Chapter 19 Marcus
MARCUS
By the time I reach the sidewalk, the rooftop should be finished business. That’s the technical truth, at least, the one I keep repeating as I set my pace.
I run my usual route. Then I take it again, my lungs burning and my legs heavy as I force the night back into sequence. But her taste won’t leave me.
“Dammit,” I throw out into the dark, the word stripped down to its bone.
She was going to kiss me.
Not by accident or ignorance. I had been explicit in the invitation itself. You choose Wolf, and kissing is not on the table. It was stated clearly because some boundaries lose their function the moment they’re treated as flexible.
The Game allows for proximity, heat, and carefully managed hunger. It allows for touch without consequence. That’s the architecture of it. That’s how control holds. And when Wolf is the one playing, lip-to-lip has no place in that structure.
Everything else had been exact. From the roses flown in and set the night before, to the bed positioned just so, to the lighting rig calibrated by my own hands. I would’ve stayed with her until the sky lightened, giving her the illusion of dawn, the impression of something earned.
But she reached anyway.
A lot of people treat a kiss as something harmless. An afterthought. Something less charged than sex.
But they misunderstand. They think sex is the point of vulnerability. It isn’t. Sex is mechanics. Access. Something you can give without disclosing anything that costs you. You can fuck and walk away intact, satisfied, and unchanged.
But kissing doesn’t work that way.
A kiss sits too high on the body to be casual. It lives between the mind and the heart. It’s a privilege that invites honesty before you’ve agreed to it. You don’t cross that line unless you want something real, or unless you don’t understand what you’re risking.
That’s why the limit exists. For me. For Wolf.
Why did she have to push it?
The worst part wasn’t the reach itself. It was the certainty that came with it. She knew a kiss wasn’t trivial. She knew it carried more weight than the excuse, “It’s just a kiss.” And she knew, damn her, that I wanted it too.
How could I not?
Those full lips, the small, precise curve of her chin, and beneath that, the thing that mattered more than any physical detail—the mind behind them. The presence. The person.
Iris Vaughn.
I never use real names in the Game. Names make things personal, and personal is where judgment slips. But with her, the name comes uninvited. Worse, I don’t feel wrong allowing it. I don’t understand it yet, and I don’t like not understanding things.
She has tested my limits more than once. Not recklessly, but intelligently. And still, one night doesn’t earn trust. It never has.
I won’t make that mistake again.
I’ve given trust before, over many nights, not just one. I let rules bend for the sake of rewarding someone. Belladonna. I let a kiss happen with her. And it was enough to be used against me.
“Fuck.”
Maybe I’m the one who ruined it by starting the Game with Iris in the first place. I brought her in for a reason. I wanted the truth from her, and I got it. I believe her. By any reasonable measure, this should end cleanly. A successful endeavor. But instead, I feel less intact than I did before.
And then there was the word she used. Intimacy. As if it had any business being part of the conversation. As if it belonged anywhere near the Game.
Marcus Lockwood doesn’t have an intimacy problem. Not in any version of reality I recognize.
That is, until she said it and lodged the idea where I couldn’t dismiss it outright.
What happened before with Belladonna left its mark. I’m not na?ve about that. But I’m not broken, either. I’ve lived long enough to put it behind me. Or I should have.
The question I don’t like asking is whether I’m still using that history as a shield, or whether it’s simply the last structure standing between control and something I refuse to name.
My head throbs.
That, more than anything, tells me this isn’t finished.
I call Liam.
“Where are you?” he says without preamble. “You’re supposed to be here by now.”
He’s waiting at The Trap. He always does. Every game ends there, full stop. I broke that rule. If I’m going to forgive myself for breaking one, this is it. And no, it wasn’t the kissing. It wasn’t even the moment I came uncomfortably close to asking her to come back next time.
Marcus Lockwood doesn’t beg. I did, however, get close enough to recognize the warning signs. I let her challenge me more than I should have. I let things stretch past protocol because dragging her off that bed for the sake of procedure would’ve been…pointless. Criminal, even.
Criminal, considering how much of her I tasted and how little of it I’ve been able to forget.
“I’m not supposed to be anywhere,” I clarify.
There’s a pause. Then, a mildly concerned, “Are you breathing like that on purpose?”
I keep running, and the asphalt hits in a steady rhythm. “I didn’t call you to babysit me,” I say between breaths.
“I’m not babysitting,” Liam replies. “I’m conducting a wellness check. Because you sound like you’re being chased.”
“I’m fine.”
“That’s not what your lungs are reporting. Are you fleeing the scene, or just the memory of Iris Vaughn?”
“She doesn’t know that man,” I say. “She’s clear. That’s all.”
“And you’re disappointed?”
“No,” I answer.
“You paused.”
“I didn’t.”
“You always pause when you’re lying. It’s adorable,” Liam says with a chuckle.
“I’m glad she’s innocent. That means we’re done. And no, I’m not running from her memory,” I say, aiming to close both arguments at once. “Satisfied?”
“Overjoyed,” he replies. “Did she tell you anything else about him?”
“Yeah.”
“And?”
“I think Theo actually knows him,” I say.
“Theo?”
I think back to our conversation about the old man discussing renovations with me, or with someone he genuinely thought was me. Maybe his mind isn’t as unreliable as I assumed.
“Long story,” I say. “I’ll fill you in after I talk to him.”
“Okay. Cryptic, but okay. I’ll allow it, given your current cardio crisis.” Then he goes right back to it. “She wanted you badly, though. I’ll give you that. You called it.”
“How’s your brother taking the loss?”
“Ego’s limping,” Liam says. “But vitals are otherwise stable.”
That son of a bitch was lucky Iris did the right thing. Otherwise, he’d be nursing more than a sore groin. I still don’t know what possessed me to put him in the lineup in the first place.
I stop running and brace my hands on my knees, breathing hard. Then, I tip my head back and look up.
Dawn is starting to creep in, irritatingly beautiful. I should be up there. I know exactly where she’d be standing.
And for the first time since I created the Velvet Game, the night feels less like a performance and more like a beginning I’m terrified to want.