungeon,” I say.

She steps across the threshold. Slowly. “No?”

“No.”

“Because there’s toys in here?” She gives a half-laugh.

“Because you are free to leave at any moment.”

Her expression shifts from amusement to something quieter.

“You thought about that.”

“I think about everything that touches you.”

“Obsessive.”

“Yes.”

“Unhealthy.”

“Yes.”

“Us,” she says.

She looks around again. Her fingers trail over the back of the chaise, pressing into the velvet. “It’s beautiful.”

I feel a thrill at the word, hating how much of me is kneeling invisibly at her feet, waiting for approval.

“Everything in this room is yours,” I say.

Her gaze cuts to mine. “Mine?”

“Yes.”

“And you?”

I step inside and close the door behind us. Her pulse jumps at the base of her throat, a sign she can’t control. She’s always putting on a brave face, her pride in the way.

She never fooled me, anyway. Not even the first night I met her.

A thread of the animal I was before I met her still exists. In this room, it can prowl freely.

Erin walks deeper into the room, pretending curiosity is stronger than nerves. She touches nothing directly except fabric. Velvet. Silk. The edge of the cabinet. Her cheeks are flushed. Her eyes are too bright.

She likes it. She’s afraid to like it. She’s worried she’s too innocent for this, for us.

For me.

I worry I’ve stepped over her invisible line. As much as she talks about me having one, hers is electrified.

This is familiar ground for us.

Finally, she stares at me. “You may have had the workforce to have this built last night. But you couldn’t have designed it as well. You were watching me sleep all night.”

“I was,” I admit.

“You planned this before Iceland.”

“Yes.”

Her gaze narrows. “Before Red Shutters?”

“Yes.”

Her hand drops to her side. “Why?”

I move toward her. “Yes.”

She turns, pressing her back against a cabinet.

She tilts her chin. “For me, right?”

Because I am a bastard. Because I buy things when I do not know how to say I am afraid. Because I wanted a place where her surrender could never be mistaken for weakness. Because I wanted her pleasure under my control in the only context where that control does not make her smaller.

Because I want too much.

Because I am too much.

Because she wants me all the same.

I stop in front of her. “Only for you.”

Her cheeks heat. “That was presumptuous.”

“Yes.”

“And lovely.”

“Yes.”

“And maybe even a bit romantic,” she mutters.

My mouth curves. “My girl.” I lift my hand, slowly enough that she can move away.

She does not.

I touch her jaw. “In this room, you can let go. You don’t have to be proud. Or brave.”

Her throat works. “That’s just how I am.”

“No. It isn’t.” I brush my thumb over her lower lip. “You can be soft. With me. I’ll be your protective shell.”

Her eyes close. For the first time since we left Red Shutters, she relaxes. The sight hits me low in the chest.

The war is upstairs. Carlos is somewhere in the world with Marina’s silence. Isobel is in the east wing, carrying secrets while feigning fear. Blaze is likely two minutes away from leaving us for his wife.

The Bachman family is strong but it feels like we’re holding on by a thread after the Village attack. Each branch has a leader in their separate locations, but the cohesion seems to have weakened along with the Village.

We are in a tailspin. All of us. Scattered around the globe, fighting to get back our power in New York, to return to our home, our history.

I’m in Iceland for God’s sake.

In a summerhouse I only dreamed of spending a week or two at.

Alone like the beast in his castle.

Now, I’ve carted what feels like half the family and part of Scotland here with us.

In the middle of winter.

But there is one constant in all of this chaos.

Her.

Erin is here. Warm. Alive. Mine. Not bought.

Chosen.

She opens her eyes. “What happens in here?”

“Whatever you want.”

Her smile returns, faint and dangerous. “That sounds suspiciously generous.”

“It won’t always feel generous.”

Her breath catches, that pretty flush rising in her cheeks.

My cock hardens with a violence that nearly breaks me. I step closer until my body cages hers.

“In here, I can order. I can punish. I can take you apart until you forget your own name.”

Her breath leaves her in a soft rush of words. “But I decide whether you get the privilege.”

“Exactly.” I lean in until my mouth brushes her ear. “Safe word.”

Her fingers curl into my shirt. “Red.”

“Slow?” I ask.

“Yellow.”

“If you use either?”

She whispers. “You stop. Immediately.”

“And if I push too hard?” I ask.

She says, “I tell you.”

“And if your pride gets in the way?” I demand.

She huffs a laugh. “My pride is non-negotiable.”

“If your pride gets in the way?” I grip her chin and turn her face to mine.

Her eyes soften.

“I trust you to take it away,” she says.

God. I kiss her because I can’t speak.

The room deserves reverence. She deserves reverence, this first time trusting me like this.

But even with her, I’m still Lucian Bachman.

I don’t kiss her gently.

My mouth takes hers with the hunger I have been holding since Red Shutters. Since blood on a towel. Since she watched Isobel step into our life and tried not to flinch. Since I saw her standing at the edge of a cliff, I realized I would never stop wanting to put her in my pocket.

Erin kisses me back like she’s starving for this. For me. Her hands slide under my shirt, shoving it back. I let it fall. Her fingers work at the buttons of my shirt, impatient, clumsy with want.

I catch her wrists.

She glares up at me. “Already?”

My favorite version of her. “Already disobedient?” I murmur.

“What?” she snips. “You’re overdressed.”

“And you are impatient.” I turn her carefully, pressing her front to the cabinet, my hand between her shoulder blades, my mouth at the back of her neck.

I drag down the zipper of her dress. I don’t let my fingertips graze her skin no matter how much I might want to.

She wore black tonight. Simple. Soft. Something chosen in a hurry after dinner with Cass and Ryan, before I brought her downstairs. Couture because she can.

A dress because—Isobel. Handing me a black-striped button-down to match her dress.

Because Isobel.

The dress opens for me, parting to reveal warm skin and the black lace I’d hoped for. The dress falls to the ground. I kneel on one knee behind her, circling one ankle at a time, lifting the dress away.

Removing her shoes for her.

Her bare feet press into the floor. “It’s heated.”

“Of course.”

Still, chill bumps rise on her skin.

Taking my time, I leave her, trembling against the cabinet, her hands pressed against its top. I fold the dress and put it over the corner of the bed. Then I return and just look.

“Taking your sweet time,” she half-laughs.

“Taking in what’s mine,” I correct her. “You’re too fucking gorgeous.”

“So, you tell me,” she whispers to the cabinet.

She’ll never know how pretty she is. Just another towering difference between her and the woman in the East Wing. Isobel knows how to use her looks to her advantage.

But she’s not in this room.

This room was built for the chosen one.

My chosen one.

Erin.

My fingers pause at the clasp of her bra.

“Color?”

“Green,” she says quickly.

I smile against her shoulder. “Eager.”

She smiles. “And you aren’t?”

I unclasp the bra and let it fall. She braces her hands on the cabinet, head lowering as I drag my palms down her sides, cupping her waist. Black silk hugs her hips. Every curve I know and still need to touch as badly as I did that first night.

“You’re quiet,” I say.

She says, “I’m trying to be the kind of woman a man builds a room like this for.”

“You already are.”

“Well,” she says, “Then I’m trying to be quiet.”

“You are terrible at it.”

She chokes on a laugh. “You’re terrible at being emotionally available, but here we are.”

I bite her shoulder. She gasps, arching back against me. “There,” I murmur. “That is better.”

I turn her around again. She stands before me in nothing but black panties and defiance.

Her eyes are bright, her mouth swollen from mine. I take one step back and look at her. She shifts under the attention. Not away. Never away.

Just a little overwhelmed.

I like her overwhelmed. It means she’s listening.

It’s the look that gives me hope. Hope that one day, she’ll know how much she means to me.

“Do you like it?” I ask.

“The way you are looking at me? Like I’m something special? Yes.” She smiles. “Or are you asking about the room?”

“The room.”

“Yes. It’s exciting. Beautiful. Another world.” She looks around, then back at me. “And I love that you made it for me.”

“I’ll give you every world I can.”

“Then show me what happens in this one.” The command is soft.

My blood goes hot. I back her toward the bed. She goes willingly, but her chin lifts as if she is still pretending I am making her. I let her have the lie. She likes having something to fight even when she wants to be conquered.

Soon, that will be gone. That’s what this room is for.

Full surrender.

But tonight, it’s just a gift. A place to be close to one another inside this hectic homestead.

But I’ll leave her with a little taste.

At the edge of the bed, I stop, leaving her. “Hands behind your back.”

She pauses, then she obeys. Slowly. I retrieve the strip of fabric from the drawer beside us.

Not rope. Not leather. Not tonight.

Silk. Black. No marks on her. Not tonight.

Soft enough not to mark unless I want it to.

I drag it over her naked breasts, first. A sharp inhale, her nipples reacting to the brush of the cool fabric.

“Still green?”

She stares at me. “Yes.”

I bind her wrists loosely enough for comfort, tightly enough for meaning.

She flushes. She likes this more than she wants to admit. I know because I know her. Because her shame has a name now.

And that name is mine.

Her smallest tremor can reorder my body’s wiring.

I lay her back on the bed.

Her bound hands rest beneath her, lifting her hips. That look on her face. I can’t tear my gaze away.

“You’re staring,” she whispers.

“You’re stunning,” I say. “You’ve stunned me.”

“And are you going to do something about it?” She smiles.

“Yes.” Then I kiss her. Thorough enough to make her forget she was being mouthy.

My hand moves over her body, learning the landscape again with deliberate cruelty. Her throat. Her breasts. The dip of her waist. The soft curve of her belly. Her hip. The edge of her panties.

She lifts into my touch, demanding. She wants more. I slide my fingers beneath the lace and feel how wet she is.

My control frays. Enough that she sees it. I drag her panties down her legs and lower my mouth to her thigh. I kiss the inside of her thigh, moving closer.

Her hips shift. “Lucian.”

“Impatient,” I remind her.

“Controlling.”

I look up. “Yes.”

Then I put my mouth on her.

Her head falls back, breath breaking.

The room goes quiet around us except for her. Her sounds. Her restraint. Her shame gives way to need as I take my time and ruin every clever answer she might have had.

She says my name once. Then again. Then without pride.

Begging. I bring her close and stop.

Her eyes fly open. “Do not.”

“You told me to show you.”

“I did not tell you to be evil.”

“You should have been more specific.”

She makes a frustrated sound and pulls against the silk.

Beautiful.

I rise over her and unfasten my trousers.

Her gaze tracks every movement.

There is no coyness now. No pretending. Only the raw hunger between us.

Hunger that was bought. Betrayed. Burned.

Now bound in my bed.

I free her hands before I enter her.

She blinks up at me. “Why?”

“Because I want you touching me when I come inside you.”

The softness in her face is almost too much to bear. Then her hands are on my shoulders, my back, my scars, and I press the head of my cock against her entrance. It’s throbbing with the beat of desire, and I have to breathe to maintain my control.

For a moment, neither of us moves. Her body grips mine. Her eyes hold mine.

I push inside her. One hard demanding thrust. She gasps, nails digging into my shoulders.

The room becomes heat. Skin. Breath. Her body taking mine. My mouth at her throat. Her voice breaking around my name. She comes with her face hidden against my neck, as if pleasure is something she still wants to keep private from the world.

I follow after, buried deep, holding myself over her as the last of my control finally burns away.

“This,” she says, voice hoarse, “is a very nice room.”

A laugh breaks out of me before I can stop it.

“You’ll come here when you want something.”

Her expression sharpens. “Want something or need something?”

“Either.”

Her eyes narrow. “And if what I want is outside this room?”

I should have expected it. Still, I ask, “What do you want outside this room?”

“A partnership.” Her hand presses over my heart.

Silence opens between us. The control she demands. The control I don’t want to give. The one that gives her a seat at our table. Instead of safely in my pocket.

I lower my forehead to hers. “I am trying.”

She rubs the back of my neck. “I know.”

“I am bad at it.” I close my eyes as her fingertips comb into my hair.

“I know,” she says, dragging her fingertips over my scalp. It’s doing something magical inside me.

“You are enjoying that.”

“A little.”

My mouth curves despite myself.

Then a knock hits the door. Three sharp taps. Rafe.

“Always Rafe.” I close my eyes.

She laughs. “It’s always Rafe.”

“If he says anything other than it’s over, I’m resigning from organized crime.”

“But I was just getting ready to order my Catwoman suit.”

The thought of her in a black bodysuit has me ready to call my personal shopper. “Me-ow, baby.”

Rafe’s voice comes through the door. “I realize interrupting may be hazardous to my health, but Lucian, we need you. Now.”

Every bit of warmth leaves my body.

Erin’s eyes lock with mine. “Now means bad.”

I withdraw from Erin carefully, hating the cold that takes her place.

“I’m coming with you.” She sits up, reaching for the sheet. “No more rooms without me.”

I hate the idea of her in that room. I love the idea of having her beside me.

I nod once. “No more rooms without you.”

I dress her myself because I can’t keep her safe enough. She lets me, though she rolls her eyes when I insist on putting on her shoes, one pretty little foot at a time.

“You know I can dress myself,” she says.

“I am aware.”

She gives a happy sigh. “And yet?”

“And yet.”

When we open the door, Rafe stands in the hall, expression grim. Blaze is behind him, leaning against the wall with his usual smile gone.

It’s bad.

Her fingers slip into mine. Not behind me. Beside me.

Rafe looks at her, then at me.

I wait for him to challenge her presence. He doesn’t. If anything, he looks as if he expected this, like he saw it coming.

Even when I couldn’t. She has that way with me. Making me grow into a newer, better version of myself.

One side of me she’ll never change.

She wouldn’t want to.

CHAPTER THREE

Isobel

The Iceland house is too quiet.

My greatest fear…

Not Mack standing outside my room like a tattooed wall with a heartbeat. Not Lucian’s refusal to look at me unless I say something to make him. Which always makes her hate me more.

Not Erin’s blue eyes, which watch me watching everyone. Then, watch Lucian like a guard dog.

The quiet. Carlos kept my rooms as silent as he kept me. Soundproof.

I didn’t realize it at first.

It took a few days. Then, at dinner one night, I heard it. Silverware clinking on plates. Footsteps. Men laughing. Phones ringing. Music from another room. Voices through walls, through doors.

Talking.

He understood silence too well to waste it. Silence isolates a woman. Makes her take whatever conversation is offered to her.

My suite faces the sea. I stand here now, a bay of windows overlooking the black shore, the dark waters. I tighten the blanket around my shoulders and watch waves shatter themselves against rocks below.

Everything here is beautiful in a way that feels breakable. Like the glass walls that shield them.

I’m always cold here.

There’s a fire lit. I heard her tell them to light it. There is a bathroom with black stone and brass fixtures. Someone put folded clothes in the drawers before I arrived. Sweaters. Socks. Soft things.

Expensive things. Not my things. Nothing has been mine in years. I wore what Carlos liked on me.

I’m dressed like a doll. Even here.

I am surrounded by armed men who hate Carlos more than I do. The house is secure. Rafe has checked my clothes, my shoes, my bag, the lining of my coat, and the clasp of the necklace I was not allowed to keep once they found it carried a transmitter.

One I had no idea was there.

I’d been wearing it.

For years.

A tracker.

Like a pet.

I doubt they believe me.

A knock sounds at the door.

I don’t turn.

Men never wait for permission.

“Rafe wants you downstairs,” he says. His voice is low. Rough. Practical.

I turn to face him. “For what?”

“Questions.”

“I have answered questions.”

“More questions.”

I laugh once. Dry.

“Does Lucian know?”

Mack’s expression does not change. “Lucian knows everything that happens in this house.”

No. He doesn’t. But I don’t say that.

I fold the blanket and place it on the chair because I’ve always been neat.

Mack waits in the hall. He doesn’t touch me. No one does.

We walk through the east wing in silence. Two of Lucian’s men fall in behind us, far enough not to crowd, close enough to remind me this is not freedom.

It makes me tired.

The main level glows with warmth. Voices drift from the family wing. Cass, bright and sharp, says something about soup. A child laughing.

The boy’s laughter makes my chest hurt. An echo of something I thought I’d have.

Lucian and Erin aren’t here.

The house feels different when Lucian is absent. Men still move. Security still breathes. Fire still burns.

Like gravity has stepped away.

I breathe easier when he’s not here.

Blaze looks at me once, quickly, then away. Not because I interest him.

Because he despises me.

Gregory stands when I enter. Polite reflex. Lucian’s brother.

Softer around the edges, yes. But the same eyes if one knows where to look. Same bone-deep attention. Same habit of holding himself as if stillness is the last defense of the civilized.

“You don’t need to stand,” I say.

He blinks, then sits again. “Sorry. Reflex.”

Blaze looks offended. “I have manners.”

“You have good looks,” Rafe says. “Often mistaken for manners.”

Then Rafe turns the tablet toward me.

Marina’s old mark fills the screen. Not a signature exactly. She would never be so obvious. A small thing. A thin black line through a gold dot.

My throat closes. “Where did you get that?”

Rafe watches me carefully. “A dead courier account came alive.”

I step closer before I can stop myself. The screen shows a message.

MARINA HAS THE PROOF.

Below it, an image. I see the warehouse first. Then Carlos.

Then Lucian.

Younger. Dark-haired. Beautiful in the cruel way young men can be, that makes a girl do stupid things. Their men around them.

My stomach turns. I know this photograph. Not because I have seen this exact print.

Because I’m the one who took it.

Carlos standing two feet from Lucian with a smile that did not reach his eyes. Lucian unaware. The men already turning their bodies toward the stronger center of gravity. Yet they don’t even realize they’re doing it.

I grip the back of a chair.

Rafe notices. “Did Marina send this?”

I stare at the mark on the screen. Closely. There’s something different about the thin black line, the gold circle it runs through.

This one is perfect.

“No,” I say.

The room stills.

Rafe’s eyes sharpen. “No?”

“It’s not Marina.”

Blaze pushes off the wall. “Looks like her creepy little arts-and-crafts signature to me.”

“It is meant to,” I say. “Carlos is pretending to be her.”

Bayne’s expression does not change, but something predatory wakes in his eyes. “Carlos.”

Rafe looks at the tablet again. “Why?”

“Blaze is right,” I say. “Hers is arts and crafts. Hand-drawn.”

Rafe studies me. “You’re certain?”

I look at the mark again. “Yes.”

“Even if Carlos made it, could Marina be working with him right now?”

A laugh leaves me before I can stop it. “She always was.”

Blaze’s jaw tightens.

“This message isn’t from her,” I continue. “And if Carlos is using her mark, then…”

I stop. The room feels like it’s tilting. No one speaks. The fire pops softly. Far away, the child laughs again, and the sound nearly breaks me in half.

Marina is too clever to be dead. She arranged other people’s deaths.

The strategy-room door opens. Lucian enters first. Erin is beside him.

Of course she is.

Her hair is slightly mussed. Her mouth is a little swollen. His hand is at her back, and something ugly, old, and unwanted twists inside me.

Not jealousy exactly. Jealousy is too simple.

It’s grief.

Once, I stood beside him like that. Then Carlos told me I was standing beside a monster.

And I decided to believe him.

I look away.

“What happened?” Lucian asks.

Rafe answers him, but his eyes stay on me. “Message came through a courier account. Isobel says it is not Marina. It is Carlos imitating her.”

Lucian says, “Why imitate her when she’s always been his willing participant?”

“What message?” Erin asks.

Rafe shows them.

Lucian looks at the photograph. The change in him is immediate and almost invisible.

A tightening of the mouth. A slight pause in breathing. A shift of weight.

Does he remember me in a white dress, standing by that fountain? Laughing as I told them to get closer. Asking why men always stand so far apart in a photo.

The Lucian I knew would have resented being steadied where men could see.

“Where did he get this?” Lucian asks.

“Marina had copies,” I say. “Of everything.”

His gaze cuts to me. For one second, the room disappears. History. A hallway neither of us wants to walk down, but both of us know by fear.

Then Erin shifts beside him. The woman he chooses now. He grabs her hand, and she brings him back into himself.

She calms him.

I never did that.

“Marina kept everything,” I say. “Favors. Photographs. Names. Old access. She used to say memory was safest with proof.”

Blaze mutters, “Charming.”

Ignoring him, I tell the others. “This message is too clean.”

“A distraction,” Erin says quietly. “Only to make us think Marina is alive.”

I nod. “Yes.”

Her eyes stay on mine. Not soft. Not forgiving. But steady.

She is the solid thing in his world. I can see why.

“Why use Marina’s account?” she asks.

“He wants you to chase the wrong ghost,” I tell her.

Lucian steps closer to the table. “And the right one? Marina?”

My throat feels raw. “The right one is probably dead.”

The room goes silent. This time, even Blaze has nothing to say.

Erin looks at me, and something in her expression shifts.

Not pity. Thank God. I can’t tolerate pity from the girl Lucian bought.

Who now stands beside him and holds him together.

“Marina may be alive,” Rafe says.

“No,” I say with a quick certainty too bold for him to disagree with.

Everyone hears it.

I force my fingers to release the chair. “Carlos wouldn’t need to use her mark if she were alive.”

“He killed her,” Erin finishes.

The words land like stones. I feel like a wound feels the moment before it starts to bleed.

I hate being in this room and feeling like I’m about to break.

“She helped him,” Blaze says. “She helped Carlos. She helped with the old routes, the messages, the Village.”

“I know,” I say.

“She helped destroy people,” Blaze argues. “For him.”

“I know what she was,” I say. “I knew what she did. I know she wasn’t innocent. She’s still my cousin.”

My voice cracks. Damn it.

Then Erin says, “That part always hurts. Loving someone despite what they’ve done.”

My eyes burn.

Lucian’s voice comes next. Low. Controlled. “What did Marina keep? And could Carlos have killed her to gain it?”

I breathe in. I can do strategy.

I cannot do grief in front of Lucian Bachman and the woman who owns his heart.

But I can do strategy.

“Authorization records,” I say. “Old Bachman routes. Warehouse rosters. Payment chains. Who opened which door? Who delayed which alarm? Carlos’s early deals. Your men.”

Lucian goes still. Dangerously still.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I mean his men. Carlos’s. From before.”

His face becomes something terrible.

The men in his eyes, I killed.

I remember those men, the way they looked at Lucian. The way Carlos watched him, his eyes darker every day. Clouded with jealousy and fear that those men would one day follow Lucian.

I remember Carlos telling me, “Do you know what Lucian will do when he leaves us? When he takes our men with him?”

I remember being horrified at what he told me. Something so dark, so devious, I instantly saw Lucian in a different life.

“We have to stop him,” I said. “We have to talk to him.”

Carlos took my face in his hands and looked at me like I was something fragile and broken and he was going to fix me. “It’s gone beyond talk. There’s only one way to stop him, Belle.”

God help me, I believed him.

I was vulnerable then.

I wanted to believe so many things.

And an ugly little part of me wanted the more vicious man. The bad man who would kill for me. Kill to get me back.

Kill to keep me.

Keep me in beautiful places filled with beautiful things where I could be his beautiful queen and reign beside him.

Powerful. Chosen. Vicious.

I got exactly what I wanted.

Only I didn’t save anyone. I lost all my freedom. And I was no queen.

Dressed in all the finest things, surrounded by the beauty I craved, I was caged by my vanity.

Now, Lucian’s eyes cut to mine, stinging. I deserve that look. I deserve worse.

Erin’s hand tightens in his. To anchor him. And it works.

He releases the breath he’s held as captive as Carlos held me.

“What else?” Lucian asks. For a moment, we hold one another’s eyes as if an old secret passes between us, like he’s ensuring with this steady gaze that I don’t tell.

I could lie.

Old instinct rises immediately. Smooth. Familiar. Survival dressed as caution.

I could say I don’t know. I could say Marina never told me. I could say Carlos kept me too isolated to understand.

Some of that would even be true.

But truth mixed with omission is my old language. And I am so tired of speaking it. I inhale a shaky breath. “I know a few things that could be helpful…but first⁠—”

Rafe’s tablet chimes again. Everyone turns. Another message appears beneath the photograph.

A message from Marina, it says.

Rafe doesn’t open it. He looks at Lucian. Lucian looks at me.

Before anyone says it, I know. Marina always loved an audience. Carlos loves one more.

“It’s not her. It’s him,” I say. “He thinks you’ll open it if it’s from her. Play it.”

Lucian’s eyes narrow. “Isobel⁠—”

“Play it,” I repeat. “We have to. There’s no other choice.”

Lucian looks at Rafe. “Play it.”

Erin steps closer to the screen. Rafe taps the file. The screen goes black. Then light.

A timestamp appears.

From five days ago.

A room appears.

Concrete walls. A metal chair. A woman bound to it, head bowed, dark hair falling forward.

For a second, my mind refuses.

No.

No.

No.

Then the woman lifts her face.

Marina.

Older than the last time I saw her. Harder. Blood at the corner of her mouth. Still beautiful in that sharp, cruel way that made men think cutting themselves was worth her attention.

Carlos steps into the frame behind her.

He places one hand on her shoulder.

Marina does not flinch.

Prideful to the end.

Carlos says to the camera. “I have always found secrets tedious. They make people careless.”

My hand goes to my mouth. No one moves. Marina’s eyes lift to the camera.

For one second, I think she sees me. Impossible.

But it feels that way.

Then she says, “He will know.”

Carlos’s smile changes. “I’m counting on it.”

Rafe kills the video before the end.

The room is silent. Marina is dead.

Carlos killed her before he even sent me to Red Shutters. She may have even been held in the same house where I was, preparing for my mission.

The room tilts. I grab the chair too late. My knees go.

Mack catches me before I hit the floor. I want to tell him not to touch me. I don’t.

Because if he lets go, I may fall all the way through myself.

Erin comes closer. Lucian stands behind her, frozen in that terrible way of his.

She looks at me, and I hate that she is the one who sees me instead of him.

“I loved her,” I whisper. “Then, I feared her. She was family.”

Erin’s eyes soften. “Those can all be true.”

Something breaks in me. A choked sob escapes my throat. I put my hand over my mouth and turn my face away because the grief is humiliating.

Rafe’s voice comes from somewhere above me.

“Carlos has Marina’s files.”

Gregory whispers, “The warehouse. The Village. They do connect. Significantly.”

The words move through the room like smoke.

The first fire. The men who died. The gates that opened. The second fire. His men gone. The Village gone.

Carlos was behind it all.

Finally, Lucian looks at me. His voice is cold enough to stop my breath. “You will tell us every secret she kept.”

I nod.

Then he says, “And every lie you ever told.”

He doesn’t want our shared secrets spilled out on this table.

Only ones he doesn’t already know.

I swallow back our shared history. “Yes.”

Erin’s gaze stays on me. Steady. Unforgiving.

But Marina is dead.

Carlos is coming for all of us.

And this time, when the fire reaches for Lucian Bachman, it will find him no longer standing alone.

CHAPTER FOUR

Erin

The house does not move after Marina dies on-screen.

It’s too much. For all of us. We all need rest.

“We’ll pick this back up tomorrow. We’ll be our own worst enemy if we don’t sleep,” Rafe says.

“Aye,” Blaze jokes. “Bayne becomes a Scottish bear without his beauty rest.”

For once, everyone appreciates Blaze lightening the mood.

I have trouble falling asleep. As does Lucian. The man never seems to sleep. I roll over, running my fingertips over his back until he finally drifts off.

The morning comes too soon. And we all wake with the same thoughts in our minds.

Five days ago, Marina Vale was alive. Now she is not.

Carlos killed her before Isobel ever reached Red Shutters.

Before Iceland.

Before any of us understood we were already standing inside the final move.

We shower and dress quickly since every moment spent outside the war room feels wasted. I eat breakfast because Lucian makes me and because sitting down now is my last chance to see Cass and Ryan, possibly until dinner.

If Carlos doesn’t get to us, or we don’t kill one another by then.

This house is running off tension, adrenaline, caffeine, held together by our joint effort to stay cheerful for one precious little boy’s sake.

Mack stays with Cass and Ryan. They’re attempting a 1,000-piece puzzle. Ryan’s very focused and takes minimal snack breaks, but it’s still almost impossible until Mack showed them how to outline the straight pieces and group the same-colored ones together.

Pretty sure the massive, tattooed walking armor that is Mack is sneaking pieces together when Ryan’s not looking.

Isobel sits across from us, pale and shaken, one hand pressed to her mouth. Blaze is by the wall; fury carved into every line of him. Bayne watches the screen with cold, lethal stillness. Gregory stands beside Rafe, glasses slipping down his nose, his face too pale in the blue glow of the monitors.

Lucian is beside me. Still. Too still.

That is what scares me most. Not his rage. His stillness. The quiet before he becomes something no one can call off. I imagine this was what he was like before he killed Caleb.

Rafe lowers the tablet. “Carlos has Marina’s files.”

Gregory’s voice is quiet. “The warehouse and the Village connect. Significantly.”

The words move through the room like smoke.

Carlos at the center of all of it.

Lucian looks at Isobel. His voice is as biting as the wind that’s beating the house. “Start with Marina.”

Isobel inhales shakily. “Marina kept proof. Photographs. Birth certificates. Death records. Payment chains. Warehouse rosters. Old access routes. Police reports. Bribes. Blackmail. If Carlos touched it, she wanted proof. If Lucian touched it, Carlos wanted proof.”

