I whip my gaze toward Ronan, my chest tightening until it feels like my ribs might crack under the pressure. “What did you just say?” The words tear out of me, sharper than steel, sharper than any cut I’ve made tonight. My voice shakes—not with fear, but with a fury coiled tight, trembling on the edge of release, the kind that devastates whatever stands in its way once it breaks free. Ronan’sgrin only widens, sharp and merciless. “You heard me. And congratulations, Trent—you just tipped my Pixie into the next level of crazy.” His chuckle is low, dangerous, a sound that makes the air itself vibrate with threat.
I force myself to move, slow and deliberate, until I’m standing over Trent again. My blade slips beneath his chin, cold steel pressing into his skin, forcing his head up until his terrified eyes meet mine. He doesn’t get to look at the floor, doesn’t get to pretend he’s anywhere but here. Not anymore.
“That was the big job, wasn’t it?” I murmur, voice low but shaking with fury. “The one Bryce dangled in front of you. Kill Ronan, and you’d get Kimber.”
The realization crashes down on me like thunder. That was the deal. That’s why Bryce promised him guardianship, why the papers suddenly shifted and the leash snapped. Trent was supposed to kill Ronan in exchange for Kimber. And he failed. He fucking failed. Which is part of the reason Bryce pulled back.
Behind me, Ronan stiffens at the sound of her name, his entire presence shifting like a storm breaking wide open. His attention locks on Trent again, eyes burning brighter than the fire they left behind at their house. “Kimber?” His voice is a growl, lethal in its simplicity. “What the fuck does she have to do with this piece of shit?”
My hand doesn’t waver as I keep the blade under Trent’s chin. I don’t look away when I answer, letting each word sink into the air like another cut. “She was the prize, Ro. The reward for killing you. Bryce promised her to him.”
The moment the truth leaves my mouth, I feel Ronan shift beside me. The thin leash he’s been holding onto snaps, and what replaces it is something darker, deadlier. My twin flame of chaos pushed right to the edge. And for Trent Malloy, things just went from bad to terminal.
“Baby,” Ronan says, calm as a saint but sharp as a loaded gun. The way his voice smooths over the air, unhurried, collected, is terrifying in itself. The calm that comes before a storm, the kind that makes every hair on the back of your neck stand on end because you know something catastrophic is about to follow. His dark eyes glitter as he tips his head toward me. “Didn’t you say something about an octopus hotdog when I first got here? Let’s see how that goes.”
A smile stretches across my lips, slow and deliberate, curling with madness that feels like home. My blade gleams in the dim light as I shift closer to Trent, my gaze locked on the one part of him he can’t hide behind bravado, the part that’ll strip every ounce of manhood from him once I’m done. I lower my hand, my knife trailing the air like a whisper, until I’m hovering dangerously close to his lap.
But before I can touch him, Ronan’s hand shoots out, his grip iron around my wrist. The sound that rumbles from his chest isn’t just a growl—it’s a warning, low and primal, vibrating through the room with enough force to make my bones hum. His lip curls, teeth flashing like a wolf about to bite. “You’re not touching his junk.”
I freeze, not from fear but from the sheer power of his claim. His possessiveness burns through me hotter than fire, setting myblood racing even as his grip tightens. With one smooth motion, Ronan moves past me, adjusting Trent’s posture with brutal efficiency. He yanks the bastard forward in the chair, jerking his legs apart, then fists his waistband and jerks the fabric down just enough to expose him—vulnerable, pathetic, laid bare under our gaze.
The sight alone sends a shiver of satisfaction through me, because now Trent’s mask is cracking. His eyes widen, his breath hitching, and at last—finally—he shows the fear he should have shown me from the beginning. Fear that tastes sweet on my tongue, the kind that makes my blade itch to sing.
“That’s better,” I murmur, satisfaction curling through my voice as the fear finally bleeds into Trent’s eyes. It’s there now, sharp and trembling, the kind that makes his chest rise too fast and his jaw tremble against his will. That’s the look I wanted—the look of a predator turned prey; a man who’s finally realized he’s nothing more than meat on the hook.
The next hour blurs into a symphony of pain and confession. Ronan and I work in sync, circling him like wolves, tearing down every wall he tries to hide behind. Every cut, every stab, every twist of the knife is measured—not just for the agony it brings, but for the truths it forces loose. Our fathers’ names spill from his mouth in broken gasps, details about shipments, accounts, dirty business deals that tie them deeper into their empire of rot. He sputters, pleads, breaks down—but we don’t relent. Not until his resistance collapses, not until his voice is stripped raw and there’s nothing left for him to give.
