She was a match, and I was soaked in gasoline.
Now every part of my life—my empire, my secrets, my control—was at risk of going up in flames, all because of one girl who spun through the air with the grace of an angel, tempting men to risk damnation just to touch her.
I reached my building and went through the usual gauntlet: thumbprint scan, retinal imaging, six-digit code.
When I walked into my fortress of a penthouse, all I saw was emptiness.
Silence, glass, steel, and too much square footage.
Just me. And whatever the fuck money could buy.
I hung my coat and walked down the hallway, past the custom kitchen I’d barely used since relocating to the city, even though cooking was a passion of mine, past the guest suite no one ever stayed in, and into the room I actually lived in.
My IT room.
The one place where everything did what I told it to.
Anonymous made me a legend.
DarkMatter made me feared.
But here? In this room? I made myself into a weapon.
I’d wiped bank accounts belonging to corrupt officials in Dubai and funneled every last cent to orphanages in Poland.
I’d exposed private plane manifests of convicted pedophiles and routed the flight logs to journalists in Mexico City.
Global Food Outreach was mine too. It kept a hundred thousand kids fed in Ukraine, even while the bombs were still dropping. It was the same group Braxton Thorin had volunteered with this past summer, when he’d gotten himself caught in the middle of a war zone.
No one knew all the things I had my hands in.
Not Anastasia. Not Rory. Not Luca. Not even the other syndicate heads.
Because in my world, love was turned against you. Vulnerability was currency. And if anyone knew what I actually cared about, they would use it to gut me.
But I did care.
Too fucking much.
And now there was her.
With my fingers hovering over the keyboard, I stared at the main screen, at images of Lyla Laine Oakley.
No. Not Lyla. Lacey Grace Oakley. Little sister of a girl who had died two years ago.
And the woman who might just destroy me.
By one o’clock, I’d packed a bag, instructed Henri to assign additional men to surveil Lyla, and texted Rory:Leaving in twenty. Xyst, Luca’s, then Boston. Overnight bag.
Moving back into my IT room, I dropped into the chair in front of the main console and pulled up the camera feeds from her apartment.
Nat was there, watching something on her laptop, headphones in.
Lyla’s bedroom was empty.
I texted Henri:Status.
His reply was immediate.She worked the full shift. Went home, cleaned, showered, and ate something. She’s headed to rehearsal now.
