Chapter 10
Ten
Onyx
Five days at The Foundry and I've had more sex in that time than I can count on both hands. Kon is insatiable and my body has become a willing traitor to every rational thought I've ever had. I swear if I wasn't on the pill I'd be scared of walking away with the Bratva Beast's baby.
My hand freezes on my coffee mug.
The pill. My birth control. The little white packet that lives in my bathroom cabinet at my father's house.
Ugh. Fuck me!
I haven't taken a single pill in five days.
The realization drops through my stomach and lands somewhere around my knees. I've been so consumed with surviving, with the investigation, with the six-foot-four Russian who keeps feeding me omelettes and orgasms in equal measure, that I completely forgot I'm not protected.
Five days. Five days of unprotected sex with a man who finishes inside me every single time and has never once asked the question.
Rule number one of investigative journalism: pay attention to the details.
Apparently that rule doesn't apply when the details involve my own reproductive system.
I take a slow sip of coffee and force my breathing to stay even.
Okay. Okay, this isn't a crisis. Five days isn't ideal but it's not a guaranteed disaster.
I just need to get my hands on a new prescription.
Which means I need to ask the man who bought me at auction to pick up my birth control pills, which is a conversation I definitely want to have over breakfast while he's wielding a spatula and looking at me with those dark eyes that make me forget my own name.
I make a mental note to bring it up after food. Preferably when he's not standing close enough to smell. Proximity to Kon Vetrov significantly reduces my capacity for responsible decision-making.
Speaking of being responsible. I turn my thoughts back on work since it’s the safe zone of my life right now. Six months I've spent building files on the Red Letter Syndicate. I know their crimes, their connections, their body counts. I know they're dangerous men who do dangerous things.
What I don't know, what nothing in my research prepared me for, is this: Persia Milano makes really good scones.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Kon slides a plate of eggs across the counter, the ceramic scraping softly against the granite.
The same routine as every morning: him cooking, me perched on my barstool, coffee bitter enough to strip paint, conversation that dances between intel exchanges and the kind of banter that makes my chest do inconvenient things.
Except today, the routine breaks.
"You've been invited to lunch." He says it casually, his dark eyes fixed on the pan like the words don't carry weight.
I set down my mug. "Invited by whom?"
"The wives." He reaches for his own coffee, the muscles in his forearm flexing beneath the barbed wire ink. "They want to meet you."
"The wives." I repeat it slowly, turning the word over, trying to figure out how I feel about it.
A week ago I would have called them hostages in designer clothes.
Now I'm not sure what to call them, and the uncertainty sits heavy in my chest. "And what exactly does one wear to a lunch date with the women of the Red Letter Syndicate?
Is there a dress code? Should I bring a side dish?
Maybe a casserole and a list of my intentions with their brother? "
His jaw softens at the corners, the faintest trace of amusement flickering through those dark eyes. "Persia said to come as you are."
"That's what people say when they've already decided what they think of you." I push a piece of egg around my plate, the fork scraping against ceramic. "Do they know? About us?"
"They know enough."
"That's not comforting, Kon."
The truth is, I'm terrified. Not of the wives themselves but of what they represent. If these women are happy, genuinely happy with men I've spent six months categorizing as criminals, then every assumption I've built my investigation on starts to crack. And I'm not sure I'm ready for that.
Not even close.
Kon drives me to the Redthorne Building in a black SUV that smells like leather and his cologne. The city scrolls past the tinted windows, glass and steel and the organized chaos of a Thursday afternoon in Chicago. He doesn't try to fill the silence. He never does.
His hair is tied back in that leather cord but the wind from the cracked window has pulled strands loose across his jaw, softening the hard angles of his face in a way that makes my chest do stupid things.
His hand rests on the wheel, scarred knuckles wrapped loosely around the leather, and I catch myself staring at those fingers and remembering what they felt like inside me last night.
I look away. Focus on the skyline.
The Redthorne Building rises thirty-two stories into a slate-gray sky. Kon guides me through a lobby, past security that nods at him without a word, and into an elevator with biometric access that whisks us to the top floor.
