Page 30 of The Beast's Broken Angel

I moved closer, deliberately invading his space. “And if it prevents further attacks on my people? The bartender they carved apart had three kids waiting at home. The waitress who burned to death was nineteen—working her way through uni.”

I reached past him for a bottle of antiseptic, my chest pressing against his back. He stiffened, then spun to face me—his shoulders pressed to the cabinet now, my body crowding into his.

“War has casualties, Noah,” I murmured, my voice dropping to barely more than a whisper. “The question isn’t whether people will die. That’s inevitable. The question is how to minimize our own losses while maximizing theirs.”

His hazel eyes locked on mine. “There are alternatives, Adrian. Not their families.”

“You have experience with gang deterrence?”

His expression shuttered, just a flicker. “I grew up in Brixton—before the gentrification. I saw what worked. I saw what created martyrs.”

“What would you do instead?”

“Make them irrelevant,” he replied, and for the first time, there was heat in his voice.

“The Turners want respect, territory, recognition as major players. So you give them exactly what they don’t want—obscurity.

Let them keep their tiny patch while you expand everywhere else.

Build around them until they’re an island in your ocean. ”

It was a good answer. More than just theory—he understood the game.

“Recruit their best with better offers. Open competing operations on every corner. Make their customers choose between quality service and loyalty to amateurs. Death makes martyrs. Irrelevance makes them forgotten.”

“Interesting perspective,” I said, studying him. “Maybe there’s more to you than medical training.”

His guard snapped back up. “Everyone’s got a past. Doesn’t mean it defines who they are now.”

“Doesn’t it?” I pressed. “You’re here because of your past. Everything that made you desperate enough to sign my contract.”

I held my ground, blocking his only way out.

He shifted—a subtle move, barely more than a breath, but I felt it. The tension between us was a live wire, thrumming.

“You don’t like being cornered,” I said quietly .

“No one does.”

“But you especially.” I stepped closer again, not touching him—just letting my presence press in. “You get twitchy when people look too long. When they start seeing past the surface.”

Noah’s jaw clenched. His eyes flicked toward the door, then back to the cabinet mirror.

“You cover your wrists,” I continued. “Even now, shirt soaked in blood, you’d rather wear it like armor than show what’s underneath.”

He scoffed without humor. “Are you always this obsessed with other people’s trauma?”

“Only when it interests me.”

I turned the mirrored cabinet slightly, until his reflection faced us both. The glass caught his profile, shirt half-untucked, dried blood smeared near the collar. He looked like he’d just crawled out of a warzone. Maybe he had.

“Look,” I said simply.

He didn’t.

“I said look.”

His hazel eyes locked onto mine in the mirror—sharp, angry, but… heated. His lips parted like he was about to argue, but nothing came. His body was tense, motionless.

“You flinch from your own reflection,” I said softly, my voice lowering to a murmur meant just for him. “But I see power in every mark. Every wound you try to hide is a reminder you survived.”

“I don’t need your validation,” he muttered, but his voice lacked bite.

“No,” I said, taking another step. “But maybe you want it.”

I moved behind him again, chest brushing the barest edge of his back. The heat of him soaked into me.

“You want someone to see the worst parts and still fucking want you. ”

He froze. The mirror didn’t lie—his pupils blew wide. His breath hitched.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” he snapped, but it came too fast. Too defensive.

“Not flattery,” I said. “Just fact.”

I reached around him, slowly unbuttoning the last few buttons of his bloodied shirt—not touching his skin, just the fabric—then peeled it open without permission.

His breathing grew shallow.

My voice dropped. “Let me show you something.”

I angled the mirror again. He saw them. The scars. Faint and pale but not gone—lining his ribs, disappearing beneath the waistband of his trousers. Beautiful in their violence.

His lips parted.

“You see ruin,” I whispered near his neck. “I see territory.”

He exhaled sharply, like the words struck something between fear and arousal.

I watched him through the glass. “You’re hard.”

His nostrils flared. “Fuck you.”

But his cock pressed against his jeans, undeniable.

“You want me to stop?” I asked. “Say it.”

No sound.

My hand hovered over his wrist—still not touching—but close enough he could feel the heat.

“Do you want me to stop, Noah?”

“…No,” he whispered.

There it was.

I leaned closer, mouth near his ear but not touching. “You don’t even know what you’re craving, do you? Control? Or to lose it?”

