Page 26 of Konstantin

“Everything.” My hand drifts along the top of her leg, and I watch her skin twitch, goose bumps chasing my touch.

She straightens, trying to mask the shift in her breathing. “Alright. What do you want to know?”

I drag in a breath, steadying the violent hum in my chest. I don’t want to scare her. But Ineedthe truth. No one has a right to hurt something so perfect. I want to tear this world apart for her, but I can’t show her that side of me. Not yet.

“Those marks,” I say, not giving away the madness in me. “Under your arms. How did you get them?”

Her eyes drop to her lap, shoulders tightening. She’s composed, but only on the surface. I can practically feel her lock up.

“I don’t know how that’s any of your business.” She lifts her gaze to meet mine. Her voice is sharper now, but I catch the edge beneath it. The flash of shame and anger.

And it destroys me.

“If someone hurt one of my employees…” I growl, leaning forward until our faces are just inches apart. “It becomesmybusiness, Tessa.” My hand curls around her thigh. “Youare my business.”

She freezes, her breath stuttering for a single heartbeat. But it’s enough. It’s the proof I needed. She’s not used to anyone protecting her. Not used to anyone giving a damn whether she bled or healed.

She’s used to pain. Used to being discarded. Used to silence.

That ends now.

She doesn’t know it yet, but I’ll find out what those scars are. I’ll drag the truth from her inch by inch, scream by scream if I have to.

And whoever left them? They won’t walk again. Breathe again. I’ll tear them apart, bone by bone, nerve by nerve, until they’re nothing but a memory.

Because she’s my property now. And I protect what’s mine. With blood, with fire, with fucking war.

She turns her head, jaw clenched, like she’s holding herself together with sheer force. Like if she breathes the wrong way, she’ll break.

“All you have to do is give me a name. That’s all it takes.”

She lets out a laugh—sharp, bitter, and broken. It sounds like it clawed its way up from someplace dark.

“You’d be running through the whole damn state. There’s a long list.”

My body locks so tight I feel the crack in my bones. A long list. A whole fucking state’s worth of people who think they could hurt her and walk away?

No.

I picture them. Each one. Cowards hiding behind silence, behind her pain. I wasn’t there to stop them then, but now I will be.

I don’t care if it takes years. If I have to peel her past apart piece by piece. The moment she gives me one name, just one, I’ll rip through that list like a goddamn plague.

One by one, I’ll wipe them from existence. Painfully. Slowly. With no one to hear their screams but me.

Because death is a gift. And I’m not in the business of giving mercy.

I take her hand in mine—small, warm, and fragile in my palm. The size difference alone makes something ugly churn in my chest. I want to shield her. Lock her away. Hide her from the world that’s already taken too many pieces of her. I want to make it so no one ever touches her again without bleeding for it.

“Who did that to you?” The words scrape my throat raw and I fight to keep my voice softer, even as it goes against everything I am.

But for her? I’ll bend. I’ll break. I’ll be whoever she needs me to be.

She doesn’t answer immediately. Her eyes flick down to our joined hands, then back up to mine. Her chin lifts—stubborn, proud—but I see it. That flicker beneath the surface. Pain. Humiliation.

“No one,” she says. “I did it to myself.”

Time stops. And I freeze, my thoughts fractured into static.