CHAPTER 15
ORION
I lean against my desk, watching the security detail through the window of my office. Six men patrol the perimeter of the property, and another four guard the front door. All are heavily armed.
The sun has just begun to set, and in the fading light, I see my own reflection in the glass. Beyond my dark eyes, I see the world I’ve built. The world I’d kill to protect.
I close my eyes, Maisy’s words from earlier today, reminding us that the clock is ticking, still ring in my ears.
“In seven days’ time, Viktor will make his move, he’ll become the head of the Slavs at the Council Meeting.”
“Fuck,” I mutter to myself, running a hand through my hair.
I turn away from the window and pace the length of my office. The weight of my Colt pressing against my ribs is the only thing that comforts me at this moment.
I think about that first time Viktor came to our penthouse, bold as brass, uninvited—we should have put a bullet between his eyes. We should have ended the threat before it began.
The knock at my office door is so faint I almost miss it. I don’t need to turn to know who it is—only one person in this house knocks that softly.
“Come in, darling,” I call out, my voice automatically softening.
But the door remains closed. I frown, crossing the room in three long strides and pulling it open myself.
The hallway is empty.
My hand instinctively moves toward my holster before I catch myself. Paranoia. This house is secure—I designed the security system myself. No one gets in or out without my knowledge.
I close the door again, pressing my forehead against the cool wood, remembering Maisy’s words.
“Viktor Mrozovski has petitioned for a quarter of New York,” she said, her voice steady despite the gravity of the situation. “He’s gone through the proper channels. The Council has agreed to hear his case. But that was when they had me.”
The memory of Kai’s reaction pulls my lips into a grim smile. He exploded exactly as I’d expect—all rage and impulse, slamming his fist on the table hard enough to rattle our glasses.
“We should’ve killed that fucker when we had the chance!” he shouted, eyes blazing. “When he walked into our fucking home like he owned the place! Now he’s got the Council’s ear?!”
Logan remained silent, but his eyes met mine across the table, and I knew we were thinking the same thing.
Kai was right.
We’d had our chance, and we’d missed it. That day at the penthouse, we could have ended it then. Three shots. Three bullets. Problem solved.
But we’d played politics instead of pulling triggers. And now Viktor is making his play through legitimate channels. The kind of move that even men like us can’t simply ignore without consequences.
I move back to the window, watching as the security lights automatically switch on around the perimeter of our estate. Our house is fortified better than most military installations, a sanctuary, one I’ve built for our family.
A memory of Viktor comes to me, and how he looked at her. I should have killed him for that look alone.
After Maisy delivered the news about the Council meeting, we strategized for hours.
I outlined our legal options. Kai pushed for immediate action—a pre-emptive strike to eliminate the threat before the meeting could take place.
Maisy listened to all of us, her brilliant mind working through possibilities and probabilities with that eerie calculation that still unnerves me sometimes.
The sound of the door opening behind me pulls me from my thoughts. I don’t turn, but I feel her presence—the subtle shift in the air that always accompanies Maisy when she enters a room.
“I stopped by earlier, but Mia called me in the last moment,” she says, her voice soft but clear. “The children are finally in bed. And Mia wanted you to know she finished the book you gave her.”
I nod, still facing the window. “Smart girl.”
“So’s her uncle.”
I can hear the smile in her voice, and despite everything, I feel the corners of my mouth lift in response. I turn to face her then, drinking in the sight of her—dark curls falling loose around her shoulders, onyx eyes that miss nothing, the curve of her lips that I know better than my own name.
“What are you thinking?” she asks, crossing the room to stand beside me at the window.
“That Kai was right,” I admit. “We should’ve killed Viktor when we had the chance.”
Her hand finds mine, our fingers intertwining naturally. “Yes,” she agrees simply.
“The Council meeting changes everything,” I continue. “Viktor’s not just some upstart trying to muscle in anymore. He’s playing by the old rules.”
“Rules you ought to respect,” she notes, her thumb tracing circles on the back of my hand.
