Page 11 of Sinful Desires (Sinful #4)

Chapter

Ten

“Discipline yourself and others won’t need to.”

― John Wooden

Théo

I was going to murder a woman. Not just any woman, though. One I’d met years ago.

She had been barely more than a face in the dark, with wet hair clinging to her cheeks, glassy eyes that had forgotten how to hope, and a mouth that had begged for death like it might taste sweet.

I should’ve walked away the second I heard her name.

But I hadn’t.

Because three years ago, Scarlett Harper had carved herself into my head like a curse I never learned how to kill.

I kept telling myself it was nothing. A night. A stranger. A girl too far gone to matter.

But she’d stuck.

Red hair. Achingly beautiful. Drenched in Chanel and self-destruction. A pretty mouth that never knew when to shut up and eyes that somehow still saw straight through me.

She didn’t remember. Of course she hadn’t. But I did. Every fucking second.

The way her fingers had caressed my face. The way she’d said my voice felt like heaven, right before she passed out in my arms.

When they offered me the job, I should’ve slammed the door. Should’ve let that ghost rot in peace.

Instead, I’d taken it. Maybe to face her, to test if the ghost of who she’d been matched the woman she’d become. And maybe?…?to finally put it to rest.

Putain de merde.

I’d been in this game long enough to know how it worked.

No one had ever had the balls to test me like she did. To disregard everything I said. To flat-out ignore every damn order I gave.

My job was simple. I made it clear from the start: I was your shadow. Your voice. Your hands. You move when I say. You listen. You obey. You trust me to keep you alive.

That was it. That’s how it fucking worked.

But no. Not with her.

It was like the universe, in all its fucked-up wisdom, had decided I needed to be reminded of who I was. So now I was stuck with a spoiled, untouchable superstar who had the whole goddamn world on its knees, and not a single person willing to tell her no.

And I was supposed to keep her safe?

Fuck.

She didn’t listen. I could tell her there were sharks with their jaws split wide open at the bottom of a cliff, and she’d still flash me that pretty smile, blow me a kiss, and swan-dive straight into their teeth, just to see if I’d try to catch her first.

She was a walking, breathing disaster. The worst fucking nightmare of a client I could’ve been saddled with.

And not just because she didn’t listen, though God knows the woman wouldn’t follow an order if her life depended on it.

No. It was worse.

She was too goddamn beautiful.

I didn’t know what exactly did it—if it was the hair that looked like it had caught fire just to piss me off, or the blue of her eyes, so bright it felt like a punch to the ribs when she looked at me.

Maybe it was her lips—pink, soft, parted just enough to make a man lose his mind. Or that tiny nose dusted with a thousand freckles, like someone had run a brush of gold across her skin and forgotten to stop.

Whatever it was, she was a beautiful fucking ruin. The kind that got under your skin, burned there, and rotted you from the inside out.

And the worst part? No photo, no magazine cover, no PR bullshit could have prepared me for the goddamn reality of her. Scarlett Harper, up close, was a forbidden prayer dressed as a walking sin. I was just the poor bastard hired to keep her breathing.

I’d seen her broken. Not the public version, the one they photographed and crucified. The real one. And it was worse, because that version had stayed with me for years.

When the call had come in from Russia, I’d already known it wasn’t going to be good.

Mikha?l Volkov.

No mafia mobster should have known my name. And definitely not one whose enemies usually ended up rotting under frozen fucking lakes.

I didn’t work for the mafia. I didn’t owe them favors. I didn’t even breathe in their direction. That was my fucking rule.

So, when Oliver Sawyer, the jackass who signed my paychecks, had asked to see me, I’d known exactly whose mess I was about to step into.

His office had smelled like cheap coffee and cheaper aftershave, the blinds half closed against the harsh noon sun slicing the room into strips of shadow. Papers were stacked everywhere, a half-eaten box of donuts bleeding grease onto a file marked Confidential .

He didn’t even look up when I walked in, just kept shoving a chocolate-frosted donut into his mouth.

“Volk’s an old friend,” Oliver said, like we were talking about some guy from his Saturday poker night, not a man who ran a syndicate built on blood and fear.

I just stood there, arms behind my back, spine locked straight. Old military habits died hard.