Lucian’s jaw tightens. “Where and how did she keep files?”

“One paper, one digital. I don’t know where she kept either.”

“Helpful,” Blaze snorts.

Isobel’s hand rises to her throat. “And, I think Carlos may have had a tracker on her.”

The necklace. The pretty gold necklace with the black stone. The one Rafe took from her after finding the dead tracker hidden inside.

“I didn’t know about the tracker,” Isobel says quickly.

I think for a moment. “Could the necklace have been anything else?”

“What do you mean?” Lucian turns to me.

I turn to Isobel. “What do you think?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know. I didn’t even know it wasn’t just a pendant to begin with.”

“Did you take the entire thing apart?” I ask Rafe.

“We stopped at the tracker.” Rafe thinks for a moment. “There could have been more? Possibly?”

“Worth a look.” Gregory stands to retrieve the necklace.

Rafe opens the pendant under a magnifier. Inside, hidden behind the black stone, is not a chip.

Blaze swears. Bayne takes his first-ever seat at the table. Isobel goes white as the ghost she is.

“It is microfilm,” Gregory breathes.

Blaze stares at it. “Oh, come on. You’re telling me she didn’t know this was here?”

Everyone but Lucian looks at Isobel. She shakes her head. She looks tired.

Her voice is a sad whisper. “Is it Marina’s? She’s the one who gave it to me.”

“Only one way to find out. Scan it,” Lucian says.

Rafe scans it. Images load on the main screen. Pages and pages of documents. A list of names. Payments. Warehouse rosters.

Isobel gasps. “This is hers. It’s hers. Why hide it in the necklace?”

Blaze scoffs. “See? She knows what’s in there. It could take days to get through this. I’m telling you we⁠—”

“I’m only here two more days, Blaze, but if you mention interrogating a woman again,” Bayne swears under his breath. “I’ll still have time to wring your neck.”

“She’s an enemy⁠—”

“Wait.” Rafe holds up a hand.

The room goes silent. He’s found something.

A line circled in red. Words too small for me to read from where I sit. Gregory pulls the screen closer, reading, “TWELVE SECOND DELAY AUTHORIZED.”

The room holds its breath. The next image appears. A map. Not Bachman Village. Not exactly. An old industrial block. The warehouse.

Lucian and Isobel try very hard not to look at each other.

For once, it doesn’t even bother me. I’m starting to feel bad for both of them. It seems as if neither of them wants to be tied to the other.

If I’m the anchor that moors him, she’s threatening to pull him under.

The third image loads. A photograph of a signature. Back-to-back letter B’s light up the screen in gold.

A Bachman authorization seal.

Lucian’s voice is almost too quiet. “That’s my father’s seal.”

Rafe studies the image. “This proves his seal was used. Not that he used it personally.”

“What does it mean?” Lucian’s hand slips out of mine. I let it.

Now, I know he’s not taking his love with it.

Then Rafe’s tablet chimes.

One sound, and the whole house becomes a popsicle.

Rafe looks down. His expression hardens. “Another message. It’s the same sender as the one who sent the last video…”

We all think of Marina, her death, and how this is all related.

Gregory inspects the screen. “It’s got to be from Carlos.”

“Wait…” At the mention of Carlos, Isobel half stands from her chair. “The necklace.”

“What about it?” Blaze asks before Lucian can.

“What if Marina gave me the microfilm because she was going to leave Carlos?” Hope edges into her voice. “What if she wanted to turn away from him?”

“Like you have?” Blaze says, bored.

“Shut up, Blaze,” Bayne says. “Let her speak.”

Blaze shoves the end of a pen in his mouth to stop himself from retorting. I’m starting to wonder if, by some miracle, those two share DNA because they fight like Cass and I do.

Isobel looks away from us, pacing a strip of floor behind her side of the table. She’s talking mostly to herself. “What if… what if she knew I was going to turn against him?”

Lucian’s voice is deadly. “You swore you told no one.”

“I didn’t.” Her eyes snap to him. “I still swear.”

Blaze tosses the pen onto the table. “Then how would she know, and what does that have to do with any of this?”

“My god. Will you let me speak!” Elegant Isobel loses her composure, throwing her hands into the air. “I swear your wife must be the most patient woman in the world.”

“She is. Patient and sweet and kind and nothing like you. And instead of being with her, living in our beautiful home, in our amazing Village, I’m stuck here in this haunted ice cube trying to eliminate your psycho boyfriend.”

“Ex,” she says, “boyfriend.”

“Like it matters!” Blaze roars.

I try to make peace. “Guys. We’re starting to remind me of Ryan when he was a toddler. We all need a snack and a nap.”

Lucian’s voice cuts through the madness. “How did she know?”

Isobel falls back into her seat, cupping her head in her hands. “I don’t know! Okay. Maybe she sensed it or⁠—”

Wait.

“The maid,” I say. “The staff member you said traveled with you. Could she have gotten word to Marina?”

Isobel looks up, thinking, then she almost smiles at me. “It’s possible.”

Then her face falls.

And my stomach twists, the vision of her in that concrete room flooding in.

And I tell the room what she’s thinking. “If Marina knew you were coming here, she may have somehow gotten the maid to hide the film in that necklace.”

Isobel starts slowly, laying out her thoughts as she speaks, “And Carlos was planning all this. It was all coming to a head, and Marina knew he was going to be asking for the hard copy.”

“And she wouldn’t give it to him,” I whisper, Marina’s face haunting my thoughts.

Isobel locks eyes with me. “And he interrogated her to find it.”

“And she still wouldn’t tell him,” I say back.

“And it got her killed.”

“She was strong,” I tell her.

We almost smile at one another. Three women locked into the sisterhood of living in a man’s world.

Rafe brings our attention back to the screen. “Ready for our next message from Carlos?”

Our silence is an agreement.

He hits a button and a file begins downloading.

ERIN.

My name fills the screen.

Lucian moves so fast I barely see him.

One second and he is beside me.

The next, he is between me and the screen, rage pouring off him.

“Do not open it.”

Rafe’s eyes lift. “Lucian.”

“I said don’t open it.”

The room goes deadly quiet.

My mouth goes dry.

My knees are not steady.

But I step forward.

Lucian turns on me. “No.”

My name on Carlos’s file. Lucian’s terror in the air.

Everyone watching to see whether I let him decide what parts of my own life I am allowed to face.

I stop beside him.

“Open it,” I say.

His eyes burn into mine. “Erin.”

“Partnership,” I remind him.

The word hits him harder than any accusation.

His face tightens. “You don’t want this, Erin. Not here.”

I see the fight inside him. The panic. The command. The need to lift me, lock me away, and burn the file unread.

“It’s okay,” I say. “We’re all in this together.”

“Not all of us,” Blaze mutters at Isobel.

“Play it,” I whisper.

Lucian turns back to Rafe. His voice is raw. “Open it.”

Rafe does.

Photographs fill the screen. Me outside the apartment before the first night. Me with Cass.

Ryan walking into school.

Bambi’s building. Us playing outside.

Timestamp after timestamp after timestamp.

My body goes cold.

It’s me. One the screen.

In the dress.

It’s that night. I’m standing outside his building.

My jaw is set, determined.

In my eyes? Pure terror.

Beneath the image, a note appears.

SHE WAS NEVER YOUR MISTAKE TO MAKE

The next line loads slowly, as if Carlos wants every word to have teeth.

THE MORETTIS MAY HAVE SENT HER

My stomach drops. Lucian knew what direction this would go. He wanted to save me from the shame that flows through me, now.

Another line appears.

I CHOSE HER TO SEND

I KNOW WHAT YOU LIKE

The room goes to another level of silence. The kind that presses against your chest making it hard to breathe.

Carlos worked through the Morettis. Carlos was behind the first night.

He knew me. He knew Caleb.

Somehow, the two are connected more deeply than I could have imagined.

Caleb, Carlos, the Morettis and their whispered instructions. Beneath my desperation, Lucian’s arrogance, and the transaction I have spent months trying to turn into something real.

He did not force me through Lucian’s door.

But he knew Caleb, knew the path he made for us, the one that made me desperate enough to walk through that door with the fob in my hand.

The screen changes again.

A message thread.

Moretti names. Payment routes. A reference to “the girl.” A note about the fob. A line about using family pressure.

Cass. Ryan. Debts.

A final instruction:

SEND HER TO LUCIAN

SHE’S THE PERFECT REPLACEMENT

Someone swears. Maybe Blaze.

Maybe it’s me.

Lucian reaches for me. I step away before he touches me. His face changes as if I struck him.

But I can’t let him hold me right now.

Not with Isobel in the room. Not with my betrayal lit up for the entire room to remember.

I came to Lucian as the enemy’s delivery girl. I came to him with soft skin, a cheap dress, and a threat in my hand.

I came to ruin him.

My eyes move to Isobel before I can stop them. She is staring at the screen, pale and still.

Of course she sees it.

Of course she understands.

The woman who once went with Carlos and left Lucian in the fire is watching the woman who walked into his bed carrying a Moretti weapon.

The room tilts.

How am I different?

The thought tears through me before I can stop it.

How am I different from her?

Isobel believed Carlos and walked away.

I believed my own excuses and walked in.

She left him to burn.

I came to help burn down everything he had built.

My throat closes.

“Erin,” Lucian says.

His voice is rough. No command now. Only pain.

My pain.

I shake my head, not at him.

At myself.

At the screen.

At every version of me who thought love could erase the way we began.

CHAPTER FIVE

Erin

I go back to the room because I choose to.

That is what I tell myself as he presses his palm to the wall and the black door opens beneath my palm and warm gold light spills across my bare feet.

I choose this.

I choose him.

I choose every terrible, beautiful thing we are becoming inside a house at the end of the world while Carlos picks through the bones of our beginning.

The sensual room waits in silence.

Leather. Velvet. Silk. Dark wood. Glass looking out over the black Icelandic coast. The sea beyond it throws itself against the rocks as if it can break the land apart by wanting hard enough.

I understand the impulse.

Lucian stands behind me. He doesn’t touch me yet. That’s how I know he’s angry.

No, not angry.

Worse.

Afraid.

His fear is colder than anger. It moves through the room without sound, slipping under my skin, tightening every place his hands have ever been.

The door shuts. I feel it in my stomach. One soft sound.

This world opens from the inside. And I have to choose it.

I turn to face him. His eyes move over me. Slow, dark, and possessive in a way that should make me run and instead keeps me here.

“I’m trying not to put you over my shoulder and lock you in this room until Carlos is dead.”

My throat tightens. “That would be kidnapping.”

“Yes.”

“Romance continues to bloom,” I say.

His jaw flexes.

“Lucian.” I don’t want to see it again. I see it anyway.

The elevator. The dress. The key fob. The girl I was, walking into Lucian Bachman’s apartment with cheap courage and a lie tucked in her palm.

His voice drops. “You stepped away from me tonight because you thought I saw you differently.”

He is too good at knowing me, at cutting through every layer of pride and finding the small, shaking thing underneath.

I wrap my arms around myself, hating the defensive movement and unable to stop it. “Maybe you should see me differently.”

“Careful.”

“Why? Because you don’t like the truth?” My voice shakes, but I keep going because if I stop, I may fold. “I came with something meant to destroy you.”

“You were desperate,” he says. “I took advantage of that. I wanted to. That was part of who I was.”

“Part of Isobel, too.”

“Do not compare the two of you.” His voice is hard. “She left me in the fire.”

The words tear out of me. “What if I was the match that started the fire in the Village?”

There it is.

The ugly thought I have not been able to swallow since the file opened.

Lucian goes utterly still.

I press a hand to my chest, fingers digging into my own skin as if I can hold myself together from the outside.

“Carlos opened the door. The Morettis pushed me through. But I walked, Lucian. I walked into your life and⁠—”

Lucian crosses the room before I can breathe. His hand closes around the back of my neck.

Enough to stop me from retreating inside myself.

“Red,” he says.

My pulse jumps. “What?”

“Say it.” His thumb strokes once beneath my ear.

I stare up at him.

His face is hard, but his eyes are burning. “Safe word, Erin.”

The room shifts.

My throat works. “Red.”

“And slow?”

The familiar word eases out of me. “Yellow.”

He grips the back of my neck. “If you say either?”

“You stop,” I whisper.

“Immediately,” he says.

My body shivers. This dangerous, furious, grief-haunted man is asking permission to take me apart.

“Color?” he asks.

I swallow. “Green.”

His eyes close for one brief second. When they open, something in him has changed. He’s focused.

“Good girl.”

The praise slides over me like silk. He takes my hand in his, dragging me to a corner of the room where there’s a rug and a black velvet cushion resting on it. I step onto the deep, soft cushion of the rug and it envelops my bare feet.

He steps back. “Undress.”

The command hits hard. My breath catches.

Usually, I would argue. Tease. Make him work for my obedience because defiance is my favorite form of foreplay and possibly my worst personality trait.

Tonight, I freeze.

Lucian’s eyes narrow. “Erin.”

“Hmm?”

“You heard me.”

“Yes.”

“Then obey.”

The word punches heat through me. Obey. Dangerous word.

Beautiful word.

It splits me open because some part of me wants to obey him so badly it scares me.

Another part hears it and sees the files, knowing now it was Carlos who sent me.

His voice lowers. “Do it for me.”

My heart stumbles. “What?”

“Not for Carlos. Not for the Morettis. Not for the girl who walked into my apartment with a lie in her hand.” His gaze burns into mine. “For me.”

I just stand there, taking him in.

“And for you,” he adds, rougher. “Because this is what you want to bring you back to me. To us. To who we are now. Together.”

Damn him for being everything I ever needed but didn’t know it had a name.

“Lucian.” My hands go to the hem of my sweater. I pull it over my head.

Slowly.

The air touches my skin. Warm. Heavy. Charged.

Lucian watches every inch I reveal as if I am not guilty. As if I am not ruined. As if the sight of me is still enough to make the world shrink to us.

I drop the sweater. The jeans I pulled on before breakfast follow.

Then my bra.

Then my panties.

My clothes are littered around me, dotting the rug.

I stand before him naked and trembling, and for once, I do not know whether I am trembling from desire or pain. With us, they seem to be forever intertwined.

Lucian looks at me for a long time. So long that it makes my nerves rise to the point I think I might say our safe word for the first time in my life.

“Say something,” I beg.

His jaw tightens. “Knees.”

The word hits like a strike.

My body responds instantly by radiating heat, low and sharp.

My pride responds too. “Lucian.”

“Knees, Erin.”

I stare at him and see the dark place in him.

The man who wants my surrender like proof. The man who wants me lowered before him so he can believe I still trust him. The man who looks at my shame and thinks if he can command my body, maybe he can drag my heart back from the ledge.

My eyes burn.

“Is that what you want?” I ask. “Submission?”

“Yes.”

The answer is immediate. It makes my stomach flip.

“You want me on my knees, surrendering to you so you can make me forget how I first came to you?”

His answer is sharp. “No.”

“Then why?” I breathe.

His eyes flash a warning. “Because I will remind you who you are to me, now. Always. Forever.”

Forever.

His words make everything stop.

I hold them in my head, in my heart, in every part of my body.

Then, I fall to my knees. The soft carpet welcomes me like a kiss.

Lucian steps away from me.

Only one step, but the distance feels enormous.

Then his hand goes to his belt. My pulse stutters.

The sound is soft. Leather sliding through loops. One slow pull.

Heat pulses low in my core, tangled with nerves, shame, and something deeper.

He folds the belt once in his hand.

Like a ritual.

The belt hangs from his hand, dark and wicked against the warm light of the room. He does not touch me with it. Not yet. He lets me look and lets the want and fear tangle in me.

My throat goes dry. “Lucian.”

His eyes lift to mine. “Color.”

The room seems to narrow around that one word.

My choice.

I swallow. “Green.”

“Turn around,” he says. “Chest pressed to the cushion. Face down.”

Everything in me wants to run. Instead, I force myself to obey. Slowly, knees in the carpet, I turn to face the cushion. I bend at the waist, pressing my naked breasts against the soft velvet, my face over its edge.

I turn my face to the window.

The glass wall reflects us in shadow: me naked and shaking, pale skin, curves on display. Lucian behind me in an open shirt and dark trousers, belt in his hand, his face carved from possession and restraint.

He crouches down. I watch him in the mirror as he moves. So controlled, so graceful. His hand settles on the back of my neck.

“You are going to listen to me,” he says, his mouth near my ear. “And you are going to believe me.”

The belt touches the back of my thigh. Cool leather dragging over heated skin. Lucian’s hand tightens at my neck. “What are you to me? Now and forever?”

I want to respond. No words come. He waits.

The belt trails higher, over the curve of me, a slow drag that makes every nerve wake.

“Mine,” he says to me.

My eyes burn. “Yours.”

“Not theirs.”

My voice shakes. “Not theirs.”

“Not the Morettis.”

The belt leaves my skin. He pulls himself to a stand. He towers over me. I can’t breathe. The silence before the first strike is unbearable.

Then it lands. Not brutal and not soft.

A sharp, bright line of heat across the middle of my ass, hip to hip.

I gasp, grabbing the edge of the velvet pillow. The sting blooms fast, spreading through me in a hot rush.

He crouches down again. His palm follows instantly, rubbing over the mark, soothing what he just lit.

“Color.”

My breath comes too fast. “Green.”

His mouth brushes my shoulder. Tingles travel up my skin. A nip at my neck. “Good girl.”

The praise breaks me a little.

The belt strikes me again. This one is lower. Heat and pain dance along the lower curve of my ass where it meets the tops of my thighs. This time I know what is coming, and somehow that makes it worse. Better. My body braces. My mind scatters.

Still, every ugly thought Carlos planted rises, trying to get its teeth into me.

I came as a weapon. I carried the fob. I lied.

The belt snaps down again.

I cry out freely, grateful for Bachman’s obsession with soundproofing.

Lucian’s hand is there now warm and firm, rubbing the sting into heat.

“What are you?” he demands.

I shake my head.

His palm grips my hip. “Answer me.”

“I don’t know.”

Wrong answer.

The belt lands again. Sharper. I gasp his name, half protest, half plea. “Lucian.”

Lucian steps in behind me, his shirt and chest brushing my back, his voice rough at my ear. “Yes, you do.”

I squeeze my eyes shut.

“I was sent,” I whisper.

His whole body goes still.

“I was sent to you,” I say, my voice breaking. “The Morettis sent me. Carlos opened the door. I walked through it.”

Lucian’s hand slides around my throat, not squeezing, only holding me exactly where I am.

“Yes,” he says.

The word hurts because he does not deny it.

He does not rescue me from the truth with pretty lies.

“You walked through it,” he says. “Then you became mine.”

The belt strokes over my heated skin again, softer now, almost tender. Another strike. I jolt, the sound leaving me raw.

He soothes it with his hand. “You became mine.”

Another. Heat flashes through me so sharply that my hands hurt from gripping the cushion so tightly.

“And not because I bought you. Not because they sent you.”

The belt lands again, lower, wickedly precise.

I cry out, and this time the sound turns into something dangerously close to relief.

“Because I chose you. And you chose me.”

His hand smooths over me.

Another strike.

“You chose to stand between my brother and a bullet.”

Another.

“You chose me when running would have been easier.”

Another.

My knees tremble. My skin burns. My heart feels cracked open and exposed.

The belt falls from his hand onto the floor.

The sound is final.

Lucian turns me around before I can gather myself, lifting me easily onto the edge of the cabinet. I gasp as the cool surface meets my heated skin, then again when his hands frame my face.

“Tell me. Now.” His eyes are wild now. “What are you?”

A tear spills over. He catches it with his thumb. “Yours. I’m yours.” The sob breaks out of me.

I hate it. I need it.

Lucian kneels between my thighs. His strong arm slides underneath my waist. He pulls me up and against him so we’re kneeling as one. He presses himself hard into my burning backside.

“Say you were not one night.” His hand slides into my hair. “Say it, Erin.”

“I was not just one night.”

“Again.”

“I was not just one night.”

His forehead presses against the top of my head.

He cups my face under my chin, turning my lips to his. “And what are you?”

I breathe through the sting, through the ache, through the ugly truth and the beautiful one waiting behind it.

“Yours.”

For a second, he doesn’t move.

Then his mouth crashes down on mine.

Hard. Possessive.

Exactly what I need.

I kiss him back with everything I am. Every lie. Every shame. Every ruined beginning.

Lucian lifts me from the rug and carries me to the bed. I’m feather-light in his arms. He lays me down on my stomach. My face is pressed into the soft covers. His clothed body grazes my naked one.

He presses a kiss to every place the belt kissed before him. Each one softer than the last.

My eyes burn into the sheets. His palm smooths over me one last time.

I turn my face enough to look back at him.

The room is blurred at the edges. He is not.

“Thank you,” I say.

His expression shifts, heat returning, deeper now. Darker.

He crawls over me, his body covering mine, his mouth at my ear.

“You were never just one night.”

I close my eyes. “No.”

“You were our first night. First night of our forever.” His lips brush the back of my neck.

There’s that word again. Beautiful and bloated with that dangerous poison: hope.

I’m starting to believe that we’ve left behind the battles of our past—that the messy, fairy-tale ending where I become a mafia queen and he is forever tied to my family might actually come true.

I lean into him, pulling him closer. “I’m ready for forever, our forever.”

“Me too, baby,” he responds with a strained laugh. “First, we just need to conquer a monster.”

“Good thing I know a dragon slayer,” I reply, “someone who could tame me.”

“Tamed,” he says, shedding his clothes. “And ready to claim.”

He gathers me into his arms with a growl. Despite everything, a giggle escapes me as he nips at my neck, nuzzling me with his chin. “I’ll slay any dragon that comes between me and my princess.”

I wrap my arms around his neck, locking eyes with him so we’re connected in every way possible. I close my eyes, turning my head with a gasp as he fully enters me.

If he can conquer my demons, what else can’t he overcome?

CHAPTER SIX

Lucian

I want all this to be over. I want Erin in my arms; our house filled with laughter and the chaos of her family. The brooding boot steps of mine.

She doesn’t know the dragon has two heads.

I have to defeat Carlos in the world, and the Isobel inside me.

I don’t want her tied to me any longer.

The guilt, the hatred, the betrayal that cuts me deeper than anything Erin has ever done or planned on doing.

Erin and I were strangers.

Isobel and I were together and had something between us that no one knew about. Something that tied us tighter than anything.

She was pregnant.

With my child.

I was young, stunned, lost, yet fiercely protective of the tiny being in her belly. It was early, she was joyous, and we chose to keep the secret to ourselves as long as we could.

She lost the baby just before the fire.

Later I learned this can happen, especially with first pregnancies.

But then, it felt like a punishment had been handed down.

I didn’t know how to handle it. Nothing like this had ever happened to me where I had to go through it with someone else. With Gregory, I was the older one, shielding him.

With her, there was nothing I could do.

And maybe in her weakness, Carlos moved in. Maybe he offered her a new life and that’s what she needed.

I don’t know.

I only know she remembers, too.

I saw her hand pass over her womb that first night she showed up on the doorstep at Red Shutters.

She’s kept it to herself, all this time. Then, at the table, I feared she was about to tell everyone.

To tell Erin.

It never occurred to me that Erin might even need to know. I thought the less I talked about that part of my past, the more I protected her from it.

Looking back, maybe cracks were formed between us then, ones that made it easier for Carlos to poison her against me. It still haunts me; what lie did Carlos tell her about me to make her do what she did?

That’s the dark inky poison that leaks into every corner of my mind.

Poison I don’t yet have the antidote for.

And I have to tell Erin. About the baby we shared.

She’s just begun to trust in our forever.

But if she finds out any other way, from anyone else.

It might be too much. It might break something in her.

And she might leave me too.

That fear grips me, and it’s why I haven’t told her before now.

I can’t lose Erin. Not now. Not ever.

Erin decrees a house reset when we return upstairs. “We’re all going to lose it if we don’t have normalcy.”

“Luckily, we have a little kid here and they demand structure,” Cass says. “Pizza game night?”

Isobel slips up to her room, as discreetly as one can, followed by armed guards. I hear Erin whispering to the staff who cook tonight to send up a Margarita for Isobel.

Funny how well she guessed. That’s Isobel’s order.

I’m tired of hating myself for knowing stuff like that.

My men put down over a dozen meat pizzas. I struggle to eat. I distract myself by playing board games with Ryan. He cheats sliding his purple plastic man up the slide instead of down, and I let him when I wouldn’t.

Cass sees and lets it go, too. We all need a win in this house.

Erin brings dessert out of who-knows-where, a Skyr Cake, a delicate cheesecake like dish with a buttery crust and fresh berries that must have been flown in from far away from this iceberg we call a home.

Again, I keep telling my freezing counterparts. I built it as a summer home.

I take her to bed and bury myself inside her until I’m anywhere but here.

And there’s still time to tell Erin the secret that’s welded me to Isobel.

By morning, the house I built to brood away the summers, isolated and alone, is a bustling den of controlled chaos, and too soon we’re back in the war room.

A room I’m starting to loathe.

A room I’m turning into an arcade for Ryan when this is all over.

Rafe has owned the long table since we arrived. With Erin here, I’m no brain and all brawn, ready to strike without even a moment’s notice. Rafe runs the show this time.

Three laptops. Two encrypted tablets. Maps layered over maps. Tech I’d be lost in, but that intrigues my baby brother.

Gregory sits beside Rafe in a wrinkled sweater, sandy hair destroyed by wind and sleep, glasses sliding down his nose as he studies the screen like Carlos might tell us where he is if Gregory stares hard enough.

My heart fills with pride while my stomach sinks.

This is everything I wanted to keep him away from, yet he’s the man I hoped he would be.

I have to let him make his own choices. He chooses to have a seat at the table.

As does she.

My beating heart sits across from me wrapped in my coat.

Across from me, watching every piece move.

I hate it. I need her. Like I’ve come to need my brother in this room. Hell, one day I’ll want Ryan here too.

Family. We’re family.

Isobel sits near the far end of the table with guards behind her. Pale. Silent. Broken.

I think of the baby that never was.

I look at Erin. She smiles at me and the gesture is a knife stabbed into my gut.

Twisted.

We’re twisted. All of us.

But me the most.

Rafe taps the screen. Gregory leans in, looking right at me. “Dad’s seal is where everyone is getting distracted.”

Gregory saying ‘Dad’ so casually, like he’s in the room and hasn’t been murdered, twists the knife another turn.

Blaze is sprawled in an oversized armchair in the corner of the room, as far away from Isobel as we can get him.

He’s glaring at his useless phone and says, “The dead-dad seal?”

Anger rises in me. “That is an appalling phrase.”

Gregory sighs. “It’s fine. It’s true, and the inner circle fighting is getting in our way.”

“It’s a clear phrase,” Blaze adds, snapping his phone shut. He glares at me.

I give him grace. I know why he holds that phone. I know why he’s as miserable as he is.

He needs his wife.

“It’s appalling and clear,” Erin says, ending the rift.

Rafe folds his hands. “Your father’s seal was not a fresh authorization. It was an old master credential. Family-level access built into the old Bachman courier system.”

I stare at the screen, at the dead-dad seal. My father’s authority.

Another ghost Carlos has dragged into the room.

“Explain,” I say. Erin cuts me a look. “Please,” I add.

Rafe does. Quickly. Thank God.

“The original Bachman system had hidden courier routes, service doors, emergency overrides, old tunnels, and master credentials. Your father either created, inherited, or approved the credential. After his death, it should have been retired.”

“But it wasn’t,” Gregory says.

“No,” Rafe answers. “Someone preserved it.”

Isobel’s eyes lower.

I do not need more.

“Marina knew where it lived,” Rafe says. “Carlos learned how to use it.”

There. A clean answer. My father did not rise from the grave to turn against us all.

“Carlos used Dad’s authority like a stolen key.” Gregory gives a look I know well—he’s choosing logic over emotion.

Rafe moves to the next file. “The twelve-second delay is the real weapon.”

Gregory straightens, grateful for facts. “It was not lag. It was programmed. Twelve seconds is long enough for a gate to read closed while opening. Long enough for a camera feed to loop one clean frame. Long enough for an alarm to route to the wrong terminal.”

It all comes to me at once. “A Bachman Seal overrides everything.”

Gregory takes a deep breath. “Yes, and Carlos used it at the Bachman Village, Carlos’s new men pulled guards to a false breach while the real access opened. Everyone was distracted enough for one man to make it inside the walls.”

Bayne steps away from the window. “So, the bastard has been using dead credentials, old routes, and a wee pause in the system to make ghosts walk through walls.”

Blaze points at him. “This is why we keep the Scots. They make even cybercrime sound sexy with that damn accent of theirs.”

Bayne wants to hide his smile but can’t. “Enjoy me while you can.” Even though he’s more controlled, he’s desperate to be back in his bed with his own wife.

Erin looks over. “You’re leaving us?”

His humor fades at the sound of her voice. “Freya made the call,” he says. “My clan leaves in a few hours.”

The room tightens.

“I’ll leave a smaller crew through the night and two men for transport,” he continues. “But Red Shutters is compromised. I cannae keep my people stretched between Scotland and Iceland any longer.”

