“This is how it needs to be.”
When she starts to protest, I shake my head.
“This war was always on the flip side of peace,” I reply, adjusting the cuff of my shirt with deliberate calm. “And somemight say it was inevitable, the way rot needs to be cut out to make way for fresh blood flow.”
Her jaw clenches. “I don’t want this.”
I wrap my hands around her waist, dropping a kiss on her forehead.
“I know.”
“And yet you keep tightening the cage.”
I pull back then, fixing my gaze on her.
“It is not a cage.”
Her laugh is sharp. “Oh, sorry. What is it, then? How many men are here this morning?”
“It is protection,” I say evenly, knowing very well I’m poking a beautiful she-wolf. “And your obedience is part of that protection.”
Her eyes flash, predictable, and I know I’m about to get the claws. Funny that my senses leap at the thought.
“My obedience?” she echoes coolly.
“Yes.”
“You say it like you’re talking about a dog.”
I step closer.
“I say it like I am talking about my wife, who was nearly turned into a headline in Red Hook because men want to punish me through you.”
Her throat bobs. “I didn’t ask to be used this way.”
“No,” I agree, voice lowering. “But you are. Whether you ask or not.”
The air between us holds.
She looks away first, because she always does when the truth lands too cleanly.
I let her… for a moment.
Then my phone vibrates.
I glance down, my jaw tightening when I see a name and a number I know too well.
Bellandi.
I don’t answer. Don’t give him the satisfaction.
Instead, I do what I’ve done since the first day Salvatore Bellandi decided New York looked like a throne he deserved.
I begin turning the world against him without firing a single bullet.
By mid-morning, his port contracts have begun to stall.
In three days, his allies receive visits from my lawyers and my senators and my regulators.
