“You want to eat first. Or talk more. Or?—”
“Madeline.”
Her spine straightened at the sound of her name in that tone. She met my gaze properly, breath a little faster.
“What did you promise me.”
“That you could… see. When you took my dress off.”
“What kind of dom would I be if I didn’t hold you to your word.”
Her cheeks flushed. “An understanding one.”
“I’m very understanding that my sub has been sending me photos that have ruined me for two weeks, then climbed on a jet with another man instead of letting Daddy see her this morning. I understand that Veil has had more angles of you this week than I have. And I understand that I have forty-eight hours to remind you who you belong to.”
Her lips parted.
I leaned in, my mouth brushing her ear. “So no, baby. We are not eating first.” I brushed her hair back. “You’re going to stand up, walk into my bedroom in those ridiculous heels, and let me take my time unwrapping what’s mine.”
Her head tipped back against the cushion, eyes falling shut for one second.
When she opened them, they were darker. I kissed her once, slow and deep, letting her feel all of my love, the kind of possessiveness that wasn’t about cages but about keeping her alive and adored in a world that wanted to eat her.
Then I stood and held out my hand.
“Up, baby. Show Daddy what Atticus didn’t get to see.”
30
Vince
She slid her fingers into mine and let me pull her up. The heels made her a little taller. Back straight, chin high, she looked like every dynasty portrait I’d ever been ordered to respect and absolutely none of them at the same time.
As we walked toward the bedroom, something caught the light at her throat. A thin gold chain. Small pendant. Not one of mine.
I stopped just inside the doorway and brushed my knuckles over the stone, turning it.
“Where’d this come from.”
Her hand rose automatically, fingers curling around it like habit. “Atticus,” she said. “Nineteenth birthday present.”
The name hit like a fist to the chest.
She went on, oblivious to the way my jaw locked. “The jewel’s from Aurelia Coast. We used to holiday there when we were kids. There’s this little market near the docks, they cut stones from the same vein. He thought it was… sentimental, I guess.” Her mouth tilted. “It’s technically a set. There were earrings too, but I left them at the DePout estate in Villain.”
Good.
Necks were for claims. For collars. For marks that meant something instead of nostalgia from a man who didn’t know her anymore.
Crows took the throat seriously. Blood, vows, control. A neck was where you put steel when you wanted obedience and where you put gold when obedience had already been given. Every ritual I’d grown up watching ended at the throat: blade, chain, crest.
All I could see was Atticus DePout’s taste hanging there like a placeholder where my collar should have been.
My blood ran hot, fast, ugly. For one second I pictured closing my fist around the pendant, ripping it off, letting it clatter to the floor so I could grind it under my heel. Pictured the line of the metal, I’d chosen, something that said mine in a language the whole world understood.
One day.
Her brows pinched when she finally looked up and saw my face. “You okay?”
