Page 94 of Shadow Waltz

After a long silence, I let myself believe, just a little, in the possibility of something different. Of a life not just survived, but lived.

“Where do we go from here?” I asked quietly.

“We figure it out together,” Luka replied, and the echo of our earlier conversation sent warmth racing through my chest. “We build something that's worth more than either of us could achieve alone.”

As the night deepened around us and the city hummed with the energy of eight million lives being lived in parallel, I feltsomething settle in my chest that I'd never experienced before. Not just safety or security, but belonging in the truest sense—the knowledge that I was exactly where I was supposed to be, with someone who saw me as I really was and chose to keep me anyway.

The collar around my throat felt lighter somehow, transformed from a symbol of ownership into a promise of partnership. And lying there in Luka's arms, marked by his teeth and claimed by his body, I realized that sometimes the greatest freedom came from choosing your own chains.

16

CONSOLIDATION

LUKA

Sunlight poured through bulletproof windows and found the marks I’d left on Ash’s throat, dark bruises blooming like exotic flowers against pale skin. He sat across from me at the marble breakfast table, collar gleaming between the evidence of my teeth, and I could still feel him wrapped around me, could still taste the salt of his skin on my tongue.

Four days. Four days since he'd made that call about Baltimore, since I'd lost control in my office, since everything between us had shifted into territory I'd never mapped before. But watching him now as he scrolled through intelligence reports with the same methodical attention he'd brought to every task I'd given him, I realized that partnership suited him in ways I hadn't anticipated.

“The Kozlov situation is escalating,” Ash said without looking up from his tablet, voice still slightly rough from the way I'd used his throat the night before. “Their remaining operations are consolidating in Brighton Beach, but they're bleeding money and personnel faster than they can replace either.”

I sipped my coffee and tried to focus on business instead of the way his lips moved when he spoke, the way the morning light turned his ice-blue eyes into something that looked like winter sky. “Opportunity or threat?”

“Both.” Ash set down the tablet and looked at me directly, and I caught a glimpse of the intelligence that had made me pay half a million dollars for the privilege of calling him mine. “Their desperation makes them dangerous, but their weakness also makes them ripe for acquisition. Question is whether we want to deal with the federal attention that comes with absorbing a dying organization.”

The casual way he said 'we' sent heat coiling through my chest, because it meant he was thinking strategically about our future rather than just surviving from one crisis to the next. This wasn't the broken boy I'd bought at auction; this was someone who understood the bigger picture and his place within it.

“What's your recommendation?” I asked, testing the waters of this new dynamic we were building.

Ash leaned back in his chair, and I caught the way he winced slightly as the movement pulled at muscles I'd used thoroughly the night before. The reminder of what we'd done, what we'd become, made my cock twitch with interest despite having had him just hours ago.

“We let them bleed out naturally but position ourselves to absorb their most valuable assets when they finally collapse,” he said, fingers tracing the rim of his coffee cup in absent patterns. “Clean acquisition without the baggage of formal merger negotiations.”

The strategy was sound, ruthless, and exactly what I would have recommended myself. But hearing it from Ash, delivered with the same calm authority he might use to discuss the weather, reminded me exactly why I'd given him access to organizational intelligence in the first place.

“Agreed,” I said, and watched satisfaction flicker across his features. “Draft a proposal for Carina. Include timeline estimates and resource allocation recommendations.”

“Already done.” Ash's smile was sharp and beautiful and completely without apology. “I sent it to her this morning, along with preliminary assessments of which Kozlov assets are worth pursuing and which should be allowed to die with the organization.”

The revelation that he'd anticipated my needs and acted accordingly should have triggered my control issues, should have made me want to reassert dominance over someone who was moving too fast, thinking too independently. Instead, it sent satisfaction rolling through me like warm whiskey, because it meant my investment in him was paying dividends I hadn't even calculated.

“You're getting comfortable with making executive decisions,” I observed, letting amusement color my voice.

“You told me to think like a partner,” Ash replied, reaching up to touch the collar at his throat in a gesture that had become habitual. “Partners anticipate each other's needs.”

The casual intimacy of the statement, the way he claimed partnership while acknowledging the fundamental dynamic between us, made something possessive unfurl in my chest. This was exactly what I'd wanted without knowing how to ask for it—someone intelligent enough to complement my thinking, strong enough to challenge my assumptions, but willing to submit when it mattered.

Before I could respond, the intercom crackled with Carina's voice, cutting through the intimate atmosphere with professional urgency. “Sir, we have confirmation on the Philadelphia shipments. All three arrived clean, no federal interference, profit margins exceeding projections by twelve percent.”

I looked at Ash, watching his expression shift from casual satisfaction to something deeper, more complex. The validation of his strategic thinking was obviously important to him, but I could see that my approval mattered more than any operational success.

“Schedule a full debrief for this afternoon,” I said into the intercom, not taking my eyes off Ash. “Include complete analysis of why the Baltimore route would have failed and how we can apply similar intelligence gathering to future operations.”

“Already prepared,” Carina replied, and I could hear something in her voice that hadn't been there before. “Ash's initial assessment was... more thorough than I anticipated.”

After the intercom went silent, Ash looked at me with an expression I couldn't quite read. “She's surprised that I'm not just decorative.”

“She's surprised that you're this good this quickly,” I corrected, standing and moving around the table until I could rest my hands on his shoulders. “Most people take months to develop the kind of strategic thinking you demonstrated.”