Page 41 of Wings of Shadow
One step deeper into him.
Whatever lies ahead, I know this much: I won’t walk away.
Not now. Not from this.
21
KAISNER
The City of Lights sprawls beneath me like a field of scattered diamonds, but not even Paris at her most decadent can rival the brilliance I’ve found within these walls. The opera hums behind me, gilded and grand—a palace of illusion and spectacle. Fitting. I’ve orchestrated a performance of my own tonight.
The cufflinks glint at my wrists as I adjust them, not out of vanity but ritual. Every detail, every gesture, is deliberate. Chance encounters, after all, require meticulous planning. Especially when the stakes are this high.
She doesn’t know the lengths I’ve gone to. The meetings arranged to seem accidental. The brief glances across crowded halls. The slow, careful draw of her curiosity. Like a wolf circling its prey—not to kill, but to claim.
I’ve kept my distance. I’ve watched. Protected. Silently, relentlessly. She’s under my guard more often than she realizes, her movements traced by shadows loyal only to me. But even my control has its limits.
Tonight, I breach them.
I pause at the threshold, my hand resting on the door handle. Clarissa’s words echo in my mind, a prophecy waiting to unfold: “A chance encounter can change the course of a lifetime.”
Oh, my darling. If you only knew how much truth lay in that.
The night air brushes over my skin as I step onto the balcony I’ve claimed for this private interlude. Above, the moon drapes everything in pale silver, and below, the city pulses with secrets. The opera fades to a murmur behind thick doors. I breathe in deeply. Her scent lingers in the air already—jasmine and something warmer, more elusive. Like the echo of a dream I can’t shake.
Then the phone vibrates in my pocket—an unwelcome intrusion.
I grit my teeth. Some obligations cannot be ignored, no matter how distasteful.
I answer with clipped precision, each syllable laced with quiet fury. The matter is handled swiftly. There’s no room for loose ends in my world.
And then, I hear it. The soft rustle of silk, the click of heels on marble.
She’s here.
She stands in the doorway like a vision conjured from starlight and willpower. That dress—gods, that dress—clings to her like molten gold, each curve illuminated as though the fabric itself worships her.
“I was beginning to think you wouldn’t come,” I say, my voice a low murmur shaped by equal parts relief and restraint.
She lingers near the doorway. Her presence is a question, not yet a promise.
“Run if you want,” I add, tone velvet and steel. “But we both know you won’t.”
She steps forward, just one step—but it’s enough. The scent of her surrounds me now, and I’m lost. Her voice trembles as she answers, “I could never stay away... Kaisner, I?—”
I close the distance between us, my fingers lifting to brush her cheek. So soft. So real. Her breath catches as I trace the corner of her mouth.
“I know,” I whisper. “I feel it too.”
The tension between us thrums like a live wire. It’s not just desire—it’s something older, deeper. Something dangerous.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” she says, but she leans into me anyway. Her body, her breath, her heartbeat—they all betray her words. “It’s too dangerous. If anyone were to find out...”
My expression hardens, a tempest of possessiveness and desire battling within me. “Do you want me to stop?” I challenge, my voice dark, husky. The words burn, but I must give her the power to choose. “Say the word, Clarissa, and I’ll walk away right now.”
Every fiber of my being screams to claim her, but I hold back, waiting.
Her eyes flutter closed. When they open again, they burn with a quiet, reckless certainty. “No. Don’t stop. Don’t ever stop.”
