Page 20 of Intrigue

Then I push him away, breathless, shaking.

“I still hate you,” I rasp.

Sandro’s expression darkens, something glinting in his eyes. “Liar.”

I start to run before he can prove me right.

“Next time, I don’t think I’m going to be able to stop. So don’t fucking show up or I’m going to be pounding your tight little ass until you forget your fiance’s name,” he rasps, his voice raw, eyes wild with a promise of depravity. “I’ll fuck you so hard you’ll feel me for days, princess, my cum dripping down your thighs while you crawl back to him, ruined.”

“Next time,” I say, swinging the door open, my voice steady despite the tremble in my limbs, “I’m going to be coming with a gun, and I’ll blow your fucking head off before you touch me again.”

“Ooh, I'd love to see that.” His tone hides humor, but his face is expressionless, a mask of stone over the chaos beneath. “If youdo intend to bring a gun to a fist fight, make sure the safety’s off. You’re not going to get a second chance, not with me.”

I make my way out of the warehouse without looking back, my heels clicking on the grimy floor, a war drum in my ears. I’m seething, sure, but I’ve also just confirmed something: I want him as much as he wants me, a sick, gnawing hunger that pulses in my veins, and it’s not going to stop until we both have at it, tearing each other apart.

Now the question is whether I want to take it that far in my quest for vengeance or not, whether I’ll let this fire consume us both or snuff it out with his blood.

***

Cassian’s arms are warm, his body solid against mine as I press my face into his shoulder. I know I’m supposed to feel safe or whole. But I don’t.

“You’re distant,” he whispers, fingers threading through my hair. “Talk to me.”

I swallow hard, the lie thick in my throat. “It’s nothing. Just tired.”

His hold tightens, but he doesn’t push. He trusts me. And that trust feels heavier than the ring on my finger, heavier than the guilt twisting inside me.

I close my eyes, willing away the taste of Sandro on my lips, the phantom press of his hands on my skin. Cassian doesn’t deserve the truth. He doesn’t deserve the wreckage I am becoming.

Sandro is breaking me. Again. And I don’t know how much longer I can hold myself together.

“So how did it go?” he asks quietly, fingers tracing absent patterns on my back. “Did he say he’d give it back?”

I stiffen. The memory of the two times I’ve let Sandro touch me in the span of twenty hours is still fresh. “It didn’t go well,” I say. “He refused.”

Cassian pulls back slightly, searching my face. “That’s it?”

I nod, keeping my expression neutral. But he isn’t satisfied. His jaw tightens, his grip on my waist firming as his frustration seeps through.

“Selene.” His voice is stronger now. “You walked into a warehouse full of armed men, confronted Sandro, and all you have to say is ‘he refused’?”

“What else do you want me to say? That I begged? That I threw myself at his feet?”

“I want you to tell me the truth,” Cassian bites out. “Because you’re acting like this was inevitable, like you knew before you even went that he wouldn’t back down.”

My mouth opens, but no words come.

Because he’s right.

Ididknow. I knew the second I saw Sandro’s face again, the second I met his eyes across the room and felt the pull like a tether. I knew, and I went anyway.

Cassian cups my face the way he always does when he’s trying to soothe me, and I feel my pulse spike—not in fear, but in shame. Because he’s not supposed to be the one I feel guilty around. Nothim.

But heis.

And that alone is enough to make my stomach turn.

“Because I did.”