Chapter 2
Phoenix
She still doesn’t get it, does she? This isn’t exhausting me—it’s feeding me.
I can do this forever.
Hell, I already have.
Cat and mouse, lies and masks, all her bullshit walls and fake smiles.
Shannen’s stubborn and can be mean as hell when she wants to be. She’ll claw and bite just to spite me, but what she hasn’t figured out yet is that I have infinite patience for this. She can fight all she wants, but in the end, she’ll give in. She’ll have to.
She hasn’t spoken to me since the plane, but I know I’m still in her head.
It’s where I’ve always been.
Her arousal hit me mid-flight like a fist to the face. I’d know her scent anywhere. Put me in a room full of strangers, kill the lights, blindfold me, tie my hands behind my back, and spin me around in a fucking circle—it wouldn’t matter. I’d find her every single time.
Shannen’s mask was firmly in place where she sat next to me, but I had to walk away before I dragged her into the bathroom and fucked the fight right out of her.
We’re not quite there yet, and I know that.
She’s still pretending she doesn’t feel the pull, and it’s fascinating watching the way she pushes back against what’s coming for her, but it’s okay because I can be patient.
She made this adorable little huffing sound when I took her bags at baggage claim, both hands trying to wrestle them back from me as if I were stealing them instead of doing what any decent man would do.
Cute effort, but I’m stronger, and I was already holding them. Why the hell would I give them back just so she could struggle?
But what I think really pissed her off was when I slid in beside her in the car she’d arranged to pick her up.
The way her liquid-gold eyes snapped to me—pure fire and fuck you.
Her fury at my audacity was almost endearing.
But I didn’t know the guy driving her around.
He could be some psycho with zip ties in the glove compartment, and she’s just going to climb into his car because she booked him through an app? Yeah, that’s not happening.
Besides, we’re going to the same fucking building. The geography is literally identical.
I spent the entire ride through New York talking to the back of her head. Not a single glance. Not one word. Just that rigid spine and the way she angled herself toward the window like I didn’t exist.
Most men might hate the cold shoulder. But I fucking love it because it means I get to be close to her while she’s awake now—something I haven’t had in years.
“I swear to god, Phoenix,” she mutters as we walk through the building, knowing I’m right behind her, practically breathing down her neck.
Phoenix… Jesus. I love the way she says it.
“What?”
“You know, I’d rather you just stayed hidden because at least then you wouldn’t be pissing me off.”
The elevator doors slide open, and we step inside.
It’s the first time I’ve been in here. I’ve taken the stairwell every single day since I moved into this building because imagine if I was in the elevator and she stepped in before I was ready.
That’s a nightmare scenario for a man like me because I don’t do cornered. I create cornered.
“You sought me out, pretty girl.”
“I didn’t know I was seeking a raging psychopath.”
The doors seal us in, and I step into her space.
I don’t touch her, but I’m close enough that if she backs up even an inch, she’ll feel the wall at her back and me boxing her in from the front.
My defiant girl doesn’t cower or shrink away from me; she just tilts her chin up, those molten eyes blazing with the kind of anger that makes me want to either fuck her or fight her, and honestly, I’m not picky about which comes first.
“Go on,” I taunt, letting the dare sit between us. “Tell me to move.”
She doesn’t, but I knew she wouldn’t.
That pride of hers won’t allow it.
“One day, you’re going to have to stop being so angry with me, baby.
” My hand finds her cheek before I can think better of it, my thumb brushing over her soft skin.
She doesn’t pull away or slap my hand. She just stares at me like she’s trying to burn me alive with her eyes alone.
“You can keep denying me, but you’re my endgame, Shannen.
One way or another, it always ends with us. ”
“You’re going to hate me by the end of this.”
“Not possible.”
“If I have to hurt you to make you understand, then I will.”
“Do your worst, baby. It changes nothing.”
