Chapter 6 A Possession Performed
Chapter six
A Possession Performed
Finnian
Istand outside her door longer than I should. That’s the first mistake. The second was giving her the ring.
I knew it the moment it left my hand—knew exactly what it would do.
Knew it would rip something open that I’d spent years burying under orders and blood and discipline.
I should’ve kept it locked away, should’ve let the wedding bands do the talking.
Clean, practical, impersonal. But I needed to see it.
Needed to see her react to something that wasn’t rage sharpened into a weapon. Anger, I can handle. Anger is familiar, anger means she’s still standing. What I can’t stomach is emptiness.
So aye—maybe it was selfish. Maybe it was cruel, maybe I handed her a ghost and watched it bleed all over us both. But when her hand shook, when her voice cracked just enough that she couldn’t hide it, something in my chest loosened like I’d been holding my breath since the chapel.
There’s still something there and that matters.
I drag a hand down my face and stare at the wood grain of the door like it might give me absolution. I feel the sting at my throat where she nicked me earlier—nothing serious, just enough to remind me who she is, who we are.
She hates me, good. Hatred means she feels. Hatred means she hasn’t gone numb. Hatred means she’s still mine in the only way that’s ever counted between us—tight, violent, impossible to sever without killing something vital.
Are we toxic? Probably. Do we destroy everything we touch when we’re together? Almost certainly.
But I don’t back down, I never have. She was raised in knives and silence.
I was raised in power and consequence. Whatever we are, we were always going to be sharp, always going to cut.
And if giving her that ring reminded her—reminded both of us—that this wasn’t just a deal stitched together by old men and bad blood…
Then I’d do it again, even knowing she’d put a blade to my throat for it.
I don’t knock, I open the door like I’ve always opened doors in this house—like what’s on the other side already belongs to me.
She’s sitting on the window seat, not pacing, not plotting, just…
there. Knees drawn up slightly, hands folded in her lap, staring out at the sky as the sun bleeds itself out over Belfast. Gold and red streak the glass, catching in her hair, softening the hard lines she’s worn all day like armour.
She doesn’t move when I enter, doesn’t flinch.
After everything today, that alone should tell me how far gone she is.
Then she looks up and something in my chest caves in.
For a split second—just one, brutal second—she isn’t the woman who put a blade to my throat this morning. She isn’t Lady Malloy with blood in her voice or my future wife bristling with knives and fury… She’s the girl I fell in love with.
Young, unguarded, sitting in the same light, years ago, when the world hadn’t sharpened itself against us yet.
When it was just the two of us and stolen hours and whispered plans that felt indestructible.
Before violence taught us new languages, before betrayal rewrote everything we thought we knew.
Her eyes are tired now. Too old for her face, but the way she looks at me—quiet, wounded, unbearably familiar—rips something loose that I didn’t even know was still holding.
Christ. I shouldn’t have come in like this. Should’ve given her time, space, something that resembles mercy. But I can’t move. I just stand there, the door still open behind me, watching the sun set around her like it’s trying to remember us too.
And for the first time since this began, I’m not thinking about deals or optics or ownership. I’m thinking about the girl who trusted me, and the man I was before I broke her.
“We have a gala to attend.”
The words sound wrong in my mouth the second they’re out. She doesn’t turn around at first, just keeps staring out the window like the city might answer for her. Then she exhales slowly and nods once, to herself.
“I know which one,” she says. Quiet, tired. “The Valentine’s peace gala.”
Of course she does. Every year, two nights before Valentine’s Day. Neutral ground dressed up in silk and champagne. Old enemies shaking hands for the cameras. Blood debts paused just long enough to pretend we’re civilised.
“It’s meant for peace,” she adds flatly. “Always is.”
I step further into the room. “It matters,” I say. “Tonight more than most.”
She finally turns then, eyes sharp despite the exhaustion dragging at her bones. “It always ‘matters,’ Finn. That’s the problem.”
I don’t argue, I lift the dress instead. It's dark, elegant, cut to command attention without begging for it.
“Put it on,” I say. Not a command, not a request, something in between. “Come with me.”
Her gaze drops—to the ring still heavy on her finger, to the necklace resting at her throat, my family’s mark cold against her skin. Proof that she’s already been claimed in every way that counts.
