That the clean image is just a shell.
That whatever he really is operates in the dark.
One thing is certain—Asher Redmont knows too much. And he wants me to know that he does.
Which makes him dangerous in a way I don’t fully understand yet.
The pressure in my chest doesn’t ease, but I don’t have the luxury of collapsing. Ella will be home soon. I wipe my face, straighten my shoulders, and force my breathing to slow. She can’t see me like this. She deserves steadiness, not the mess unraveling inside me.
Still, my thoughts betray me, drifting back to him no matter how hard I try to stop them. To the way he stood too close, close enough to steal my air. To the intensity in his eyes as they stripped me down to every secret I thought I’d buried. To the brief moment—just one breath—when his voice softened and something dangerously human slipped through.
You’re going to lose more than you bargained for.
I’ve always known he was dangerous.
But now I’m starting to understand just how much.
Chapter 19
War, Disguised as Excess
Asher
The reports pile up on my desk, neat and precise, with every number exactly where it should be. Crimson Inc. is expanding—quiet acquisitions, hostile takeovers dressed up as mergers, and growth that looks clean on paper and ruthless beneath it. Normally, this is where my focus lives.
Today, I can’t see past the screen mounted on the wall.
The surveillance footage loops again, muted but unmistakable. A penthouse soaked in excess. Bodies pressed too close. Faces glassy, unfocused, unraveling under the influence of Zephyra. My territory. My city. My rules—ignored.
This wasn’t a random party. It was hosted by people who knew exactly where they were standing, and exactly whose ground they were on. Rinaldi doesn’t make mistakes like this. He makes statements.
And this one ended with a girl dead.
Alessandra Moore. Twenty-three. A socialite, photogenic enough to make headlines unavoidable. Disposable in our world—except for the fact that her death detonated exactly where Rinaldi wanted it to. Loud. Public. Impossible to ignore. An overdose headline tied to a designer drug everyone already associates with my territory.
War, dressed up in champagne and music.
Maverick stands beside the desk, arms crossed, eyes locked on the screen as the footage resets. “It wasn’t hers,” he says finally.
I don’t look at him. “I know.”
If it had been Violet’s Zephyra, we would’ve seen it immediately. Her signature is unmistakable—clean synthesis, consistent dosing, and none of the sloppy edges that get people killed. What’s playing out on that screen tells a different story. Panic. Collapse. Chaos.
Mav slides a thin file across the desk. “Our guys recovered multiple tabs from the scene. Some were pure counterfeit. Others were realZ—cut and laced after the fact. Fentanyl in enough of them to guarantee a body count.”
My jaw tightens.
“So Rinaldi steals the product, poisons it, then lets his people distribute it at a party on my turf,” I say, my voice level. Too level. “And he thinks I won’t understand what that means.”
“He wants you blamed,” Mav says. “Or dragged into it.”
“He wants to see if I’ll hesitate,” I correct. “If I’ll play clean when he bleeds dirty.”
Mav exhales, scrubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “There’s another problem. The lab still can’t duplicateZ. We’ve broken it down to base components, mapped the molecular structure, and isolated the binders—and every trial batch fails.”
I close the folder carefully. “You’re telling me a full team of chemists can’t recreate a drug one woman made alone.”
“That’s exactly what I’m telling you.” His mouth tightens. “Whatever she’s doing—it’s subtle. Something in the synthesis process we’re missing. Without knowing every step, we’re guessing.”
