Page 22 of Desperate Crimes (Mergers & Acquisitions #6)

T he last forty-eight hours feel like a fever dream.

Dark. Dirty. Salacious.

My body is still sore in that decadent way, muscles heavy and used, skin tingling with phantom touches.

I wake up alone, sunlight cutting through the curtains in slanted gold streaks.

For a split second, I wonder if I imagined it all.

The house. Him.

How he took me— in every way possible.

But this is still his bedroom. His house.

It really happened.

And I don’t know whether to be thrilled or terrified.

I turn my head to see my phone and purse sitting neatly on the bedside table— exactly where I didn’t leave them.

Curious, I grab my phone and swipe it open.

The last message from my mother is time-stamped yesterday morning.

Mom

Where’d you disappear to? I thought we were going to go over the plan for Dad’s surprise birthday party next weekend?

I blink. Then I see the response underneath. From me.

Only I didn’t send it.

Me

Sorry, I guess I just needed sleep. Call you tomorrow.

My brows shoot up.

“Oh my God,” I mutter, stunned. “He texted my mother ?”

I should be angry.

I should be climbing the walls, demanding boundaries and calling every lawyer or detective in a ten-mile radius.

But instead, I just sigh.

Because of course he did.

I shake my head, torn between disbelief and reluctant admiration.

The man doesn’t just blur boundaries— he bulldozes through them like they’re suggestions on a napkin.

And what’s worse?

It doesn’t bother me.

Not the way it should.

That’s the most insane part of all of this.

I swing my legs out of bed, only to find a folded piece of thick black stationery propped against a cut-glass vase filled with those beautiful dark roses— my favorite .

A note. In his handwriting. I recognize it immediately, and it’s just like him, strong and unmistakable.

You looked tired, Princess, so I let you sleep. I have to be at the Den until late tonight. Be a good girl.

-N

Be a good girl.

I roll my eyes, biting back a surprised smile.

“I’m not a pet , Nico,” I whisper, brushing my thumb over the note.

But something about it twists warm and slow in my belly.

Still. That doesn’t mean I’m going to spend the day playing sleeping beauty in his castle.

I take a long soak in the ridiculous spa-like tub, then get dressed in another outfit that fits like it was tailored for me—because it probably was .

The closet is obscene, and every piece is exactly my style.

Summer knits, gauzy linen, delicate lace.

He hasn’t said it’s for me, but I think it is, and I have to wonder.

How far does his obsession go?

Far enough that I can’t ignore it anymore.

But I’m not a kept woman.

Not a collectible to perch on some gilded shelf and polish when he’s in the mood to play pretend.

I’m flesh and bone and wildfire wrapped in silk, and I won’t be caged—no matter how beautiful the prison.

So I order a car.

And I leave.

I don’t sneak. I don’t slink. I walk out with my chin high and my spine straight.

I expect guilt to eat at me. Fear to coil in my belly.

But it doesn’t.

What I feel is power .

Control.

A whisper of who I was before him.

Before the shadow he casts stretched over every inch of me.

That lasts for the entire ride into the city.

Until ten minutes after I’m back in my Manhattan apartment, surrounded by my things, the scent of my candles, the silence I used to crave.

Then my phone lights up.

And I see it.

Hades.

That’s what flashes across the screen.

Not Nico. Not even his full name.

Just Hades.

My breath catches.

He changed the contact in my phone.

Somewhere, somehow.

The sheer violation of it makes my stomach twist.

But the worst part?

I don’t delete it.

Because he’s not wrong. That’s what he’s become.

The god of the underworld.

My shadow.

My captor.

My something.

I stare at the screen like it might shatter from the weight of his presence alone.

Like the phone will burst into smoke and ash and he’ll step through it, dressed in darkness and fury, dragging me back to his domain with fire in his eyes.

But it doesn’t.

Because this is real life.

Even if it feels like something darker. Older. Fated.

My heart pounds as I swipe to answer. I don’t say a word.

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going, Princess?”

His voice slices through me—razor-sharp and ice-cold, burning with a fury I can feel through the line.

It is his name, after all, and he owns it so well.

I walk to the window, looking down at the street like I expect him to be there.

A storm in a suit.

Thunder in his chest.

Lightning in his eyes.

But he’s not.

Of course, he isn’t.

“Where am I going? Home, Nico,” I say, my voice level but laced with steel. “My home.”

“You were home.”

“That was your house. Not mine.”

A pause. Then, low and lethal, “You got that wrong, Leanna.”

I swallow hard, fury crawling up my throat like fire laced in thorns.

“I woke up alone. You were gone. What was I supposed to think? That you were done with me?”

“Done?” He laughs—a brutal sound, ugly and hot. “We are far from done.”

“No,” I bite out. “You’re just not finished playing house. But I’m not a doll, Nico. I’m not a fucking trinket you get to obsess over and hoard like treasure.”

The silence is explosive.

Heavy. Charged.

“I underestimated you,” he says finally. “Thought your sweetness meant submission. Thought you’d stay where I put you. I was wrong.”

Then, with venom-laced clarity, he growls, “So let me be crystal clear now. No more misunderstandings. You. Are. Mine.”

The words hit me like a brand to the skin.

I’m trembling, but not with fear.

With anger, yes.

But also, something darker.

Something that wants to be his.

“No,” I whisper, but even I hear the waver in it. “I have a life, Nico. A real one. People who love me. Who know me.”

“They love you. But do they know you, Princess?” he hisses. “Do they know how you sound when you moan my name? How your body melts when I touch you? Do they make you come so hard you forget your own goddamn name?”

“That’s just sex. You’ll get tired of me.”

“Don’t lie. Not to me. Not to yourself, Leanna,” he says, and I swear I can almost see his expression in my head.

“You think I didn’t see it? The way you look at me like I built the stars just for you? You think I didn’t feel the way your soul screamed mine every time I touched you? You were always meant to be mine, Princess.”

“So what? You just took me?”

“That’s right. I made your darkest dreams come true. I’m your Hades, Sweet Persephone,” he whispers, and a shudder runs through me.

Tears burn my eyes.

Because he’s right.

Because I hate that he’s right.

“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.