Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 101427 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 507(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101427 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 507(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
I took a breath.
My hand reached out to him.
It hovered just above his cheek, not quite touching, but close enough to feel the heat of him.
His steady, molten stare stayed locked on me.
“Kenji. . .if I come to your place tonight, will you. . .let me leave the next night?”
His eyes flickered. Something shifted in the air between us, and then he spoke, “No.”
One word.
It was sharp as a cracked bone and just as final.
He leaned forward with his hands still resting on his thighs like a warrior kneeling at an altar. “But that’s not the question you should have asked me.”
“What should I have asked you?”
“Whether you say yes or not, will I let you go at all?”
“And. . .will you?”
“No.” He licked his lips. “It doesn’t matter if you say yes or no. I just want you to say yes.”
My bottom lip quivered. “You. . .lowered to your knees and asked me nicely to come with you, knowing that you would trap me to you regardless?”
“My Roar thinks I should be polite about caging you.”
“And what do you think?”
“I think that you will say yes tonight, not because I asked, not because you are scared, but because your body already craves it.”
My nipples stiffened.
“I also think you’ll say yes because the hunger between us isn’t casual. It’s chemical. And, you’re just as ruined by wanting me as I am by needing you.”
Lust blazed through my body.
“And. . .”
I widened my eyes.
“I think that once I have you in my space, I’ll craft a kingdom around your pleasure—so decadent, so tender, so addictive—that freedom won’t even tempt you. In fact, for you, leaving would feel like self-destruction.”
I gulped. “So. . .you would build me a paradise disguised as a prison?”
“An opulent one with gold bars, diamond locks, and a bed shaped from your moans. You’ll thank me for never finding the key.”
Those sentences wrapped around my ribs and tightened like a corset. I was both flattered and afraid. Both turned on and tempted to run.
“Tora. . .you must say yes. . .I’ve kneeled before no man. No God. No boss. And definitely no other woman. But for you, I dropped like I was made to live at your feet.”
My heart boomed in my ears.
I didn’t know how long I sat there, staring at him.
Time fractured.
A breath became a mile.
God.
He made obsession sound like shelter.
Possession sound like praise.
The pink bow on the box in my lap trembled, and I realized my hands were shaking.
And for one moment. . .I wondered what it would be like if I didn’t say yes and he actually let me walk away from him. What would life look like without Kenji Sato?
I imagined it all. The empty mornings. The silence that would ache. I saw the other men. Safe ones. Smiling ones. Ones who'd never kneel for me. Who'd never set the world on fire just to keep me warm. Who'd never bleed for my yes.
I saw a version of myself that looked fine from the outside, but she was dim inside. Hollow in the ways that mattered.
And I hated her. That future, that world, that lifeless shell of me.
Fuck. . .
I wasn’t made for mild. I was made for madness. And Kenji was the only man who’d ever looked at me like I was both the fire and the altar it burned on.
“Tora, will you say yes?”
I put my attention back on him and knew that I wasn’t just answering a question. I was surrendering a version of myself that existed before him—one who believed love couldn’t coexist with danger.
Still. . .for him. . .I was willing to let that part of me go too.
I trembled. “Yes.”
His breath left him in a rush as if my yes had rewritten the story of his life in real time.
“I’m just. . .nervous, Kenji.”
“You should be.”
I blinked.
A knock sounded.
Then, Eye One stepped inside. "Hiro called."
Kenji's jaw visibly tensed. “Did he?”
“Yes.” Eye One continued, "Reo told him you were in the helicopter heading away from the chaos, so—"
"Reo wants us in the helicopter now, just in case Hiro tests that story and has his people check the sky."
The Eye gave a slow nod.
Kenji rose and stood, fluid and tall, every line of his body hardening with purpose. He put his hand out to me.
I didn’t hesitate. I rose with him, careful to draw the cape around my body. My heart was racing now.
But Eye One wasn’t done. "Also, Reo wanted you to know that the traitor was the saxophone player. Apparently, he owed money to a loan shark and gave tonight’s location in exchange for fifty million yen."
Kenji sneered. "And did Reo find out who those assassins belong to?"
The Eye didn’t blink. "Your brother, Akiro."
The temperature in the room dropped. A new kind of fury pulsed from Kenji now.