I do not like it. But I can’t argue. He’s stayed longer than he should have. Risked more than I wanted him to.

“Thank you,” I say.

Bayne’s brows rise. “Careful, Bachman. Gratitude makes you sound soft.”

Then he looks at Erin. “Keep him from locking you in a tower before I see you again.”

“Bayne,” I warn.

“Did you hear him?” Erin says to me. “Freya made the call. A woman.”

“Aye. She’s the head of our wee operation. And she’s damn good.” His mouth curves.

“Don’t encourage her, Scot,” I warn.

“And when the wedding happens, I expect proper notice. I’ll not be hauled over the coals because Kitt only has a week to choose an outfit when the two of you finally admit the obvious.”

The word hits the room.

Wedding.

Erin’s face colors.

Mine does not.

Isobel sinks into the walls.

Four carats. Princess cut. Platinum band.

Bachman’s finest.

Erin says quickly, “Marriage has not been discussed.”

Blaze lowers his phone. “Oh, I love this. Finally, something more interesting to talk about than Carlos.”

Erin looks at him.

“What?” He shrugs. “I mean, I’m not one to talk. I married my sister.”

“Stepsister,” I quickly correct.

He raises both hands. “Hey, family first. Am I right?”

Bayne breaks. “Yer disgusting. Will someone call that wife of his and get Cleopatra here as fast as possible, so we don’t have to listen to his gibberish any longer?”

“You’re leaving,” Erin reminds him gently. “You don’t have to put up with it anymore.”

Before I can interject, the front security panel chimes.

Every man not in on the secret moves toward the weapon of choice he carries.

Blaze goes from lounging to lunging in one movement. His knife flashes in his hand as he flies up from the chair. “Why the hell weren’t we warned someone was approaching?”

Bayne’s brows lift, amused. “You have that little faith in my men? See, that’s why Freya calls us back. Because you, Blaze, are a pain in the arse.”

“Stand down,” I say to the room. “Blaze. The door is for you.”

Blaze goes still. “Oh,” he says.

In on the plan, Erin grins at me. “You finally shut him up, Lucian.”

“What oh?” I say.

Rafe turns the tablet to face Blaze. He falls to his knees. “I can’t believe it.”

A woman stands beneath the gray Icelandic sky in a colorful patchwork coat that looks more thrift store than couture, her brown hair hanging in a braid over her shoulder. She has one hand on a suitcase, the other planted on her hip.

Cleopatra. Blaze’s wife. She waves at the camera above her head. “Yoohoo! Is one going to let me in? It’s freezing out here, and I have some choice words to deliver.”

Blaze is gone.

Erin and I sit, smiling at one another. We hear the front door open. Wind rushes in. Blaze lets out a kind of cowboy victory yelp.

Then her teacher’s voice cuts through the house.

“Do not sweetheart me, Blaze Bachman. Your phone stopped working, your texts turned into caveman fragments, and then Freya called me to let me know your phone wasn’t working and said everyone here was temporarily alive. Temporarily. Alive.”

Bayne murmurs, “Freya does enjoy theatrics.”

Blaze says something too low to hear.

Cleo snaps, “Don’t you dare kiss me until⁠—”

The sentence ends.

Erin laughs under her breath. “I like her.”

A moment later, Blaze returns with his wife tucked firmly against his side and no apology on his face.

He looks different with her.

Still lethal.

Still insufferable.

But steadier.

Like a match that finally found its hearth.

Cleo scans the room, taking in the maps, the weapons, the faces.

Her gaze lands on Erin first.

“Erin. I would hug you, but my husband has decided I’m luggage.”

“She told the men in New York that if they were coming to replace Bayne’s men, she was coming with them,” Blaze says.

“And because the last two texts you sent me were,” she blushes, “one asking for very inappropriate images of yours truly, and then the last one—you texted⁠—”

Blaze interjects. “Alive, busy, likely murder later, LOVE YOU all caps? Was it that one that did the trick?”

She’s much shorter than he is and she has to tilt her head to stare up at him. “Precisely.”

Then Cleo looks at the screen.

Her smile fades. “This is about the Village.”

Not a question. Blaze’s arm tightens around her. “Yes. Among other, trivial things.”

She knows what the Village means. She knows what loving a Bachman man costs her. Her love for Blaze is written all over the way she stands there: a good girl, a brave girl with a terrified heart, still walking straight into the room with the monsters.

Or, as Erin likes to think of us, monster slayers.

She steps closer.

“What do you need?”

Blaze brings her back, saying, “You need to rest.”

“No.” She looks at the maps. “I need to know what I can do.”

Blaze opens his mouth.

She turns to him. “Give me a moment. Please.”

His mouth closes for the first time since we arrived, happily replaced with a lopsided grin.

Erin murmurs, “I don’t think it works on Lucian.”

Rafe brings us back. “Carlos has gone quiet since the last message.”

“Quiet is not peace,” I say.

“No,” Rafe agrees. “Quiet is an invitation to make the first move.”

Cleo frowns at the screen. “Then don’t chase the noise.”

Every man looks at her.

She stiffens but does not retreat. “I’m not a strategist. I teach kids for a living. But when a child acts out for attention, you don’t chase every little thing. You watch the pattern. Figure out what they want you to do. Then don’t do that very thing.”

Silence.

Blaze looks at her like she hung the moon and loaded it with ammunition all at once. He leans down, scooping her up into his arms. “That’s my girl,” he says, kissing her softly.

Gregory leans in. “She’s right. The first move could be the wrong one.”

Rafe nods slowly. “Carlos wants movement. Panic. Overcorrection. He has attacked Marina, thrown what was to be emotional warfare on Lucian.”

Gregory adds, poetically, “He wants you doubting every beginning before he makes his final move.”

“Your education wasn’t wasted,” I say, trying to think.

Erin studies the map. “So we don’t chase the message.”

“We find where the message came from. Then, attack.”

“Use his own weakness for revenge against him. If he were bulletproof, he would know not to send us messages in the first place”

Gregory grins. “It’s not like the old Bachman days. Everything sent through tech is traceable. We must find the access that made the message possible.”

Rafe’s mouth almost curves. “Exactly.”

Pride moves through me so sharply it nearly hurts.

My brother, my men, my woman, together at the board.

“Well played,” I say.

“Partnership,” Erin counters.

Blaze sighs. “Beautiful. Growth. Love. Emotional evolution. Blah, blah, blah. Can you all afford to miss me for a couple of hours, or what?

He stares down adoringly at the woman in his arms.

We all speak at once. “Go!” “Get out of here!” “See you for dinner.”

He runs from the room, Cleopatra laughing in his arms.

Rafe clicks through the microfilm. Fast. Clean. Blaze isn’t here to say we should torture it out of Isobel, which is a relief. We all know she had no idea what was in that necklace.

“What do we know?” I ask.

“The seal was an old master credential preserved after your father died. Something Marina stole and took with her, then Carlos used dead authority to override the system.”

Click.

“The twelve-second delay was a programmed blind spot. Gates, alarms, and feeds fell out of sync long enough for the wrong people to move through the right doors.”

Click.

“Marina kept copies. Carlos took enough of her records but killed her over something on that microfilm.”

Isobel speaks, and we remember she exists. “And she knew whatever was on that hidden microfilm was important enough that she died keeping it safe.”

Good.

Done.

Click.

Erin adds, “Carlos didn’t choose me by accident. He recognized a wound named Caleb and aimed it.”

I tick off the list. “My father, Marina’s death, revealing that he chose Erin to send, is emotional warfare.”

“As it always is with him,” Isobel agrees.

Rafe turns off the screen. “Now we decide whether to let Carlos believe we are still reacting.”

I feel the answer settle before I speak it.

The boy with the dead parents.

The man from the warehouse.

The king whose Village burned.

The lover who nearly lost Erin because every door in my life has been compromised by ghosts.

All of them go quiet.

The Bachman king remains.

“No more reacting,” I say. “We need to find him. We need to strike his location first. But it has to look like we’re headed in another direction.”

Rafe nods. “We leak a controlled response. Make Carlos think we are moving toward what’s currently being rebuilt in New York, emotionally, not strategically, to protect it. That we are burning everything in our path to get there before he does.”

Gregory adds, “Then we watch which old credential wakes to track us.”

I look at Erin. This is the part where every instinct tells me to remove her from the room, lock her away, and call it devotion. She knows it.

Her chin lifts.

Silent. Defiant. Mine.

She’s not going anywhere. I accept her decision. I hate that I do.

Rafe stands. “Let’s break for a meal. Our minds will be sharper after.”

Isobel disappears, two guards behind her like a veil. I let our secret momentarily disappear with her.

“Your men arrived with Cleopatra.” Bayne checks the time. “My transport leaves in a few hours. I need to gather the men.”

He comes to stand before me.

For a moment, we are brothers.

“You have my number, my favor, and my warning,” he says.

“Which is?”

“Do not let Carlos choose the battlefield in your head before you choose the one beneath your feet.”

I smile.

He turns to Erin. “Keep him angry enough to live and calm enough to think.”

“A delicate balance.” She moves in to hug him, whispering private words of gratitude to him as we look on.

Bayne smiles as she releases him. “Absolutely,” he says to her. Bayne bows slightly. “Until the wedding, then.”

Bootsteps. Low voices. Doors opening. Engines starting beneath the pale sky.

The house feels larger as they leave, but I know our men are moving in.

I stand at the window with Erin beside me as Bayne’s convoy rolls out. He pauses at the lead SUV and lifts a hand in farewell.

Then he is gone, taking his men back to his stormy Scottish islands.

I wrap my arm around her shoulders. “What did you ask him?”

She grins up at me. “I told him if I could ever repay him, let me know how. Then, I asked if he’d be a groomsman at the wedding. I hope you don’t mind me making that decision.”

“I’ll allow it.”

A smile tugs at her mouth. “That sounds like growth.”

Cass is in the hallway, calling us to come eat before she takes it all for herself.

Rafe isn’t fooling me. He’s called a break to get everyone out of the room. He’s onto something.

Somewhere beyond Iceland, beyond Scotland, beyond New York, a line moves in the dark.

A door opens.

A dead credential waits to wake.

Carlos thinks he is calling us back to fire.

Let him.

This time, we are not walking into his story.

We are writing our own around it.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Erin

The message arrives while Lucian is explaining to the entire war room why I am absolutely not going to Bachman Village and I’ll be moving to Cass and Ryan’s locations as soon as possible.

Which, I will not be.

Obviously.

Rafe stands at the head of the table, one hand braced against the wood, the other moving between feeds. Gregory is beside him, glasses low on his nose, his notepad already full of tiny diagrams.

Blaze leans against the wall, arms crossed, looking less violently bored than before his wife came.

Isobel sits at the far end of the table under guard, pale and quiet, her hands folded so tightly her knuckles are white.

And Lucian stands beside me like a storm. “You’re not going,” he says.

I say, “We haven’t even finished discussing the plan.”

“We do not need to finish discussing a plan that includes you walking into Carlos’s reach.”

“Lucian.”

“No.”

I look at Rafe. “Is there a version of this conversation where he becomes reasonable?”

Rafe does not look up from his tablet. “Historically, no.”

Blaze snorts. “I’ve seen brick walls with more flexibility.”

Lucian’s gaze cuts to him.

Blaze lifts both hands. “Emotionally supportive brick walls.”

Cass would love this.

Cass is not here.

That is the one good thing about today.

She and Ryan are already being moved to a secondary secure location in Norway with Mack’s best men, two of Rafe’s people, and enough surveillance to keep even Cass contained. Gregory had the idea to send them. Lucian agreed before Gregory finished speaking.

Ryan thinks they are going on an “inside camping trip” with snacks and movies.

Cass thinks we are all insane.

Lucian thought he could get me to go with them.

I fold my arms. “You promised partnership.”

Lucian turns fully toward me. “You are confusing partnership with idiocy.”

“Carlos wants you frantic. He wants you blind. He wants you making decisions from fear instead of strategy.” I take a breath. “Which you are.”

Blaze points the switchblade of his knife in his hand at the sky. “She’s right.”

Lucian does not look away from me. “Stay out of this.”

“I wasn’t talking to you,” Blaze says.

Lucian’s expression goes lethal.

“Not helping,” I tell Blaze. Rafe’s tablet chimes. The sound cuts through the room.

Every word dies, and every body in the room goes still.

“From Carlos?” Gregory asks.

Rafe taps once. “Same routing style. Old credential chain. Dead account layered over two false relays.”

Lucian’s voice is ice. “Put it up.”

The screen goes black. Then white text appears.

COME, LUCIAN. TO WHERE THE GATES OPENED INVITING IN HELL.

LET’S SEE WHETHER QUEENS BURN BETTER THAN GHOSTS.

Can’t breathe. No one speaks.

Not even Blaze.

Progress under Cleo’s control. We love to see it.

Rafe zooms in on the message structure. “He wants a reaction.”

“He wants the Village before we even finish reconstruction,” Blaze says.

“He wants Erin,” Lucian snaps. “Which is why after this meeting, she’ll be joining Cass and Ryan.”

“He wants both,” Rafe says.

He left Iceland two days ago, technically. His voice still appears in our lives whenever something dangerous happens, like a Scottish ghost with cheekbones.

On-screen, Bayne lounges somewhere dark and expensive, probably on one of his wee islands, looking both amused and prepared to order someone’s murder before tea. He’s not been able to fully give us up, yet.

Carlos loves his theater. His messages mean many things.

“Rafe,” I say slowly. “Bring up all of Carlos’s typed messages.”

Lucian’s head turns. “What? Why?”

“Please.”

Rafe does and every message Carlos has sent appears on the screen.

My skin prickles.

Gregory leans closer. “What are you seeing?”

I shake my head, thinking. “I don’t know yet.”

Lucian’s voice lowers. “Erin.”

“Don’t rush me.”

Blaze mutters, “Brave.”

I ignore him. I read them all again. And again.

Proof. Mistake. First night. Queens. Ghosts. Come home.

My eyes narrow. “I feel like he thinks the Village is a stage. And he’s putting on a play with everyone he’s killed. Lucian and Gregory’s father. Carlos’s men. Isobel. Marina.”

Isobel looks up. Her eyes are hollow.

“That is what Carlos does,” she says quietly. “He loves a good show.”

Like the tragedy he wrote where Isobel turns on her love to follow the devil to hell.

“Yes,” I say. “But there’s something else.” My heart starts beating faster. “Everyone keeps asking who opened the gates for the attack on the Village. Your father. Marina. Carlos. The Morettis. Isobel. Whoever had the seal. But Carlos doesn’t talk about who; he’s saying where.”

Gregory’s gaze snaps to mine. “Where,” he repeats.

“Yes. Where the gates opened. Not who opened them. We know they used the delay to open one of the gates to get inside the Village.”

Lucian becomes so still I can feel the danger in him settling into attention.

Gregory’s voice quickens. “The twelve-second delay wasn’t only a timing flaw to get one man inside one gate to plant explosives for the attack?”

“No,” I say, pulse racing now. “It’s something more. I just don’t know what.”

Gregory nods. “A sequence of doors? A future map of how to get in all the gates?”

Blaze mutters. “God forbid one psycho be straightforward.”

“As a security protocol, no one is allowed inside the new walls right now. Only the vetted of the vetted have access to the rebuild. And whoever went in isn’t allowed to leave those gates until it’s finished and all new security systems are in place.”

“The new gates have never been opened?” I ask.

“No.” Gregory taps the screen. “If he wants to get into the new gates, to destroy the rebuilding of the Village, he needs movement. Security protocols. Gate responses.”

Rafe says, “He’s primed us to be emotional and reactive. He expects this last message to be the tipping point.”

“And make us want to run to the Village to defend what we have.” Blaze laughs. “Damn. It worked on me. I’m ready to storm our gates.”

“Exactly, Blaze. He needs us there, opening the gates, triggering the system.”

Rafe’s eyes lift. “And if we don’t⁠—”

Lucian finally speaks. “We force him to spend his final move.”

“You need him to think you are doing exactly what he wants and that his emotional warfare has paid off. Then,” Isobel almost smiles, “his pride and ego will inflate. He’ll think he’s already won. And that’s when he becomes weak.”

“We need a controlled arrival at Bachman Village. Visible enough to wake his surveillance. Protected enough to limit exposure.”

“And I need to be there,” I say. “If Carlos sees me, he’ll think Lucian’s failed to protect me, that he’s put our attack over my safety.”

“And he’ll inflate. And make mistakes,” Isobel agrees.

“No,” Lucian says.

My head turns. “What?”

His eyes are on me, and they turn black. “Careful.”

“No.” I take another step. “You don’t get to pull me back, now.”

Blaze whispers, “Where is my popcorn?”

“Shut up,” Lucian says.

Blaze shuts up. Miracles happen.

I look only at Lucian. “He calls me queen because he wants you to treat me like a piece on your board. A game move you can play when you feel threatened.”

“I do feel threatened,” he growls. “And when I feel threatened, I want to lock you away. As far from our games as possible.”

“Lucian, I see the board clearly. I’m a game player, not a pawn. But for us to succeed, he needs to think I am.

His jaw flexes. “I hate this,” he says.

“I know,” I say.

“I hate every word coming out of your mouth.”

“I know,” I say.

“I hate that you’re right.”

That makes me smile. “I know.”

Rafe clears his throat, wisely gentle. “She does not need to enter uncontrolled. We can build a contained arrival. Erin appears as part of the visible team. Not isolated. Not exposed. Lucian within reach. Blaze close. I control exterior feeds. Gregory monitors the old gate sequence.”

“And Isobel?” I ask. The room goes quiet.

Isobel’s face pales further. “Carlos said queens burn better than ghosts. He wants both, the old one and the new one.”

“And what?” Lucian asks. “You want to volunteer as tribute, Katniss?”

How dare he reference my favorite book character at a time like this.

“No,” she says, her voice thin but clear. “But if you hide me, he will use it. If I appear controlled, guarded, alive, and not crawling back to him, it may force him to adjust.”

Lucian’s stare could freeze oceans. “You do not get to ask me to trust you.”

“I’m not asking for trust,” Isobel says. “I’m offering predictability. Carlos will watch me. Use that.”

A bitter laugh leaves Blaze. “Hell of a sales pitch.”

Bayne’s voice comes through the screen. “She is not wrong.”

I forgot he was even here.

Lucian looks murderous. I touch his arm. “Lucian.”

“No.”

“We need to force him to play his last move.”

His eyes close for one second. When they open, they are clear. “Controlled arrival team,” he says. “Visible but contained. Erin appears only when and where I say.”

“No,” I say.

His eyes snap to mine.

I lift my chin. “Where Rafe says. Based on the plan. Not based on your panic.”

A muscle jumps in his cheek.

Rafe suddenly becomes extremely interested in his tablet, like he’s hiding a laugh he knows will get him killed.

Lucian steps close enough that I feel the heat of him. His mouth is by my ear. “You are pushing very hard for a woman I am considering locking in a vault.”

“And you are threatening imprisonment for a man trying to prove he trusts me,” I hiss between my clenched teeth.

He moves away with a furious exhale. “Fine.”

“Fine?” I repeat.

His gaze returns to mine.

Dark. Possessive. Furious.

Terrified.

“Yes, Erin. Fine.”

Blaze whistles under his breath. “Write it down, Oxford. We’re making history today.”

Lucian ignores him. “You appear as part of the controlled arrival team,” he says. “You do not improvise.”

I open my mouth to deny I’ve ever put myself in danger by creating terrible plans that I then followed.

His eyes narrow. “Do not make me regret this in the first thirty seconds.”

“No improvising. Got it.” I close my mouth.

Bayne laughs from the screen. “God, I hope I make it back for the wedding.”

“There is no wedding,” I say. “Because there hasn’t been a proposal.”

Lucian’s eyes remain on mine. His expression changes. His thumb brushes the bare skin at my wrist.

Once.

A lovely little promise.

Butterflies take flight in my stomach. Here we are plotting a man’s death, and I’m imagining wedding dresses. Silly girl.

The room returns to movement.

Rafe starts assigning positions. Gregory maps gate sequences. Blaze checks weapons with the expression of a man finally being given something useful to do. Isobel sits very still, as if any sudden movement might make her regret offering herself as a ghost.

Lucian pulls me aside when the others are occupied. We stand near the window; the Icelandic coast crashes black and violent below us.

I think he might kiss me. Instead, he grips my chin and tilts my face up.

His voice is low enough for only me. “I am agreeing because I’m doing my part in this.”

My heart stumbles. “In us?”

“Yes.” His eyes burn. “If this goes wrong⁠—”

“It won’t.”

His thumb strokes once along my jaw. “If this goes wrong, Erin, everything right left in me goes with it.”

My chest tightens. He’s the man trying to choose trust while every scar on him screams cage. “Then we make sure it doesn’t go wrong.”

His mouth lowers to mine.

The kiss isn’t soft or sweet.

It is terror in the shape of possession.

I kiss him back just as hard. Because I’m scared too.

When Lucian pulls away, his forehead stays against mine. “I hate every second of this,” he says.

I close my eyes. “I know.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Erin

Carlos is waiting somewhere between old gates, dead credentials, and the ruined bones of Bachman Village.

Rafe has sent the leak. Gregory has mapped the delay. Blaze has sharpened his violence into something almost cheerful, while Saint Cleopatra of Eternal Patience has generously offered to stay with Cass and Ryan in order to tutor Ryan, who has been AWOL from school since who-knows-when.

Blaze hated the idea. But he agreed to let her go since he has a weak spot for Ryan.

As do we all.

Isobel has gone silent in that way that makes me think she’s either praying or remembering every bad decision she ever made.

And Lucian has agreed to let me appear with the controlled arrival team.

The man looks like compromise is swallowing glass. And like he may shatter at any moment.

So, when his hand closes around mine and he leads me down the hall, I do not ask where we are going.

The black door opens beneath his palm. Warm gold light spills out. Leather. Velvet. Silk.

The ocean throws itself against the dark cliffs below, savage and endless.

Lucian steps inside first, then turns back to me.

He doesn’t pull me in. He waits for me to step inside. Which seems rather scary right now.

I know going in this room means the stakes will be higher. We will go further. He will push me further. The man who wants to drag me behind ten locked doors and call it love stands in the doorway of the room he built for control and lets me choose whether to enter.

My throat tightens. “Don’t look so handsome,” I say, stepping inside. “It’s unsettling.”

The door shuts behind us with that soft, stomach-tightening click. No lock. Only choices.

His eyes move over me, slowly and dark and possessive enough to make my pulse stumble.

“We leave for New York soon,” he says.

“I know,” I say.

“You will be visible,” he says.

My stomach tightens with nerves. “I know.”

“Carlos will see you.” His jaw tightens.

“I know.”

His jaw tightens. “Stop saying that as if knowing makes it acceptable.”

“It doesn’t make it acceptable.” I step closer. “It makes it right.”

He looks away.

I grab his hand. “I’m not fearless, Lucian. I’m not walking into this because I have some death wish or because I need to prove I’m brave enough for you.”

His expression hardens. “I know that.”

“Do you?”

Silence.

I smile faintly. “That wasn’t rhetorical.”

“I know.” His thumb moves over my knuckles.

That is honest enough to reach me.

He lifts my hand and presses his mouth to my fingers. His eyes darken. Lucian’s voice lowers. “I brought you here because I want to give you something.”

I glance around the room, pulse quickening.

He leads me to the cabinet along the wall. The locked one. Of course.

He opens the drawer slowly, not taking his eyes off me. Inside, nestled against black velvet, are things that make my pulse jump.

A small bottle of lubricant. A slim wand with a dark glass handle. And beside it, several plugs arranged by size, each one smooth, elegant, wicked.

My breath catches. “Oh.”

Lucian watches my face. “You asked once what else happens in this room.”

“I ask many reckless questions.”

“I enjoy every reckless thing about you until you place yourself in harm’s way.” He stares. “Which you do. Often.”

I look back at the drawer. “And this is about danger?”

“No.” His voice roughens. “This is about choice.”

My pulse stutters.

Lucian takes out the smallest plug.

It rests in his palm, black and glossy, almost delicate. And terrifying.

His eyes stay on mine. “Tomorrow you will remember to listen to yourself. To Rafe. To the plan. And yes, to me when necessary.”

I look at the plug again. Heat curls through my stomach. “So this is a training exercise? For battle?”

His gaze drops to my lips. “No.”

My breath goes shallow.

His voice deepens. “This is me giving you something you can feel. A reminder that your choices matter. And you can’t go running headfirst into danger, even if you think you’re saving someone.”

He makes kink sound like strategy, strategy sound like devotion, and devotion sound like an order for me to obey.

“That was dangerously close to emotionally healthy,” I whisper, staring at the plug. “In the most twisted way.”

“You wear it because you choose to.”

The words land low in my body. Lower than they should. “Lucian.”

“If you choose it,” he says, “I guide you. I prepare you. I take care of you. And if you decide at any point you do not want it, I stop.”

The room is too quiet. Too warm. The ocean outside is too violent.

Inside this room, my own storm brews. Curiosity. Want. A little bit of nerves. A little bit of wickedness. The wind blows just right and I lift my chin. “Safe words?”

His eyes flash. “If you say, red?”

I answer. “You stop.”

“If you say yellow?” he asks.

“You slow down,” I say.

“Color now?” he asks.

I look down at the plug. Then back at him. And I say, “Green.”

The word sets him in motion. Lucian sets the plug, lubricant, and wand on the low table beside the bed.

Then he turns to me. “Undress.”

My body answers before my pride can make a fuss.

Still, I cross my arms. “You do know I’m capable of doing things without commands.”

“Yes.”

“And yet?”

“And yet.”

The nerve of him. The devastating, arousing nerve.

I undress, taking off everything. Lucian watches like he did the first time in this room. Like I am revealed to him.

His.

My skin heats beneath his gaze. He steps closer but doesn’t touch me yet.

His smile is wicked. “Still green?”

“Yes.”

I think…

Warm hands guide me to the bed. “Lie on your side.”

My stomach flips as I lie down on the black satin sheets, facing the window. The glass shows me bare and Lucian dressed, controlled, and watching me. Twisted is as twisted does.

God help us all.

The mattress dips behind me. His hand settles on my hip, warm and steady.

“First rule,” he says.

“Always with your rules,” I whisper.

His mouth brushes my shoulder. “You like my rules. You love my rules.”

“I like rules when I can break them creatively.”

“You will not be creative with this one.”

I smile despite the nerves climbing my spine. “Fine. What is the first rule?”

“You do not endure discomfort to please me.”

My smile fades.

He strokes his thumb over my hip.

“If it is too much, you say yellow. If you want it over, you say red. You do not grit your teeth. You do not prove anything.”

The ache in my chest is sudden and sharp.

Maybe because tomorrow I will have to prove things.

Maybe because this room is the only place where proving myself is not allowed.

“Okay,” I whisper.

“Second rule.” His mouth touches the back of my neck.

I breathe out. “There’s more?”

There is always more. “What’s the second rule?”

The bed shifts as he reaches for the lubricant. The soft click of the cap makes my pulse jump. His hand returns to my hip.

“Breathe,” he says.

“I am.”

“No, you’re pretending to breathe.”

Annoyingly accurate. I pull in air. Slowly. He waits.

The man who wants to own the world waits for my lungs.

When his fingers touch me, they are slick and careful, not rushing, not taking. My body tenses from instinct more than pain.

He stops immediately. “Color.”

I swallow. “Green.”

His fingers move with more patience than I expect from a man built almost entirely of control issues. He doesn’t force or control. He coaxes. Small circles.

Soft pressure. Strange. Uncomfortable. Coming from a shameful place before him I never knew could be used like this.

A kiss to my shoulder. Another to the side of my throat. “Good,” he murmurs. “That’s it.”

Heat begins to replace nerves. Slowly. Embarrassingly. Completely. My body, traitorous little thing, decides curiosity is fascinating.

Lucian notices. Of course. His breath changes against my skin. “I love how your body responds to me. I love how wet you get for me, baby. You beautiful girl.”

That just makes it worse.

Overwhelmed, I close my eyes. My pussy clenches for him, wanting him inside me and my anal muscles tighten around the strange situation going on behind me.

His fingers move further inside of me. My muscles want to reject him, but he doesn’t allow it, pushing steady and firm.

“Still green?”

My voice is thinner now. “Green.”

“Good girl.” That praise slides under my skin and melts something; any pride I had remaining.

I am fully his.

His hand moves away for a second, and then the wand hums softly to life.

My eyes fly open. “Oh.”

Lucian’s mouth brushes my ear. “Too much?”

“It hasn’t touched me yet.”

“It touched your imagination.”

I swallow. “My imagination is dramatic.”

“Yes.”

He drags the smooth head of the wand along my inner thigh. A tremble instantly shoots through me. The vibrations make me pulse harder with need. He moves it higher, not where I need it. Not yet. But closer.

Just close enough that every muscle in my body waits for him.

He stares at me in the reflection. “Still green?”

“Mmm…” is all I can manage.

“Words, baby.”

“Yes. Green.”

The wand moves higher. Lucian uses patience like a weapon, and I am helpless against it. The hum touches the edge of want, and my breath breaks.

