I catch the baton mid-swing with my free hand, absorbing the impact without flinching, and yank it out of his grip with all the force to send him sprawling backward onto the pavement.
"You have made a significant tactical error," I inform them both, my voice perfectly calm despite the adrenaline surging through my veins. "Return to your employer and inform him that intimidation tactics will not be effective. If he attempts to threaten my mate again, I will respond with considerably less restraint."
I drop the baton onto the pavement with a metallic clatter and walk away, leaving both of them groaning and nursing bruised egos in the alley.
My knuckles are starting to ache, and I can feel the warm trickle of blood running down my chin from where the taller onemanaged to land a glancing blow during the scuffle. I press the back of my hand to my split lip, grimacing at the sharp sting.
Chantel is going to panic when she sees this.
By the timeI return to the apartment, the sun has set and the building is bathed in the warm glow of streetlights filtering through the hallway windows. I pause outside our door, taking a moment to smooth down my hair and wipe the worst of the blood from my face with my sleeve before I unlock the deadbolt.
The apartment is dim, lit only by the small lamp in Chantel's studio corner and the flickering glow of her laptop screen. Cardboard boxes are stacked haphazardly around the living room, half-filled with books and kitchen supplies and carefully wrapped paintings. She is sitting on the floor in the center of the chaos, her legs crossed and her shoulders slumped in defeat, and her like this, small and defeated and preparing to abandon our home, ignites a fresh wave of fury in me.
"Faugh," she breathes, scrambling to her feet. "What the hell happened?"
I close the door behind me, lock the deadbolt with a decisive click, and cross the room in three long strides. I drop the thick legal folder onto the coffee table, the heavy thud echoing in the small space.
"We are not leaving," I say, my voice rough and edged with barely restrained violence. "And anyone who attempts to force us out will regret it."
13
CHANTEL
Igaze at the bruise blooming purple across Faugh's knuckles, at the angry split in his bottom lip that's still oozing blood, at the furious tension radiating from every massive inch of him, and my brain just completely stops processing.
"What do you mean you're not leaving?" I manage, my voice coming out higher and more frantic than I intend. "Faugh, we don't have a choice. The building was sold. We got the eviction notice. You can't just, you can't just will your way out of corporate real estate law by punching people!"
He doesn't respond immediately. Instead, he crosses to the kitchen sink, running cold water over his knuckles with the kind of methodical precision he applies to literally everything, even basic first aid. I watch the blood swirl down the drain, pink against the white porcelain, and feel my stomach twist into anxious knots.
"Faugh," I try again, softer this time, moving toward him. "Please talk to me. What happened? Did you get into a fight with the landlord? Because that's assault, and they can press charges, and?—"
"I did not fight the landlord," he interrupts, his deep voice clipped and precise despite the barely leashed fury vibrating beneath it. He turns off the water, dries his hands on a dish towel with deliberate care, and finally turns to face me fully. "I had a physical disagreement with the developer's corporate security in an alley outside their headquarters while my legal team worked."
I blink at him in absolute disbelief, my eyes going wide as saucers. My mouth opens and closes a few times without producing any actual words, just a series of pathetic little clicking sounds that would be embarrassing if I wasn't too shocked to care. "Your... your what?" I finally manage to squeeze out, my voice coming out as more of a strangled squeak than actual speech. I look down at the deed in my trembling hands, then back up at his infuriatingly calm face, then back down at the papers, as if the words might rearrange themselves into something that makes sense. They don't. Nothing about this makes sense.
"My legal team," he repeats, as if this is a perfectly normal thing for a person to have. "I retained them this morning after you received the eviction call. They have been working all day to finalize the paperwork."
My brain is scrambling to keep up, trying to connect the dots between Faugh leaving this morning in a tailored suit and returning tonight with bruised knuckles and mysterious legal documents. "What paperwork? Faugh, I don't understand what you're?—"
He reaches over to the coffee table with deliberate, measured movements, his huge frame shifting with the kind of careful grace that comes from a lifetime of navigating spaces built for smaller bodies. His long fingers, close around the thick folder with surprising gentleness, cradling it like it might shatter under his strength. When he extends it toward me, the motion is slow and intentional, giving me time to process what's happening.His amber eyes, sharp and unwavering, lock directly onto mine with an intensity so focused it feels like the rest of the world has simply ceased to exist. I watch his gaze track across my face, taking in every micro-expression, every flutter of my eyelashes, every barely perceptible widening of my pupils. That singular focus makes my breath catch, hitching on the exhale in a way that's equal parts terrifying and electrifying. In that moment, suspended between his steady offering and my frozen uncertainty, I feel the full weight of whatever he's about to tell me pressing down like gravity itself has changed.
I take it with shaking hands, flipping open the cover to reveal pages and pages of dense legal text, official stamps, notarized signatures. My eyes scan the first page, struggling to make sense of the formal language, until three words jump out at me in bold print.
Deed of Ownership.
"What..." I flip to the next page, then the next, my heart pounding so hard I can hear it in my ears. Property address. Legal description. Transfer of title. "Faugh, this is... this is the deed to the building. Our building. The entire apartment building."
"Yes," he confirms, his voice steady and absolutely certain. "I purchased it this afternoon. The developer accepted my offer. We are no longer being evicted because I am now the landlord."
The folder slips from my numb fingers, landing on the coffee table with a heavy thud that echoes in the sudden, suffocating silence.
He bought the building.
He bought the entire goddamn building.
"How..." I choke out, my throat tight and my eyes starting to burn. "How did you... Faugh, buildings cost money. Like, actual money. You can't just?—"
"I used the remainder of my dowry gold," he says simply, as if he's telling me he picked up groceries. "My legal team was able to liquidate it quickly through a specialized dealer. The developer was motivated to sell; the transaction was completed within hours."
