Page 12 of Silent Schemes (Broken Blood)

"Don't what? Care that someone put their hands on you?

Care that you came back here instead of running?

" He's close enough now that I can see the pulse in his throat, the way his chest rises and falls with controlled breathing.

"You could have disappeared. Vincent gave you the perfect opportunity. Why didn't you?"

"You know why."

"I want to hear you say it."

"Because I'm not done with you yet."

His laugh is dark, knowing. "Liar. You came back because you wanted to. Because whatever this is between us is more real than anything your controlling father offers you."

"This isn't real," I protest, but even I can hear the lie in it. "This is a game. A mission. A scheme."

"Then let's play." He tosses me a pair of wraps. "Unless you're afraid to get in the ring with me without your knives."

It's a challenge I can't refuse.

Won't refuse.

Because maybe if I hit him hard enough, I can forget the way he makes me feel.

Maybe if we fight, I can remember who I am, what I'm supposed to be doing.

Maybe violence will remind me that I'm a weapon, not a woman who's falling for her target.

I wrap my hands slowly, aware of him watching every movement.

The cut on my cheek throbs, and I know he's cataloging that too, adding Vincent Carlisle to some mental list of people who will pay for touching me.

The thought shouldn't warm me from the inside out, but it does.

"You know about the poison," I say as I finish wrapping my hands.

"The vial in your left pocket? Yes."

"You know about tomorrow night."

"The gala. The very public death your father has planned for me." He stretches, muscles rippling with the movement. "I know everything, Sienna. The question is what you're going to do about it."

We circle each other in the ring, two predators sizing each other up.

He strikes first—a testing jab that I deflect easily.

I respond with a combination that would have dropped most men, but he flows around it like water.

"You smell like him," Varrick says, dodging my hook. "Like cigarettes and cheap cologne and fear."

"I don't fear Vincent."

"No, you fear what he represents. What happens if you fail?" He lands a body shot that steals my breath, follows it with an uppercut I barely avoid. "What happens to Maya?"

I spin, catching him with an elbow that splits his lip.

First blood to me. "Don't talk about my sister."

"Why? Because it makes you emotional? Makes you sloppy?" He grabs my next strike, uses my momentum to pull me against him.

For a moment, we're pressed together, breathing hard, before I break free.

"Or because it reminds you that you're not just fighting for yourself?"

I sweep his legs.

He goes down but rolls, coming up fluidly and ready.

We're both breathing hard now, circling again, looking for openings. The rain pounds against the windows, creating a rhythm for our violence.

"You met your handler," he states, not asks. "Gave him intel."

"I gave him nothing about you. Nothing real."

"Yet." The word hangs between us like a blade. "But tomorrow night, you'll have to choose. The poison or me. Your father or your freedom."

I attack for real right now, unleashing combinations I've only used in death matches.

He meets me strike for strike, our bodies colliding as the heat ramps up between us.

We're not sparring anymore—we're trying to prove something to each other, to ourselves.

I get him in a chokehold, arm locked around his throat, and for a moment I have him.

I could break his neck.

I could end this right the fuck now.

Complete my mission and save Maya from becoming me.

The position is perfect, the pressure exact.

One sharp twist and the Bastard King dies.

But he doesn't fight.

Doesn't struggle.

Just relaxes into my hold, trusting me completely, and that trust undoes me more than any violence could.

"Do it," he whispers. "If you're going to kill me, at least do it yourself. Not with poison like a coward."

I release him, stumbling back, disturbed by how wrong it feels to hurt him.

He spins, tackles me to the mat, pins me beneath his weight.

We're both gasping, sweat-slicked, hearts pounding in sync.

" Why? " I demand. "Why didn't you fight?"

"Because you already made your choice. You just haven't admitted it yet."

The space between us crackles with electricity.

His weight presses me into the mat, and every point of contact burns.

This is what Vincent warned about—getting compromised, forgetting the mission, wanting something I'm not allowed to have.

"I hate you," I whisper, but my hands are already reaching for him.

"No," he says, catching my wrists, pinning them above my head with one hand. "You hate that I see you. The real you, not the weapon your father made."

His free hand traces the cut on my cheek with unexpected gentleness. "I'm going to kill him for this."

"Vincent's mine to handle."

"Not Vincent." His eyes are black with promise. "Theodore. For every bruise, every scar, every piece of you he broke."

"You don't know?—"

"I know everything. I know he started training you when you were twelve.

Know about the first man you killed at seventeen.

Know about the room in the basement where he makes you practice.

" His thumb brushes my pulse point, feels how fast my heart is racing.

"I know you cry in your sleep sometimes, whisper Maya's name like a prayer. "

"Stop." I can't handle him knowing me this well, seeing through every wall I’ve ever put up.

"I know you came back tonight even though Vincent gave you an out. Know you could have run, but chose to walk back into this penthouse, into this trap, into my arms."

The tension between us finally snaps.

I surge up, catching his mouth with mine, and it's nothing like our previous encounters.

This is desperate, hungry, two people trying to devour each other's pain.

He releases my wrists, and I immediately tangle my hands in his hair, pulling hard enough to hurt.

"This is a mistake," I gasp between kisses.

"The best kind," he responds, his mouth moving to my throat.

