Page 28 of The Final Contract (The Black Ledger Billionaires #5)

I t’s been more than a few hours, and normally I’d start to think something was wrong. But Killian’s texted me a few times—checking in, letting me know where he is. I appreciate it more than I’ll admit out loud: the reassurance, the breadcrumbs he leaves, each one closer and closer to his return.

The last ping was a picture of a little bakery I love, with a question: The pistachio macarons still your current obsession?

The way he notices makes me smile.

SERAPHINA: I wouldn’t say no to a lavender one also

I text back.

When he doesn’t reply right away, I add:

SERAPHINA: If you want to get back into the penthouse, I demand payment in macarons.

I hesitate, then bite my lip, fingers flying faster than my brain: I’ll take a slutty selfie in substitute.

I send it before I can erase it. My stomach flips. I know exactly what I’m doing—flirting with him. I also know I shouldn’t. I’m the one who started this whole suitor mess, after all.

But when I told them the suitors didn’t matter anymore, I meant it. Not just because of the stalker.

Because my Irish giant has crowded every corner of my mind. There’s no room left for anyone else.

A new bubble pops up on my screen.

KILLIAN: Are you objectifying me?

SERAPHINA: Hell yes

I type back, grinning like an idiot.

SERAPHINA: Show me something, big man.

My cheeks burn even though I’m alone in the penthouse. Finn’s stationed quietly outside the door for another hour until the night guard comes to relieve him, but it still feels like someone might see what I just sent.

A minute later, my phone pings.

Killian in a bathroom. Looks like the bakery. A mirror selfie—and my mouth goes dry.

His shirt is caught between his teeth, baring a torso that looks carved from marble. Abs, chest—all of it on blatant display. One hand holds the bakery bag, the other his phone. He’s angled, flexing. Sexy.

SERAPHINA: Very nice, Mr. Shaw

I type, biting my lip so hard it hurts.

Another pic arrives. This one makes me chuckle—he’s clearly propped his phone up, stripped his shirt off completely, and caught himself flexing from behind. Broad shoulders, back roped in muscle, arms pulled tight.

Another buzz. This time he’s facing the mirror, arm pressed low against his side, biceps swelling, abs tight, torso curved just so.

Fuck. He’s a beautiful specimen of a man. And he’s showing off…just for me.

A new text follows:

KILLIAN: Someone walked in and caught me. I may be banned for life.

I laugh out loud, clutching the phone to my chest.

SERAPHINA: Three pictures? I tease. One was acceptable.

He fires back instantly, cocky as ever:

KILLIAN: Just making sure there’s no competition.

I roll my eyes, still smiling like a fool.

Then another ping.

KILLIAN: Show me something, Miss Wylde.

My cheeks heat. I’ve done enough boudoir shoots to know how to hit the angles, but this feels different. This feels personal. For him.

I’m already stretched out on the rug in front of the fire, the faux fur soft against my skin.

So I shift, arching my back just right, making sure my ass pops, toes pointed.

A pose that could imply the POV of him standing over me, looking down the line of my body. Imagining me on my knees, pleasing him.

I snap the picture before I can talk myself out of it and hit send.

A beat later, my phone buzzes with his reply. Just one word.

KILLIAN: Fuck.

Then:

KILLIAN: Running by my apartment to grab something. Be back soon.

Instantly, my pulse quickens. Waiting has never felt this unbearable.

To keep myself occupied, I make one of my favorite cocktails—a pussy-friendly one. Grey Goose vodka, cranberry juice, and pineapple juice, shaken and poured into a martini glass. Tart, sweet, and smooth. The cranberry helps fight against UTIs; the pineapple helps my sweet pussy’s pH levels.

Things a good companion makes sure to take care of.

I curl up by the fire—not for the heat but for the cozy aesthetic.

Earlier, Eve and I talked about making a timeline, piecing together the events that triggered the stalking.

She thought it might help. So I grab a pad of paper and a pen and start taking a trip down memory lane, noting every strange thing, every date, every text.

It’s exhausting, and I’ve probably been at it an hour when the door finally opens.

I know those boots. That walk. Killian.

I’ve shifted to my favorite chair, legs tucked under me, when he rounds the corner—two brown bags in hand. One from the bakery, one plain. He must’ve stopped home to change, because somehow he looks even more unfairly attractive than he did this morning, in all black.

“Your payment, ma’am.” He sets the bakery bag in my lap, deadpan but with a glint in his eyes.

I grin like an idiot, and he likes it. I can tell.

The plain bag he drops in the chair across the room. Then he checks his gun before storing it in the drawer of my coffee table. His knife comes off his belt next, set within reach on the table. Every movement only adds to the dark, dangerous sexiness that clings to him like a second skin.

He drops onto my wide couch, one foot on the floor, head resting against the arm so he’s facing me.

I’ve already fished out a pistachio macaron, taken a bite. Peeking inside the bag, I find more—different colors, different flavors. “Thank you, Mr. Shaw,” I tease, standing and walking toward him with the second half of the macaron between my fingers.