I nod. I’m a lawyer by training, a criminal by birth. The duality has always served me well—it’s allowed me to navigate both worlds with equal skill. I understand the importance of institutions like the Council, even as I subvert them for my own purposes.
“If we move against him now, before the Council hearing, we risk alienating the other families,” I say, thinking aloud. “But if we wait…”
“If we wait, he gains legitimacy,” Maisy finishes for me. “And legitimacy means power.”
“Exactly.” I squeeze her hand gently. “And he’s already too powerful for my liking.”
“The meeting’s in a week,” she says. “We need to find something concrete on him before then. Something the Council can’t ignore.”
“You think there’s dirt?”
“There’s always something,” she replies with certainty. “No one’s record is clean. Especially not a man like Viktor.”
I release her hand and move to my desk, sit down, and unlock the bottom drawer. From it, I withdraw a thick file—everything Logan, Kai, and I have compiled on Viktor since his arrival in the city.
“Logan and I have been through this a dozen times,” I say, dropping it on the desk with a thud. “There’s nothing we can use that wouldn’t implicate us as well.”
Maisy approaches the desk, placing her palm flat on its surface as she leans over the file. “Let me try. A fresh perspective.”
I watch her as she goes through it, her eyes moving rapidly over the pages, absorbing every detail. Her photographic memory is more than just a party trick—it’s a weapon in its own right. She’ll remember every word, every number, every connection.
“There’s something here,” she murmurs, prodding at a page halfway through the file. “A pattern.”
I lean in, close enough to catch the scent of her perfume. “What do you see?”
“His shipments from North Macedonia,” she says, flipping back and forth between pages. “The manifests don’t match. Look—the weight differences are inconsistent. Small enough to go unnoticed individually, but when you add them up…”
I follow her logic. “He’s smuggling.”
“Yes, but not in the way you think.” Her finger traces a column of numbers. “These aren’t drugs or weapons. The weight and frequency suggest something else.” She looks up at me, horror gleaming in her eyes. “People, Orion. He’s trafficking people.”
Human trafficking is the one line none of the established families would cross. Even in our world, there are boundaries. Rules. And this is the one that, if broken, would turn every family against him.
My mind is already racing ahead. “Can we prove it?”
Maisy shakes her head. “We don’t have time for that.”
I watch her continue to pore over the documents. “If you’re right about this, the Council won’t just reject his petition, they’ll sanction a hit,” I tell her.
She looks up at me, those dark eyes unflinching. “I know.”
“And if you’re wrong…”
“I’m not wrong,” she says, with absolute certainty.
I reach out, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, my fingers lingering against her cheek. “This is why I love you, darling.”
A small smile curves her lips. “Because I can find patterns in shipping manifests?”
“Because nothing escapes you,” I correct as she comes over to my side of the desk. “Not even the things Viktor Mrozovski thinks he’s hidden.”
I pull her gently into my lap, my arms circling her waist as she settles against me.
Her fingers trace the edge of my tattoo above my collar, and she leans in and presses her lips chastely to mine.
I expect that to be it, but she rakes her fingers through my hair and intensifies the kiss.
Her tongue weaves passionately with mine; it almost feels odd, especially from her, because she wouldn’t be into topping from the bottom, I’m sure.
“Would you let me fuck you?” she whispers against my lips.
I chuckle. This confident Maisy, who thinks she can fuck me, has a lot to learn.
“Absolutely…” I nip her lower lip. “… not . But you can ride my cock if you want. I won’t stop you.” I nip her jaw and continue down her neck as I unbutton her shirt. “Do you know why I won’t stop you?”
She grins, and bares her breasts from her bra cups the moment I’m done unbuttoning, waiting on me to suck them and play with them.
“Why?” she breathes.
“Because you’re my whore,” I mumble into her skin, “and you’ll do what I tell you to.”
Her hips have begun gyrating softly over my cock and as I play with her breasts, her movements grow more insistent.
