Page 85 of Deal with the Devil
“And?”
“And she’s not yours,” he snaps, nostrils flaring. “She’s his. Youknowshe’s his.”
“That’s debatable.”
“So it’s true, then. The reports about her death—they were fabricated. You’ve had her this whole time.”
“Watch your tone.”
“No,” he says, stepping closer. “Don’t deflect. Don’t pull rank. Don’t act like this is beneath me. It’snot. It’s within my fuckingpay gradeas Rafael’s righthand to care when somebody starts crossing lines that can’t be uncrossed.”
Any interest I had in entertaining his tantrum vanishes.
“Iam Rafael,” I snarl, mirroring him, stepping into his space. “Don’t forget that. I’m the one in charge. And you… you're nothing more than a soldier. You want to talk about crossing lines? Let’s talk about your own, Adagio. Because the only reason you’re so fucking concerned about Portia is because you’re too busy fucking her sister.”
His face goes rigid.
For a beat, he doesn’t breathe. He just stares at me like he’s thrown I’ve brought it up so suddenly.
“You didn’t think I knew?” I ask. “I knoweverything. I know what you’ve been doing the past two weeks, sneaking off like a teenage boy with a hard-on and no impulse control.”
His jaw tightens. I see the flicker of rage in his blue eyes—the moment he considers hitting me. His fists are already clenched, shoulders squared, weight shifted like a man about to throw one.
But he doesn’t. He backs down.
Instead, he strides past me, storming out of the penthouse.
I watch him go with a sense of twisted amusement.
Coward.
They all want to pretend they can challenge the devil. But in the end, they all kneel.
I leave the open-space living room area and move onto other parts of the penthouse without even bothering turning on a light. The silence here is heavier than usual, stretched taut over the shadows, as if even the walls are holding their breath.
I head straight toward the door that belongs to her now, where Mara has set her up to stay.
My footsteps are soundless against the floorboards, but Adagio’s voice echoes in my head—bitter, accusatory, furious in a way that surprised even me.
She’s his.
He said it like it meant something. Like there are still rules. Like there’s still a goddamn line that can’t be crossed.
But I don’t believe in lines.
And I don’t believe she belongs to him any more than anything else he’s staked claim over.
Everything he’s ever thought was his is mine now. She’s mine if I decide she is. Mine if I take her.
I crack open the door to her bedroom and peer inside.
She’s asleep, curled on her side under cotton sheets, her face half buried in the pillow, one bare shoulder exposed to the cool air and the moonlight. Her breathing is slow and steady, lips parted just enough to tempt a thought I shouldn’t be having right now but do anyway.
She looks... soft like this.Breakable.
She ignites the same hot, carnal lust in me even at a glance, even at a distance halfway across a room.
They believe I’m never supposed to have her. But none of them have any say in what happens.