For once, I don’t guard myself. I just climb onto the couch, hike one leg over, and straddle him.

His hands find my hips immediately, squeezing, running up my sides and back down again.

“You like macarons?” I ask, voice huskier than I intend.

I lean down, kissing him—just a brush of tongue.

He answers against my mouth. “Don’t. But tasting them off you? Might come to love them.”

I smile and kiss him again.

“Hungry?” he murmurs.

“Starving. If I don’t have some hot pasta soon, I may die.”

He chuckles, handing me his phone, already open to the Caviar Black app. “We can’t have that.”

Still straddling him, I make my selections while his hands stay on me. He rubs, massages, traces idle circles as I scroll, never once taking his eyes off me. By the time I finish and set the phone aside, I’m flushed and fidgeting in his lap.

He cups my ass and pulls me closer, kissing me deep and slow, his tongue warm against mine.

“I’ll have you know,” he growls softly, “I walked around half of Manhattan with a raging hard-on because of you.”

I throw my head back, laughing. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Please do.”

He sits up, pressing kisses along my chest, breathing in my perfume like it’s oxygen. Then he stalls, a flicker of something uncharacteristically bashful crossing his face. “I got something.” He hesitates. “For you.”

My smile softens. His hand grips my hip like a warning to hold steady as he leans forward, dragging the plain brown bag into his lap.

“It’s not much,” he mutters. “Just something. You don’t have to keep it.”

I cup his face, thumb brushing against the scruff of his jaw. “Thank you,” I whisper, lips grazing his.

I pull the item out, blinking at first, not sure what it is.

“It’s for your light,” he says.

And then I get it. My breath catches. A sun-catcher—but not the tiny kind for a window. This is for the whole room—and I can imagine it saturating the space in beautiful, fractured colors and prisms of light.

My expression must give me away, because his lights up to match mine.

“Will you put it up?” I ask, barely more than a breath.

He nods, trying to play it cool, but I can tell he’s nervous—and God, I like it.

It doesn’t take long. When he flips the switch, I gasp.

Rose and yellow reflections scatter across every surface, my entire room bathed in shifting color. Like living inside one of my sun-catchers.

“It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” I say, spinning toward him, heart swelling.

He watches me, and the softness in his eyes nearly unravels me. I hug his neck, kiss him hard. “Thank you. It’s the most thoughtful gift anyone’s ever given me.”

“You made it yourself, didn’t you?”

He shrugs, murmuring, “Been working on it here and there. It’s okay if you don’t want it up.”

Before he can finish, I jump into his arms, wrapping my legs around his waist.

“I love it,” I whisper fiercely. “I want to keep it here forever.”

My heart lurches as the words slip free, because what I really want…is to keep him here forever, too.

D inner arrives, and with music soft in the background, we eat and talk like any normal couple. Except we’re not. At least we’re saying we’re not.

He asks about my family, and I’m honest. I’m not ashamed of what I chose for my life. But I know they are, and it makes me sad. They mostly tell people I’m still a nurse, working shifts alongside my sister. The lie is easier for them to swallow than the truth.

So I ask him a question back. Why the Ledger? Why choose to guard escorts?

He doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t flinch like it’s something shameful. His mother was a sex worker. His father married her, had him and his brother, but people never let her forget what she did for a living—like it was a stain on her, like she should hang her head in shame. That never sat well with him.

The words sink into me, heavier than I expect.

Love is not in the cards for some of us.

That’s what I told him. What I believed.

Yet the way he speaks about his mother—with respect, with pride, with love—undoes that certainty thread by thread.

Maybe it isn’t the work that makes someone undeserving.

Maybe it was only me convincing myself it did.

“What happened to her?” I whisper.

His voice goes quieter, lower. “She walked away. Had to. Left me and my brother. Our father raised us.” His jaw flexes hard. “He wasn’t a kind man. Crossed a line I could never follow him across. So I left too. Took my mum’s name. And here I am.”

I swallow. “What did he do?”

This time he hesitates. His eyes flick away like the truth is too heavy to set between us, but then it comes anyway. “He burned down a church with his enemy inside.” His throat works, and I know there’s more.

The words fall like lead. “Children’s choir inside too. Called them collateral damage.”

I gasp, hand flying to my mouth.

“I tried to stop him,” Killian says, voice rough as gravel. “Tried to get them out. He fought me. Gave me this scar.” His finger brushes the line above his brow. “Held me back. Made me watch.”

Tears sting my eyes before I can stop them.

“My father was a big man,” he says quietly. “So I became bigger. To make sure no one could ever stop me again. Not when people needed saving.”

I stare at him, my heart breaking and swelling all at once. For the man who tried to save them. Who’s carried that fire in his chest ever since.

And in that moment, I know—I will only see the shadows around him as proof of his strength. His heart. His refusal to be anything like the man who made him.

A man who will protect those around him—but deserves to be protected too.