He turned his head slightly, lips a breath away from mine. His whole body vibrated with tension, torn between pulling away and falling forward .

“You think you’re dangerous,” I whispered, “but you’ve never had someone make you feel that way.”

I brushed a finger down the center of his chest—slow, deliberate, stopping just above the waistband of his jeans.

“And now that you have,” I said, “you won’t be able to forget it.”

He looked at me in the mirror. Eyes dark. Chest heaving.

“Say it,” I breathed.

“…I want this.”

“Want what?”

“You,” he said, voice rough. “I want you to fucking destroy me.”

I smiled, slow and sharp.

Not yet. Not yet. He wasn’t ready. But something in me wanted to test that edge. To show him just how thin the line could be.

I let my palm hover just an inch from his bare skin, ghosting the heat of a touch I withheld.

He trembled. Even his breathing felt like a question I’d forced from his chest. I could have taken him apart, right there—bent him over the counter, pressed his cheek to the glass, made him watch.

That would have been easy. But I wanted something more complicated. I wanted him aware. Exposed.

I pressed the silent alert hidden in my pocket, a custom-built remote that sent a single encrypted pulse. Viktor would come. He always did. He knew when he was needed.

Noah didn’t notice. Not with how wound up he was, how he fixated on the movement of my hand, the tone of my voice curling like smoke in his ear. He was barely breathing, too consumed by the heat in the air—by fury, shame, and something far messier.

Three hard knocks. The door opened. The sterile air shifted as Viktor stepped inside, closing it with a soft click that sounded like judgment. Final. Inescapable.

Noah flinched, half-naked and flushed, but he didn’t move. His reflection stared back at him from the polished steel cabinets—shoulders tense, lips bitten raw. My reflection beside his looked calmer, colder. Predatory.

“What the fuck is he doing here?” Noah spat, but his voice had frayed at the edges—more fear than fire.

I didn’t bother to answer. I looked at Viktor instead, gave a small tilt of my chin. It was all he needed.

He moved forward, quiet and massive, placing himself between Noah and the exit. A wall of flesh and silence. I reached back, curling my fingers around Viktor’s wrist as he passed behind me—guiding him forward, letting him know what I wanted without saying a word.

His body responded before his mind even caught up.

I moved to unbuckle my belt, but Viktor’s hands replaced mine—precise, obedient. He lowered himself to his knees with deliberate reverence, the overhead light catching on the pale scar slicing through his knuckles.

As he undid my belt and pulled my trousers down just enough, I cupped his jaw.

“You know what to do,” I murmured, my voice low, intimate.

Viktor’s dark eyes met mine for a heartbeat. Then he kissed me.

Not soft. Not gentle. It was filthy and full of weight, his lips bruising mine, his tongue demanding space. I let him devour me for one greedy second before I bit his bottom lip and pulled away.

“You only get what I give,” I growled. Then I spit into his open mouth.

He swallowed without flinching—because he knew it was a gift. Then he looked up at me from his knees, lips wet and red, and wrapped one fist around the base of my cock.

His mouth was hot as it closed over me—tongue working in practiced circles, throat flexing as he swallowed me deeper, slower, deliberate. He made a sound low in his throat, guttural and obscene, and I felt it all the way through my spine.

But my eyes weren’t on him.

They were on Noah.

His face was thunderstruck. His breath came hard, shallow. His cock strained visibly against his jeans, and he was trying—failing—not to reach for it. The mix of rage and shame carved deep into his face, coloring his cheeks a violent pink.

I caught his gaze in the mirror, not allowing him to look away. Not from this.

“You see this, Noah?” I asked, voice razor-sharp. “You see what loyalty looks like? Obedience. Not lip service. Not tantrums. Not ego.”

Viktor took me deeper, moaning as his nose pressed against my pelvis, my cock buried to the hilt. His spit made it loud, slick, a vulgar soundtrack to Noah’s unraveling. My fingers tightened in Viktor’s hair as I rocked into him with measured control.

Noah gritted his teeth. His knuckles were bone-white where he gripped the edge of the stainless-steel counter. The overhead lights were unkind—highlighting the line of his jaw, the glint of desperation in his eyes, and the undeniable bulge between his legs.

His cock twitched.

His shame was so palpable I could almost taste it.

I groaned low, not for Viktor—but for Noah. For the ache I knew was eating him alive. “You don’t decide what you get,” I said, each word deliberate. “You don’t even get to touch your cock unless I say so. ”