I grip the sheet.

He stills. “Don’t hold your breath.”

“I’m trying not to embarrass myself.”

His hand tightens on my hip. “There is nothing your body gives me that could embarrass you. It all belongs to me.”

The wand moves again, and this time the pleasure sparks so fast my hips jerk. “Oh my god.” I feel it before I even register what happened, the delightful ripples run through my core.

Lucian’s hand steadies me. “That’s it,” he says. “Let it happen.”

“Easy for you to say.”

“It is not easy for me to say.” His voice is rough now. “I am exercising heroic restraint.”

“You said that already—” My words turn into a gasp as he finds the perfect place, the perfect pressure, the perfect wicked rhythm that makes thought loosen in my head. Then his slick fingers return to my ass, gentle and patient, and the room tilts.

“Oh god, oh my god.”

It’s everything and too much all at once. Wet heat slicks my thighs as my pussy and ass simultaneously clench for him, and the plug is still yet to come. The wand eases away.

I make an involuntary sound of protest.

His mouth curves against my shoulder. “Greedy little girl.”

“You built an entire room to make me feel greedy,” I say. “Don’t judge me now.”

“I built an entire room for you. To worship your body.” He reaches for the plug.

I feel him pause behind me.

“Do you want this?” he asks.

My heart thumps. I turn my head enough to see him. His face is dark with restraint, but his eyes are on mine.

I look at the plug. Then at Lucian. “Yes,” I say. “I want it.”

His jaw tightens. The words cost him control.

The knowledge sends a wicked little thrill through me.

“There she is,” he says.

Then I lose all mine. The plug touches me. Cool at first.

Then slick. Then pressure. Harder, firmer this time, not giving any way.

My breath catches.

He stops. “Breathe.”

“I hate when you’re reasonable during sex.”

“This isn’t sex yet.”

Yet.

The word pulses through my pussy.

He presses a kiss beneath my ear. “You are doing beautifully.”

I breathe and he waits. Then guides the plug forward with excruciating patience. Pressure becomes fullness. Fullness becomes a strange, intimate ache.

My fingers clutch the sheet.

“Yellow?” he asks immediately.

I shake my head.

“Words.”

“No. Green. It’s just…” I breathe through it. “You know.”

“Yes.”

The plug eases in another fraction. My body resists. Then gives.

The sensation steals a small sound from me. Lucian goes very still behind me.

“You like that,” he says.

Wicked, wicked man.

I close my eyes. “Don’t sound so smug.”

“I am behaving with extraordinary restraint.”

“You are absolutely not.”

His mouth brushes my shoulder. “Breathe.”

I do.

This time, when he guides the plug deeper, my body accepts it.

Slowly. Carefully. Until the widest part passes and the plug settles into place with a strange, shocking finality.

I gasp. Not pain. Not exactly pleasure either.

Awareness.

A secret held inside me.

Lucian’s hand smooths over my hip. “Color.”

My voice comes out breathless. “Green.”

His forehead rests against the back of my shoulder.

For a moment, he does not move.

Neither do I. I feel full. Exposed. Claimed in a way that is not exactly ownership. More like a secret between us.

“How does it feel?” he asks.

I swallow. “Like I have a secret.”

His hand tightens on my hip. “Good.”

I laugh softly. “Of course you like that answer.”

“I like every answer that tells me you are listening to your body.”

Holding my hips, he rolls me onto my back. The plug shifts inside me, and I moan without wanting to.

Lucian watches my face. Always watching. “Too much?”

I shake my head. “Words,” I say, because I know him. “It’s not too much.”

His mouth curves faintly. “Good girl.”

Heat rushes through me, wet heat that leaves me throbbing. He moves over me, bracing himself on one arm. Still dressed. Still controlled.

Infuriating.

His free hand glides down my side, over my hip, down my thigh. “Tomorrow,” he says, “if something feels wrong, you tell me.”

“Tomorrow?” He has my mind in the clouds.

“Tomorrow,” he says. “Don’t try to be brave, don’t do something rash. Listen to the commands as I’ve made you listen to your body.”

My mouth opens. Closes.

“Patience,” he tells me with a kiss. “My world depends on you making choices that keep you alive.”

My throat tightens. “Lucian.”

I touch his face. “You’re putting a lot on my decision-making skills for a man who thinks I’m reckless.”

His eyes burn. “You are reckless. You’re also smart. And brave.”

“I like working with you.”

“I want to lock you in here until Carlos dies.”

“I know.”

“I won’t.”

“I know.” I pull him down and kiss him.

He holds back for exactly one breath. Then the restraint breaks. His mouth takes mine hard enough to bend my spine, and the plug shifts inside me, sending a startling wave of pressure through my body.

His hand slides between my thighs. The first stroke makes my hips lift. The plug makes every sensation feel deeper, stranger, more intense, as if my body has become a room with another door opened inside it.

“Oh,” I breathe.

Lucian’s mouth brushes mine. “There?”

“Yes. There.”

He rewards me with another stroke, slow and exact. The pleasure builds differently this time. Not wild at first. Concentrated. Heavy. Curling through me in waves that make my hands tighten in his shirt.

“Keep talking to me,” he says.

I reach for his belt. His hand catches mine. “No.”

“Excuse me?”

“Not yet.”

“But I’m listening to my body like you want me to.”

“You chose the plug. You choose whether it stays. You choose your colors.” His hand moves again, and my protest turns into a broken sound. “I choose how long I make you wait.”

That is unfairly hot. Also annoying. Mostly hot. He lowers his mouth to my breast, and the pleasure sharpens. My hips arch, the plug pressing deeper, awareness blooming into need.

Lucian’s mouth. Lucian’s hand. Lucian’s voice telling me to breathe, to answer, to stay with him.

When I come, it drags through me, slow and deep, stealing the air from my lungs. I clutch him, shaking, my mouth open around his name. “Lucian.”

Lucian watches me through every second. He always watches. His forehead lowers to mine.

My body is still pulsing. The plug feels less foreign now. More like heat. Like a secret weight. His hand cups my cheek. Then he kisses me again, slower this time. Deeper. A kiss with teeth beneath it, but not enough to break skin.

When he pulls back, his eyes hold mine.

Dark. Ruined. Terrified.

“Tomorrow,” he says, “when you feel this, you remember me.”

Can’t. Breathe. “Lucian.”

“You remember this room. This choice. My hands on you. My voice telling you to stop if something feels wrong.” His thumb brushes my lower lip. “Then you remember that I love you too much for you to take risks.”

My chest tightens until it hurts. “I’m not planning on it.”

“You are reckless.”

“I prefer decisive.”

“You are impulsive.” His mouth curves. Then his face turns serious again. “If you want to do something impulsive that puts you in danger, feel this and think of me.”

The plug shifts inside me as if his words make my body aware of it all over again. He undresses. He lies over me, heat and protection. He stares at me as he enters me.

He goes slowly, filling me. The pressure changes, now as full inside my pussy as my ass. Strange, thrilling, everything tensing. He holds me closer, building his rhythm as he goes. The orgasm builds from within now, so powerful it’s almost terrifying.

The room goes blurry at the edges. I come undone, chaotically unraveling in his arms. He gathers me against him afterward, bare skin to muscle, my body still holding his reminder.

Outside, the Icelandic sea keeps trying to break the cliffs.

Inside, Lucian’s hand moves over my back.

Tomorrow, Carlos gets the queen he asked for.

But not the one he wrote.

CHAPTER NINE

Lucian

New York looks colder than Iceland from the windows of the jet. I swear to God, this is the longest winter I’ve ever endured. It began with a girl on my doorstep in a coat inadequate for the weather.

Then, she disappeared.

I hunted her down, landing in England with one thing in my veins: rage. I found her hiding in a cabin on the moors wearing my coat and pretending she did not need me. She was determined to take her ghosts on by herself.

I remember feeling like I couldn’t breathe until I found her and brought her back to safety.

And I swore, when I did, I’d never let her out of my arms.

And I’d lock her away from the world.

But then my ghosts came haunting and she’s been beside me every step of the way.

Now, she’ll stand beside me at the gates of my rebuilt home, her hand in mine.

And it guts me.

Because this time, I agreed to let her be seen.

The jet cuts through a low ceiling of winter cloud, descending toward the city.

Beside me, Erin sleeps. Or pretends to.

Her head rests against the cream leather seat. Her dark hair spills over one shoulder, the ends brushing my black coat I pulled over her like a blanket before takeoff. She fought me on the coat for exactly eight seconds, “I’m not tired,” then fell silent with my arm around her shoulders.

She is learning to choose her battles. I am learning not to make everything a battle.

Both of us are terrible at it. But we’re getting better.

Across the cabin, Rafe works in silence, tablet balanced on one knee, an encrypted laptop open on the small table in front of him. Gregory sits beside him, pale and focused, his glasses slipping every time the plane dips through turbulence. He has not stopped reviewing gate schematics since we left Iceland.

Blaze is near the rear of the cabin, one boot planted on the edge of the seat across from him, one hand turning a knife over and over.

He wants Cleo. Desperately.

His wife is a plane ride away, teaching Ryan and helping Cass. He let her go but he’s clearly regretting the decision.

Blaze has not made a joke in over three hours.

Concerning.

Isobel sits alone near the opposite window with Mack across the aisle. Guarded. Watched. Alive.

She stares down through the oval glass as if she expects the clouds to open and Carlos to be waiting beneath us with fire in his hands.

Maybe he is.

I turn back to Erin, watching the breath enter and leave her body, her chest rising lightly under the blanket.

The plane drops again. Her gaze finds mine immediately.

“You’re staring,” she murmurs.

“Yes.”

“Obsessive, much?”

“Yes. Always.”

Her mouth curves.

I want to put my mouth on hers until she forgets the city below us, the gates waiting, Carlos watching, the old routes waking beneath new stone.

Instead, I look away. Because I can’t lock her away.

New concept.

I hate it.

Rafe closes one window on his screen and opens another. “We land in seven minutes.”

Blaze’s knife stops moving.

Gregory exhales slowly. “The decoy movement went through three channels. Two old Moretti fragments, one Bachman contractor path. If Carlos is watching for emotional response, he has enough to believe we are coming hot.”

“We are coming in hot,” Blaze says.

“We are coming controlled,” Rafe corrects.

Blaze smiles without humor. “I’m bringing the blaze.”

We all wish for Cleo.

She keeps one of our most volatile men from trying to turn everything into a crime scene before the plan begins.

Rafe continues. “Carlos should believe we intend to enter the new Village gates within the hour. He should also believe Erin and Isobel are both with the team.”

“They are,” I say.

“Yes,” Erin’s gaze cuts to me. “We are. We will be.”

“They will be visible with the team,” Rafe says. “Protected by said team.”

My jaw tightens as the plane descends beneath the clouds. Bridges. Water. Buildings. More snow along rooftops. Too many cars inching along the roads.

My chest tightens. Not from nostalgia. From memory.

The first time I became responsible for another life, I was too young and too angry to understand responsibility was not the same as control. Gregory was a tiny boy then. Silent. Too clever.

Watching me with eyes that asked questions I couldn’t find the words to answer. It turns out emotional unavailability isn’t something that came after Isobel. I learned it the day my parents died.

Erin’s hand slides into mine. I look down. Her fingers are warm. Small, compared to mine.

But not fragile.

“You’re doing it again,” she says.

“What?”

“Staring.”

My throat tightens. I look at her.

A low laugh comes from Blaze. “Get married already, you two.”

“Has anyone told you to shut up yet today, Blaze?” Erin’s cheeks color with a shy smile.

The idea of Erin wearing my ring has lived under my skin long enough to become part of my pulse. Bayne started wedding talk to irritate me. Now, Blaze has picked it up.

“Um.” Erin clears her throat. “There has been no proposal.”

Rafe looks up. “Landing.”

The wheels hit the runway. New York accepts us back with a jolt.

Cold air slams into us as we step down onto the Bachman private tarmac. Armored SUVs wait in formation. Our men stand beside them, stone-faced and ready.

Every instinct screams for me to put my body between hers and the skyline, between hers and every man with eyes, every window, every rooftop, every possible line of fire.

Instead, I hold her hand as Mack opens the door.

Erin pauses before climbing in. “Any update on Cass and Ryan?”

“Secure,” Rafe says from behind us.

Relief moves through her body like water. “Thank goodness. I mean, I knew your men would protect them, but the confirmation is nice.”

Rafe says, “The Norway locations suit them. Cleo sent word that Ryan is doing well in his studies, and for us to give Blaze a kiss for her.”

I know what it means for her to stand here without the two people who made her desperate enough to walk into my life that first night. So, she knows a bit of what I’m feeling. Only, she gets to lock hers away in a secure location about as far from danger as possible.

Mine stands beside me and right now I’m helping her into an armored car.

The convoy starts.

Rafe and Gregory ride in the lead vehicle with two security men. Blaze and others take the third. Isobel is in the fourth under guard.

Erin and I ride in the second. The city slides past tinted glass. Gray sidewalks. Steam rising from grates. People bumping shoulders along the sidewalk, hunched against winter wind.

A boy tugging his mother’s sleeve near a crosswalk. A woman carrying flowers wrapped in paper. A delivery truck blocking half a lane.

Life continuing, indifferent to the danger our cars are driving straight for.

Erin watches me.

I watch her.

“Say it,” she says.

I look forward out the wind screen. “Say what?”

“Whatever terrible thing is crawling around in your head.”

My teeth grit. “There are many.”

“Pick your favorite.” And she smiles.

Despite myself, my mouth twitches

Then the silence between us stretches as another ghost rises from the ashes.

Isobel, pale, shaken, beautiful. But it’s not her I think of.

She holds her hand over her stomach. “Lucian, I might be pregnant.”

The city outside blurs for one second. My voice comes before I can convince myself to silence it. “There’s something I haven’t told you.”

Erin goes very still. “What?”

I look at her. “Isobel was pregnant. Back then.”

Her eyes widen, a small break in her expression. Shock. She reaches for my hand.

“She was?” Erin asks.

“Yes.” My throat feels scraped raw. The words come harder now. “She miscarried early.”

Erin inhales softly. “Before or after the fire?”

“Before.” I stare at our joined hands.

I can’t look at her. Because I can’t bear to see her face when I cause her more pain.

Erin is quiet. Too quiet.

I force myself to look at her. She’s looking at me, worried about me.

She says, “This isn’t about me, Lucian. Stop worrying about me. This is about you. Your pain.”

That undoes me more than anger would have. I rub a hand over my forehead, releasing the tension there.

“It was your baby,” she says softly. “It wouldn’t hurt me for you to love your child.”

“I…”

Her thumb moves over my hand. “Where would Cass be without Ryan?”

The name not spoken sits with us anyway. Caleb. They love Ryan despite him.

“I can handle you loving a child, even her. The only thing I couldn’t take is if you were still in love with her.” Her voice trembles once. “I don’t share well.”

“Neither do I,” I choke out a laugh. “And you know there’s no space inside me that belongs to anyone but you.”

I lift my hand and cup her face. She leans into the touch. “I’ve come to realize something,” she whispers. “It’s okay for the before Lucian to love the before Isobel.”

Something inside me breaks. Not collapse. More like a dam.

Release.

Erin gives me a watery smile. “Honestly, I think she would have made a fierce mother. Possibly terrifying. But fierce.”

I stare at her, this woman who is always surprising me.

She shrugs. “Like that spider who eats her partner after mating to nourish the baby inside her.”

For one second, the entire world stops.

Then a laugh tears out of me. Uncontrolled. Wrong for the day.

Perfect.

Erin’s smile grows. “What? It’s nature.”

“You are twisted.”

“As are you,” she says. “The perfect pair.”

I pull her into me. She tucks against my side, and I bury my face in her hair. The brutal truth comes before I can stop it.

Whispered words are all I can manage. “I was afraid you might leave me,” I say into the dark silk.

Her body stills. She turns to face me, her arms around my neck. “I’ll never leave you.”

A pause.

“But it’s getting pretty difficult for a patient lady to keep waiting for a commitment. Are you ever going to get around to proposing to me or what? Hearing even Blaze talking about wedding bells, a girl starts to get bridal fever.”

My heart slams once. Hard.

She lifts her head. There is fear in her eyes now.

Fear that she asked too much.

Fear that she opened a door for us that I might not walk through.

Foolish girl. Beautiful girl. Mine.

I cup her jaw. “Do you want me to propose in an armored car on the way to bait a psychopath?”

Her lips part.

Then narrow. “No.”

“Good,” I say. “Because there is only one thing that’s been holding me back.”

“Which is?” She stares up at me.

“The ring has to come from the family jewelry store. There can be no other way.” I brush a thumb over her lips. “And so, I wait.”

“Oh my God.” A grin breaks over her face. “A ring from Bachmans Jewelers. Do you know how many times I’ve walked by that store before I met you? Dreaming of diamonds I’d never have.”

For a moment, with New York outside and Carlos waiting somewhere beneath old bones, I can see it. A ring. Her dress. The Village gates opening without blood.

Erin walking toward me because she chooses me.

My wife.

The thought is so sharp I can’t breathe.

Rafe’s voice comes through the comm. “Two minutes to outer perimeter.”

The moment folds itself away as the convoy slows. Ahead, Bachman Village rises from ash.

Erin looks out the window. Her hand finds mine.

CHAPTER TEN

Erin

Once, this place had been a hidden civilization in the middle of New York. A full city block sealed behind gray stone walls and windowless backs of Bachman-owned businesses. Black gates tucked behind luxury shops. Secret closets in offices and storerooms. A second gate beyond the first. A private world no one entered unless a Bachman allowed it.

A little town hidden behind money. A completely hidden, right in the middle of it all, civilization.

Streetlights. Cobblestone. Bistro tables. Wine and bread and fruit. Couples kissing beneath soft lamps as if the city outside didn’t exist.

Now, it is scaffolding and snow. Fresh brick over old scars. Half-finished row homes where a secret kingdom used to breathe.

But I can see what it was.

Worse, I can see what Carlos wants Lucian to remember losing.

New black iron rises between stone pillars still dusted with construction grit. Floodlights cut through the gray winter afternoon, turning falling snow into silver ash. Open spaces in the stone wait for windows. Walkways are half-laid. Men move on rooftops like shadows with rifles.

It should be ugly and sad, but it’s not. It’s beautiful in the aching way messy things are before they are whole but you know they will be spectacular in the end.

Sometimes you have to wade down the muddy road to get to the rainbow at the end.

Our convoy arrives to our destination. We beat the cold, all rushing up the stairs to get a better view.

They’re calling it the watch tower.

A pub-slash-cigar bar with families housed in a building across the street from our battlegrounds. We stand in a line, soldiers preparing for battle, pressed to the windows, where we have a perfect view of the gates outside the new Village and what we can see of the rebuild.

We are watching and we are waiting.

Lucian stands beside me, silent. His hand is still wrapped around mine like he’s still scared I’ll let go now that I know about the baby.

He told me on the plane.

A tiny life that existed in the before world, with the before Lucian and before Isobel, then disappeared just before the couple were woven into Carlos’s web of destruction.

I thought today couldn’t get any weirder, with me, him, and Isobel loading up on the jet like some kind of time-traveling love triangle.

Then he told me about their baby. And I felt protective of them. All three of them.

Which I will not tell Isobel because today does not need to get any stranger.

Lucian watches the gates like they might breathe.

His eyes are trained forward.

Not looking at me.

Then, he says, “What you said in the car.”

“About the spider?” I ask.

His mouth almost moves. “No.”

“Oh.”

His thumb slides over my knuckles. “Thank you.”

Two words. Quiet. Rough.

Enormous from him.

I look at him. “You don’t have to thank me. It was a sad thing.”

He sighs. “I know many people who would be…different about it.”

“You have too little faith in people,” I say.

“Yes.”

I nudge him with my elbow through my coat. “Maybe stop doing that.”

“Working on it.” He gives me a shy peek over his shoulder. “Also, the other thing you said in the car…”

“When I told you that I can handle you loving anyone, but I couldn’t take it if you were still in love with someone?”

“Exactly.”

I’ve come to realize it’s okay for the before Lucian to love the before Isabel. And that’s what I told him.

Despite everything, I turn my face, stretch up on tiptop and kiss his lips. He smiles when I pull back. He grins back.

My smile quickly drops when Rafe’s voice comes over the radio. I press my hand flat against Lucian’s chest, feeling his heartbeat as we wait for the words we know are coming.

“Show time.”

Lucian’s entire body sharpens. Then, he says, “No one moves until I call it.”

The convoy waits outside, visible. Just as much a part of our plan as Isobel—Belle, to Carlos, and to me. He takes my hand, leading me out to the line of black bulletproof cars. Delicate flakes of snow stick to the dark threads of my hair.

Isobel walks ahead of us, looking every bit the Ice Princess as she glides through her winter castle. Her long blonde hair hangs elegantly down her back. She wears a pure white knee-length coat over black leather boots with stiletto heels, impossible in this weather, yet she moves with the grace of a ballerina. She’s so beautiful to look at that sometimes even I have to stare.

The girl you want to hate because you wish you looked more like her. But I don’t. Lucian has made me feel so beautiful in my own skin that I no longer need his praise to know I’m every bit as lovely as she is.

Right now, I just feel sad for her.

She chose the white coat, the boots. “Carlos always liked me in white.”

She holds her head high, not even glancing at us over her shoulder as she climbs into her vehicle. Lucian ushers me into ours, the warm cab a surprise even though I’m expecting it. I run my hand over the luxurious black leather seats.

Snow taps against the wind shield making the cab feel like a snow globe. A snow globe that could turn into a beautiful coffin at any moment.

I squeeze Lucian’s hand.

The Village waits too.

Having heard Rafe’s call beyond the gates, men in dark coats move with a new urgency. They know we are ready. They know our plan. They know Carlos may be watching through something old, buried in the very bones they are rebuilding.

I take a slow breath. The plug is not there anymore.

Lucian removed it before we left Iceland, with infuriating patience and an amount of aftercare that made me feel softer than I wanted to admit.

But I can still remember it.

Not as a physical sensation exactly.

A reminder; My world depends on you making choices that keep you alive.

Shameful man. He found a way to make kink educational. And somehow, it is working.

Because right now, with the gates ahead and fear trying to turn me inside out, I am listening to my body.

My pulse is fast. My hands are cold. My stomach is tight.

But nothing in me says run.

Not yet.

“Still good?” Lucian asks quietly.

I look at him.

He didn’t ask if I was scared. Scared is obvious. Not one of us here is unafraid.

“Green,” I whisper.

His eyes flare.

It is wildly inappropriate that a safe word check across from a mafia construction site gives me butterflies.

Twisted. The both of us. We do make a pair.

Rafe speaks again, and every ear listens. “Positions. Vehicle one holds at checkpoint. Vehicle two advances to the new gate when I say. Vehicle three fans left. Vehicle four remains behind until I confirm visual exposure.”

Visual exposure. That means Isobel. The ghost. Me, the queen. Lucian, the king.

And we all pray Carlos will play the part of our pawn.

Carlos’s theater comes to life exactly the way he wrote it. But the Bachmans have an alternative ending. And we’d like a little time on stage.

Gah—he’s making even me dramatic.

Isobel’s SUV moves.

Then ours.

The tires crunch over snow and salt as we roll toward the first gate.

The gate. The one that has never opened. Not once since the rebuild began.

Our SUV stops ten feet from the gate.

Mack opens my door. Cold air rushes in. He’s here with us, instead of with Cass and Ryan. That alone should tell you how much danger we’ve put ourselves in right now.

Lucian is out before I can move, his hand extended and I take it.

The moment my boots touch the ground, every hair on my body rises.

The Village sees me. The cameras. The wires running through old tech lines, creating a feed we hope goes straight to Carlos. I stand in the snow beside Mafia King Lucian Bachman straightening my spine. I toss my hair over my shoulder for good measure so everyone here doesn’t mistake who his queen is.

Look. At. Me.

Blaze exits behind us, coat open despite the cold, one hand near his weapon. I know his first thought is of Cleopatra and if she’s safe in Norway, and if he’ll make it back to her in one piece. All humor is gone from his face.

Love is fun.

Rafe steps out near the lead car. Gregory stays half inside, laptop open against the doorframe. Mack positions himself two steps behind me and to the right.

Close enough that Lucian’s shoulders relax.

Isobel’s vehicle advances. The door opens. The two guards who have become her bookends step out first.

Then Isobel.

Beautiful, sad, vulnerable Isobel.

Carlos wants to know if queens burn better than ghosts. Here we are. Queen. Ghost. King.

Rafe’s voice sounds through the earpiece tucked beneath my hair. “Visual team in place. Gregory?”

Gregory answers, fast and focused. “Old credential is active but not moving. It’s watching for gate engagement.”

“We hope.” Lucian’s jaw flexes.

Everything is riding on one idea; Carlos is waiting for those gates to open.

Rafe says, “Gate one on my mark.”

My stomach dips. Lucian’s hand brushes mine. And I remember not to do anything stupid.

Gregory’s voice comes over for the first time, but I don’t think he means to speak out loud as he says, “Holy shit. We’re really doing this, guys.”

Despite himself, Lucian shakes his head with a curve at his lips. “He’ll learn.”

The new gate wakes. I wait for my cinematic groan, a rumble of thunder, the gates to part like the Red Sea. We get only a soft electronic click.

Then another.

Then the black iron shifts one inch.

Only one.

Blaze mutters, “Well, that’s unsettling as shit.”

“Is it supposed to do that?” I whisper.

Lucian stills. “I have no idea. We’ve never opened it before.”

Gregory’s voice cuts in. “Twelve-second delay initiated.”

Rafe says, “Counting.”

The gate holds half-unlocked. One second. Two. Three. My skin prickles.

Four. Five.

The cameras above us adjust in the wrong direction.

Six.

A lock inside the left pillar clicks, though no one touched it.

Seven.

Gregory says, “There. Secondary credential call.”

Eight.

Rafe: “Tracing.”

Nine.

Lucian’s hand tightens around mine till it hurts. I gasp, “Lucian.”

“God,” he says, relaxing his fingers. “Sorry.”

Ten.

The gate shudders as if something beneath it is trying to decide whether to obey the living or stay with the dead.

Eleven.

Gregory whispers, “It’s not one gate.”

Twelve.

The system corrects. The gate locks again. No one breathes.

Then three alerts burst across Gregory’s screen.

He swears. Actually swears.

That’s bad.

Rafe turns sharply. “Report.”

Gregory’s voice is thin with horror. “The delay woke a sequence. Gate one queried gate three, gate three queried the service corridor, and the service corridor queried an old sublevel beneath the east row.”

Lucian turns toward the unfinished brownstones.

“The old Bachman Jewelers,” I whisper.

I point before I can stop myself. “It’s not opening outward. It’s pulling inward.”

Gregory looks at me, then back at the screen.

“Yes,” he breathes. “Yes. That’s exactly it.”

Blaze looks between us. “For those of us who express love through violence, translate.”

Rafe’s voice goes cold. “Carlos does not need to break through the gate. He needs us to trigger the gate, so the old system opens a route inside.”

“Like inviting hell in,” I say.

The words from Carlos’s latest message, the one we received this morning, return to my mind.

COME, LUCIAN. TO WHERE THE GATES OPENED INVITING IN HELL.

Not poetry.

Instruction.

Memory.

Mechanism.

Lucian’s face goes deadly. “He was never talking about one gate.”

“No,” Gregory says. “He was talking about a gate cascade. Open one under the right emotional protocol, and the old system tests the rest.”

“Emotional protocol?” Blaze asks.

“Visible arrival. Emergency security posture. Family-level access. King present. Queen present. Ghost present.” Gregory looks almost sick. “He built a scenario the system recognizes as high-value movement.”

“Because the old Bachman system was built around protecting the family,” I say.

Gregory nods. “And Carlos learned how to make protection open doors.”

Lucian releases my hand. This time, I let him.

He steps forward.

Toward the gate.

Rafe’s tablet chirps again. His eyes sharpen. “Partial location ping. East sublevel.”

Gregory’s fingers fly over keys. “Not enough. It bounced through the old service route.”

“Can you isolate?” Rafe asks.

Gregory’s sharp answer flies back. “If we trigger the second sequence.”

“No,” Rafe says immediately. “Not yet.”

Lucian looks at him. Rafe, built for this, doesn’t flinch.

“If we move too fast, Carlos vanishes. He wants us charging. He wants panic. We need him to believe we are still assuming the gate is one.”

I look past the gate. Beyond the iron, the Village waits. Half-built. Half-haunted.

Men on rooftops. Floodlights. Stone.

The outer row of brownstones where new walls rise over old damage.

And somewhere beneath it, Carlos is close enough to make the system breathe.

A sound crackles through the comm. Static. Then a voice. Soft. Amused.

Carlos. “Welcome home, Lucian.”

Lucian doesn’t move. His eyes stay on the gate.

Carlos laughs quietly. “Careful. If you stand outside too long, the Village may think you’re afraid to come in.”

Blaze’s hand closes around his weapon.

Rafe snarls though the private line. “Blaze. No.”

Lucian’s voice is controlled death. “Carlos.”

