Page 102 of Crushed Vow

My heart stopped.

I looked around. Was this a setup? Another kidnapping? Was he here to chloroform me, drag me back to that hellish psych ward?

My body froze, locked in panic. I couldn’t breathe. My hands trembled. The air was thin. Were there masked men hiding in the shadows? Was this how it would end again?

I reached into my bag with shaking fingers and dialed Cassian.

No answer.

Panic hit me like a tidal wave. I felt something wet trail down my leg. Humiliation burned through me.

I was peeing on myself. In the middle of a hospital parking lot.

God, what have they done to me?

The trauma had rewired my body so brutally, I didn’t even have control over my own nervous system anymore.

A memory slammed into me—screams in a white hallway. Masked men holding me down. A needle piercing my skin. My own voice begging them to stop. The silence after the sedation hit.

I was spiraling.

Then—a hand curved around my waist from behind.

I screamed, my entire body convulsing in terror—until a voice, low and steady, whispered against my ear:

“It’s me, baby.”

My whole body froze.

Cassian.

My knees buckled.

I turned, met his eyes beneath the tinted glasses, and everything else—everything—went quiet. The storm inside me paused.

I clung to him like a lifeline.

“Long time no see, brother,” Luca muttered, pushing off the side of my car, hands in his pockets like he owned the asphalt beneath him.

Cassian ignored him, his focus entirely on me.

He turned me to face him, his body a protective barrier between me and Luca.

His fingers brushed my jaw, tilting my face up, and his lips hovered over mine, a silent question in the space between us.

My breath hitched, and I leaned in, giving him the answer he needed. His lips crashed into mine, fierce and possessive, a kiss that consumed me.

I melted into him, my hands fisting his jacket as I sucked on his lower lip, desperate and hungry, like his touch was the only thing keeping me alive.

His grip on my waist tightened, fingers digging into my skin with a need that matched my own.

The world dissolved—Luca, the hospital, the cold New York air—none of it mattered. There was only the heat of his mouth, the slick dance of our tongues, the raw, visceral pull between us. My body pressed against his, every curve molding to his frame, and I didn’t care who was watching.

The kiss was a claim, a defiance.

When we finally broke apart, it felt like an eternity had passed.

My eyes fluttered open, my lips tingling, wet with our shared breath.