“Volk. Mikha?l Volkov,” he said, spraying crumbs everywhere. “Big guy. Head of the Silas. Whenever he does business around here, he hires my men for backup. Leaves his own crew back in Russia. Wants to keep things clean, especially now that he’s playing house with a wife and kids.”

Oliver slurped his coffee. “Paid me fat and shook my hand,” he said proudly. “Nice guy, really. If you can ignore the fact he’s got enough blood on his hands to repaint the Kremlin.”

Nice. Real fucking nice.

I bit back the irritation crawling up my throat. “He called me last night. Said you told him I was your best man. Harpers are dangling five million a month. Wanted me to think about it.”

Oliver licked icing off his thumb, finally glancing up. “Well? Did you?” he mumbled around the bite.

“Yeah. Thought real hard. Picked up the phone. Told him to fuck off.”

Oliver choked on the donut, coughing crumbs onto his desk. He lurched out of his chair, eyes wide like I’d just shot his dog.

“Are you fucking insane? You don’t say no to the Silas !”

I shrugged. “Guess I just did.”

He slumped back into his chair with a groan, rubbing his chest like he could already feel the heart attack blooming.

“Théo,” he muttered, reaching for his coffee, “one of these days, it’s not gonna be a bullet that kills me. It’s gonna be you, you stubborn fuck.”

Everything had changed that night.

I told myself I’d fake it. Pretend I didn’t recognize the name when Mikha?l Volkov had said it. Pretend I had no fucking clue who he was talking about. But I knew.

Scarlett Harper . The girl in the fountain. Three years ago. New Year’s Eve.

Scarlett Harper, daughter of billionaire Lucius Harper and Italian socialite Francesca Lazzio.

Shoplifting arrests like they were hobbies.

Benders fueled by drugs, booze, and too much fun time.

Mob scenes wherever she set foot, like her mere existence lit people on fire.

Fistfights with paparazzi caught on grainy footage.

Boyfriends who looked like they belonged in morgues, not on red carpets.

Photos of her topless on beaches, weeping behind designer sunglasses, flashing cameras the finger like a spoiled brat denied her favorite toy.

They called her the Red Goddess when they wanted to sell magazines. The Red Queen when they wanted blood.

I’d told him I wasn’t interested in babysitting some spoiled superstar. What I hadn’t said was that I’d been watching her for three years.

Call it stalking if you want. I called it survival.

The thing inside me, the monster, stayed quiet every time it saw her. Watching her fall apart was the only thing that had kept me from doing the same. And in the shadows, where no one looked, I had already been taking care of her.

But her as my client? Hell fucking no.

I protected politicians with skeletons in their closets, CEOs who’d bought their way out of scandals, blue bloods who thought morals were tax write-offs. They at least understood discretion.

Scarlett Harper? She was a loaded gun, safety off.

I should know. I’d already been shot by her once.

The memories rushed back. I saw water. Stone. Her fingers on my lips. She’d looked up at me like I was death wearing a suit. Had whispered things I’d never repeat.

And now I was being asked to watch her. Protect her. Officially . Pretend I hadn’t once pulled her out of a grave she’d dug with her own hands. And maybe I could’ve walked away if Oliver hadn’t known exactly where to sink the knife.

“Maybe you’re not as good as you think you are,” he said, voice low. “Didn’t think a little spoiled diva would be the one to break you. Guess I’ll stick you with some half-dead senator again. Wouldn’t want the great Théo LeRoy getting his hands dirty.”

I fisted my hands at my sides, knuckles white. If there was one thing I couldn’t stand, it was being fucking underestimated.

“I’m in,” I said, the words tasting like ash in my mouth.

He just leaned back in his chair, smug as hell.

“But they better make it ten. Five million won’t even come close to covering the nightmare I’m about to fucking walk into.” I turned away, my head pounding, not just with the weight of my own fucking stupidity, but with the echo of her voice slurring against my throat.

You feel like an angel.

I had walked straight back into that fire. Voluntarily . And I’d known exactly what it would cost.

This wasn’t protection. This was diving straight into hell.

“If you haven’t gotten the memo, turning on any appliance in the morning is illegal, asshole,” Scarlett grumbled, her voice thick with sleep as she glared at the blender like it had personally wronged her.

She stumbled into the kitchen like she’d lost a fight with her bed, wearing shorts so small they barely clung to her thighs, with skulls and crooked black hearts stamped all over them.

