Chapter 14 #2
“She was everything good in me,” I say. “And when she died, all I had left was revenge. So I infiltrated Vesper. Learned how they move. Who they bribe. Who they ruin. Ironveil was the failsafe—a lockbox of everything I’ve collected on them for ten years.”
“And Specter?” she asks, voice cautious.
My eyes meet hers. “Specter was… her alias. Before they erased her.”
Dahlia steps back like she’s been hit.
“I chose you because you carried the name. I thought it was fate. Or maybe just guilt. Maybe I wanted to weaponize you.”
I laugh bitterly.
“But you weren’t a weapon. You were the detonator . Getting too close with every heist. I know you’ve already heard about them. It was only a matter of time before your little online poll chose them next. I couldn’t let that happen.”
Her lips tremble. “So that’s why you brought me here? That’s why I’m in danger?”
“Every other reason still holds. But, yes,” I say. “Ironveil is locked, but not impenetrable. And now they know something’s moving. You’re a liability, Dahlia.”
She flinches, and I instantly regret the word.
But then she lifts her chin. “Then let me do what I do. Protect me. Or let me go. But stop withholding.”
I step forward. Cupping her face, my thumbs brushing her cheeks.
“I can’t let you go.” The words leave me before I can stop them.
Because it’s true. She’s already under my skin. Already inside every decision I make.
This started as a game of collateral and revenge.
But now?
Now it’s something else entirely.
And we’re both standing too close to the fire to walk away unscathed.
Dahlia
I wake to the sound of choking.
Not mine.
His.
Dante thrashes beside me, soaked in sweat, his breaths jagged, panicked. Moonlight cuts across his face and I see the anguish. His lips part like he’s trying to speak. A name slips out between clenched teeth. “Rina.”
His sister.
My chest seizes.
“Dante,” I whisper, brushing damp hair from his forehead. He jerks again, and I press my hands gently to his cheeks. “Wake up. Come back.”
His eyes fly open, wild and unmoored.
He grabs my wrists, hard—reflex more than intention. But the second he sees, sees me , something in him crumbles.
“I’m here,” I murmur. “Just me.”
His jaw clenches. “She was screaming,” he says hoarsely. “I couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t fucking move. They made me—made me watch .”
“I know,” I say, even though I don’t. Not really.
But I feel it. In every line of his body, the way he’s unraveling beneath the surface. Powerless. Trapped. Haunted.
And maybe I’m selfish, or maybe I’m just as broken—but I need him inside me. I need to pull him out of his head and into mine. Need to give him something to control when he’s drowning in things he can’t.
“Let me help,” I whisper, guiding his hand to my throat. “Take what you need. Master me, Sir. Destroy me.”
His gaze flickers. Something fierce blooms behind it. His fingers tighten and his cock thickens. Surges.
“On your knees,” he rasps.
My pulse kicks.
I slide down the sheets and kneel at the edge of the bed. Naked. Waiting. Wanting.
“Hands behind your back.”
I obey. Breathless and grateful.
His cock is hard, jutting from the dark V of his hips, and when I lean forward to take him into my mouth, no preamble. All gloried surrender.
He hisses through his teeth.
“Fuck. That’s it,” he growls, fingers curling into my hair. Tight enough to sting and bruise. “Take your goddamn penance, little thief.”
I hum around his length, hollowing my cheeks, licking along the underside of his engorged cock until his grip tightens.
“Christ. You’re so fucking good at this,” he mutters. “Like you were made to be on your knees for me.”
I moan, gag slightly as he pushes deeper.
“Messy. Obedient. Fucking mine .”
His cock pulses deep in my throat. Once. Twice. But he pulls me off just before he comes, fisting my hair and yanking me to my feet.
“I’m not done with you.”
He flips me around, presses my face to the mattress, and shoves into me with a brutal, hungry thrust that knocks the breath from my lungs. “Oh— fuck ?—”
“Say my name,” he snarls against my ear, one hand wrapping tight around my throat.
“S-sir.”
“No. Say my name! ”
“D-Dante—” I gasp, voice shattering.
“Louder.”
“Dante! Please—oh my God ?—”
“You feel that?” he pants, fucking me harder, deeper. “That’s how deep you are in me, Dahlia. In my head. In my goddamn soul .”
My vision whites out. I sob as he edges me, pulling out at the last second, denying me the orgasm that’s clinging to every nerve.
“Please, please—don’t stop—Sir?—”
“Milk me with that tight little cunt all you want. You’ll still come only when I say.”
Tears sting my eyes.
He slaps my ass, grips my hip hard enough to bruise, and drives back into me. “This is the only place I’m sane. Where I find fucking peace. Inside this pussy. Inside you . Don’t you fucking get it?”
My voice is gone. There’s only breath. Heat. Surrender.
Whimper and bracing for the storm.
And when Dante O’Driscoll breaks all over me, I come with a cry, trembling so violently he has to hold me up. His own groan follows seconds later, low and guttural, as he spills and spills and spills inside me.
He collapses over my back. Not crushing—just there .
His lips brush my shoulder. “You scare the shit out of me.” His voice is low, wrecked—like the truth is a blade he’s finally stopped dodging. Or a confession dragged from the ruins of a man who never meant to feel this much.
I swallow. “Why?”
“Because I’d burn the world to keep you safe,” he says, breath rough. “And I don’t know who I become when that happens.”
I twist beneath him. Cup his cheek.
“You’re not alone in this, Dante.” He dragged me into this—literally kicking and screaming. Now wild horses couldn’t drag me out.
And God help me, I don’t know if it’s because I believe in the mission… Or because I’m too far gone for the man behind the monster.
He looks at me like he wants to say something more. But he doesn’t. He just pulls me close. Wraps me up tight in his arms. And for the first time, I feel it—not just sex or surrender or strategy but something real.
Something we don’t have words for yet.
Something we both know can’t last.
Because the clock is ticking.
And we’re running out of time.