“King at the gate,” Carlos says. “Queen at his side. Ghost before him. How touching.”

“I can’t figure this out.” Gregory shakes his head before hissing, “Stall him.”

Rafe mouths, Keep him talking.

Lucian’s eyes flick once. Understood. But we all inwardly groan.

Conversation is not Lucian’s strong suit. He talks with his body. Trust me. I know.

“You wanted us here,” Lucian says.

“I wanted you honest.” Carlos’s voice drifts through the comms like smoke under a door. “You dress it up as strategy, but here you are. Because I called. Because I said fire. Because I said queen.”

Lucian’s hand twitches at his side. He wants to kill.

I step closer, enough that my shoulder nearly brushes his arm.

His eyes cut to mine. A warning. I choose, and right now, I’m choosing to ignore him.

“Hiya, Carlos! How you been?”

“Ah,” he says softly. “There she is. My gift to you, Lucian.”

Lucian’s entire body turns lethal.

I speak before he can shut me up. “You talk too much for a ghost still living under Lucian’s shadow.”

Silence. Sharp, beautiful silence.

Then Blaze coughs once, badly hiding a laugh.

I look at Rafe. He gives me an encouraging smile and a gesture to keep going.

I shove my hands in the pockets of my coat, like a hostage negotiator might. I steady my voice. “You’ve killed your closest confidant. Your woman turned against you. And the man you envy above all other men survived.” I sneak a glance at Lucian. “And I’d say he’s thriving.”

Lucian does not smile.

Carlos’s voice changes. Only slightly. But it changes. “Well hello. How is my purchased replacement? Bargain bin edition.”

That hurts. It shouldn’t but it knocks me speechless and I falter.

Only for a moment.

I bite back. “Yes! I wanted to thank you, by the way, for introducing us. That first blind date,” I let out one of Cass’s low wolf whistles. “Whew. If New York penthouse apartments could talk.”

He gives a dark laugh. “I can imagine. You had a lot riding on that night. You had to make it convincing.”

Paid whore.

It makes me petty. “Too bad you’re not as good at playing matchmaker for yourself.”

Isobel laughs then.

It’s a real laugh and it’s a beautiful sound. For one moment, she glances over her shoulder and smiles at me.

Lucian smiles at me and I smile at both of them.

No matter what happens as we enter hell, we know at least some part of us has healed.

“Come out so I can thank you properly,” Lucian says.

“Where are you hiding, Carlos?” I say. “You came for us.”

“You mistake hiding for positioning, little queen.”

Rafe speaks quietly into the team channel. “Got another bounce. East sublevel to old courier chamber. Still not full location.”

Gregory adds, “He’s routing through a dormant gate relay. We need one more activation.”

“No,” Lucian says.

Rafe doesn’t argue.

Because we all know what one more activation means.

Opening the gate farther. Giving Carlos more of the play he wants. And that was not our plan.

Isobel looks at the speaker. Her voice shakes, but it carries. “Carlos.”

The comm line crackles.

Then his voice returns. Softer. “Belle.”

Lucian goes so still I feel it in my bones.

Isobel’s face is pale, but she does not retreat. “You always did love making women feel small.”

Carlos laughs quietly. “And you always did what you were told, didn’t you?”

She flinches. But stays upright. Isobel lifts her chin. “Not anymore.”

The line hisses.

Gregory’s fingers fly.

Rafe’s gaze sharpens. “There.”

“What?” Lucian asks.

“He reacted,” Rafe says. “The relay shifted when he answered her. He stopped bouncing through the false loop for two seconds.”

Gregory’s voice rises. “I have a direction.”

Rafe says, “Gate two on standby.”

Lucian turns to me. This is the moment. The plan is working.

Meaning it is becoming more dangerous.

I can see the no in his eyes. I can see him swallowing it like glass.

He steps close. His voice is low. Only mine. “Color.”

My pulse stutters. The world narrows.

Gate. Snow. Carlos. Fire. Lucian.

My body answers before the fear can. “Green.”

His face tightens. He hates it.

He turns back to Rafe. “Gate two,” he says. “Six inches only. No full entry.”

Rafe nods. “Mark.”

The second gate wakes. Not the one in front of us. A service gate beyond the first road.

Gregory starts counting. “One.” The cameras shift. “Two.”

A light in the east row flickers on.

“Three,” says Gregory. The ground beneath us hums. “Four.”

Rafe’s screen fills with moving code as he says, “Five.”

Carlos is silent now. Blaze whispers, “I hate quiet psychos.”

“Six.”

“Seven.”

Isobel’s breathing grows audible.

“Eight.”

Mack shifts closer to her.

“Nine.”

Lucian’s entire body angles toward mine.

“Ten,” Gregory says. “Almost there. Eleven.”

Rafe says, “Hold.” Then Rafe’s tablet emits one clean tone.

Gregory exhales. “I have him.”

Everything stops.

The comm cuts.

Every screen goes black for one half second.

Then the Village alarms wake. Not all of them. Just enough. A low pulse of red light moves beyond the gate. Somewhere inside the unfinished walls, a door opens.

Rafe swears and says, “He made his first move.”

Smoke rises from the east row. Isobel stares toward the smoke, shaking but upright.

Carlos thinks he has called the three of us into fire.

Maybe he has.

But this time, when Carlos calls us, we are not weak.

And we are united.

Three ghosts from his past here not to haunt him.

Here to destroy him.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Lucian

Smoke rises from the east row. Thin at first. Then thicker. Dark against the snow.

For half a second, I am back in the warehouse.

Heat. Screams. Men trapped behind doors that should have opened. Isobel’s voice telling me she might be pregnant. Carlos whispering that love makes men weak.

The past closes its hand around my throat.

Then Erin touches my wrist. Not holding. Not pleading. A reminder.

Green.

I come back.

Snow. Gates. Smoke. Erin beside me. Isobel ahead. Rafe at the lead vehicle. Gregory pale over his laptop. Blaze smiling like violence finally received an invitation.

Carlos made his first move.

Now he dies.

“Positions,” I say.

Rafe’s voice snaps through radio. “Outer team holds. No one enters until Gregory confirms the relay.”

Blaze takes one step forward.

“Blaze,” Rafe warns.

“What did I do? Breathe too soon?”

“Do less.”

Gregory’s fingers fly over his keyboard. “The smoke isn’t fire. It’s triggering safety protocols. He’s recreating the fire without burning the Village down.”

Memory, not destruction. That is worse. Carlos doesn’t want rubble.

He wants me standing in fear, making mistakes.

Every instinct in me screams to put Erin in the SUV. Send her to Norway. Lock countries and steel between her and that smoke. But I don’t, and the restraint feels like it’s carving me open.

“Gregory, Rafe,” I say. “Find him.”

“I can, but I need the old route to answer once more,” Gregory hisses. “We are so close.”

Rafe’s eyes cut to mine. “Not the gate.”

“No,” Gregory says quickly. “A ghost knock. We make the system think the family entered the perimeter, but not through the door Carlos wants. Then I can trace his exact location, and we can send in the troops. So. Close.”

Erin’s voice is quiet. “Make him think he has the play without giving him the stage.”

Gregory points at her. “Exactly.”

Pride hits me hard enough to hurt. Carlos wanted a pawn. But he gave me a queen that night.

Dressed in an inadequate coat.

“Do it,” I say.

Gregory hits the key.

The Village answers beneath our feet. One low pulse. Old stone recognizes old blood.

Carlos’s voice returns through every radio. “You always were sentimental, Lucian.”

I turn toward the speaker above the gate. “Still hiding?”

A soft laugh. “Still pretending she is not bait?”

Carlos wants proof that he can still reach inside me.

I give him nothing.

“She isn’t bait,” I say. “And she’s not my mistake. It was your mistake to send her. Now, we’re all stronger.”

Silence. Small. Sharp.

Then Carlos says, “Love does make men stupid.”

“No,” Erin answers before I can. “Ego does.”

Blaze mutters, “God, I love her.”

“So do I,” I say.

Erin turns her head.

Carlos goes silent again.

Rafe mouths, Keep him talking. More.

I hate talking.

I prefer killing.

Today, I do both.

Erin’s word stays with me; ego makes men do stupid things.

“You killed your men because you feared they’d follow me. You killed Marina before she could turn on you,” I say. “You stole my father’s seal because you had no authority of your own. You used Isobel because she left you for me. You used the Morettis because you couldn’t reach me on your own, and you used Caleb to get to Erin because you didn’t have the power to get to me yourself. You sent a girl to do your job. And even that didn’t work.”

The snow falls harder.

“All because you couldn’t be a Bachman. You knew they wouldn’t take you. Because you build your world on other people’s shoulders,” I say. “Then call yourself powerful.”

Carlos’s voice lowers. “Careful.”

The first crack.

Thank god.

Gregory hisses, “Four seconds. I need four more seconds.”

“Then we battle.” Blaze exhales happily.

Rafe’s voice shakes. “He shifted. East row confirmed. Old courier chamber. Sublevel two. We need ten more seconds.”

Carlos says, “And you have all the power of the mighty Bachmans behind you and you still can’t strike.”

Carlos’s voice turns venomous. “You should hear her scream before you get poetic.”

Everything in me stops.

Erin’s hand closes hard around my wrist. “Remember who you are, now,” she whispers.

Remember who you are now.

For her. To whom. Who she’s built me back up to be.

Carlos waits for me to break.

I don’t.

I wait.

“I have him,” Gregory says.

Sheer joy runs out the terror in my blood.

Rafe’s screen stabilizes. “East row. The old Bachman Jewelers. He is inside. He’s communicating from inside.”

“Bachman Jewelers wasn’t only a store,” Gregory says, his voice going thin in that way it does when history becomes a murder weapon. He’s researched every map and every building plan of the Bachmans he could find. “None of the old businesses were only businesses.”

Rafe drags the old schematic across the screen.

Bachman Avenue. Daughtry Clothiers. Clara’s Children’s Boutique. Bachman’s.

A ring of luxury built around a secret.

“The Village was hidden behind the backs of those buildings,” Gregory continues. “No rear windows. No normal exits. Each Bachman-owned shop had a concealed access point in the back. Office, storeroom, cloakroom. A blocked exit only family could use.”

The gates are wide enough for our cars and each car is programmed with a sensor that automatically opens the gate, like our thumbprint. Which leads to a second gate. Which leads to our Village.

The businesses and shops that form the square are all owned by Bachmans.

They all have blocked exits, accessible only to our family.

My stomach drops. “Bachman Jewelers had one too,” I say.

Rafe nods. “Behind the back office.”

Lucian’s face turns deadly still.

“It leads to a black gate,” Gregory says. “Then a second gate. Then the Village.”

Blaze leans over the screen. “So Carlos doesn’t need to break through the front.”

“No,” Rafe says. “He needs the system to believe a Bachman is coming home.”

Gregory points to the blinking line beneath the jewelers’ floor plan.

“The twelve-second delay isn’t opening one gate,” he says. “It’s waking the old family route.”

Lucian looks toward the half-built Village beyond the glass.

“Bachman Jewelers,” he says quietly.

Not a store.

A door.

And Carlos had found the handle.

“Gregory?” My voice is clear.

Gregory looks up. “Confirmed.”

The world narrows to one building that I can see from where I stand.

“Mack.” I look at him. “Closer.”

Mack moves to her shoulder. Erin opens her mouth. I look at her. “Do not.”

Her mouth closes.

The second miracle today.

I turn to Erin. “Stay visible. Stay alive. Do not make me return to an empty space.”

Her eyes soften. “I’ll be here.”

“I love you,” I say, holding her face in my hands.

She smiles. “I love you too.”

“God save it for the altar, will you?”

We all know the man who muttered those words. I let them go, my attention solely on Erin as I say goodbye.

I give her a quick kiss, and then I move. I lead. Reliable Rafe at my right. Blaze the blade at my left. Two of our men ahead. Gregory at the vehicle, keeping the system breathing. Mack with Isobel and Erin.

We don’t use the gate. Carlos expects the gate. We take the side route.

Under the cigar bar we stand in, is a tunnel. One that leads straight into the Village. From there, a hidden backdoor of a small office set at the back of the jewelry store awaits us.

And Carlos will be inside.

I lead the men to the basement. Our guards have already moved the shelving unit that conceals the tunnel entrance. A round metal seal, embossed on a massive circular door, stands before us. This building was not touched in the Village’s reconstruction. The damaged tunnels were the first to be rebuilt.

I press my hand to the black pad and smile as it lights up. A locking mechanism whirs.

Under construction sheeting and scaffolding, the tunnel under the building didn’t lead through the front gates. It fed into the old service corridor behind Bachman’s, the same hidden route the family once used to pass from store to Village unseen

Rafe says through the radio, “Twelve-second delay starts the second you open that door, Lucian.”

“Copy. Count it off for me, baby brother.” I look at my men. They are ready. I take the handle. And I open the door.

Twelve seconds.

Twelve seconds to lead these men down the tunnel and climb back up the street to get inside the walls of the Village without Carlos being alerted of our presence.

And we run. Breathlessly we run. My lungs are searing as I tear through the dark tunnels.

Gregory counts over the earpiece in my ear. It hits me in this delicate moment: my brother is a Bachman and maybe this can be his way. Out of the direct line of fire, angling the guns.

The Village is being rebuilt above us, but underneath, the old bones remain.

Finally, we see daylight pouring down into the tunnel, cold air rushing toward us. The latch is open and our men wait to lift us to safety. We race up the ladder as Gregory gets to three.

“Hurry!” Strong hands reach down to grab us. We scramble up and over the edge of the opening of the tunnel.

Gregory: “One.”

Our men hop back down into the tunnel, closing it from the outside in. Blaze Rafe and I take one moment to breathe, then we’re crouched in the short alley that leads to the secret back door of Bachman’s Jewelers.

Two men step from the dark.

Blaze grins as his switchblade flashes from his pocket. I know how lethal he is with a knife, but I’m amazed every time I see it in action. He drops the first with his blade. Rafe handles the second one before he can shout out alerts to more of Carlos’s men.

His men are slow. Out of shape. They look like life has treated them harshly.

The slain guards must be the low-hanging fruit on his gang, those he was willing to sacrifice.

Who is he not willing to sacrifice?

The corridor beyond is narrow. New drywall gives way to old brick. Modern wiring runs over rusted pipes. We’re almost at that hidden backdoor.

Carlos’s voice spills into my head. “Mistake, leaving your women without your protection, Lucian.”

I want to rip the piece out of my ear. I don’t.

“He’s bluffing, Lucian,” Blaze says quickly, keeping me focused. “Carlos can’t resist theater, even with a rope around his neck.”

Gregory’s voice is low. “You’re close enough for me to look for heat signatures within the building. Rafe?”

“Got it.” Rafe pulls a screen from his pocket and presses buttons.

“That’s strange,” Gregory muses like he’s back in the library.

“Don’t waste words,” I snap.

“Sorry, it’s just that there is only one heat signature. He’s inside.”

“Just him.”

“Only him.”

“That can’t be right.”

Rafe says, “It’s our tech. It’s right.”

I look from him to Blaze. “Then I go alone.” I push the door open without listening to their protests.

And I’m suddenly back in the office of Bachman Jewelers. I’d envisioned myself here a dozen times, paying for the four-carat princess-cut ring that was to be Erin’s.

Carlos stands in the center of the old office. And he is alone. Frighteningly alone. There is no other person in this building. Only the two of us.

Does he have no men? Or does he have a plan so devious he needs no one other than him to destroy us?

Gray coat. Black gloves. Silver at his temples. Elegant as ever in his composure. I can’t help but feel that familiar tug in my chest. He was once my mentor. It’s difficult to shuffle every emotion into a new box.

Carlos smiles. “Lucian. My boy.”

My boy.

What he first called me when he swooped in and took me under his wing.

My mouth is sawdust. “Carlos.”

“You made it.”

“What is this?” My mouth almost gapes as I stare at the wall behind the man.

Screens line the brick wall behind him. Images dance and flicker on the screen.

Erin at the gate. Isobel in white. Marina’s dead body splayed out on a concrete floor, covered in blood. The warehouse in flames.

My father’s car.

He brought every ghost to watch.

I cross the room slowly. I can’t tear my eyes from the center screen. CCTV footage of a street. A car that looks a lot like my father’s. Is that the shape of my mother in the passenger’s seat?

We’d suspected Carlos ordered their murder, but to see a car that may be theirs on that screen…it’s unnerving.

And that’s exactly how he wants me.

I force myself to look away from the screen and at him. “More of your emotional warfare.”

“Is it working?”

“Yes.”

His smile returns.

I stop a few feet away. “You killed my parents.” I stare back at the screen.

“Yes. I did. A payback for a favor for Marina. And you were to be mine.”

I want to look away, but I can’t. I have needed the answer to this question my entire adult life.

I need to know exactly how my parents died.

I know I’m off my game, that I’ve let my guard too far down, but I’m enthralled with the grainy image of the blue sedan turning down Sixth Street. I want to move closer to see my mother’s face up close.

Carlos could end me now if he wanted.

But I have to watch.

Gregory’s voice fills my ear. “Marina’s files are live and… now!”

“Wait!”

But it’s too late. We’ve overridden the feed. All screens go dark. Carlos’s videos disappear.

The screens change. Payment chains. Warehouse rosters. Old authorization records. Caleb and his father shaking hands with men outside of Glasgow. Boats on a river. The Hoax. Glasgow routes. Carlos’s transfers.

Carlos’s edits to the Bachman emergency system.

Every lie stripped of his theatrics. Every one of them bare on the screen.

Marina must be smiling down on us, her microfilm as alive as can be.

Every ghost has been given a name. Every one of his criminal acts has been documented.

Now, it’s my turn to smile.

He takes in my face. Then Carlos turns toward the screens.

His voice, murderous. “What did you do?”

Rafe steps into the room. “Marina died so that Isobel could bring this to us.”

“The two closest women in your lives working together to destroy you,” I say.

“You really are bad at choosing broads, aren’t you?” Blaze enters the room.

Blaze smiles. “Oxford grew claws.”

Carlos looks at me. For the first time ever in my life, I see the panic beneath the polish.

“You think files matter?” he snaps, clearly losing control.

It’s strange for me to see him like this. Others may have seen his weakness, but I couldn’t.

Not until now.

“I think exposure matters to a man who wanted to write the ending.”

His eyes darken. “You were a grieving boy with a famous name you refused to take. I made you.”

“No.” I step closer. “But you should have killed me when you had the chance.”

“I don’t have to. There are mercenaries killing your women right now.”

“Lucian,” Rafe warns.

“Don’t fall for it, big brother. He’s only saying it because he knows his feeds are down.”

Panic palpitates in my chest. Can Gregory still see Erin? I can’t ask because I can’t show my cards.

He looks at me with hatred so pure it almost shines. “The girl you bought. The ghost you mourned. The child you lost⁠—”

“And you, the man who wanted nothing more than to be me.”

He laughs once, ugly and hard. “Love made you stupid. As you are right now. I can hear Erin’s screams.”

“Lucian, do not lose your shit,” my brother hisses in my ear. “Hold tight, everyone.”

And the screens go dark once more.

Only one comes back. The one in the center. But it no longer shows my parents. Gregory brings back the live feed of the girls. Erin and Isobel are safely tucked into armored cars and driving away.

Alive and well and safe.

I shake my head. “You never understood, Carlos.”

He sneers. “What?”

“You can destroy the Village, but it’s only houses. Buildings. The people who lived in them still love one another. You can take their homes, but the Village is the people in it.”

“Touching,” he spits. His weight shifts and so do his eyes. He’s losing whatever ground he thinks he held.

Only then do I realize he’s lost the Morettis’ backing as well. And the Hoax. Marina must have been the last one to betray him.

Everyone has turned their backs to him.

“You came here alone, Carlos,” I say. “And when I kill you, you will die alone.”

He comes at me with a knife hidden in his coat.

No theater now.

Only rage.

I meet him halfway.

His weakness makes him slow. I catch his wrist, twist until bone gives, and drive him into the brick wall hard enough to crack old mortar.

He gasps.

I see the warehouse. The men.

Isobel in white.

Gregory as a boy.

Erin walking into my penthouse with a fob in her hand and fear in her eyes.

Everything Carlos ruined.

Then I see the only thing that matters.

The phoenix that rose from the ashes.

Me.

Me loving Erin, Erin loving every twisted part of me. Loving me enough to force me to let her stand at my side, a place where no one has stood for a very long time. I see Erin and our family seated around the table, eating, laughing, and loving one another. I see Ryan speeding down the hallway, cape billowing behind him, knowing he is loved.

Our forever.

My hand closes around Carlos’s throat.

“This is not for the man I was,” I say. “He would have made this last.”

Carlos claws at my wrist. “No! Stop!”

“This is for the man I am now.”

“Stop!” His breath breaks.

“For the men you burned.”

He gasps, his nails cutting into my skin.

“For Marina, who deserved judgment but not your ending.”

His face purples.

“For Isobel, who chose wrong and still did not belong to you.”

His mouth opens. Nothing comes out. His eyes begin to roll in the back of his head.

“And for Erin.” His eyes widen. “The woman you thought you sent to ruin me.” I tighten my grip. “She saved me instead.”

Carlos tries one last time to speak.

I snap his neck with my bare hands. The sound is small. It’s one of the first things I was trained to do as a Bachman. An ugly click in a room full of the dead past and hope for the future.

Carlos drops to the concrete.

For a moment, the room is silent.

Then Blaze crouches, checks him, and looks up. “Dead.”

The word should satisfy me.

It doesn’t. Instead, it feels almost anticlimactic.

Am I getting soft? Or was this too easy?

I chalk the feeling to adrenaline and poor emotional regulation.

Gregory’s voice cracks through radio. “Is it over?”

I look down at Carlos. “Yes,” I say. “It’s over.”

As I say the words, I don’t feel the full flood of relief I thought I would. I guess that’s what love does to you. Makes you feel vulnerable even in your victory.

Static fills the line.

Then Erin’s voice. “Lucian?”

One word. My name. A command, a warning, a caress.

All at once.

I close my eyes. “I’m here.”

A shaky breath comes through the radio.

“I’m coming to you.”

My first instinct is no. But I need her. So, I force the word out. “Come.”

I stand in the old courier chamber beneath the rebuilt Village with Carlos dead at my feet and wait for Erin to come.

Mack appears first.

Then Erin.

Snow melts in her dark hair. Her cheeks are flushed from the cold. Her eyes find mine before they find the body.

She stops at the threshold. Her gaze drops to Carlos. Then to my hands.

Then back to my face.

I expect horror. I expect recoil.

Instead, she steps into the room.

Toward me. Every inch of me breaks.

She comes until she stands in front of me. “Are you hurt?”

A laugh almost leaves me. “No.”

She takes my hands. She lifts them one at a time and presses her mouth to my knuckles.

The room goes silent.

Blaze turns away first.

Rafe looks down.

Mack watches the corridor.

Erin keeps my hands in hers. Alive in front of me. Choosing me after seeing me at my worst.

I pull her into me. Too hard. I know it the second my arms close around her.

But she lets me anyway. “I’m here,” she whispers.

I bury my face in her hair.

Carlos is dead.

Gregory appears in the doorway minutes later, pale and shaking, laptop clutched like a shield.

He looks at Carlos.

Then at me.

Then at Erin.

“It worked,” he says, like he cannot believe he was right.

I look at my brother. The boy I protected by becoming a monster.

The man who helped end one.

“Yes,” I say. “It worked.”

His eyes shine. Then, he fully takes in the body of the dead man lying on the floor. A momentary shade of color fades from his face.

It’s quickly replaced with the sharp word, “Good,” and the locked set of his jaw.

And so, it begins.

I put a hand on his shoulder, turning him away from the scene like I can still shield him from this world.

But I can’t.

And now, he wouldn’t want me to.

We leave Carlos behind on the concrete with his screens dark, his files exposed, his men gone, his lies severed, and no one left to listen.

She takes my hand and leads me right out the front door. The cold air hits my face. The smoke has thinned. Snow falls through the red pulse of dying alarms. Men move across the courtyard, securing doors, checking roofs, calling all-clears.

Open.

I stand on the sidewalk and look back at what will soon be the place I purchase the only physical proof of my love I can give.

You know it by now.

Four carats. Princess cut. Platinum band.

With an inscription inside.

I know what it will say.

Isobel is standing on the sidewalk, under guard in her white coat, face turned toward the sky as snow melts against her cheeks.

Blaze is calling Cleo on the phone and saying, “Before you yell, I’m alive and handsome.”

Mack is checking every angle as if peace is suspicious.

I look at Erin.

Alive.

Free.

Mine because she chooses.

Behind us, Carlos lies dead under the old Village.

Ahead, our home waits unfinished in the snow.

For the first time in years, the fire is out.

And the Mafia King walks out of the ashes a better man.

Hand in hand with the queen who made him so.

As we walk back to the cars, she whispers to me, “You know I like gold, right?”

“What?”

“For the ring. When you propose,” she smiles up at me. “I always pictured it in gold.”

A laugh comes from the center of my chest. “Gold. Okay. Gold it will be.”

She narrows her gaze, giving me a curious smile. “What’s so funny?”

“Compromise,” I say. “Partnership.”

“You inhaled too much smoke, silly.” She stretches up on tiptoe to kiss me.

I need her comfort, her warmth. I need to feel that she’s alive. Safe.

“Come here.” I wrap my arms around her waist, pulling tight against me. “Maybe. Or maybe you just make me deliriously happy.”

“Come on, let’s go,” she says. “You know Isobel doesn’t eat if I don’t feed her. And she’s looking extra peaky right now.”

That’s so Erin, it makes me smile. We pile up in the convoy, Rafe glued to his screen. Before we loaded up, I told him to keep his eyes out and his guard up.

Something feels off to me.

On the ride to our next destination, Erin rests against my shoulder, her breathing slowing to a relaxed rate.

I’d say I almost nod off myself. And I would.

If I felt relief, I would.

But I don’t.

I rest the back of my head on the headrest and try to convince myself that the scene in the office of Bachman’s Jewelers was the end.

Then, Rafe looks up from the screen. He catches my eye.

He mouths, ‘Another message.’

CHAPTER TWELVE

Erin

For the first twenty-four hours after Bachman Village, I let Lucian cage me.

Not because I don’t notice.

I notice everything.

The extra guards outside my room. The way the hallway goes quiet when I open the door. The way Mack appears every time I move more than six feet from the bed. The way my phone disappears for a “security review” and returns with a new encrypted system I didn’t ask for. The way every window has men beyond it now, shadows moving between trees with guns and orders and grim little earpieces.

I notice the doctor checking my wrist twice because Lucian tells him to. I notice the nurse getting searched before she enters.

I notice Lucian watching me like blinking is a risk.

And for twelve hours, I let it happen.

Because I am tired.

Standing there beside Isobel doing nothing drained me, and as soon as Lucian was out of my sight⁠—

I understood the fear he felt.

The need to lock me in a room where nothing could ever touch me.

Because, my god, waiting there and being able to do nothing more than hope he was okay?

It was pure torture.

So, I let him keep me under lock and key.

For a bit.

His hand at the back of my neck while the doctor speaks.

His body between me and the door.

His coat over me like a blanket on the ride to get checked out.

I wake alone in his bed.

Not really alone. Lucian is in the chair by the window, fully dressed, awake, gun on the table beside him. Because of course he is. The man has the sleep schedule of a haunted gargoyle.

The room is dim. Heavy curtains drawn. Fire low in the hearth.

Upon seeing me wake, Lucian moves instantly.

“I’m going to see Cass,” I say.

His face does not change. “No.”

There it is. One word. Just no.

I stare at him. “She’s down the hall.”

“No.” He looks away, breaking eye contact. “You need rest.”

“I have rested.”

“You know we know this can’t end with Carlos.” He paces the floors, running a hand through his hair. “It can’t have been this easy.”

“And we are safe. At your family’s Hamlet. In Connecticut. A state away from where Carlos died. Surrounded by armed men. And you sleep with a gun.” I push the covers back. “I’m going to see my sister.”

His eyes flick over me. “I said no,” he says.

I move toward the door. He is there before me. Blocking.

The old Erin might have yielded to his force. The size of him. The authority built into his bones. The dark promise in his face saying he can rearrange the world if it displeases him.

The current Erin needs to see her sister. “Move.”

His eyes darken. “No.”

“Carlos is dead,” I say softly.

His face changes. “I didn’t tell you.”

“Tell me what?” A creeping feeling of unease crawls up my spine. He doesn’t answer. “Tell me what, Lucian?”

His eyes lock on mine. “We received a message. Just before we arrived.”

I count back. “That was like twenty hours ago. What. Message.”

“And. And…I couldn’t.” The hurt that flashes across his face almost makes me break. “I couldn’t send for Ryan and Cass after that.”

“They aren’t here?”

He shakes his head. “No. I’m sorry.”

“You let me believe my family was on the way this whole time. That we were safe…”

My words trail off as I put the pieces together.

Silly, silly girl.

The extra guards, Mack being weird, Lucian having me checked over by medical like I’d been in battle.

We were never safe.

His jaw flexes. “I’m not trying to hurt you.”

“I know.”

“You needed rest.”

“I know.”

