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)
They laughed like I wasn’t there.
Like I was some poor, lost girl in a pair of borrowed heels pretending to belong.
I kept my spine straight.
My chin high.
But inside?
My heart was slamming so hard it felt like it might bruise my ribs.
And then the door opened.
Fuck.
Reo stepped out.
Everything in me tightened. My vision tunneled. My pulse surged like I was about to leap off a building and hope the wind caught me.
His expression was unreadable.
Behind me, the court went quiet.
Waiting.
Watching.
I stood perfectly still.
Reo, hook me up. Please. Don’t let me lose in this hallway. Not like this. I might fight somebody.
Reo stepped through the doorway as a myth come back from the dead—taller than I remembered, broader too. One muscular arm was tucked in a black sling, and a bandage sat high on his cheekbone—a war medal stitched into his skin.
Even banged up, bruised, and clearly running on fumes. . .Reo was mafia nerd fine. The kind of fine that knew complicated calculus algorithms and also where to hide a body.
Reo’s dark eyes locked on mine.
And then to my utter surprise, slowly—deliberately—he looked down. His gaze tracked my white sheer blouse, the delicate flash of black lace beneath it, the black pencil skirt that hugged my hips like a second skin, my legs, and then finally the red Louboutins.
Then—like he remembered where we were—Reo snapped his eyes back up to mine, cleared his throat, and straightened slightly. “Nyomi.”
Just my name, but there was something behind it. A beat of acknowledgment. Maybe even respect. Maybe more.
I smiled, soft and polite. “I don’t want to disturb you all. I just wanted to check on Kenji. For a quick minute.”
Come on, Reo. These bitches are hating on me. Let them know who I am?
He tilted his head. The bandage on his face shifted slightly when he smirked. “You want to come in? Or do you want the Dragon to come out?”
“Come in.”
The royal court snickered.
Reo paid them no mind. “That’s fine, but only if you promise me this.”
Behind me, someone gasped. The sound was almost cartoonish in its disbelief—like royalty had just been insulted in church.
Oh shit. . .am I going to be the first woman to enter Kenji’s war room?
I raised a brow. “O-kay. . .what do you want me to promise?”
Reo’s smirk deepened, just a little. “Please, convince the Dragon to go to bed. We’re all exhausted, and he won’t listen to us. At this point I believe that only you can help us.”
From behind, one of the Royal Court huffed—loud and sharp.
I fought the smirk threatening to crack across my face. “I’ll do my best.”
“Thank you.” Reo nodded once, and then stepped aside.
That tiny shift of his body—the space he made for me—was all I needed.
Permission granted.
And just like that, I crossed the threshold.
Chaos erupted behind me.
The maybe-baby mama snapped something in Japanese, her tone gone shrill and angry. Her court joined in—a cacophony of sharp syllables and disbelief.
Reo didn’t flinch. In fact, he appeared absolutely annoyed.
I didn’t look back. But God, it was hard not to turn around and stick out my tongue like I was back in high school.
Instead, I walked inside.
And behind me, their fury only got louder and made the moment even sweeter as I heard more movement and now Reo responding in annoyed bursts of Japanese.
Chapter twenty-three
The Softest Weapon
Nyomi
The moment I stepped into the Dragon’s war room, the air changed.
It hit me like heat from an open furnace—dense, male, volatile. Sweat, cigar smoke, and the faint skunky twist of weed clung to the air.
Testosterone teemed in every square inch of the space.
And the room.
God.
It was massive.
A ballroom of war.
The ceiling arched high above with black beams like a ribcage. The walls were stone, slick and dark, broken only by mounted guns and a long line of crimson banners—each marked with a silver dragon curling in a circle and eating its own tail.
My gaze went to the wall across from me where there was a gigantic display of eight huge flat screens—two rows of four—glowing with late-breaking news footage. All were on mute, but the silence made it worse.
Tokyo burning. Smoke still curling into the skyline. Subtitles crawling across each screen.
But it was the center that stole my breath.
A giant 3D layout of Tokyo stretched nearly the entire length of the floor. Not flat like a map.
This was sculpture.
Towers rose up to my hips. Roads curved with chilling precision. I spotted Shibuya. Roppongi. Odaiba. Ginza. Ueno. Daikanyama. Akihabara.
Even the glinting shape of Tokyo Tower, scaled down to perfection, stood at attention beneath the low light.
Holy fuck.
It must’ve taken twenty artists. Maybe more.
Men moved along its edge, heads bent, murmuring to one another as they placed glowing tokens on key intersections or on top of roofs. A few painted huge black X’s on the front of buildings.
I wondered if those were the ones that had been bombed or would fall next.