Consuming possession.
Maddeningly addictive.
All poisons that I would willingly drink again and again, if he held the cup.
I was ruined.
Marked.
Owned.
And I never wanted to be free again.
The shower hissed on, water beating down like rain in a storm, washing blood, cum, and sweat down the black stone, but none of it washed my darkening soul clean.
I tipped my head back against the wall, lungs dragging ragged air, my body still shivering around him, and then. . .I saw it behind him.
That dragon-shadow.
It hovered across the steam-slick wall, taller, darker, more solid than I’d ever seen before. Not a trick of light. Not some phantom. No—this thing was alive, curling black smoke into the shape of wings, horns, fire-breathing rage.
And it wasn’t looking at Kenji.
It was watching me.
Oh my God. Am I going crazy?
My breath caught in my throat all over again. Fear iced through the molten wreck of my body. That dragon-shadowstared with something ancient, something hungry, as if it didn’t just want my flesh—it wanted my soul.
For one breathless second, I wasn’t the marked woman, the dragon’s altar, the claimed and ruined lover.
I was just Nyomi—a girl who wanted to be loved without drowning, who wanted to believe she wasn’t losing herself in Kenji’s fire.
But the dragon-shadow didn’t care.
It just wanted more from me.
And Kenji wanted more too.
And I was frightened I didn’t have anything left to give.
I knew, in my bones, that what happened in this bathroom, from my putting him in the water to him dominating me in the shower. . .it had gone further than just sex and pleasure.
These moments were bigger than orgasms. . .they were changing us.
Maybe that was why this darkness was here, this dragon-shadow. Kenji had merged with it when he took me in this shower as if they were finally fully one. . .and for the life of me. . .I didn’t know what that would truly mean for our future.
I’m so far gone.
I blinked and the dragon-shadow disappeared.
I was an outsider, but I wasn’t going anywhere.
I didn’t know shit about the Yakuza or Japanese culture, but I deserved his love.
I wasn’t completely sure of my place, I just knew it would be next to his side.
I was his Heart.
