Page 126 of The Dragon 2

We slid past love hotels disguised as temples, hostess clubs built like floating lanterns, bars without names—just doorbells and shadows.

Steam curled from vents in the sidewalks. Laughter, drunken and lascivious, filtered through cracked windows and karaoke slats.

It smelled like mischief and latex.

Perfume and heat.

We began to head toward Shinjuku’s kinkier veins, where everything you weren’t supposed to want was sold.

I blinked.

Tora?

While this world paid tribute to me in many quiet ways—through hush money, loyalty, and the need for my protection, I had never walked into any of the places around here for pleasure.

Not once.

Until now.

A strange stillness settled over me as the Rolls continued.

Neon signs flickered above us—not with words, but different symbols. A bitten lip. A leather collar. A bare foot pressed to frosted glass.

I quirked my brows.

One building had nothing but a single red dot glowing over its doorway like an eye that never closed.

Another flashed the wordObeyin English, over and over, as if casting a spell.

I stirred in my seat.

Then, a billboard flickered to life just as we passed beneath it—two masked lovers suspended mid-air in a Shibari rig, ropes burning gold under UV light. Their limbs trembled.

I caught a glimpse of a domme in stilettos standing on a balcony, smoking a cigarette while a man in a collar knelt beside her, holding her handbag in his teeth.

My throat tightened with a strange hunger.

My pulse surged with an emotion I hadn’t tasted since I was a boy clutching a ticket to my first amusement park. Giddy, breath-catching excitement climbed up my spine.

I nervously ran my fingers through my hair and couldn’t help but chuckle to myself.

What is she planning? I really have no fucking idea. . .

This was unnatural for me to experience with any woman.

I was always the puppeteer.

I remained the god behind the curtain.

Tonight, she had all the control, and that unsettled something in me so deeply that it. . . thrilled me.

Tora, I already knew I would never let you go. . .but now. . .the cage around you may close sooner than we both expected.

My lips curved.

It didn’t matter what came next.

Whether the club she chose was silk-and-champagne or chains-and-shadow. Whether the lights dimmed or the world exploded. Whether there was food or music there. It didn’t matter.