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“I bought your debt,” he said coolly, stepping forward. “If I bought you, I wouldn’t be offering a deal, and if I hadn’t bought the debt, you’d be dead.”

“Bullshit,” she hissed again.

“Truth,” he countered. “You screwed up, but one of the two men who placed a price on your head wanted something from Con. He agreed to give it to them in exchange for your life. I bought the debt you owed Con from him.”

“You can’t go around buying and selling people like property or merchandise.”

“You keep saying that, Keira. But here you are.”

“No one gave me a choice.”

He stopped in front of her. Too close. Always too close. She refused to back down.

“I should’ve let you hang back then,” he said softly. “I should’ve let Con put a bullet in your kneecaps, drop you to your knees, and use that talented mouth of yours until you broke. But I stepped in. Gave you a choice.”

“You call that a choice? Or this?” she shot back, but her voice wavered. Some part of her—deep, stubborn, and stupid—still wanted to believe he meant it. That there was a version of this where she wasn’t just being maneuvered again. That if he’d ever truly fought for her, maybe this wasn’t punishment. Maybe it was something else.

“You’re still breathing, aren’t you?”

Keira growled under her breath. “You know, I used to find you charming.”

“You were mine... you still are.”

Silence.

He didn’t look away. He didn’t blink. And suddenly, all the years melted away, and it was just them again—staring across a chasm of hurt and history, the air between them thick with words never spoken, her name hovering on his lips like a loaded gun—part promise, part threat.

“No,” she whispered. “Don’t. Don’t do that. I left for a reason.”

“You ran,” he corrected. “You ran on our wedding day, Keira. Left me standing at the altar in front of everyone—no call, no note, just gone. I was ready to burn the whole damn world down for you, and you disappeared like I never meant a thing.”

She swallowed hard, fury and guilt twisting like barbed wire in her throat. “I wasn’t a sacrificial lamb—yours, Con's or my uncle's. Thank god, I figured that out in time.”

“I never offered you up.”

“No, everyone else did. You were the one to whom they were sacrificing me!”

Finn stepped forward slowly, closing the space between them like it was his to take. Keira didn’t stop him. She raised one trembling hand and pressed it flat against his chest, not to hold him back—but to feel him, real and solid and too close. His heart thundered beneath her palm. Then his hands came up, threading through her hair with reverence and restraint, tilting her face up to his like a vow. That dark, hungry heat she thought she’d buried roared to life, curling around her like smoke and memory.

“I’m not your enemy,” he said, voice softer now. “And I sure as fuck never stopped wanting you.”

Her laugh cracked, brittle and raw. “That’s not reassuring. It’s a damn warning label—and you know it.”

Reassurance would have meant safety, comfort, softness, something she hadn’t known since she was a girl. And Finn—he was the opposite of safe. He was sharp edges and dangerous heat, the kind of man who could ruin her with a word, a look, a kiss. Even so, some traitorous part of her ached for the wreckage.

He stepped even closer, so close she had to tilt her chin up to keep staring him down. His breath was warm against her cheek. “You think I don’t know what it’s like, Keira? To realize the people you trust would sell you for the right price?”

His fingers brushed her wrist. The barest touch. Electricity. Fire. Her breath caught, chest tightening as memories surged—his hand gripping hers as they danced in the dark, his touch after long nights tangled together. She told herself she hated him, but her skin didn't lie. It sparked. Reacted. Reached for more.

She snatched it back as if she’d been burned.

But he wasn’t done. “You think I didn’t fight for you? Con may have told me to take you as a bride, but I wanted you. I could have refused. I chose you, and I waited.”

“For what?” she asked, voice breaking before she could catch it.

“For you to come back.”

Her throat worked. “You didn't wait. You ordered me here.”