Her top, tight and long-sleeved, stuck to her like a second skin, the sleeves pushed up.

Her hair was in her usual braid, and her face was still puffy, soft, undone.

She looked like hell. She looked like heaven.

She looked like both at once, and I fucking hated her for it. And maybe I hated more that I still noticed. Still remembered too much.

The rough scrape of her voice dragged through the room, thick with sleep, sticking to my skin. My dick hardened enough to hurt. I grabbed a frozen banana, dropped it into the pitcher, and punched the blender to life. The machine screamed through the kitchen.

She yelped, hands flying up to clamp over her ears like I’d shot her. She marched closer, ripping the plug from the socket, and the blender died with a hard cough. Still clutching the cord, she glared at me like she was ready to wrap it around my throat.

“Are you deaf?” she snapped.

I wiped my hand on a piece of cloth and grabbed the pitcher off the base, ignoring her.

“Sadly not.”

I poured the sludge into a glass, tipped it back, and swallowed in three long, rough gulps. When I looked at her again, she was still glaring, a frown carved into her forehead, lips pinched tightly.

Her hand settled on her hip and my gaze dropped unwillingly, but not unwilling enough to look away. It was too much, too fucking much. Every inch of her screamed to be noticed, and I couldn’t stop myself from following the line of her body.

Six fucking months of blue balls and self-control I wouldn’t wish on a priest.

I had to tear my eyes away, like I was scorched by the sight of her, and turned my back quickly, hands fisting at my sides as if that could block her out.

Behind me, she hummed. Softly. Aimlessly. The same tune from the night we’d met. I gripped the counter hard enough to crack it.

“Why are you drinking that crap this early? Haven’t graduated to solids yet?”

“It’s past noon, Miss Harper.”

“Yeah, well, it’s still morning for me,” she grumbled, yanking open the fridge.

She was a nightmare .

Not just for my sanity, but for my goddamn routine. Discipline had always been the one thing keeping my demons at bay, the thing that had kept me from unraveling completely. I wasn’t about to let some fiery redhead mess that up.

I was up before five every damn day, without fail. It was a habit, one drilled into me during my time in the military. By the time I’d finished my workout, it was barely eight in the morning. Not long after, I was showered, dressed, shake in hand, sitting at my laptop, ready to hit the day.

Meanwhile, Sleeping Beauty probably had about five hours left in her slumber.

A few days ago, I’d found myself in the kitchen just after seven. I’d skipped my workout for once and thought I could get a moment of peace.

Instead, I had walked in on her with arms full .

A bucket of vanilla ice cream had been tucked under one arm, two different bags of chips hanging out of the other. She froze when she saw me, eyes wide and guilty, like a kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

Her red hair was a mess, barely held together in her lazy braid, and her pretty eyes, half lidded with exhaustion, had that same mischievous gleam I always saw. I could tell she hadn’t been to bed yet. The little bags under her eyes weren’t even trying to hide it.

It was the same look she’d worn the first time I saw her. Half alive, half haunted. And somehow, I kept looking.

Her face had turned even redder, and she’d practically sprinted away, still clutching her junk food like it was her lifeline.

It was probably for the best that our lifestyles didn’t overlap much. It kept her out of my way, which was better for my head, soul, and most definitely my dick.

Or that’s what I kept telling myself.

That keeping her at arm’s length would be enough. That, if I avoided her long enough, I’d stop remembering the girl in the fountain. The one who had looked at me like I was something worth holding on to, even for a breath. The same eyes I still saw every goddamn time she wasn’t looking.

“Oh,” she said, twisting off the cap of the apple juice container and taking a deep gulp. “We’re leaving in twenty minutes, by the way.”

I raised an eyebrow, mentally flipping through the day’s schedule. She’d been killing herself in rehearsals every damn day for her upcoming tour, from three to midnight.

But today? It was her only day off. Nothing was on the schedule.

“Where?” I asked, already dreading the answer.

She shrugged and took another swig.

“You’ll see.”

With a wink, she sauntered off, leaving the juice container wide open on the counter and disappeared down the hall, humming that same melody. The same one she had breathed into my ear while half dead in my arms, trembling and soaked, tasting of sin and surrender.

I had drowned in her once.

And God help me, I was already slipping under again, dragged back into her waters.