He laid me down and then stood over me, taking in my naked body. “Oh, Tora.”
I looked up. The Dragon’s mask had cracked and fell away. On his face was much more than approval, it was searing all-consuming hunger.
And then I realized that Kenji himselfwasthe ultimate test.
His kiss.
His cock.
His vow.
His obsession and possession would be the true blades against my throat.
And there would be no two-minute timer.
This would be forever.
Fuck.
Chapter six
The Dragon’s Possession
Kenji
The lights were still on.
I didn’t dim them.
I wanted nothing hidden—no shadows to swallow her expressions, no darkness to blur the truth on her face.
The room held its breath with us, amber glow pooling over the sheets, gilding the curve of her shoulder, the line of her throat, the quiet rise of her breathing.
She lay naked on my bed—our bed now, whether she said the word or not—and I stood there a moment longer than I should have, just to memorize what victory looked like.
Not my victory.
Hers.
My Tiger had walked through my test—a field of knives—and returned with her feet uncut. She had seen through my three most trusted Fangs—men who didn’t shake and didn’t blink—and she had found the seam where their lies lived and pulled them until they came free.
She doesn’t even understand. . .not yet. . .she doesn’t know. . .
If anyone looked at her for too long, I would string them upside down in my bamboo room and let their blood soak the roots, their marrow drip into the soil until the stalks grew thick on their agony. The bamboo would creak and split with new life, each shoot rising through the sound of their screams.
If anyone dared to speak her name without respect in their tone, I would slice the syllables from their tongues and leave them mute forever. Their mouths would gape uselessly, trying to form the sound of her while only silence bled out.
If anyone thought to touch her, even by accident, I would take their hands, pickle them in glass jars, and line my shelves with the trophies. Each jar would be proof that the punishment for reaching her was worse than death. The fingers would shrivel and warp inside the liquid, pointing eternally toward her, forced to witness what they could never touch again.
And if she ever tried to walk away from me, even for a breath, I would build her a gilded cage of gold and bone, line it with silk, and fill it with every comfort. I would kiss her through the bars, feed her with my own hands, wrap her in furs and jewels.
I would keep her soft, keep her mine.
If she wept in that cage, I’d collect her tears in crystal vials and drink them like communion wine.
And all day and night I would sit at the cage door until she understood that freedom was an illusion.
Possession surged through me then like black water in a flood, filling my chest, drowning my lungs, saturating my brain until it pressed against the backs of my eyes.