“I am trying to keep your family safe and you alive.”

“I know.”

“I won’t apologize for taking care of you,” he says. “But I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”

“Thanks, but why didn’t you? You knew I was counting down the minutes till they got here.”

“Exactly.” His dark eyes reach mine. “Honestly? I didn’t know how.”

“I get it.”

Lucian received a message from the man he’d just killed. And he’s trying to keep my family safe.

And keep me sane.

And he doesn’t know how to talk about any of it.

My poor, tragic, unable-to-process-emotions, man.

I wrap my arms around his neck.

“Come here,” he says, pulling me hard against him. He buries his face in my hair, breathing me in.

Have you ever had a man made of stone inhale your scent to comfort himself?

The feeling is intoxicating.

“What was the message?” I ask, softer now. “Come. Sit down.” I take his hand and lead him to the bed.

We sit side by side.

This time, my arm is around him.

I’m the one holding him up.

After a moment, he says, “It was pre-recorded.”

“From Carlos?” I guess.

“Yes.”

My heart stops beating, the air leaving my lungs. “What did he say?”

“Let me play it for you.” He slips his phone from his pocket and, with a swipe of his finger, lights his screen.

Carlos appears. He’s looking solemn. “Lucian, if you are receiving this message, then know, even in death, I will prevail. I will win. And everyone who has betrayed me will die. I have made sure of this.”

“Where is this going?” I murmur.

“You’ll see.”

Carlos stares at the camera. “This was to be sent to you in the case of my death. To tell you that even dead, I will still haunt you. And I’m coming for someone very close to you.”

I give an audible gasp. Lucian puts a hand on my thigh to steady me.

The screen goes black.

He holds the phone with its screen darkened in his hand. “He had no men there, Erin. Literally, only two guards in the Village. And they didn’t stand a chance against us.” He shakes his head, gripping my thigh. “We cornered him. We exposed him. We took every route, every file, every woman he tried to use. He died with nowhere left to go.”

“And now he’s going to haunt us? What does that even mean?” I think for a minute. Then, look around me.

“The guards,” I say. “The round-the-clock security. Cass and Ryan still in Norway. You know something more than you’re saying. Don’t you?”

He sighs.

“Lucian…”

Finally, he says, “Because there was one more part to the message.”

“Show me.”

“I can’t.” He looks away from me, almost sheepish.

“Lucian,” I say.

He doesn’t respond.

“What did you do?”

“Nothing. I only got rid of the last part. Before the screen cuts to black. I knew you’d want to see the message the moment I told you about it.” He looks at me. “But there was no need for you to see that part.”

“Lucian…” There is no point in arguing with this man. I skip that part and go for what I need to know. “Tell me what it said.”

“It said.” Anger flashes over his face and darkens his eyes. There he is. The monster within the man. “He said that he’s made sure of it.”

“Of what?”

“That the Morettis are coming.” He looks at me. “For her.”

I freeze as ice creeps into my veins.

The Morettis aren’t finished with us.

Specifically:

They aren’t finished with me.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Erin

The Morettis are coming for me.

For three whole seconds, I believe it.

I believe the extra men outside the windows are not enough. I believe Cass and Ryan are somewhere I cannot reach them because Lucian made the right call for all the wrong reasons.

My hand goes cold inside his.

Then his bedroom door opens without a knock.

Rafe.

Of course.

Lucian is on his feet before I can blink, body between mine and the door, the gun from the table already in his hand.

Rafe stops just inside. He looks from the gun to Lucian’s face.

“Before you shoot me for entering without permission, you need to hear this.”

“Talk.”

Rafe’s gaze shifts to me.

That tiny movement changes everything.

“What?” I ask.

He lifts the tablet in his hand. “They don’t mean you.”

The room goes silent.

Lucian does not lower the gun. “Explain.”

Rafe walks farther in and turns the screen toward us. A message thread fills it. Not Carlos’s elegant threats. These are clipped. Businesslike. Names, dates, old routes, references I don’t understand.

One sentence is highlighted.

THE WOMAN WHO CARRIED MARINA’S ARCHIVE IS TO BE RECOVERED ALIVE.

I stare at it.

“The woman who carried...” My voice disappears.

“The necklace,” Rafe says. “The microfilm.”

Isobel.

Relief hits so hard it makes me dizzy.

And then shame follows immediately because relief means I am glad another woman is in danger instead of me.

“No.” I shake my head. “No, that isn’t better.”

Lucian finally lowers the gun.

His face does not soften.

If anything, it gets worse.

“They want Isobel,” he says.

Rafe nods. “Carlos’s message was deliberately vague. He knew you would assume Erin. He knew fear would do the rest.”

Lucian looks at me.

I see the exact moment he understands what Carlos managed to do after death.

He put me back in Lucian’s cage without laying one finger on either of us.

“That bastard,” I whisper.

Lucian’s hand flexes around the gun.

“Dead bastard,” I correct.

“Not dead enough.”

“Pretty sure there is only one level of dead.”

His eyes flick to mine.

For one second, the monster retreats.

Then Rafe says, “There’s more.”

Of course there is.

There is always more.

Lucian immediately reaches for me.

“I can stand.”

“I know.”

His hand stays at my waist.

I let it.

Partnership does not mean pretending I do not like when his physical touch holds me together.

Rafe expands the message. “The Morettis believe Marina copied records that tied them to the Hoax, that put their old Glasgow operation, locations where they operate. I think somehow they know Marina gave all her files to Isobel before she died.”

“The microfilm proves more than Carlos,” I say.

“It proves enough to hurt several organizations,” Rafe answers. “Including men who are still alive.”

Lucian’s voice drops. “So, they want the archive.”

“And Isobel,” Rafe says. “Because they think she knows what else Marina kept. She’s the last one standing who knows everything Marina did.”

I look toward the hallway as if I can see through walls.

Lucian asks, “Does she? Know more than she’s given us?”

Rafe’s mouth tightens. “We’re about to find out.”

Lucian starts for the door. I catch his wrist. He looks down at my hand.

Then at me.

“I’m coming.”

“No.”

I give him a look.

His jaw sets. “Erin.”

“Lucian.”

Rafe turns toward the hall. “I’ll give you both ten seconds to complete whatever dominance mating ritual this is.”

“Shut up, Rafe,” we say together.

He almost smiles.

Lucian stares at me for another long second. Then he holds out his hand. Not to pull me behind him.

To bring me with him.

I take it.

Isobel is already in the small library off the back of the stunning home where we are currently staying.

The Bachmans and their libraries. Seems like every one of them has one. Makes me think I’d be a good Bachman one day.

If I get to be.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Lucian

Isobel is here.

I long for the day she is not.

There is no part of my heart that does not beat for Erin.

But with Isobel around, I can’t rid myself of the noose holding my past around my neck.

And I want to.

Desperately.

She is wearing one of the soft gray sweaters and black leggings. I’m pretty sure I bought them and Erin loaned them to her. A casual look instead of the armor of clothing she uses. No cream coat. No heels. No diamonds. No makeup contouring the angles of her cheekbones.

She looks younger without the costume.

More human.

With Carlos dead, I feel less edgy standing in the same room as her.

Slightly.

She did leave me to burn in a warehouse fire.

Gregory sits on the edge of a chair with a laptop open. Blaze is near the fireplace, arms crossed, looking like he would personally volunteer to kill every Moretti in Europe if it got him home to Cleo faster.

Despite Cass threatening me with the withholding of baked goods for the rest of my life, Cass and Ryan are still safely in Norway.

In the end, she knew they were safer where they are.

And that war room conversations do not need to be interrupted with snack requests.

Isobel looks at Erin first.

Then at me. “What happened?”

Rafe places the tablet on the coffee table. And gets right to the point. “The Morettis are coming for you.”

She doesn’t gasp or cry. She closes her eyes. Like she’s given in.

Like they already have her.

“I wondered when they would,” she whispers.

Erin goes still beside me. “You knew?”

“I knew they would want whatever Marina left behind,” she says. “And they think I’m another microfilm.”

“Are you?” Blaze asks, raising a dark brow.

“No.” Isobel shakes her head. “Carlos kept me in the dark. I didn’t even know she gave it to me.”

“Do you know what else she kept?” Rafe asks.

“No.”

I finally speak. “Think.”

A flicker of fight comes into her eyes. She stares at me. “I have done nothing but think since the day we found the microfilm in the necklace.” Her voice cracks on the last word.

Rafe shifts. Just enough that she knows someone is there.

Not comfort. Not forgiveness.

Just presence.

She notices.

So do I.

Bloody traitor.

His one weakness has always been blonde women who bring a chill to the air with their presence.

Regardless, I’ll kill him for this little disloyal crush later.

Meanwhile, I wrap my arm around the warm, soft woman next to me. The only woman in this world who is my weakness.

My type.

My soulmate.

Erin says, “Somehow Carlos knew you had the microfilm⁠—”

“Or guessed it,” Isobel says.

Erin says, “And he told the Morettis you had all of Marina’s information on them.”

“Information they would kill to keep secret,” Isobel agrees.

Rafe says, “Whether he knew you had it or not, telling them would ensure they would come for you.”

Isobel looks at him. “I’m almost certain that’s what he’s done. He would have found some way to get revenge on me for betraying him. Even in death.”

“Carlos never left a door without setting a trap behind it,” I say.

Erin whispers, “He destroyed everything he touched. So why wouldn’t he leave a fire in his wake?”

For a moment, the room is still. Quiet. Too quiet.

Gregory breaks the silence first. “We use the archive.”

Everyone looks at him. Me with fatigue. Isobel with hope. Erin with curiosity.

“We’re likely the only ones, aside from Carlos, who have seen Marina’s files. She took such care to ensure no one knew Isobel had them that not even Isobel did.” He stands over his laptop screen, his glasses slipping down his nose as he stares at it. He pushes them up. “We make all the information we have impossible for them to take.”

“Still not following,” Blaze offers helpfully.

Rafe’s expression sharpens. “Distributed release.”

Gregory nods. “Copies. Encrypted. Several locations. If anything happens to Isobel, the files go out.”

Blaze whistles. “Oxford has become a criminal.”

Gregory looks unoffended. “I prefer the term anarchist.”

I almost laugh.

Almost.

Isobel does not. Her face is pale. “There is something else,” she says. “Something Marina didn’t put in the files.”

My attention snaps back to her. “Say it.”

Isobel looks at the floor. “I should have told you a long time ago.”

I know. I know before she says it.

The baby.

The grief I carried like a locked room inside my chest.

Erin moves closer to me. Holding me up.

It’s something to do with the baby that still holds us bound to our terrible past.

Finally, Isobel lifts her chin. “I didn’t think it mattered if I ever told you. But now it feels like I should give you the last secret I kept from you.”

My body freezes in place. I have no idea what she could say.

“The pregnancy,” she says in a breathy rush. “It was not what I told you it was.”

The room stops breathing. Erin doesn’t move. I can’t feel my own heartbeat.

“It was no surprise.” Isobel continues because if she stops, she may never start again. “Months before I told you I was pregnant, I stopped taking birth control on purpose.”

My voice is so low I don’t recognize it. “You did what?”

Her eyes fill. “Then we lost the baby, so what did it matter anyway? Now, I see my lies create decades of consequences.”

I feel like someone has reached inside my chest and closed a fist around my heart. “Having a child is not something you toy with. And having a child with someone isn’t a decision you make alone.”

Erin’s hands are on my shoulders. To calm me. “Why?” I ask. “Why would you do something like that?”

Isobel’s tears spill. “Because you were leaving me.”

“What?”

My mind is a fog with old pain swirling around my thoughts, my memories, the past. I stare at her. “A child is not something you use as a weapon. Or a trap.”

“Let her finish,” Erin whispers.

“No. You don’t get it.” She shakes her head. “Carlos had already started telling me what you were becoming. That you would leave and join your family. And that there was no way they would ever accept me.”

“Why?”

It’s the only word I can find.

“I was scared, and vain, and desperate to still matter to you.” Her hands twist together. “So I told you I might be pregnant. I wanted you to stop. To look at me. To choose me.”

I want to feel rage. That would be easy. Instead, I feel grief.

All the pain in my past that I carried. The walls I built around me. All the pain I’ve put Erin through because of those walls.

All built on the lies of others.

My voice is barely audible. “I don’t understand how you could do that.”

“It’s in the past,” Erin whispers.

“No.” She swallows. “It’s still here.” The room is so quiet I can hear the fire settling. “And that’s why, for the fire, the baby, everything…” Isobel looks at me, looks at Erin. “I need you to know. And I need to say, I’m sorry.”

I stare at her for a long time.

“I loved you,” she whispers. “In a way that served me.” She looks at Erin. “But she loves you in the way you deserve.”

Erin grabs my hand.

“Don’t let what I did to you…let you ruin her.”

Then I turn to Erin. And I hold her in my arms. She looks up at me with every ounce of love and trust she’s given me, which I’ve done nothing to deserve.

I want to kiss her, but the moment is too raw for that.

I make her a promise instead: “I won’t.”

She smiles up at me in a way that makes me want to command everyone to leave us alone in this room.

Immediately.

Behind us, Blaze clears his throat.

It is the most helpful sound I have ever heard from him.

“Yo. Romeo. We still have some nasty Italians trying to kidnap Ice Queen.”

Isobel gives a tight smile. “Thank you, Blaze. I thought you’d rather see me dead.”

“You’re welcome.” Blaze gives that roguish, half-devil, half-danger shit-eating grin of his. “It’s not you, Elsa. I just can’t do this feelings crap. Let’s get ready to blow up some shit.”

“Blaze,” Rafe sighs. “We will not be ‘blowing shit up.’ We’re doing the opposite. Locking it down.”

“So that later, we can blow their shit up.”

Rafe gives Blaze an exasperated look.

Blaze holds out a hand in surrender. “Only if we need to.”

Erin laughs.

I stare at her, so beautiful when she smiles. When she doesn’t. When she’s angry with me.

When she wants me.

When she wants me to show her how much I want her.

I stand there, dazed. Worried.

And head over heels in a love so deep my chest is so full it aches simply when I look at her.

Rafe picks up the tablet. “Gregory, duplicate everything. Three encrypted vaults minimum. One with Bayne and the Kings in Scotland. One with the Russos in Italy. And ours.”

Gregory nods.

Rafe barks more orders. “Blaze, call Cleo and tell her we need her in Norway a few more days.”

Blaze looks personally betrayed. “Why would you do this to my marriage?”

“Because I need you.”

“I need to be in my wife’s bed.”

“Blaze.”

“Fine.”

Rafe turns to Isobel. “You’re not going to the Morettis.”

She blinks.

“You are not going to be traded for peace. You are not bait. You are not leverage. We are ending that part of your life.”

For the first time since I met her, Isobel looks surprised by kindness.

Jesus. He does have a crush.

I’ll kill him.

“What happens to me?” she asks.

I answer her before Erin forces me to. Not warm or cruel, I tell her, “The Bachmans will protect you.”

She looks at me. Something final passes between us.

Not love.

Not hate.

The absence of ownership.

Freedom.

“Why?” she asks me. “Why, after all this and everything that I’ve done to you, to her, to everyone…why protect me?”

I turn to Erin. “Because she’s taught me that betrayal isn’t always the end.”

She grabs my hand and squeezes it.

No one comments.

Blaze snorts.

Rafe starts giving more orders.

Gregory starts typing.

Blaze starts complaining.

Isobel moves with her guards, leaving the room.

Erin turns to me. “Come with me.”

I narrow my eyes. “Where?”

“I need air.” She stares at me. “You can’t deny me air.”

“Only this once,” I say. “Do not get used to it.”

We walk through the house, finally stepping outside together.

Brisk air. Sunshine. No guards between us.

And finally, I do what I’ve been scared to do since the moment the thought first came into my mind.

I drop to one knee in front of the only woman who could bring me to my knees.

“Erin. Marry me.”

She smiles down at me, and her eyes hold equal parts surprise and acceptance.

Like she had hoped, this moment would come.

But was never really sure that it would.

And it has.

“Erin.”

“Don’t use that Lucian voice with me when you’re proposing.”

But she’s smiling.

So, I grab her hand. And I say it again. “Erin. Marry me.”

I won’t stop till she says yes.

But there must be a God because she does.

“Yes,” she says, staring down at me with tears in her eyes.

“Say it. Again.”

“Yes, Lucian,” she laughs. “I’ll marry you.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THREE MONTHS LATER

Lucian

Bachman Jewelers is no longer a crime scene.

That should feel like progress.

Instead, I stand in the back office with my hands in my pockets, staring at the exact stretch of floor where Carlos died, and feel nothing at all.

Not satisfaction.

Not grief.

Not even rage.

Only the strange, hollow quiet left after a fire finally goes out.

The office has been rebuilt from the studs. New floor. New plaster. New safe. New security system designed by Gregory, tested by Rafe, and threatened into perfection by me.

The old courier route beneath us has been sealed behind steel, stone, and enough surveillance to make ghosts reconsider haunting.

No hidden backdoor opens without three living Bachmans approving it.

No dead credential breathes under this floor.

No twelve-second delay waits in the dark.

Carlos is gone.

And still, some rooms remember what they were.

I turn away from the floor.

Beyond the open office door, the store glows.

Bachman’s.

The gold letters have been restored on the front window. The glass counters sparkle beneath warm brass pendant lights. Diamonds sit in velvet trays. Pearls gleam. Watches rest in neat lines under crystal. The air is clean and cool, quiet in that expensive way that makes ordinary people lower their voices before they know why.

It is beautiful.

It always was.

Bronson Bachman once told me this store was never only about jewels.

I was young enough then to think that sounded sentimental.

I know better now.

There are stores in New York that sell diamonds.

Bachman’s sells history.

Power.

Secrets.

Apologies men are too proud to speak aloud.

Vows they would rather place on a woman’s hand than admit they are afraid to lose her.

The front bell chimes.

Bronson’s voice comes from the doorway of the office. “You look like a man about to either buy a ring or commit murder.”

“Both have happened in this building.”

“Only one today, I hope.”

I glance over my shoulder.

Bronson stands in the doorway of the back office in a black suit, his expression dry, unreadable, too familiar. Beside him, Paige Bachman carries a red leather box in both hands as if she were bringing me something sacred.

She probably is.

Paige looks around the office once, her gaze catching on the floor.

She knows.

Of course she knows.

Everyone knows what happened here.

That story has become family mythology.

A girl on Bachman Avenue.

A proud old brownstone.

A blue diamond in the window.

An itch in her fingers.

A Bachman waiting on the other side.

And a woman who once walked into the most exclusive jewelers in New York wearing kitten-printed work scrubs, wanting a diamond that she had no business touching.

Bronson’s beginning.

Or maybe Paige’s.

Depends which one of them tells it.

“What?” Paige asks, catching my stare.

“Thinking.”

“Dangerous habit in this family.”

Bronson’s mouth curves. “She would know.”

Paige narrows her eyes at him. “I run this store.”

“You do.”

“Brilliantly.”

“You do.”

She looks back at me. “He gave me Bachman’s because he thought I needed purpose.”

“I gave you Bachman’s because you were better at it than me,” Bronson says.

“You had never done paperwork in your life.”

“I had people.”

“You had chaos in suits.”

His mouth moves again. “Then we tried suburban life in the Hamlet.”

“And now, we’re back in the city.” Paige beams. “And I’ll never, ever leave the Village again.”

“I know.”

The look of love he gives her is so intense, I feel like an outsider. I look away.

A strange ache opens behind my ribs.

I want Erin.

Paige steps farther into the office and sets the red leather box on the desk. “When Bronson gave me this store, I thought he was giving me diamonds,” she says. “He wasn’t.”

Bronson’s expression changes.

Subtly.

The way ours do when women unknowingly put their hands on the softest part of us.

“He gave me a place to become someone,” Paige continues. “A place that was mine. Not because I stole it. Not because I dreamed about it from the sidewalk. Because I earned it.”

She opens the red box.

Tucked inside the red velvet is Erin’s ring.

Gold band.

Four-carat princess-cut diamond.

Sharp enough to catch every light in the room and throw it back brighter.

Mine.

Mine as vow.

Mine because she chose me.

My throat tightens.

Paige watches my face and softens. “She’s going to love it.”

“She likes gold.”

“I know. You said that at least fourteen times.”

Bronson crosses his arms. “Seventeen.”

I ignore him.

The diamond flashes.

I think of Erin in an armored car on the way to Bachman Village, asking if I would ever get around to proposing as if she did not already own every ruined part of me.

I think of the first night.

Her fear.

Her false name.

Her inadequate coat.

The money she needed.

The way I thought I was buying one night, when I was really opening the first door to the rest of my life.

Then I think of Erin walking into this store one day, not as a desperate girl staring at things she cannot have from the sidewalk.

As my wife.

As a Bachman.

“Inside?” I ask.

Paige nods. “Exactly as requested.”

She lifts the ring and tilts it toward me.

The inscription is small.

One perfect word.

“The wedding is soon,” Bronson says.

Paige laughs. “You Bachman men never favored long engagements. Did you?”

“Never,” Bronson says. “When you know, you know.”

Paige glances at him.

Something passes between them.

Something old enough to have built legends and recent enough to still make her cheeks warm.

Every Bachman story begins there, whether the men admit it or not.

Not with the money. Not with the gates. Not with the violence.

With a woman walking where she should not. A man who thinks he owns the room.

And the moment both of them discover they were wrong.

I close the red leather box.

For the first time since Carlos died here, the office doesn’t feel dark.

It feels like a beginning.

“I want to buy it,” I say.

Paige blinks. “Lucian, it’s already yours.”

“Erin should have something purchased cleanly,” I say. “Chosen. Paid for. Recorded. Hers.”

Paige smiles.

Not brightly this time.

Proudly.

“Then I’ll write the receipt myself.”

Bronson looks vaguely pained. “I married a woman who at one time insisted on buying things on her own.”

“You married a woman who enjoys ownership,” Paige says sweetly.

His eyes darken.

I pretend not to see.

Paige walks to the front counter with the red box, and I follow her out of the back office.

The store is open but empty. We closed it for this. No customers. No staff. Just family, glass, gold, and a morning quiet enough to hold what this means.

Paige steps behind the counter.

The same counter, family stories claim, where she once looked at a diamond as if it had called her by name.

Now she opens a sales ledger.

Paper.

Not digital.

A very new Bachman choice.

“What name?” she asks.

I stare at her.

She looks up, brows raised. “For the receipt.”

“Lucian Bachman.”

She writes it.

“And the item?”

“Engagement ring.”

“For?”

My chest tightens.

“Erin.”

Paige waits. Teasing me with her smile.

I exhale.

“Erin Bachman.”

Her smile turns brilliant.

“Sounds lovely, doesn’t it?”

Bronson makes a small sound.

I look at him.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“It was not nothing.”

“It is only satisfying,” he says, “watching another man get ruined properly.”

Paige laughs.

I look down at the ring box, red leather beneath my hand, Bachman’s stamped in gold across the top.

Once, a woman stood outside this building and wondered what secrets it held.

She found Bronson.

Erin found me through a different door.

And the ring I have imagined on Erin’s finger since before I had the courage to ask is finally in my hand.

Paige slides the receipt across the counter.

I sign it.

Lucian Bachman.

For Erin Bachman.

The letters look like a vow.

When I hand the pen back, Paige places the box into a black-and-gold Bachman’s bag, folds the tissue over it, and ties the handles with a gold ribbon.

“There,” she says. “Official.”

I take the bag.

It weighs almost nothing.

Yet the promise it comes with is everything.

At the door, I pause and look back.

Through the front windows, Bachman Avenue moves around us. Daughtry Clothiers. Clara’s Children’s Boutique. Cass’s bakery isn’t open yet, but it’s coming. A street built on money and secrets and women who keep changing what Bachman men think they know.

The brownstone stands strong and proud around me, older than my grief, older than Carlos’s envy, older than the blood spilled beneath it.

A historical giant with too many secrets.

But not all secrets are ugly.

Some are love stories waiting behind locked doors.

Some begin with a stolen glance at a blue diamond.

Some begin with a girl selling one night to save her family.

I step out onto Bachman Avenue with Erin’s ring in my hand.

Ready to make her my wife.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Erin

I have learned several things about planning a wedding to a billionaire mafia king.

One: budgets are apparently a cute little hobby for normal people.

Two: if you say, “Wouldn’t it be pretty if…” within Lucian’s hearing, twelve people will arrive the next morning with samples.

Three: men who can coordinate armed security across three countries cannot correctly identify ivory from champagne.

Four: Lucian has opinions about flowers.

Strong ones.

“I said white roses.”

“They are white roses.”

“Those are cream.”

I stare at him.

He stares at the arrangement.

As a man whose proposal was a command, he does not back down.

The florist looks like she is considering climbing out of a window.

“Lucian.”

He points. “Cream.”

“Try to relax.”

“I am trying.”

“Then leave.”

He looks personally offended.

We are in the bridal suite above the restored Village ballroom. Cass and Ryan are currently on Fifth Avenue, chaperoned by Mack, shopping for his ring bearer suit and her Maid of Honor dress.

On the Bachman tarmac in New York, I started crying before the door of their jet even opened. Ryan hit me at a run, all elbows and decked out in superhero paraphernalia, and Cass, too, was obviously crying before that door opened.

Lucian stood behind me, one hand on my lower back. We watched the two people I had once sold my soul to save, the two people who helped me save my cold, dark Lucian from himself…

Arrive to complete our family.

The Village is finished.

Not exactly as it was.

Better.

The houses are brighter. The security is stronger. The old stone remains wherever it could be saved, threaded into new walls as if the family decided scars deserved architecture.

Cass’s bakery opened last month.

Bachman Jewelers reopened beside it.

The old gate is standing.

Not hidden the way it once was.

Still private.

Still protected.

But no longer built like fear itself.

Two days after we left the Hamlet, Rafe moved Isobel to a protected coastal house under Freya and Bayne’s network, far enough from the Village that Lucian could breathe and close enough to testify when needed.

Apparently, Isobel made an impression on Freya during her short stay with us in Iceland. Freya told Rafe, “Blondes with impeccable taste in clothing must look out for one another.”

The next evening, Gregory enacted his plan.

By morning, three Moretti Swiss bank accounts were frozen. That got their attention. Our spies informed us that they immediately emptied three of their safe houses in New York and Glasgow.

Once Rafe saw that we had their attention, Blaze and his brother, Haze, met with one of their Moretti contacts. I was able to help arrange the meeting, organizing a neutral ground: the apartment where Cass, Ryan, and I used to live, Bambi’s place.

The brothers with the rhyming names delivered the Bachman message:

If Isobel dies, Marina’s archive goes public.

If the Morettis move against the Bachmans, it goes to their enemies first.

If they don’t bother us again, the files stay quiet.

And that’s the last we’ve heard from them.

Their silence means peace.

Peace means the Bachmans can relax and enjoy our celebration.

After Lucian proposed, I quickly found out two things about this family:

They have very short engagements.

They love nothing more than an over-the-top wedding.

So, we are giving them one.

Today, flowers climb every railing. White candles sit in glass lanterns. Gold ribbon winds through winter greenery even though spring has finally arrived.

Lucian is supposed to be downstairs.

Instead, he is terrorizing the florist.

I point toward the door. “Out.”

His eyes narrow. “You are separating the groom from his bride.”

“Yes.”

“I haven’t seen you all morning.”

“That is traditionally the point.”

“I dislike tradition.”

“You are about to participate in two ceremonies in one day.”

His expression changes.

The second ceremony is private.

Family only.

Bachmans.

Something older than the legal vows we are about to make in front of everyone we love.

He reaches for me.

I swat his hand away. “No touching the bride. Not yet.”

“I bought the dress.”

“Then respect your investment.”

His mouth curves.

There he is.

My monster.

My man.

My almost husband.

He leans close enough that the florist suddenly becomes very interested in a ribbon spool. “You look beautiful.”

The words are quiet. No command. No teasing.

My throat tightens. “Thank you.”

He looks down at my dress.

Silk.

Clean lines.

Fitted through the waist and hips before falling into a long train.

No giant princess skirt.

I tried one.

Ryan said I looked like a cupcake.

Lucian offered to buy all the dresses in the bridal shop so I could try them on in private.

I chose this instead.

Elegant. Soft.

Mine.

My veil is waiting on the chair. My ring sparkles on my left hand.

There was no ring to accompany the proposal at first.

Of course, I happily said yes, even though there was no ring and he technically didn’t really ask me.

It was more of a command.

One I was more than okay with.

The ring had to wait. He insisted it had to come from the family jewelry store, where all Bachman marriages begin, and there would be no stand-in ring until this one was purchased.

I was also okay with waiting.

The perfect four-carat princess-cut diamond that makes me smile every time light hits it.

Lucian touches the ring with one finger. “Still like the gold?”

“I love the gold.”

“Good.”

“Compromise.”

He sighs. “Partnership.”

I grin. “You were right. About the gold.”

“When am I not right?” He kisses my forehead.

He leaves before I can correct him.

The florist waits until the door closes. “Is he always…”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t finish.”

“Whatever you were going to say, yes,” I laugh. “He’s always this Lucian.”

Cass rolls in from the adjoining room wearing a hot pink dress. Her hair is pinned up.