His phone rings and he holds the elevator for a minute while he picks up.
"Speak."
There's a pause while the person on the other end says their piece. Kon's jaw tightens, that micro-shift I've learned to read as threat assessment in real time. His eyes cut to me briefly, then away.
"How many at the location?" Another pause.
His free hand curls into a fist at his side, the knuckles going white beneath the ink.
"Tell Luca to pull the surveillance footage from the south entrance.
I want eyes on every vehicle that's come through in the last forty-eight hours.
" His voice drops, the accent sharpening the consonants into blades.
"And get me Brennan's current location. Da. I don't care how. Find him."
He ends the call without a goodbye. That's Kon. No pleasantries when there's a problem to solve.
Kon looks at me and mouths, “I’ll be up shortly.” He reaches in, pushes the button for the pent house and turns a key in a hidden compartment.
A few moments later, the doors to the elevator slides open and I step into a space that rewrites every mental image I've ever constructed about the Red Letter Syndicate world.
This is not a headquarters. Not an office. Not the polished command center I built in my head to replicate the coldness of my father’s mansion after six months of research and worst-case assumptions.
This is a home.
Warm colors wash the walls in shades of cream and soft gold.
Oversized furniture clusters around a fireplace with real flames licking behind glass.
Toys scatter across a plush rug, a stuffed elephant here, a tower of wooden blocks there, a tiny pair of pink shoes abandoned near the couch.
And the smell. Butter and vanilla and scones baking in an oven, warm and domestic and so painfully normal that my throat tightens without warning.
A woman rounds the corner from the kitchen and every preconception I've built shatters on impact.
She's tiny. Five-two at most, with deep violet hair swept up in a loose twist and wispy bangs framing a heart-shaped face dusted with freckles.
Her eyes are aqua blue, bright and warm, and she's wearing a flowing sundress in pale yellow that radiates warmth into every corner of the room.
A toddler rides her hip, a dark-eyed cherub with her mother's easy smile and her father's intense gaze.
"You must be Onyx." She crosses the room in three quick strides and pulls me into a hug before I can react.
She smells like vanilla extract and baby shampoo, and her arms are surprisingly strong for someone so small.
"Kon's told us absolutely nothing about you, which means he's completely obsessed.
Come in. The scones just came out of the oven. "
I stand there, arms rigid at my sides, unsure what to do with warmth I didn't ask for. She pulls back and reads my face with a perceptiveness that reminds me, uncomfortably, of her husband's reputation.
"Too much?" Her smile doesn't falter, but it softens. "I'm a hugger. Fair warning."
"I..." My voice sounds foreign to my own ears. "Thank you for having me."
"Oh, please. I've been dying to meet the woman who's got Kon tied in knots." She shifts the toddler on her hip. "This is Sofia. Say hi, baby girl."
Sofia stares at me with dark eyes that are pure Rafael Milano, assessing and ancient in a face still round with baby fat. She shoves two fingers in her mouth and continues staring. Smart kid.
Persia leads me deeper into the penthouse and the domesticity intensifies with every step.
In the kitchen, a woman sits at the marble island, brown hair pulled back in a practical ponytail, glasses perched on her nose, laughing at her phone screen.
A baby girl sleeps in a carrier beside her, dark curls peeking out from beneath a knitted blanket.
"Kat, she's here." Persia sets Sofia in a high chair and starts pulling scones from a baking tray. "Onyx, this is Katriana. Drake's wife."
Katriana looks up from her phone and pushes the glasses higher on her nose, brown eyes warm and immediately assessing.
There's a book wedged under her elbow, spine cracked, pages dog-eared.
Even at a lunch date, she came prepared with an escape route into fiction.
We are going to be best friends for sure.
"Hey." She stands and offers her hand, her grip firm, her smile genuine. "Ignore everything the guys have told you about us. We're much worse."
I almost laugh. Almost.
"And this sleeping beauty is Charlotte." Katriana brushes a curl from the baby's forehead with a tenderness that makes my sternum ache. "She sleeps through everything. Gets that from Drake, who can fall asleep literally anywhere."