And when his body shakes too hard to hold itself upright, when his skin is painted in blood and sweat and the octopus of ruin I carved between his legs leaves him whimpering like a child—that’s when the last mask falls. He sings like a canary—desperate, pathetic—spilling every last secret he thinks might save him. But nothing can.
By the time Trent’s chest rises for the last time and his breath leaves in a hollow rattle, I step back, my chest heaving, the blade in my hand slick and trembling from the aftermath. The silence that follows is deafening, punctuated only by the faint drip of blood pooling on the floor.
Ronan turns to me. Slowly, deliberately, his gaze finds mine, and the world narrows to just the two of us. His eyes burn with an intensity that scorches straight through me, raw and unflinching, so powerful it roots me to the spot. There’s no mockery in him now, no feral grin, no teasing edge—just truth. Stripped down and bare.
“You’re beautiful,” he says, his voice thick, rough with more emotion than I’ve ever heard from him. The words hit me harder than any blade ever could, lodging deep in my chest, breaking something open that I thought had turned to stone long ago. He takes a step closer, his gaze still locked to mine, and the next words come out lower, steadier, carrying the weight of a vow. “I love you.”
It’s not a question. Not a plea. It’s a declaration, solid and irrevocable, spoken like a brand that sears itself into my soul.
“I love you too,” I whisper, the words ripping free from somewhere deeper than my lungs, a place I’d buried so long I almost forgot it was there.
Before the echo of screams dies in the room, Ronan’s hand fists in my hair, tugging my head back just enough to crash his mouth against mine. The kiss isn’t gentle. It isn’t sweet. It’s desperate, consuming, like he’s been starving for me for years and finally has permission to feast. His lips bruise mine, teeth grazing, tongue demanding—and I give back what little I have left to offer.
We’re clawing at each other, both frantic, both undone by everything that’s led to this moment. His grip is everywhere—my back, my hips, my face—like he’s terrified I’ll vanish again if he doesn’t hold me tightly enough. I can’t stop touching him either, running my hands over his chest, his shoulders, the ridges of muscle straining beneath his shirt, needing to prove to myself he’s real. That we’re real.
The desk bites into the backs of my thighs as he lifts me, setting me down like I weigh nothing, his body crowding mine, caging me in. The world narrows to the heat of his skin and the press of his mouth, the dark fire in his eyes when he pulls back just enough to look at me. Behind him, Trent’s body slumps lifeless in the chair, the sharp tang of blood in the air only stripping the moment bare, heightening the charge running through me. Death is in the room, but so is life—ours, tangled and burning, reckless and undeniable.
“Mine,” Ronan growls against my lips, and the word feels less like a claim and more like a vow. A vow I echo with every kiss, every gasp, every desperate pull to keep him close. “Need to be inside you, Berk.” His voice is guttural, frayed at the edges, and before I can take in the words, he’s already moving. My pants aretangled around one ankle, forgotten, and then he’s there—thick, relentless—slamming into me with a force that knocks the breath from my lungs.
Pleasure detonates inside me so fast it’s blinding. My back arches against the desk, stars exploding behind my closed eyes as the orgasm rips through me instantly, wild and unrestrained. His name tears from my throat, half sob, half prayer, clinging to him like he’s the only anchor I’ll ever need.
“Fuck, baby,” Ronan groans, his voice cracked with need. He stays buried deep, unmoving, like he’s savoring the first drag of oxygen after drowning. His forehead presses to mine, his lips brushing across my nose in that soft, reverent way that undoes me more than his thrusts ever could. “So sensitive,” he whispers, his breath hot against my skin. “You ready for me?”
There’s no time for an answer, no space for thought. He leans back, gathering my legs in his powerful grip, pinning them tight as he draws out slow—agonizing—before slamming back into me with brutal precision. The sound that leaves me is a strangled cry, my body clenching tight around him, already quivering on the razor’s edge of release again.
“Yes… yes,” I chant, the word breaking with every thrust, a desperate mantra that drowns out everything else—the world outside, the danger, even the corpse sprawled feet away. None of it exists. There’s only us, colliding like fire meeting gasoline, years of loss and rage and need igniting into something uncontrollable.
We aren’t careful. We aren’t tender. This is raw, violent passion, a storm of fury and love crashing together, burningeverything in its path until nothing is left but ash and the wreckage of all the years we lost. And in that chaos, in his unrelenting claim, I finally feel whole again.
His thrusts grow harder, more frantic, each one slamming into me with a rhythm that feels less like sex and more like survival. My nails dig into his back, dragging down hard enough to leave marks, desperate to tether myself to him as wave after wave crashes over me. My body clenches around him, pulsing tight, dragging him deeper into me, and the pressure builds so fast I can’t breathe.