Jessica is still against me, on me. Warm. Real. Breathing.
That’s when it hits; this wasn’t just sex. I crossed a line I can’t cross unless I intend to redraw the map afterward.
Sex has never confused me. It’s always been physical. Controlled. A release that ends when I decide it does. What just happened doesn’t feel like that. It feels like I let something into my world that refuses to stay contained.
I close my eyes briefly, forcing myself to catalog the damage. She knows too much now. She’s been touched by me. Seen me without the distance I usually keep intact.
I feel it settle into my chest with unsettling clarity. Whatever happens next, Jessica is no longer peripheral. She’s no longer a variable I can cut loose if the equation turns sour.
She’s central to everything now.
The realization doesn’t spark panic, even though I search for it, all I feel is possession.
I’ve built my life on leverage. On understanding how people move, what they want, what they’ll trade when pressure is applied correctly. I can usually predict outcomes before anyone else realizes they’re already trapped in a game they didn’t know they were playing.
But I didn’t plan this.
Which means I need to plan everything that comes after.
Because sex with Jessica means exposure. It means I’ve shown my hand to myself, if no one else. It means I want more than her body, and wanting is a liability I don’t tolerate lightly.
It also means I won’t let anyone else touch her. Ever.
That thought arrives fully formed, sharp and absolute. The kind of ownership that doesn’t need to announce itself because it simply is. And beneath that, darker still, is the awareness I’ve been avoiding since the moment I first noticed her.
If there’s even the slightest chance she could carry my child, then everything changes again.
Not because of sentiment. Because of permanence.
Children anchor things. They end wars. They justify bloodshed. They turn men like me into forces that don’t retreat.
I don’t know yet if that’s where this is going, but I know one thing with brutal certainty: I won’t let Jessica walk away now.
Not into a city full of men who would use her name, her body, or her bloodline as leverage against me. Not back into a life where she pretends she’s untouched by the underworld when it’s already closed its fingers around her wrist.
Jessica
For a few seconds, I can’t move.
I’m on the office floor, the city a smear of light in the darkening night behind the glass, my body still humming like it hasn’t caught up to reality yet. Everything feels too bright. Too sharp.
I feel… buoyant.
Loose-limbed. Light-headed. Like something heavy I’ve been carrying for years has been set down without me realizing I was even letting it go.
I push myself away from the slab of his chest slowly, dragging my blouse closed with hands that tremble only slightly. He is still inside me, not moving, and knowing he is still there sets off conflicting feelings. On one hand, it’s sexy as hell, on the other, it’s a solid reminder of what we just did.
Our reflection catches in the window and I barely recognize the woman looking back at me. My hair is a mess. My mouth is swollen. My eyes are bright in a way that feels dangerous.
Alive.
I lift my eyes to his, bracing myself for regret. For shame. For the cold snap of reality that should follow something this reckless.
It doesn’t come.
Rurik is watching me the way he did during the meeting, only this time there’s no pretense of distance. No attempt to hide the intensity. His gaze tracks every movement I make, steady and unblinking, like he’s already recalculating the world with me standing inside it.
The awareness between us hasn’t eased. If anything, it’s sharpened.
