Chapter 67
ADELINA
He was unsteady when I finally let him go. Bandages damp, chest heaving, eyes lit like he’d stared straight into the sun. Cezar looked wrecked. Beautifully, dangerously wrecked.
And somehow still smirking.
I made my way off him, tugging my hair out of my face. My thighs ached, my breathing still uneven, but none of it compared to the sight in front of me. He looked too damn satisfied for a man who had just begged me for death.
“I—uh…” He cleared his throat and reached slowly under the bed, careful of the pain. “I have something for you.”
What the fuck could it be? He set a velvet-wrapped bundle in my lap. I eyed it for a moment before unwrapping it.
A dagger. Sleek, balanced—too beautiful to be part of his brutal collection.
The hilt wasn’t anything like the others I’d seen him sharpen or drive into a man’s heart.
This one was sculpted, every petal shaped with obsessive care.
Crimson enamel pooled in the grooves, mimicking fresh blood in the light.
The stem coiled into the guard, thorns positioned to bite if you swung a certain way.
Even the blade itself had a dark polish, elegant in the way danger sometimes is.
It wasn’t just a weapon. It was him in steel—violence disguised as beauty.
My rose.
For a moment, I just stared. My throat was tight. “You made this?”
His smile broke wider, a little undone at the edges. “Yeah. For you.”
Of course he did. He lets me carve into his skin, begs for my hand on his throat, and now he’s forging blades with roses because he can’t stand the idea of me touching a dagger that isn’t his.
“You’re obsessed,” I grumbled with a smile while already tracing the grooves in the rose. It fit too well in my hand. Crafted, like he’d studied me down to the last detail.
His gaze followed every movement, drinking in every second. “You like my blades. Every time you draw with it, you’ll think of me.”
As if I don’t already.
As if I’m not already his in ways I never meant to be.
Warmth settled heavily inside me, knowing I was all his. I flipped the dagger and tested the balance, unable to stop the grin. “Red suits me better than you know.”
The way his breath hitched made it too obvious—he lived for scraps of my approval.
I shouldn’t have caved so easily. I should have told him I didn’t need his obsession forged into steel. I squeezed the handle, letting the thorns press into my palm, prominent enough to sting. His reminder imprinted into me.
Slowly, I leaned forward, fitting the rose of the hilt against the swollen, blood-crusted rose I’d carved into him hours ago. The metal met flesh, enamel against raw skin. His throat worked around a breath he couldn’t quite take.
His pulse battered beneath my hand. When he moved, barely a twitch, his arm brushed the nightstand—knuckles grazing the edge of his phone before falling still.
The broken case caught a line of light sneaking through the window.
Even now, he reached for it without thinking, that same instinct to keep control even though he’d given it all to me.
I already knew I was everything to him. Still, Cezar guarded his ghosts even when he was breaking, held them close like they might disappear if he ever stopped trying to protect them.
“Perfect,” I whispered.
Because it was. My mark in his body, his mark in steel, everything between us tangled together until I couldn’t tell where he ended and I began—bound to each other beyond escape.
I should have stopped there. “Cezar… I’m no good for you.” My voice barely held together. “I’ll get you killed.”
“I’d die for you.”
My chest clenched. “That’s the problem.” I paused. “Thank you, Cezar.” The admission tasted strange on my tongue. I needed to stop lying to myself.
His eyes went wild, like I’d handed him the world. And maybe I had, because the truth was, I wasn’t letting go of this dagger. Or him. Even if I should. Even if it killed us both.
He is mine.