We roll across the mat, fighting for dominance even in this.

My workout clothes tear—his hands aren't gentle, and I don't want them to be.

When he pins me again, I bite his shoulder hard enough to mark, and his growl vibrates through both of us.

"Tell me to stop," he says, even as his hands stake their claim on my body.

"I can't." And that's the truth that damns us both.

The mat burns against my back as we move together, still more fight than finesse.

Neither of us knows how to be gentle, how to love without brutality.

We're two weapons trying to find softness in each other, failing beautifully.

His hands leave bruises I'll treasure, and my nails leave marks he'll wear with pride.

"Look at me," he demands, and I do, maintaining eye contact as everything unravels between us. "This is real. We are real. Everything else is a lie."

I want to argue, but coherent thought is impossible when he touches me like I'm something precious he's simultaneously trying to break and preserve.

Every nerve ending is on fire, every careful wall I've built crumbling under him.

His hands map my body like he's memorizing territory he plans to conquer, and I arch beneath him, desperate for more.

"I can't—" I start, overwhelmed by the intensity of what's building between us.

He silences me with a kiss that tastes like blood and promises. "You can. You will. Because you're mine now, my little ruin. Have been since you walked into my casino."

His mouth moves down my throat, leaving marks that will be visible tomorrow.

Evidence. Proof that I let him this close.

The possessiveness in his touch should anger me.

I've been owned my whole life—by my father, by the Cross name, by the violence, betrayal, and bloodshed that shaped me.

Instead, it makes something wild unfurl in my chest.

Because this is different.

Varrick doesn't want to own me to use me.

He wants to own me to keep me, to protect me, to worship me in his own violent way.

"Say it," he demands against my skin. "Say you're mine."

"Yours," I gasp, and hate how easily the word falls from my lips.

His response is immediate and intense, showing me exactly what my surrender means to him.

The mat beneath us burns against my bare skin as we move together, two predators finally stopping their circling dance.

Neither of us knows how to be gentle—our coupling is as much battle as it is surrender.

"Look at me," he commands, and I force my eyes open, meeting his dark gaze. "I want to see you when you fall apart. Want you to know exactly whose cock is doing this to you."

The intensity in his eyes is almost too much.

No one has ever looked at me like this—like I'm precious and dangerous and necessary all at once.

My nails rake down his back, adding new wounds to our collection, and his response tells me he loves the pain as much as the pleasure.

"That's it, girl," he growls. "Mark me. Make me yours, too."

The admission that this possession goes both ways undoes something fundamental in me.

I've been trained to seduce, to perform, to fake passion for the mission.

But this is real, raw, unscripted.

Every response is genuine, every sound torn from somewhere deep inside I didn't know existed.

When release finally crashes over me, it's with his name on my lips—not whispered, not performed, but torn from my throat like a confession.

The terrible realization follows immediately: I'm completely, irrevocably compromised.

There's no going back from this, from him, from what we've just done.

He follows me over the edge, spilling inside me, my name a prayer and a curse on his lips, and in that moment, I understand what I've really done.

I haven't just compromised the mission—I've compromised everything.

After, we lie among the wreckage—torn clothes, a little blood, the mat askew.

My body aches in ways that have nothing to do with fighting.

I trace a scar on his chest, a long silver line that must have nearly killed him.

"Who gave you this?"

"Someone who claimed to love me."

The words carry weight, warning. "Did you kill them?"

"No. I let them go. Stupidest thing I ever did."

I understand what he's really saying.

He's talking about my future, about what happens when this game ends.

When I betray him—because we both know I will—he's telling me he'll let me go.

And it will destroy him.

"Maybe they'll come back," I say quietly.

"Maybe. But it won't matter. Some things can't be undone."

We lie there in silence, two broken people finding solace in shared damage.

But reality creeps back in, as it always does.

Vincent's threat echoes in my mind.

One week.

Tomorrow night.

The poison in my pocket feels like it weighs a thousand pounds.

"What are you thinking?" Varrick asks, fingers tracing lazy patterns on my bare shoulder.

"That this is going to end badly."

"All the best things do."

I sit up, reaching for my ruined clothes. "I should go shower. I still smell like Vincent."

"Burn the clothes," he says. "I'll have new ones sent up."

"Possessive much?"

"When it comes to you? Yes." He sits up too, catches my wrist before I can stand. "Sienna. Whatever your father has on you, whatever he's threatening, I can protect you. Both of you."

For a moment, I want to believe him.

Want to confess everything—the escape plan, the money I've hidden, the desperation to save Maya from becoming me.

"No," I say softly. "You can't. Not from this."

I leave him there on the ruined mat, knowing I'm walking away from the only person who's ever seen me as more than a weapon.

Knowing that in less than twenty-four hours, I'll have to make a choice that will define the rest of my life—however long that might be.

The shower is scalding, but it can't wash away his touch or the truth that's becoming harder to deny: I'm losing my fucking mind.

And for the first time in my life, I don't care.

Tomorrow night at the gala, I'll have a choice to make.

The poison or the truth.

My father or my freedom.

Death or something that might be worse—hope.

But as I stand under the burning water, feeling Varrick's marks on my skin, I realize I've already chosen.

I just hope we both survive it.