So I released it the only way that made sense—by disrupting her life, the way she’d disrupted mine.
Her company. Her family.
Yet she didn’t crumble. Didn’t break down and weep like grown men often did when pressure closed in. She absorbed every blow, every calculated slight, and continued forward.
She persisted.
She endured.
And that, more than anything else, made me want to own her.
To make her dance to my tune—like the rest.
Are you ready to play, Lielit?
???
The guard opened the door and I stepped into the restaurant.
Sound hit first—layers of it. Laughter. Murmured conversations. Business conducted over linen and wine. Glasses clinked. Cutlery scraped against porcelain. People eating, drinking, living—utterly unaware.
We moved through the room without slowing. Past the maître d’. Past tables filled with people who didn’t matter.
We stopped at hers.
I glanced at the man seated beside her—the representative from Grant Wessing LLP. His shoulders stiffened the moment he recognised me.
“Mr Prothero,” he said nervously, fingers tightening around his water glass.
“Leave,” I said.
Lielit gasped.
I didn’t look at her.
The man shuffled out of his seat, not sparing Lielit a glance as he hurried from the restaurant.
I waited until the guard cleared his place setting.
“Fetch me my usual,” I drawled, taking a seat.
When I finally looked at the woman sitting opposite me, I relaxed.
She wasn’t frightened.
Oh, no.
She was livid.
Fenrir stretched within me.
Good. Fear was boring.
“Is the IPO launch not going so well, Ms Tolera?” I asked as my man set my drink down.
“Who are you?” she snapped.
That irked me, but I didn’t let it show.