“My personal slut.” I bite and pull at her nipple. “To share as I please.” I knead her other breast and rub the nipple. “To fuck when I want.” I unbutton her jeans and slide my hand down inside her panties. “To use as a cum bucket.”
“Orion…” Maisy moans.
I run my fingers between her folds. Her wet cunt is ready for me.
She tries to stroke my cock over my pants, but I put my hand over hers, squeeze it, then take it away and thread our fingers together.
I look at the darkness in her eyes, the real her that craves to be seen, before I devour her mouth, weaving my tongue with hers.
I stand up, taking her with me. “And right this very moment, your purpose is just that.”
I spin her around and bend her over my desk. In one move, I pull down her jeans and panties, revealing her sweet, juicy ass.
“ Yeees …” I stroke her butt cheeks. “This is good, very good, Maisy,” I mutter, nearly losing my mind with the need I have for her.
I slide my index and middle fingers inside and coat them in her juice, hearing her whine as I take them out and swirl the arousal over her nub.
The second time, I jerk my fingers deeper, to the knuckle, and do this a few times before she bucks and raises her hips into my fingers.
I collect her arousal on my way out and rub it over her swollen clit.
“You like this, don’t you, whore?”
“Y-Yes,” she moans as I continue sliding my fingers inside her and rubbing her nub. I repeat the motion, over and over, until she throws her head back. “Orion!” she cries.
A rush of cum dribbles out of her cunt and her hips jerk up into my hand as she rides the waves of her orgasm.
I hurriedly unbutton my jeans with my free hand.
The moment my cock is out, I fist it and pump a few times, the precum running down over my piercing.
I withdraw my soaked fingers from inside her and bring them to my lips.
“Oh, fuck! Why do you taste so divine?” I wasn’t planning on eating her as my cock craves her as much as my tongue, but tasting her now, I know my cock will have to wait.
I kneel down behind her, spread open her butt cheeks and press the flat of my tongue against her cunt, now soaked with arousal.
My tongue slides from her sweet nub up to her asshole, stirring incomprehensible sounds from her as she helps me by spreading her legs just a little bit further.
I push my tongue inside her cunt, lapping up everything she has. I hold her butt cheeks firmly open, keeping her in place, and she bucks downward against my mouth, jolting and moaning as I continue to devour her swollen nub.
“ There , just there!” She jerks her hips again, right into my tongue as I lap up her juices. My tongue swirls over her nub, and I suck on that little fucker while pushing two fingers inside. Her thighs begin to tremble and she fully unravels into a long moan.
“Orion!” she whimpers.
I get to my feet before she’s down from her heaven and with my cock hard as steel, I begin to enter her ass, my piercing breaching her slowly.
She realizes she’s going to stay high for a while, and hums in approval.
I push again, and again; each time she allows me to go deeper, gushing so much arousal that my balls are soaked as I stretch her out.
Her ass is going to be the death of me. She’s taking me inch by inch, and I’m nearly halfway in when her long, whining moans encourage me to slide the rest of my cock in until I’m balls-deep.
“There you go. Your ass is mine now!”
She looks back at me over her shoulder, her pupils dilated, her fingers curled around the edge of the desk, holding on for leverage as I claw at her hips and start pumping her deep, hard, grunting with each thrust.
She reaches between her legs, rubbing herself as I slam into her, whining like she’s flying up to cloud nine, right where I am.
“You want my cum, whore?”
“Y-Yes,” she begs.
“Hmm?” I grunt.
“Yes, please ,” she huffs between thrusts.
I’m so close to orgasming. “Why?”
“B-Because I’m y-your cum bucket,” she whimpers. She’s starting to come undone again. Her whole body’s vibrating.
“Correct!” Electrifying, staccato moans fall from her lips and I increase the pace; her back arches and her head falls back. “Never forget that!”
One last thrust and I still, feeling my cock spurting cum inside her cunt. Halfway through my release, I pull out and pump a few more ropes over the crack of her ass, watching it dribble down into her gaping entrance.
Still clawing at her hips, I growl, long and loud. “ Fuck! Maisy, you’re my whore forever!”