Page 82 of Desperate Crimes
“I won’t be your toy,” I whisper. “I need more than obsession.”
His breathing spikes, sharp and rough like a beast prowling the edge of his cage. “I am more. But you don’t get to leave me.”
“I already did.”
His voice drops into something cruel and beautiful and broken.
“Don’t hang up on me, Princess.”
I close my eyes.
And I do it anyway.
Click.
My breath is shaky as I lower the phone.
It hurts. More than I want to admit.
Because I don’t want to go.
I want him to come after me.
But I have to remind him what I am, what I’m worth.
And if he really wants me?
He’ll prove it.
With more than chains and shadows.
Chapter Twenty-One-Nico Jr
At the Vipers’ Den
The Den hums with tension.
It always does.
Whether it’s contracts or blood money, every breath in this building tastes like control and compromise.
I sit at the long waterfall conference table—nine feet of tension, carved from a tree older than sin. Amboyna Burl, rare and temperamental, twisted into something unnatural by time and pressure.
The kind of wood that doesn’t give up its beauty easily.
You have to fight it. Bleed for it.
And that’s what makes it perfect for this place.
The grain is wild—dark veins that look like lightning frozen mid-strike, running beneath a surface polished to a lethal shine.
Down the center runs a thick ribbon of deep epoxy, black and blue stardust suspended in resin like a galaxy cut open and left to bleed.
A river of midnight nightmares that flows straight through the heart of the table.
It demands your attention.
Commands silence.