She sees me in the dress and immediately starts crying.

“Stop.” My command comes out as a whisper.

“I can’t.”

“We haven’t even gotten to the ceremony yet.”

She wipes her face. “You look like Mom. She was so pretty.”

The words hit me.

I don’t have an answer. Cass reaches for my hand.

For a moment, we are not in a billionaire’s bridal suite.

We are two sisters who survived.

Ryan knocks once and enters before anyone answers.

His little black suit jacket is slightly crooked.

His tie is worse.

“You look fancy,” he tells me.

“Thank you?” I laugh.

He comes closer. “Uncle Lucian said I have an important job.” He pulls a tiny black box from his pocket.

My wedding band. “Don’t lose it,” I say.

His eyes widen. “I won’t.”

Cass laughs. “Maybe don’t scare the ring bearer.”

“I am preparing him for responsibility.”

Ryan stands straighter. “I can do it.”

“I know you can.” I bend and kiss his forehead.

A knock comes from the open doorway.

Gregory.

He is in a black tuxedo.

No glasses today.

He looks older without them.

Or maybe I have finally stopped seeing him as the nervous younger brother at the edge of Lucian’s shadow.

He looks at Cass like there is no one else in this room. “Cass,” he says, “You look beautiful.”

And for once, Cass is speechless.

Interesting.

Then they stare at one another long enough for the room to grow uncomfortable, and neither one realizes it.

They are lost in one another long enough for it to hit me;

She doesn't need another man to guard her. She needs the man who becomes her partner.

Could that man be Gregory?

Here I am on my wedding day, suddenly more interested in whether my sister should be marrying my husband-to-be’s brother.

Sounds unnatural, but it’s the most natural thing.

Gregory can meet Cass's sarcasm. Cass can tease him mercilessly. Intellectually, they are a pair.

Then, Ryan.

Our precious little boy.

Gregory isn't merely protecting Ryan and Cass. He's engaging Ryan, entertaining him, teaching him, and becoming part of Ryan’s household rhythm.

He’s the normalcy Cass and Ryan never had.

That Cass never thought she’d need.

Looking at the two of them, I’m tearing up.

Finally, Gregory turns to me. His smile is soft. “Erin. If Lucian is capable of crying, seeing you in that dress is the closest he’ll get.”

I give a genuine laugh. Then he says, “Ready?” and the nerves kick in full force.

Am I ready?

To make a commitment not only to a man who once terrified me, but to his entire Mafia family as well.

No.

Yes.

Terrified.

Certain. I say, “Absolutely.”

And I mean it with my full heart.

For the first ceremony at least. The traditional one. The one when I know what to expect.

Still, I cling to Gregory’s arm as the ballroom doors open.

I hear the room inhale. Not literally. Probably.

But that is how it feels.

Hundreds of candles. White roses that are definitely white. Gold light.

The ceiling is draped in sheer fabric.

A string quartet somewhere beyond the flowers.

And at the far end of the aisle, Lucian.

He stops breathing.

I know because I know him.

His shoulders lock. His hands curl at his sides. His jaw tightens. His eyes go black.

Mine.

Those eyes still say it.

But now I know what comes after.

Because you choose to be mine.

I start walking.

Cass comes before me.

Ryan walks ahead of her, holding the rings, his chin held high with pride.

He knows Bayne will be watching.

No one stands beside Lucian.

Too many good men surround him to choose a best one.

Blaze sits with Cleo beside him in the front row, and she’s already whispering for him to behave.

Bayne came from Scotland with his wife, Kitt, and enough of his clan in kilts to make me miss our time on the wee Scottish island.

Almost.

I reach the altar. Lucian takes my hand.

We just stare at one another, a silly grin on my face, a serious look on his.

The officiant begins. I hear almost none of it.

Marriage. Commitment. Choice.

Family.

Words float around us. The world floats around us.

Then it is Lucian’s turn.

The room goes quiet.

His eyes stay on mine. “Erin, I loved you badly before I knew how to love you well.”

My throat closes.

“I thought protection meant control. I thought fear was proof of devotion. I thought if I could put enough walls around what I loved, nothing could take it from me.”

His thumb moves over my knuckles.

“You broke every rule I had.”

A few people laugh.

He doesn’t.

“And then you made me understand that rules were never the same thing as promises.”

My eyes burn.

Lucian doesn’t look away. “I promise to stand beside you when every part of me wants to stand in front of you. To give you every luxury I can buy and never confuse any of them with the one thing you give freely.”

His voice roughens. “Yourself.”

I am crying now.

So much for waterproof mascara.

The officiant turns to me.

My hands shake in his. “Lucian.” My voice cracks.

I look at him, repeating the traditional wedding vows as the officiant says them. He didn’t tell me we were writing our own, and I’m grateful not to have known.

There’s no way I’d be able to get them out on my own.

Ryan brings us the rings. Lucian slides a thin gold band beside my engagement ring.

I slide his onto his finger.

The officiant says the words.

Husband.

Wife.

Kiss.

Lucian does not wait for the full sentence.

His hands close around my face, and his mouth takes mine.

The room explodes.

Applause. Whistles. Blaze yelling. Cass crying.

Ryan cheering because everyone else is.

I wrap my arms around Lucian’s neck.

My husband.

The word lands somewhere deep.

He pulls back just enough to whisper against my mouth.

“Mine.”

“Always.”

The reception is exactly the kind of excess I pretended I did not want.

Champagne. Crystal. A six-tier cake Cass could not bake.

Not yet. But one day. She’s taking lessons.

Music. Dancing.

He doesn’t let me out of his arms the entire night.

And I don’t complain.

At midnight, the last non-family guests leave.

The ballroom grows quiet. Then, it empties. He takes my hand.

Nerves settle in, making my knees grow weak.

He glances down at me. “One more ceremony.”

“The private one.”

“The real one,” he says.

The Bachman riverboat waits beyond the Village gates.

I have seen it before from a distance.

Tonight, it looks like another world.

Black hull.

Warm windows.

Gold light spilling across the Hudson.

No press.

No guests.

No hired orchestra.

Only family.

The rebuilt Village glows behind us as we walk toward the dock.

Every Bachman carries a candle that is not yet lit.

Lucian walks beside me.

My new husband.

My public husband.

But I understand now why he said one more ceremony.

This is not about the law.

This is about belonging.

The boat pulls away from shore.

New York becomes light behind us.

The upper deck has been cleared.

No tables.

No flowers except a few white roses along the railing.

At the center stands a narrow altar of dark wood.

On it rests a sword.

Not a weapon.

A symbol.

I stop.

Lucian looks at me.

“Nervous?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

I narrow my eyes.

He almost smiles.

“You told me nervous and excited are the same emotion.”

“You remember too much.”

“Everything about you.”

We walk forward.

The family forms a circle around us.

Men and women whose names I’m still learning.

Some I met today.

Some I have known through stories.

The old families.

The new ones.

The ones who stayed after the Village burned.

The ones who came back.

An older Bachman steps to the altar.

He wears no robe. Only a dark tux these men are so fond of.

His voice carries over the water. “The law witnessed a marriage tonight.” The boat moves beneath us. “The world witnessed a marriage tonight.” He looks around the circle. “But family witnesses something else.”

Lucian takes my hand.

The man continues.

“The Bachman name has never meant blood alone. It is a promise. Protection. Loyalty. It is the choice to stand when standing costs something.”

I glance at Lucian.

His eyes are on me.

Am I ready to become one of them?

To join this family?

A family that is violent and ridiculously kinky and too wealthy and complicated enough to require flowcharts.

A family that rebuilt a Village because home mattered more than ashes.

There is a small red leather box in his hand. Bachman’s written in gold on the top.

He opens it.

Inside is a delicate gold necklace. A small sword pendant dangles from the chain. Light blue stones line the blade.

“It’s beautiful.” I touch my throat.

He steps behind me. His fingers brush the back of my neck as he fastens it.

His mouth comes close to my ear. “You still want this?”

“Yes.” I smile through tears. “And ask me when I’m ninety.”

“I will.”

He moves back in front of me.

The older man lights one candle, sharing the flame with someone else. The flame moves around the circle until the deck glows with dozens of small lights.

The river wind should extinguish them.

Somehow it does not.

The older man raises his candle.

“Bachmans, do you accept Erin?”

“We do.”

The voices roll across the water.

A shiver moves through me.

“Do you pledge to care for and protect her as your own blood?”

“We do.”

My throat closes.

“And how long will you hold Erin and Lucian in your care?”

The answer comes from every direction.

“Forever.”

I break.

There is no elegant way to describe it.

I cry.

The older man smiles. “Welcome home, Erin Bachman.”

Erin Bachman.

I close my eyes.

For years, names were survival.

Fake names.

Last names that connected me to people who hurt us.

Names on bills.

Names on records.

Names I gave men because I could not trust them with the real one.

Now I have one I chose.

I look up at Lucian.

“Erin Bachman.”

His face changes.

Pride.

Love.

Possession, because he is still himself.

But something gentler beneath it.

“My wife.”

“My husband.”

The river carries us past Manhattan.

Past bridges.

Past a city where I once believed money might solve the worst thing that could happen to me.

I was wrong.

Money helped.

A lot.

I am not going to become one of those women who pretend that being rich is not fantastic.

I’ve been too poor for that.

But money did not save me.

Cass did.

Ryan did.

I saved myself.

And Lucian...

His mouth brushes my temple. “Happy?”

“Very.”

“Good.”

“Scared?” I ask.

He stills. I smile against his chest. “You can say it.”

“Yes.”

“Of what?”

He looks out over the water. “That this is the moment something takes you.”

I pull back. “No.”

His eyes return to mine. “You asked.” His jaw tightens.

I touch his face. “We are allowed to be happy after the danger is over.”

“What if it is never over?”

“Then we’ll be happy while it’s happening.”

He stares at me.

I continue, “I don’t need a life where nothing bad can happen. No one gets that.”

His arms tighten around me.

“I need a life where bad things don’t get to be the only things that happen.”

Something in his expression gives.

Peace.

Just a little.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Erin

There are private islands.

And then there is whatever the Bachmans consider a private island.

The Parrish rises out of the Aegean in layers of white stone, green olive trees, and water so blue it looks fake.

I stand at the edge of the terrace in a white silk robe and stare down at the sea. “Lucian.”

No answer.

“Lucian.”

Still nothing.

I turn.

He is lying across the enormous bed with one arm over his eyes.

My husband is pretending to sleep.

Badly.

“Are you ignoring me?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you are wearing that robe and standing too far away.”

I smile. “We have been here exactly twelve hours.”

“Eleven hours and forty-two minutes.”

“That is alarming.”

“I have a watch.”

“You aren’t wearing a watch.”

He moves his arm enough to look at me. “I know what time the plane landed.”

It’s only since we became husband and wife that I realized my husband has an internal calendar. “Of course you do.”

The bedroom doors are open to the terrace. Warm wind moves the curtains. I move to the edge, holding the iron railing of the balcony.

Beyond the terrace, white stone villas dot down the green hillside.

Pools. Stone paths. Flowers. A private beach.

Heaven.

A dock with a yacht, I have been informed, is not technically ours because it belongs to the family, which in Bachman language means it is ours whenever we want it while we are on our honeymoon.

The entire mansion we’re staying in is empty except for staff housed far enough away in the guest cottage that Lucian personally checked twice before we went to bed last night.

I walk back toward the bed. His eyes follow me.

Dark. Possessive. Not tired anymore.

Definitely not pretending to sleep. “Come here.”

“Ask nicely, Mr. Bachman.”

His nostrils flare.

I enjoy this too much.

“Please come here.” His voice lowers to a growl. “Now.”

I stop beside the bed. “See? Growth.”

His hand closes around my wrist, and he pulls me down.

I land half on top of him, laughing. He rolls me beneath him.

The robe falls open.

His expression changes.

There are moments when Lucian looks at me like he has never seen a woman before.

I live for those moments.

His fingers trace the gold sword at my throat.

“Mrs. Bachman.”

My stomach flips.

“My wife.”

“Say it again.”

“My wife.”

Heat curls through me. I wrap my legs around his waist. “My husband.”

He kisses me. Not carefully.

We have had careful.

We have had frantic.

Angry.

Desperate.

Shameful.

Healing.

This is different.

There is nowhere we have to be.

No message waiting.

No strategy room.

No enemy with a camera.

No private room to cave to control.

His hands move over me slowly because time is ours.

And we are each other’s.

When he pulls back, his forehead rests against mine.

“Color?”

I smile.

“Green.”

Always the question.

Always the answer he waits for.

He opens my robe completely.

The sea breathes beyond the terrace.

Sunlight spills across the sheets.

For once, I do not feel watched by danger.

Only him.

And that is exactly how I want it.

Later, I wake with my cheek on his chest.

His fingers move through my hair.

I don’t know how long he has been awake. Probably hours. Vampire.

I lift my head. “Did you sleep?”

“Some.”

“That means no.”

“I slept.”

“How long?”

“Enough.”

“Lucian.”

He sighs. “Forty minutes.”

I sit up. “That is not sleep.”

“I was thinking.”

“Even worse.”

He looks toward the open terrace.

I follow his gaze.

The sun is lower now.

Gold across the water.

“What about?”

His hand finds my ring. He turns it around my finger. “Everything.”

“Specific.”

He’s quiet.

I wait.

This is another thing I’ve learned about my husband. Sometimes if I just give him time, he speaks. Sometimes he needs the silence to get there.

Finally, he says, “When I was younger, I thought peace would be boring.”

I smile. “And?”

“When there was an enemy, there was a task. A plan. A person to kill.”

“Romantic.”

He cocks a brow. “You married me.”

“I know. Questionable judgment.”

He squeezes my hip. “But I like it.” He looks at me. “The peace.”

“Me too.” I smile.

His brow furrows. “What do normal people do?”

“Normal people?” I ask.

“Yes.”

I think about it for a moment. My past. Our beginning. “I’m not sure I know.”

We spend six days doing absolutely nothing useful.

I swim.

Lucian pretends he does not hover at the edge of the pool. In the ocean, he doesn’t even try. He lifeguards me as if any one of the calm waves could swallow me whole.

We take the ‘boat’ out. We have dinner on the yacht’s terrace. I scream like a baby when a seagull, attempting to snatch a dinner roll, flies too close.

He never mentions it again because he values his marriage.

We sleep late. Or I sleep late.

He watches me sleep like the undead.

We make love in every room of the villa and one place outside that I refuse to describe because I have standards.

It’s the last night, and we walk down to the beach.

No shoes.

My dress keeps catching in the wind.

Lucian carries a bottle of wine and two glasses.

“This is romantic,” I tell him.

“I brought a gun.”

“There he is.”

We sit near the water.

He pours.

I hold up my glass. “Here’s to surviving our beginning.”

He clinks his glass against mine. “And here’s to surviving you.”

I laugh. We drink.

The waves move in and out.

For a long time, neither of us speaks.

Then he says, “I feel something.”

“What’s that?” I ask, happy to help my now emotionally less stunted man process.

“I feel…” His voice lowers as he stares out over the ocean. “I feel happy.”

My heart melts. I smile. “Say it again.”

“I am happy.” He looks at me with a softness in his eyes I’m trying to get used to.

My heart aches. In the good way. I lean into him. “Me too.”

He puts his arm around me.

No enemy appears.

No phone rings.

No one dies.

The world simply keeps moving.

And we let it.

EPILOGUE

ONE YEAR LATER

Mrs. Erin Bachman

The first thing I hear every morning is a delivery truck.

Not gunfire.

Not security.

Not Lucian barking orders.

A delivery truck.

It backs into the alleyway up the street at six fifteen every morning with a beep-beep-beep that makes my husband threaten murder from beneath our duvet.

This is my favorite part of our happily ever after.

“Make it stop,” Lucian mutters.

I open one eye. Sunlight pushes through the curtains of our townhome. Our townhome.

Not a penthouse. Not Iceland. Not a fortress hidden on a cliff.

Home.

Three floors of old brick and warm wood in the rebuilt Bachman Village. Across the narrow lane, on the public street, I’m sure the windows in Cass’s bakery are already glowing. Next door, I can picture the black-and-gold sign for Bachman Jewelers as it catches the morning light.

The delivery truck beeps again.

Lucian growls.

I smile into the pillow. “You could buy him a quieter truck.”

“I could buy the company and extinguish it.”

“Growth.”

“I am in bed. Growth begins after coffee.”

Coffee wouldn’t cure his reflex. I know the sound the truck makes is more about the trigger than the annoyance.

He’ll never stop protecting me.

I love being reminded of this fact.

I roll toward him. His hair is a mess.

I love that too.

No one else gets to see Lucian Bachman with bedhead like a child.

That might be my greatest luxury.

He opens one eye. “Why are you staring?”

“Obsessing,” I say.

He grins, closing his eyes. “That’s my thing.”

“I’ve adapted.”

His hand slides around my waist. My wedding ring presses between us.

Thin gold band. Four-carat princess-cut diamond.

Inside:

MINE

I still take it off sometimes just to read it.

Ridiculous. Perfect.

Mine.

Someone rings on a screen on the wall beside my side of the bed.

Lucian’s eyes close. “No.”

Another ring.

“Do not answer that.”

Then Ryan’s voice comes over the speaker. “Aunt Rin! Mom says you have to come taste something!”

I laugh. Lucian pulls the pillow over his face, mumbling a muffled, “No way, Ryan.”

“Be right there,” I say.

“He has a mother.” He grumbles. “Can she dissuade him from calling so early?”

“His mother let him call.”

“Then this is a coordinated attack.”

I climb out of bed.

Lucian catches the hem of my sleep shirt. “Where are you going?”

“Bakery.”

“No.”

I stare at him.

He looks at my bare legs. “Cover those sexy legs of yours before you leave this house.”

I grin. “There he is.”

I pull on the stretchy pants he likes to pull down so much.

He follows me downstairs because apparently marriage has not cured him of escorting me thirty feet away.

The Village is awake.

Security men nod as we pass. Children ride bikes between the townhomes.

An older Bachman couple sits at a cafe table, each with a coffee.

We leave the gates and head out to the street. Cass’s bakery smells like butter, sugar, cinnamon, and happiness. She is behind the counter, dusted with flour.

Ryan sits on a stool eating something he was definitely not supposed to touch yet.

“Tell him to stop,” Cass says.

“Stop.”

Ryan takes another bite.

“I tried.”

Cass rolls her eyes.

Gregory emerges from the back carrying a tray. He has flour on his black sweater. Two Cass-sized handprints. On the back of his shoulders.

Lucian notices. I notice Lucian noticing.

Interesting, we both think.

Very interesting.

But also natural.

He makes her laugh. She keeps him in check. And he cares for Ryan in that way that makes a woman’s womb ache just watching them together.

“Cinnamon rolls.” Cass points at the tray. “My new recipe.”

Gregory sets down the tray. “Technically, I suggested the temperature adjustment.”

Cass looks at me. “He has become unbearable.”

“You asked for help.” Gregory smiles. “You said the croissants were uneven.”

“They were rustic.”

“They were burnt.”

“They were artisanal.”

I have to ask. “So. Gregory. You’re enjoying your time here⁠—”

Lucian leans toward me. “Do not meddle.”

“What?” I whisper back.

“You have the look.”

“I have many looks.”

“That one means matchmaker, and you know we don’t have a good past with those.”

Cass puts a pastry in my hand. “Eat.”

I bite. Butter, sugar, cinnamon, and gooeyness fill my mouth. “Oh, my God.”

She grins. “I know.”

“And so perfectly baked,” Gregory interjects.

“This is addicting.”

“Like you.” Lucian takes a bite from mine without asking.

“Get your own.”

“Partnership,” he counters, then takes another bite.

The bell above the bakery door rings.

Rafe walks in.

Lucian looks right at him. “No.”

Rafe stops. “I haven’t even said anything.”

“You never bring casual information before seven.”

He looks at Lucian. “Correct.”

Lucian puts down the pastry.

My stomach tightens automatically.

Old reflex.

Rafe sees it. His face softens. “Nothing bad. I hope.”

I breathe. Lucian does too. Barely.

“A note.” Rafe hands me a small package, a notecard attached. “For Erin.”

Lucian asks if Rafe ran the harmless white card through security. Twice. Rafe is insulted.

Twice.

But Lucian doesn’t stop Rafe from giving me said note.

Progress.

No return address. My name on the plain white cardstock.

Erin Bachman.

I immediately guess the owner of the precise penmanship.

Erin,

I hope the Village is whole again.

I hope he is too.

I think, because of you, he might be.

If not now, soon.

You are kind to him, and you’ve been kind to me.

Freya is helping me learn how to live with what I’ve done.

And what was done to me.

I hope you get your happy ending.

- Isobel

I read it twice. Then I hand it to Lucian.

He reads. No visible reaction. Then he snaps it closed.

“Do you want to keep it?” I ask, testing when I don’t mean to.

When I know I have no need to.

He gives it back. Not cruelly. Not dramatically.

He looks at me with a furrowed brow. “God no. Why?”

Just done.

Ready to move on.

I pretend I don’t need the sigh of relief his response brings me.

Maybe I’ll keep it as a reminder.

Women keep strange souvenirs from the wars they survive.

I fold the card and put it in my pocket.

I turn to Ryan, eyeing his sticky hands and face. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

“Thanks, sis. I’ve got another tray to get in the oven.” Cass rolls back into the kitchen, Gregory right behind her to assist.

Rafe breaks his ‘the body is a temple’ crap and steals a pastry. The morning continues.

No alarms. No emergency exits. No enemies.

Just family arguing over baked goods.

Lucian and I walk back to our house. He takes my hand. He always does when we walk together.

I look down at our joined fingers.

At my ring.

At the gold sword against my throat.

At the cobblestones beneath our feet.

“We did it,” I say.

He looks at me.

“What?”

I gesture around us. “This.”

“The Village?” he teases.

“No.” I squeeze his hand. “Us. Normalcy.”

His face softens.

The expression is still rare enough that I remember every one.

“We did.”

“Are you happy?”

He gives me a look. “You’re going to use that admission against me. Aren’t you?”

“Maybe.”

He leans in, heat against my ear. “I thought what happens on the island stays on the island.”

“Some things do,” I say. “If you ever tell anyone about that little outdoor sexcapade, I will die of humiliation.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. I don’t want anyone picturing you doing anything other than praying in a convent. Covered head to toe robes.”

“You’re silly,” I laugh.

My laughter drops as he ends our walk, stopping in the middle of the lane. A cart delivering fresh bundles of flowers to the homes has to go around us.

He ignores it, staring at me. “Erin.”

“Yes, husband?”

Then he pulls me hard against him.

I wrap my arms around his neck.

He looks at me for a long time. Then, he says, “I am happy.”

Happy tingles come over me as I smile. “Good.”

Then he kisses me.

Right there in the middle of the Village.

Someone whistles.

Blaze, probably.

I don’t look.

He holds me tighter, binding us together. But the strongest bond I have ever known is the one I choose every morning.

Bought.

Betrayed.

Burned.

And finally, beautifully, willingly...

Bound.

YOUR OBSESSION HAS ONLY JUST BEGUN…

Bronson: A Mafia Billionaire Romance is the original book, the first in an over 30-book world where we first meet the Bachman family.

The Bachman Crown series begins a new era of the Bachman Brotherhood—where power, loyalty, family, and obsession rule behind the gates of Crown Village.

Turn the page to explore…

YOUR OBSESSION HAS ONLY JUST BEGUN

THE BACHMAN CROWN SERIES

Enter the Crown Village Here

The Bachman Crown series begins a new era of the Bachman Brotherhood—where power, loyalty, family, and obsession rule behind the gates of Crown Village.

These interconnected, standalone dark mafia romances feature dangerously possessive Bachman men who protect what is theirs at all costs.

CHAPTER One

CLARA

There are three things you should know about my car.

First, she's twenty years old.

Second, the driver's-side window hasn't rolled down since Easter.

Third, every mechanic within a fifteen-mile radius has advised me to cut my losses and sell her for scrap metal at the junkyard.

I have declined.

Mostly because my current transportation budget is approximately fourteen dollars, and I have a clearance rack shirt that looked way better on the hanger that I need to return.

Tonight, however, BlueBird may finally have won.

“Don't do this,” I whisper.

The dashboard lights blink.

Once.

Twice.

Then every single one dies.

BlueBird rolls silently onto the shoulder of Blackstone Road.

“Oh my god. Not again.”

I turn the key.

Click.

“Traitor! Come on.”

Click. Maybe some encouragement?

“Aren’t you a girl’s girl? We gotta stick together.”

Click. Didn’t work.

“You are the worst car. The absolute worst.”

Then I remember that plant study Bea told me about where two groups raised house plants; one group talked nicely to their plants and one talked meanly. Bea says, if you talk mean to them, they die.

I stroke her weather word dash. “You know I love you, Blue girl.”

Click.

“You're incredibly beautiful. You know that, right? You’re the loveliest shade of midnight sky.”

Nothing.

“I take it back. You're the worst. And your paint is chipping.”

Apparently, our relationship has finally ended.

I drop my forehead against the steering wheel.

It is eleven forty-seven at night.

I’m so tired, in thirteen minutes, I might actually turn into a pumpkin.

My shift at Hawthorne House ended seventeen minutes ago. Bea is home alone with our father, who promised me over text that he was totally sober, a phrase only drunk people use.

Nic is God knows where.

And I am four miles from home.

Perfect.

My phone shows six percent battery.

Also perfect.

I grab my canvas ‘No Books Should be Banned Books!’ tote, shove my phone inside, and climb out of the car.

The October air bites through my thin cardigan.

Because, of course, I forgot my coat.

I'd worn it to work this morning and left it on the hook beside the employee entrance after Mrs. Peterson spilled tomato soup down the sleeve. I’d scrubbed it as best I could, then left it hanging to dry.

I told her it was fine.

And it is. But that stain must come out.

It’s my only winter coat.

Mrs. Peterson is eighty-nine, has dementia, and once told me she could tell the future from her tea leaves. And she’s a coffee drinker. I can’t be mad at her. I love her.

But I hate that I left that coat and that it still smells like soup.

I start walking.

Blackstone Road cuts between the forest and the enormous stone wall surrounding whatever rich-person fever dream recently swallowed the old Van Dorn estate.

The locals have theories.

Tech billionaires.

Foreign royalty.

A utopian commune experiment.

Personally, I’ll take anything over rich people. I’m too envious of the casual security they have, yet seem to take for granted day in and day out.

I've walked perhaps half a mile when I hear it.

A whine.

I stop.

There it is. Again. Softer this time, and with a higher pitch.

The kind you make when you’re in pain.

It’s coming from the woods.

I hate the woods. I’m terrified of the woods. “No, we are not going in there. No matter how pitiful that sound gets.”

I tell myself to keep moving. Something rustles in the dried leaves. Another whine.

“Oh, for god’s sake.”

I fish around in the bottom of my bag, grab my phone, switch on the flashlight, and push through the brush. The leaves crunch under my worn boots. There’s a path. I hear the sound again, and it seems to be further down, so I can at least leave the brush and walk on the trail.

The trail leads to a gravel drive. It must lead to a house. Maybe the owners will be here soon, looking for their pet.

“Hello?”

Excellent, Clara.

I’m too far from the road now to even see it through the trees. But the whining continues, so I keep walking.

I find him another ten feet down the drive.

He's young. Maybe a shepherd mix. Dark fur, big frightened eyes.

One rear leg is tangled in rusted wire.

My heart caves as I fall to my knees. “Oh, sweetheart.”

He barks. Once. A warning. My sign to leave.

“Fair. You don't know me.”

But… there… his tail twitches just a bit. Right to left. So, I crouch-crawl a little closer to him.

“I'm Clara. My hobbies include poor financial decisions, looking up ‘how-to’ car repair videos I’ll never be able to use on YouTube, and walking into the woods when I shouldn’t. So, basically just making bad decisions in general.”

The dog smiles up at me. Like, actually smiles. His snout turns up at the corners, and his tail wags for real.

I inch closer. “Can I help you?”

I hold my phone flashlight beam closer to investigate. My heart falls as I take a closer look at the wire around his leg.

There is really nothing I can do. Only now do I realize how cold it is out here. How far into these woods I’ve journeyed. How dead my poor car is. And how little help I can actually offer to this precious creature.

I settle further on my haunches, pulling my cardigan tighter around me as I think of who to call.

I smile at Pup. “It’s going to be okay!”

It’s going to be anything but.

He looks back at me with a hope-filled deep brown gaze.

I’m thinking about who to call and how long I can keep my flashlight on before my phone dies, as headlights wash through the trees.

More than one vehicle’s worth.

And they’re headed our way.

We’re just off the edge of the drive. There’s no way to hide.

And I’m not leaving him.

I should feel excited, thinking maybe help has arrived. But I don’t. Chills run over my arms because these are not ordinary cars.

The thick line of black SUVs rolls up the drive. Too quiet for the kind of cars you buy off the lot. These seem custom.

Expensive ones with windows tinted so dark it’s illegal. Or it should be. Especially when it’s so unnecessary, and my car won’t even start.

My stomach tightens.

Because apparently I not only need my car to break down tonight, but I also need to be kidnapped by the Men in Black.