She looks back up at me, eyes blazing and wounded all at once. “No,” she says.
I don’t move, I don’t raise my voice. I just hold the dress out between us like an offering I don’t deserve to make.
“We go together.” I say quietly.
The sun finishes setting behind her, the last of the light draining from the room, leaving us suspended in shadow and history and things we never finished saying.
She doesn’t argue. She steps forward and takes the dress from my hands in one smooth motion, fingers brushing mine just long enough to be intentional. Then she turns away—not to hide, not to retreat. To face me.
She undoes her clothes slowly. Methodically, no hurry, no shame. Every movement measured, like she’s daring me to look away.
I don’t.
She never breaks eye contact. Silk slides from her shoulders. Fabric pools at her feet. She stands there with my ring on her finger and my family’s necklace at her throat, bare everywhere else, utterly unafraid. Not offering, not performing, claiming the moment back.
My jaw tightens, my hands curl uselessly at my sides. Christ.
She steps into the dress and pulls it up herself, smooths it into place with the same care she’s used all day to keep herself intact. The fabric settles against her like it belongs there—like it was always meant to be worn by her and only her.
Then she reaches up and pulls the pins from her hair. It falls loose around her shoulders, dark and soft and devastating. The girl from the window seat is gone. In her place stands the woman who has ruined me twice over.
She turns without a word and crosses to the closet. I watch her choose the shoes. Sharp heels, enough to make a point. She carries them back to the bed and sits, graceful and infuriatingly calm, setting them neatly at her feet.
She doesn’t put them on, just looks up at me then, expression unreadable, waiting. The room feels too small for the things I’m not saying.
I cross the room slowly, deliberately, like she might bolt if I move too fast—or stab me if I don’t. She watches me the whole time, chin tipped up, spine straight, fury banked behind her eyes like she’s daring me to make a mistake.
I crouch in front of her. The shift in power is immediate. Her breath catches—not loudly, not dramatically, but I feel it all the same. She doesn’t move her feet, doesn’t offer them, doesn’t pull away.
Good.
I take one heel from where she’s set it beside her, fingers closing around the narrow arch. My knuckles brush her ankle as I guide her foot into it, slow enough that it feels intentional. Possessive and earned.
Her skin is warm. Still marked, still mine.
She swallows. I watch her throat work as I fasten the strap, my thumb lingering just a beat too long against the inside of her ankle, where her pulse jumps like it knows me. When I look up, she’s staring down at me like she hates me for this, like she wants me on my knees forever.
I take the second shoe and repeat the motion, just as careful, just as unhurried. When I’m done, I stay there—hands resting lightly on her calves, grounding her whether she wants it or not.
“You walk out of this room,” I murmur, low enough that it’s only for her, “looking like you belong beside me.”
I rise slowly to my feet, towering over her again, the air between us thick and dangerous and unfinished.
She hasn’t forgiven me, neither have I, and fuck me if that doesn’t feel exactly right.
The car waits at the bottom of the steps—black, long, polished to a mirror shine that reflects the house back at itself like a warning. Engine idling low, patient. Expensive. Quietly lethal.
I open the door for her. She doesn’t look at me when she slides in, skirts arranged with deliberate care, chin high, spine straight.
Every inch of her screams control, even now.
Especially now. The necklace catches the low light as she moves, gold and blood-red stone resting at her throat like a vow she never spoke.
I shut the door and round the car, getting in beside her. The driver pulls away smoothly, Belfast blurring past the windows—brick and iron and history giving way to something brighter. Louder. Dangerous in a different way.
The gala is already alive before we reach it. I can hear it in the distance—the hum of music, the swell of voices, the soft threat of too many powerful people in one place pretending they want peace. Every year, a lie wrapped in silk and champagne.
She sits beside me without touching, hands folded in her lap like the lady they all expect her to be tonight. Like she hasn’t threatened me with a blade not hours ago. Like she isn’t wearing my ring and my name and my future on her body.
I glance at her anyway. She’s looking straight ahead, jaw set, eyes sharp. Ready for war in a room full of smiles. Good. I lean closer, just enough that only she can hear me over the quiet rush of the road.
“Smile for them,” I murmur. “Let them think this is easy.”