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I look at my tactical watch. I have an hour left. An hour and then this self-imposed hell will end. I stare the little psycho down, showing him I’m the one in charge when it comes to us.

Eliot frowns at me, and I have the urge to adjust myself again. A part of me likes it when he defies me. I can’t wait to press all his buttons so I can explode inside of him.

El’s eyes are so big while he stares at me. He probably doesn’t know what those eyes do to me, have been doing to me since the moment we met when he was fifteen and I asked my father to have his brother sell him to me. He doesn’t know he already belongs to me, only that he belongs to the Triad.

He probably thinks his father grew a pair and wanted to give him a better life than living in a whorehouse with his mother, when he came to the compound, asking for the dark side of the moon.

I think I’ve been doing a good job hiding how much I want him. I like the way he laughs, smiles, and talks amicably with Tian when he thinks I’m not watching. I’ve been keeping an eye on him from afar, tracking his every move. I even installed security cameras in his room to watch him. I run a hand through my hair and let out a deep sigh. Maybe that wasn’t one of my brightest ideas watching him take a shower. I feel a flush creeping up my neck as I stroke my clean-shaven jaw. He’s starting to get uncomfortable. I can feel it radiating from him, but I don’t care. I need to be close to him. I’ve been holding back all these years, but tonight that’s finally changing. Mine echoes through my head. Mine.

“Moon,” he says his voice so low and sweet my dick twitches. I’m a depraved asshole who likes to make him hurt and a part of me believes he’ll like it too. That’s why he’s been letting people beat the shit out of him in the ring and coming home to jerk off under the sheets while I watched from the feed I set up on my phone while I was traveling with Tian.

I’ve practiced keeping my face in check whenever he’s around. I feel my mask starting to crack. How long can I hide the gentle proud gaze Tian once caught me giving El while I was staring at my little psycho angel while he was translating for us back in Seoul.

“Moon?” El asks again, his voice so small it reminds me of that time I had Tian make El come to Tokyo with him, under the guise of a visit while I was still with my Yakuza chapter.

“I’ve never seen you look at anyone like that,” Tian remarks while we’re drinking at one of my bars in Tokyo located in an old Japanese style house. I watch Eliot talk to Yuki on the wooden veranda outside, my jealousy almost swallowing me whole. I want him to talk only to me, no one else.

“Like what?” I bite out.

“Like you care for him,” he says, almost sounding worried for me.

My hands are itching to punch Tian in the throat.

He holds up his hands in surrender. “Don’t hit me in the face, I still need to marry your blood and I can’t if you break my nose. He’s the guy you bought right, I mean the pretty smaller one with the big eyes?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I feign innocence. I fucking love El’s dumpling cheeks and big eyes.

The bastard points a finger in my face. “Brother,” he says in Cantonese. “Look at your face.”

“What?” I huff.

“Like time stops when you look at him. Like he’s the most precious thing you own, and I’ve seen your car and motorcycle collection.”

I stare at my reflection in the glass window. The way my eyes look is almost gentle, warm, like I care. But I’ve never cared about anything my whole life.

“Don’t pretend you don’t have a connection. It’s the same reason I want your sister. I knew it the moment I saw her.” He takes a deep breath. “You and I look at the world as something to conquer, like a war we have to win. We’re so fucking detached from everything human; we don’t love anything but that changes when they’re next to us. The same devotion we have toward our empire is also reserved for them.”

“What?” I bite out, focusing on the man who’s been on my mind the moment I laid eyes on him. It felt like I was freefalling. The same as I’m doing now standing this close to him on the night I’m finally making him mine.

He flinches and I stare around the courtyard, the memory fading as I curse myself for scaring him.

“Moon,” Eliot says reluctantly, waking me from my daydream. It’s a fucking dream standing this close to him again. I can smell him, that outdoor woodsy smell mixed with cigarettes and dried blood.

“How long has it been?” I ask, and he swallows hard, running a hand over his Adam’s apple, the same area I want to sink my teeth in and mark him for everyone in this goddamn courtyard to see.

“Eleven months and seven days.” His voice so soft it tears my heart right open. He’s my freedom, the only empire I want. I don’t care about anything else. I only want one person, and I’ll kill anyone to get him.

Eleven months and seven days, who the fuck remembers that? I feel my cheeks heating.

Why does his vibe feel gentle all of a sudden? Like I’m someone of immeasurable value to him. I’m nothing. I’m the son of a whore who was sold to his family to do with whatever they want. They own me. Why I haven’t already been passed around or sent to our Bangkok chapter, beats me.

I run a hand over the back of my neck, and he follows my every move.

“You changed your hair,” he says, while I nod, not answering. “Hmmm, eleven months and seven days,” he repeats, still boxing me in against the railing, and my heart skips a beat. He moves closer to me and it’s like time fucking stops, the outside world fading away. The voices from the other men in the courtyard are like water flowing around us while I take in his scent.

The wind picks up and blows a strand of hair in my eyes. He reaches out to softly push it behind my ear, and for the first time I don’t back away but look up at him. Why does he keep looking at me like that? Like I’m something extraordinary, like I’m some kind of fucking miracle in his fucked-up life. It’s like he yearns for something I can’t ever give to him. I shake my head. Why does it suddenly feel hard to breathe and to stand in his presence?

He leans forward and presses his lips against the shell of my ear. “Two hours left,” he says, pushing himself from the railing and focusing on the man standing behind me.