Is this injured dog my first alien encounter?

The first SUV stops.

Then the others.

Only one door opens. The passenger side of the first can.

A man steps out. Tall with broad shoulders. Unnervingly large.

He moves towards me with the kind of swagger a man who is used to people running from him would.

He wears a dark gray wool coat over whatever too-expensive suit he has underneath.

I’m terrified, still, I hold the phone higher, aiming the beam towards his face to get a closer look.

Then I realized the car’s headlights had illuminated both of us. My hand drops to my side.

His face is angles and planes. Jawline carved of stone and set like a trap.

A faint scar cuts through one eyebrow.

Above the bluest set of eyes I’ve ever seen. Deep pools that draw me in. Then glare at me.

Late thirties.

Probably not a peace-and-love-commune leader.

Possibly a vampire.

He narrows those dark brows at me. “Don't move.”

His voice is deep enough, controlled enough to make the command vibrate inside my chest.

And bossy enough to make me rise slowly. I stand in front of him, straightening my spine to my full height of still-way-shorter-than him.

I swallow. “What’s with the cars?”

His gaze tracks over me.

I don’t typically feel ashamed of my cheap clothing and my scuffed boots, but his blue eyes make me cross my arms over my chest so I can hide them.

Tote bag instead of the Birken bag I’m sure the females in his world carry.

Then he sees the trapped dog.

His expression doesn't change.

His gaze returns to me. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for forest creatures to pull me home in a magical pumpkin wagon.” I force a shaky smile. “What do you think?”

He doesn’t answer. Just gives me a stare that tells me I’ve said the wrong thing.

“And you?” I glance at the line of patient, intimidating cars behind him. “I’m guessing you’re having a Will Smith moment?”

His eyes narrow again. He either has no idea what movie I’m referencing or doesn’t care. And he’s clearly losing patience.

I point toward the animal.

“Obviously, I'm helping the dog.”

“It's midnight.”

“Dogs remain injured after business hours.”

He doesn’t even smile.

“Step away from the animal.”

“No.” The word comes out strong without a second thought.

Then his eyes lock with mine.

Nobody has ever looked at me quite like that.

Not a stare.

A threat.

And as if he has full authority over me, this dog, these woods.

“The wire is cutting into his leg.” I point helpfully to the dog.

Pup thumps the ground with his tail. Once. Then puts his head down.

His arms slowly cross over his chest as he graces the pitiful creature with a glance. “I can see that.”

“Wonderful. So you know why I’m here. And you know that you have to do something to help him.”

His jaw clenches. A muscle in the corner twitches.

He steps closer.

I retreat a step.

Then another.

He notices. Of course he does.

He says, “Whatever you choose to do—don't run.”

Every hair on the back of my neck joins the already standing-on-end hair on my arms.

“I’m not planning on it. Because. You know.” Again, I help out with a point, nodding toward the dog.

His gaze holds mine. “Good.”

Everything in me tells me I need to get away from this man and his creepy lines of cars as fast as possible.

Sorry, Pup. I’ll be back. If I survive.

I turn and run.

Welcome to Crown Village.

Once a Bachman claims you, you belong to the family forever.

Their love stories are dark, intense, emotional, and complete with a happily ever after.

WHERE IT ALL BEGAN

The entire world of the Bachman Brotherhood poured out of my head and my heart and onto the page with BRONSON: A Mafia Billionaire Romance.

I’m sharing the first chapter with you here, for free:

Paige

What can I say? I like nice things.

I love nice things. I crave nice things. I have to have them.

They fill a hole inside of me.

The feel of silk. The scent of Ralph Lauren. The pinch of a Jimmy Choo.

What’s the point of living without luxury?

Don’t even get me started on my shoe collection.

Anytime I get a little down—going up a few pounds on the scale, getting into a screaming match with my annoying boss, or feeling that old emptiness creep back in—all I need is a fresh pair of red-bottomed Louboutins to breathe life back into my soul.

I sound like a shallow girl.

I’m not.

I have a heart. One as big as my curvy ass, in fact.

But sometimes that big heart feels more like a hole in my chest and I don’t have any way to fill it.

I’m a medical assistant. Paid by the hour to do the dirtiest work you can imagine.

And my place of employment?

A drafty old nursing home.

Not the posh kind the rich kids pop their aging parents into and forget they ever even had parents.

Their dollars drain from their padded bank accounts right along with their guilt.

And I love every corner of it.

No glitz, no glam. Just an understaffed, poorly maintained, New York City home for the elderly. A drab, crumbling gray building tucked in a poor neighborhood.

Out of sight, out of mind.

Our patients, or my family as I call them, don’t have a penny to their name.

And I love every one of them.

We do our best with the little bit of assistance they get.

Delayed refills, cheaper substitutions, and supplies stretched far beyond what any decent facility should permit? We make impossible choices and pray no resident pays the price.

Ms. Tulla Gold in room 101 used to be a nurse. On days when she doesn’t think she’s a famous talk show host, she’s very helpful to us, doing the morning rounds with her blood pressure cuff.

We make it work.

I wear scrubs for a living. A far cry from my closet full of couture. Ones with tacky, colorful prints dotting the scratchy fabric—the patterns make my patients smile. And the shoes we have to wear, my goodness, how disgusting can footwear be? Thick soles, black Velcro sneakers to protect my arches from the concrete floors. Not flattering for anyone, but especially ugly on a twenty-five-year-old.

And I would never think of getting a blowout before work. It’s ponytails or messy buns, every day, all day.

But I love my job. And the only thing I love more than my fancy labels are my patients. Especially the saddest cases.

The ones with no visitors.

They break my heart. And I’m there for them till the end.

I hold their hands when they take their last breaths.

But I’m not perfect. I can’t seem to help myself… I just like nice things.

But the items I crave aren’t within my means on my meager salary. And until I can get myself a sugar daddy and pull a Pretty Woman, marching myself into Daughtry’s, demanding service, I’m going to have to do what I do best.

Take what I want.

And never get caught.

I know it’s wrong. I’m not an idiot. I’ve heard every lecture about stealing and consequences, usually delivered by people who’ve never had to decide whether to pay the electric bill or eat something besides stale bread for dinner.

Not that hunger is why I take things. That would almost make it noble.

I take beautiful things because they stay.

People disappear. They forget birthdays. They drink through Christmas and leave little girls sitting alone beneath a tree without presents. But a beautiful dress never forgets you. A pair of shoes never looks through you when you cry. Things can be held. Hidden. Kept.

That’s the excuse I give myself, anyway.

I have plenty of them. None make what I do right.

My latest acquisition sits in a prettily decorated store window, taunting me every day as I make my trek to the bakery in my soft-soled shoes.

This window doesn’t just belong to any store—it’s the store. The one everyone in New York City who’s anyone shops at from recently made celebrities with cash falling out of their pockets to the highest class of old money in New York.

Even the mafia.

I’ve seen the well-groomed gangsters with their slicked-back dark hair and pinstriped suits marching out the door with their purchase. A pair of two-carat diamond earrings, an apology gift after their wife finds out they have a hot little goomar on the side. Armed with one of those little red bags, the man knows his wife will forget to care she’s become number two in his heart.

Because in his guilt-laden, bulging wallet, she’s still number one.

Oh, those red bags.

Just seeing one swinging freely from the hand of a millionaire makes my heart pound faster. Blood rushes past my ears, my eyes widening as I picture the small red leather box that rests within—as red as my gel-manicured fingernails.

On top of that little box, the name boldly emblazoned with curving gold letters, right on the front…

Bachman’s.

Saturdays are my one day off. The day I do my collecting. I hit a different borough every week. No more than five stores, no less than three. I take what I want, then I go home with my spoils. Stuffing my goodies underneath my bed. In the tiny wardrobe that’s so full I can barely close the doors.

I do have rules.

No wallets. No purses belonging to actual women. Nothing from a shop where the owner works behind the counter and every sale keeps the lights on. And never anything sentimental.

I stick to luxury stores, places with security guards, obscene markups, and insurance policies worth more than the building where I live. Places that will record a loss on a spreadsheet and move on.

It is still stealing.

But rules make it easier to pretend I’m not the kind of thief who truly hurts anyone.

I know I shouldn’t…

I know it’s wrong…

But even then, as I lie in bed at night, awake on the sagging mattress of my twin frame, my mind goes to those little red boxes. That word so powerful, it’s written in gold: Bachman’s.

I love my pretty things. But I want that ring.

I know what I do is messed up.

I’m messed up.

I’m trying to get better.

But I’m not.

It’s getting harder to cover up my little habit. When my co-workers compliment me, or ask where I’ve gotten such a great piece on our salary, I tell them it’s a knockoff I’ve purchased from Canal Street. Or that my rich big sister, the one they’ve never met—and who doesn’t exist—has given me another gift.

So generous of her. She’s such a doll.

None of my conquests compare to what sits in the window of that jewelry store.

The ring.

Just thinking about that ring sends the nervous butterflies to flight in my tummy. The ones I get just before I make my move.

A blue diamond.

The rarest in the color family of diamonds. And at three carats, well, let’s just say the price on the tag is a number so big I have a hard time gathering up the guts it would take to steal it.

But I have to have it.

I can’t help but feel she’ll one day be mine.

Every day I walk by it. Every day, with my bag of stale buns in one hand, coffee in the other, I shuffle past it, my eyes wide as they take in its beauty. Afraid I’ve been caught staring, I always take a nervous sip from my cheap black coffee.

When I walk by Bachman’s, picturing myself inside, purchasing a necklace or perhaps a simple bracelet, my ugly work shoes and cheap brew melt away.

In my imagination I become her.

Pretty Woman.

Today is no different.

After exchanging words with my nasty boss, I head out to the bakery to get yesterday’s goodies for my friends. Now, a smile stretches on my face just thinking of the smile on theirs when I get the treats back home to them.

A crisp, early fall breeze caresses my cheeks, tangling my short dark hair that for some crazy reason, I’ve chosen to let hang loose around my face this morning.

Fall in New York is my favorite time of year.

The leaves are just beginning to change. Red and gold surrounds me. I lift my hand, attempting to gather a falling, swirling leaf. It lands in my opened palm.

Lucky catch.

Pinching the stem between my fingers, I twirl the leaf, enjoying the beauty of its colors. I release it and it flutters to the ground to join the others. Inhaling deeply, I glide over the sidewalk, my work shoes feeling almost like sandals.

The crisp air, the autumn beauty, it makes a fullness well in my heart… On the days Ms. Jones wakes up and her knees don’t ache, she smiles and says, Must have woken up on the right side of the bed. That’s how I feel today.

Though the trees are beautiful, our street is not. Trash blows in the wind. Dirty kids with no coats tug on mismatched shoes as they run to catch the bus. A couple of mangy cats fight over a discarded fishbone—something you’ve probably only seen in cartoons.

I turn the corner, walk a few more blocks, and I’m in another world.

Women with slicked-back hair, their oversized sunglasses covering half of their perfectly done faces, talk loudly into their cell phones. Their expressions say, Look at me, I’m gorgeous and I’m important. The men, their suits costing more than my entire tuition had, brush past me with their muscled shoulders.

They don’t even know I exist.

I’ve gotten pretty good at being invisible. Sometimes, you must disappear to get what you want.

I turn the corner and I’m on Bachman Avenue, named, I assume after the jewelers that guard the ring I so covet. This street houses the stores that are the cream of the crop. All places I’ve never had the guts to steal from. The only reason I even discovered this part of town was the bakery is here and they were the only ones to answer my ad. Home for the aging seeks day-old pastries in exchange for smiles.

I pass Daughtry Clothiers, Clara’s Children’s Boutique. My heart beats faster just knowing I’m getting closer.

One more store, then another… there it is.

I stand in awe.

The brownstone building is strong, proud. This historical giant is much older than any of us busy pedestrians bustling past it. I wonder what history it’s seen over the past century. What secrets it holds.

A sigh escapes my lips as I stare at the gold letters.

Bachman’s.

I gaze through the window. My eyes lock on the display case holding the ring. The blue diamond glitters at me prettily in the sun.

My heart pitter-patters. A dull sweat breaks out across my hairline. I get that tingly feeling in the palms of my hands.

The itch to steal.

I should ignore it. I want to.

I can’t.

I shake my head, my pin-straight hair falling right back into place. I glance down at my shoes. My light blue scrubs covered in dancing kitties. I don’t look the part today. There is no way I should go in there like this. There is no way I should go in there at all, right?

The Bachmans are mafia. Bad men. And their origin story is much like mine.

Before they were Billionaires, they stole from the rich to give to the poor.

Call me…Robin Hood.

My eyes go back to the diamond. The sunlight hits it perfectly. Rainbows dance along the case. The princess-cut gem stares back at me. I belong to you, it whispers. A gust of that fresh autumn air ruffles my hair. A red leaf swirls before me.

There seems to be magic in the air today.

Why not? It’s a free country. I can march in the most exclusive jewelers in New York City wearing kitten scrubs. It’s not like I’m not going to take anything. Though I daydream, I would never really steal something so valuable.

I find my head nodding. I’ve made my decision—I may as well do a quick surveillance.

Brushing imaginary lint from my clothing, I take a deep breath. Jutting my chin up as if I belong in such an establishment, I harden my gaze. I march myself down the sidewalk, right past the display.

My feet touch the store’s stone step for the first time, sending a flutter of nervous butterflies through my gut. My fingers curl around the cold metal handle. I’m surprised at the heaviness of the door as I tug at it. The weight is almost too much for my five-foot-four frame. I struggle, but with sheer will, I finally pull the thing open. The momentum is more than I am prepared for and I do a half stumble, half fall, before catching myself.

My first time entering the store is nothing like I imagined. I always thought I would plan it out, make a day of it. Wear my white Dior dress. Slick my hair back into one of those tight ponytails the businesswomen wear. Have my makeup done for free by the lady at the MAC counter who’s practically adopted me. She croons over my olive complexion, and loves how I look amazing in red lipstick. Her compliments once caused me to slip a stick of ‘ruby red’ into my purse on my way out the store.

I would breeze into Bachman’s (obviously in my fantasy I don’t have trouble pulling the door open) and demand to see the blue diamond.

To try it on.

The salesclerk would be intimidated by me. Moving quickly to satisfy what she assumes to be a wealthy young baroness. She would bring me the diamond. I would eye her, bored, and say, Sometimes a girl just got to treat herself. You know?

Today does not go that way at all.

After almost falling, I regain my balance. A burning blush rises in my cheeks. I scoot out of the way to avoid the heavy door whacking me in the ass as it closes behind me. My hand instinctually goes to my bag—the five-hundred-dollar yellow leather over the shoulder purse that’s the only splurge I’ve allowed myself to purchase, legally. Yellow because it’s so conspicuous. Who’s dumb enough to draw attention to the place they tuck their stolen goods? Smoothing my hair with my trembling hands, I will my nerves to steady.

Then, I see it for the first time.

The inside of Bachman’s.

It’s more beautiful than I’d imagined from my quick glances in the windows. The air is clean, cool. I take a deep breath. It’s the same smell you’d expect to find in a spotless museum or brand-new library. Not a speck of dust flies through the sunlit room.

The glass counters sparkle beneath the lights. No harsh LED bulbs, but a soft white warmth shines down from the heavy brass pendants that hang overhead. The counters seem to go on for miles.

This store is endless.

I hold my breath in awe as my hand flutters to my chest. The word reverently slips from my mouth.

Bachman’s.

My whisper is followed by a greeting. “Hello. Welcome. How may I help you?”

I look over my shoulder to see the face that belongs to the cheerful voice.

She is nothing like what I expect.

A girl, perhaps a few years younger than me, with blonde curls spilling over her shoulders, openly smiles at me. Her small white teeth are like pearls. Her hazel eyes are large like mine. Her gaze holds a hopeful optimism that only those with parents who love them can possess.

“How may I assist you?” she asks. A look of genuine helpfulness crosses her face as she makes her way over to me. Stopping just a few feet short of me—a polite distance—she folds her hands in front of the lap of her mint green dress.

I expected a harsh, angry, beautiful woman. Dressed in a tailored black gown. Her nose high in the air as she sniffs out my poverty.

This is not her, the arch nemesis I had dreamed up. Not a beauty, but cute. Sweet, even. Her button nose is not turned up at me. She patiently awaits my response.

Which is… what?

“I—ah… I,” I stutter.

She studies my outfit. Not in a mean way. Just an honest one. Observing her guest. “Just browsing?” she suggests helpfully.

“Y-yes,” I manage.

Her eyes light up. “Oh, goody! That means I get to make suggestions.”

She takes my hand in hers, as if she’s known me forever. She’s tugging me over to the corner that is furthest from the front of the store. Tossing her curls over her shoulders, she trills, “We just got this collection in. And it is adorable! All butterflies.”

She releases my hand. Careful not to touch the glass, she waves her fingers over the displays and sighs, “Aren’t they gorgeous? Perfect for girls our… age.”

Her pause says it all.

Girls like us. Girls who get paid by the hour. Girls who don’t really matter.

Standing here in Bachman’s, breathing the expensive air, I no longer care whether I matter.

I just want to be here. Take it all in. I meet her eyes, shooting her a timid smile.

She returns it with a grin. Just a couple of girls playing dress-up.

“Go ahead, take your time. My name is Alice. Call me if you need anything,” she says. Giving me one more warm smile, she turns to leave.

Her name is from a storybook, and it suits her. I watch as she flounces to the other side of the store.

Guilt gives one sharp tug beneath my ribs.

That’s inconvenient.

Salespeople aren’t supposed to be kind. They’re supposed to trail me through the store, inspect my cheap shoes, and make it obvious that someone like me has no business touching anything behind their glass. Their contempt makes taking from them easier. Almost satisfying.

Alice hadn’t given me contempt. She’d given me her hand. Her name. A smile that made me feel welcome.

For one reckless second, I consider leaving with nothing.

Then I turn toward the butterflies.

As I turn to the case, my breath catches in my throat. Before me on the counter sits a metal black tree with thin branches. Its limbs are curled into loops and hooks. Jewelry hangs from its metal curves.

My gaze travels to a thin silver chain, dangling from the end of a branch. Hanging from the chain is a tiny diamond-encrusted butterfly. Its little wings are spread, ready for flight.

The charm reminds me of when one of our patients leaves this earth. (Die and dead are two words I do not allow at Our Home.)

As they struggle to take their last breaths, their hands feeling paper thin in mine, I imagine them as butterflies.

Delicate, fragile things. But then they beat their wings, rising above the ground, strong enough to fly away from the pain.

Reborn in beauty.

I reach out, touching the charm. It’s cool against my skin, the weight surprisingly heavy as I slide my fingertip beneath it.

She is ready to fly.

Right into my bag.

The butterfly wants to be free. To be taken home with me. To be worn around my neck, its delicate chain sparkling as it turns and twists with my movements. Only I know how special she is. She wants me to have her. If I don’t take her, inevitably some spoiled rich brat will receive her at a birthday party, along with a dozen other gifts. Toss her to the side with an unconvincing thanks, then never think of her again.

She belongs to me.

I can feel it.

“Hello, little beauty,” I whisper. “Want to come home with me?” The familiar feeling swells in my belly. Nerves, excitement, the thrill of the act.

And guilt. The one emotion I try to ignore.

Perspiration prickles at my hairline. My palms are itchy. The little hairs on my arms all stand on end. I slip the necklace from the branch of the tree. A glance to my left tells me Alice is still on the other side of the store. My fingers close around the butterfly.

Alice laughs at something across the room. The bright sound travels through the store and lands directly on my conscience.

Put it back.

My fingers loosen. The necklace slips halfway toward the branch.

Then the diamond wings catch the light. The familiar hunger opens inside me—that empty, grasping place that never stays satisfied for long.

I close my fist again.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, though Alice is too far away to hear me.

I slide it into my bag.

I am in such a trance, I don’t bother to do my usual sweep of the rest of the store. Normally after a steal, I would wander about the shop, taking any attention away from the area of my crime. I never rush after a conquest. I always take my time, looking calm, collected.

But everything about today is different. I came into this store, unplanned, in my work clothes. The sales assistant was nice, young. And although I’d only planned to playact, I now have a piece of Bachman’s in my bag, ready to go home with me.

The nervous thrill begins to cool, but the satisfaction I usually feel never comes. The little butterfly seems heavier inside my bag than it did in my hand.

I tell myself Alice will never know. Bachman’s will replace it. No one will be hurt.

The excuses sound weaker than usual.

I head to the door. Alice is not looking surprised to see me leaving so soon—she probably assumes I’ve been eyeing the impossible price tags—and she calls out a kind farewell. I raise my hand in a wave of thanks.

The fingers of my other hand curl around the handle of the door.

“Not so fast.”

The heavy words come growling out of thin air.

Bile rises in my throat. My heart drops. A cold sweat breaks out over my forehead.

Do I run? My fingers tighten around the handle.

“Don’t even think about it.”

The voice is shockingly commanding.

I have to obey it.

My hand drops to my side. Nausea pools in my stomach. I turn to face the owner of the voice.

My heart stops beating in my chest.

A huge man stands before me. And he’s livid.

Dark hair meticulously combed over dark brows. The broad shoulders filling out the gray suit jacket, tapering down to a single button done over a slender waist. There’s got to be rippling muscles beneath that starched white shirt. Bronzed skin that looks like it just left a Greek Island, gleaming against that white collar. His arms are crossed over his chest. His hands are huge.

And those eyes. Those flashing black eyes. He takes another step toward me and my stomach drops to my feet. He’s inches from my face and I can see they aren’t black at all. They’re an entrancing deep brown.

He’s The Looker.

“It’s… you,” I stammer.

His already creased brow further narrows. “Excuse me?” he demands. “I don’t have time for games.”

He has no idea who I am.

And I barely know him.

For the past month or so, he would come up to Jane’s floor every Sunday afternoon, visit a newer patient of hers, stay for hours, then leave just as the sun was setting. He was always courteous, but not friendly. He had an energy about him that made me keep a distance. The others didn’t sense it—they were too taken with his striking features.

He looked to be in his early thirties, and the older nurses couldn’t let a visit go by without elbowing my shy friend, saying, “Jane, you have to find out who that man is. He’s such a looker.”

Hence, he’d been given the nickname, The Looker, by the henhouse.

He repeats himself. “I said, I don’t have time for games, little girl. Now tell me what the hell you’re up to.” His fingers curl around his bicep, clutching as if he’s stopping himself from doing something he’d regret.

A shiver runs through me.

“Nothing,” I manage to murmur. “And I was just leaving.” I reach for the door once more.

The gaze he gives me stops me. My reaching hand hangs awkwardly in midair.

In a sudden movement, his arms uncross. He’s reaching toward me and I cringe. His right hand wraps around the back of my upper left arm. His strong fingers dig into my flesh. The pressure from his grip is uncomfortable, bordering on painful. Panic pulses through my body.

“Come with me,” he growls.

My feet move on their own, my mind blank, as he escorts me to the back of the store. I shoot a ‘help me’ glance at Alice, but she’s busy with a client who’s looking at the high-end stuff. The commission from one of those pieces probably pays her rent. She doesn’t even notice me.

“Where are you taking me?” I stammer, my mouth finally working. It feels as if it’s stuffed with cotton.

“To the back. To talk.” His grip tightens. The pain makes a tiny yelp escape my lips.

My mind races. What are my options?

I can scream.

I can take my chances on talking.

I can kick him in the shin and try to make a run for it. Judging by the strength in his grip I don’t stand a chance in a battle of physical wills. I sneak a glance at him out of the corner of my eye. He’s tall. Built. And furious. His chiseled features are set in a stony state. Jaw clenched, he catches me looking at him and gives me a sneer.

Okay, so I won’t try to make a break for it.

We reach what I assume is his office door. Leaving me with my last and most humiliating defense.

I can cry.

Willing the tears to come to my dry eyes, I sob the song of the poor, pitiful street wench. “I’m so sorry—I don’t make much money and the necklace was just… so… pretty.” I can feel the beginnings of a tear forming. I tell my lower lip to quiver—just a touch, don’t want to overdo. “And I just wanted… One. Nice. Thing.” I open my eyes wider, creating what I hope is a doe-eye effect. Damn, I’m good. I prepare to look up at him from underneath my mascara-coated lashes. My gaze slowly rises to meet his—first traveling over an endless stretch of muscled torso. When I see his face, I gulp.

If looks could kill, I’d be lying on the floor. Dead as a corpse.

He releases my arm.

His dark eyes flash. Challenging.

“You don’t have any nice things?” The question was innocent enough but the razor-sharp edge in his voice reawakens my fight or flight response. I’m glistening, my heart beating so loud I can hear the blood as it rushes past my ears.

“Ah… no…”

His eyes fall to my purse. “And what of that Casa Blanca canary yellow leather purse on your shoulder? I believe that runs, what, five hundred?” His dark brow rises.

My fear dissipates, instantly replaced with my very quick temper.

I had scrimped, saved, and even gone without gel in my manicures for weeks just to get ahold of that bag. A friend who worked in the department store had come in and hid it for me, every morning, behind a row of black bags. It had taken months for me to save up enough to shell out for it.

But it was a classic.

And I had paid every penny. The words burst from my lips, pitiful girl act shoved aside. “Hey! I actually bought this with my own money. It’s the one thing I didn’t…” My words trail off as I realize what I’m about to reveal.

“Steal?” he asks. A satisfied smirk crosses his face, somehow making him even more handsome than before. He crosses his arms over his chest again, the material of his suit stretching and pulling to form around his muscles. He studies me for a moment.

My stomach flips, then dives into my clodhopper shoes. Heat rises in my cheeks. “What I meant to say was… that… I didn’t…”

He almost smiles, shooting me a look of mild curiosity. “Didn’t what?”

Didn’t what? Didn’t what?

I rack my brain. It comes to me and I cry out in a burst of enthusiasm, “Didn’t even get it on sale! Can you believe that? A little old medical assistant like me managed to buy a Casa Blanca, full price?”

“They never go on sale.” Uncrossing his arms, he grabs the doorknob and turns it. The door swings open. Grabbing my upper arm again, he pulls me into a small office. “But I’m guessing you already know that.”

Time to steer the conversation away from me. “How do you know so much about women’s fashion, anyway?”

Closing the door behind him, he stands before it, blocking my exit. “I dabble in what you could call import exports. But that is neither here nor there. The only thing that matters is what’s in the bag?”

As if turning itself in, the strap slips, the purse sliding from my shoulder. I grab at it, clutching the soft leather to my chest. “I don’t think you want to look in there. It’s that time of the month if you know what I mean. Might make you a tad uncomfortable. Just handfuls of tampons. Super plus, super plus plus…”

His hand shoots toward me, snatching the bag and whipping it from me. My mouth drops open, forming the unsaid word that I’m shouting in my head.

No!

His gaze leaves mine, his hand dips into the almost empty bag. Nausea roils in my stomach.

He lifts his hand. The chain hooks around his index finger, the butterfly dangling in the air. The light dances off its tiny diamonds.

“Pretty, isn’t it?” he asks.

He speaks of the necklace, but his gaze is locked on me. His eyes travel over my body, peeling away my clothing. I stand before him, feeling naked. A tingling sensation prickles at my core. Heat rises in my face. My tongue is thick and useless in my mouth. I hope to God he can’t see how hard he’s making my nipples beneath my shirt.

He reaches out, gently taking my hand in his. Electric pulses dance over my skin where he’s touching me. He opens my palm, turning it face up. He lowers the necklace into my hand. One by one, he curls my fingers, closing them around the charm. His gaze locks on mine. A shiver runs down my spine.

“Keep it,” he says. His words sound like a threat. He tosses the purse to me.

“Thank you?” I stutter as I grab the bag. Breaking his gaze, I slip the necklace back into my purse.

“Now, we must discuss your punishment,” he says.

My body turns to ice. What the hell have I gotten myself into? I shift the strap of my bag to my shoulder. My hands are shaking, and I hide them in the pockets of my shirt. I steady my voice and say, “Punishment?”

He glares. “Yes. I think you’ll find me quite fair.”

I stare at him, my mouth gaping.

A muscle in his jaw twitches as he speaks. He has the slightest hint of an exotic accent, but I can’t place it. “I can call the police. Have you arrested for theft? That would be the proper protocol. Or…”

My fate hangs in his pause.

I gulp, arranging my face in a mask of confidence I do not feel. I raise my brow. Jut out my chin. I demand, “Or what?”

One of his arms remains crossed over his chest. The hand of his other arm goes beneath his chin. As if he’s thinking. He begins to circle me. Slow, purposeful steps as his gaze studies me. My nipples tighten beneath my bra as he comes closer to me. I can smell his cologne. Feel the air move around me as he paces.

He says, “We can take care of things the old-fashioned way. My way. Your punishment will be quick, severe. Then your crime will be forgiven.” He’s not even touching me, yet my skin raises in chill bumps. Beyond my fear, a strange sensation rises. My pussy is soaking my panties. He wants to punish me and he’s so… big… stern… and damn—he is a looker.

His anger only serves to give his handsomeness a dangerous, sexy as hell edge.

As he awaits my answer, my mind spins, my core throbs.

What am I going to do?

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