The elevator chimes for my floor, and everything in me screams to stay and ignore the opening doors, to keep her trapped here in this tiny box where she can’t run or hide behind distance and silence. But I make myself step back, watching her disappear behind polished steel as the doors slide shut.
Three minutes. That’s all it takes before I’ve got Shannen on my phone, pulling up the feed from the cameras I planted years ago.
She drops her bags by the front door, her shoulders slumping forward, and heads straight for the kitchen.
Reaching into the cabinet, she grabs a glass and pours herself a drink—vodka, if I had to guess. No ice, no mixer.
She sets the glass on the island, rests her elbows on the marble, and slowly lets her forehead drop to the counter.
I should feel guilty because I know it’s me causing this stress.
But I don’t feel bad, and I’m not sorry.
She just needs a little time.
I throw myself onto the bed, phone still in hand, my eyes glued to the feed.
We’re both silent and alone in our separate apartments, forced apart by floors and walls when we could just be done with this.
All she has to do is stop fighting it—stop pretending she doesn’t feel this—and I’ll show her that my kind of love doesn’t have limits.
I must've passed out at some point because when I wake up, my phone's dead—the screen black and completely fucking useless.
I fumble for my charger, my pulse already spiking because I have no idea what time it is, but the light outside has that gray-violet hue that means I've lost a few hours.
The second the screen fires up, I pull up the camera feed, and my stomach drops.
Empty.
Her apartment is fucking empty.
No Shannen on the couch.
No Shannen in the kitchen.
No Shannen in the bedroom.
No Shannen…
I'm already tapping into her phone's location before my brain catches up to my fingers. The map loads, and there it is, the little blue dot, still in her apartment.
This fucking girl.
She left her phone behind like her own personal fuck you.
One, two, three, four, five… breathe, Phoenix.
I’ve lost sight of her before, but only a couple of times, and never for long. She never goes anywhere without her phone, not fucking ever. That was always my fail-safe, my invisible leash around her delicate throat.
But it’s different now.
Everything changed the second I put my hands on her.
I’ve felt the way her body reacts to mine. I’ve heard the way her breath stutters when I say her name, like those two syllables alone have the power to undo her.
I tell myself to keep busy.
I need to wait and bide my time until she comes back.
I need… fuck, I need her.
I dig into my cabinet with trembling fingers and fire up my tattoo gun, the buzz the only thing keeping me from completely losing my shit.
I find a bare spot on my forearm—there’s barely any skin left untouched, but there’s always space for another piece of evidence that she’s mine. One deep black line for the way my name fell from her lips in that hotel room.
One day, I’ll stop marking myself. Probably the day she’s wearing my ring, and I finally get to call her my wife. That’ll be the only mark I’ll ever need.
I’m pacing back and forth across my apartment like a caged animal, my mind spinning out in every fucking direction.
She’s gotta be with Lianna.
That’s the only place she’d go. I already checked her office—yes, I tapped into those security cameras a long time ago, sue me—but she isn’t there.
It has to be Lianna.
Fuck this.
I’m out the door and take the stairs two at a time up to Shannen’s place, slipping inside as easily as I ever have.
I scan the apartment, hunting for any clue she might’ve left behind, and that’s when I see her phone on the nightstand beside a letter with my name scrawled across the front in her handwriting.
The second I unfold it and see what she’s written, I can’t decide whether I want to strangle her or fucking applaud her for fighting back.
I mean, I hate it—hate that she’s pushing me out and I really hate the challenge—but god, there’s pride burning in my chest too.
GET THE FUCK OUT, ASSHOLE.
I laugh. I shouldn’t because she means it, and I can feel the venom dripping off those block letters, but I can’t help it. She hasn’t given in or rolled over. She hasn’t made this easy, and I hate it. But fuck if I don’t love her for it.
I fold the letter, careful as anything, and tuck it into my pocket like it’s worth more than gold. Dropping onto the couch, I settle in for the wait. I stretch my legs out and allow my head to fall back against the cushions because I’m not going anywhere until I see her walk through that door.