KENJI
The sound of the door clicking shut behind her was almost funny. A quick, sharp sound that perfectly matched the way she'd practically fled the room.
She moved like a startled deer, all graceful limbs and pure, undiluted panic. It was better than I'd imagined.
That blush, though. That was the real prize of the morning. The way her cheeks flushed a hot, betraying pink when I called her "Nic." A simple, single syllable, and her entire body reacted.
She couldn't hide it. She tried to keep her face neutral, but the blood rushing to her skin shouted the truth. She was acutely, painfully aware of me. Exactly the reaction I was aiming for.
I turned back to the cityscape, but I wasn't seeing the skyline anymore. I was seeing her. The way she'd clutched that heavy manual to her chest like a life preserver. The slight tremble in her hands.
Six years. Six long years of watching her, of molding her from a broken child into this… this exquisite creature of nerve and potential. The celibacy, the deliberate distance—it was all a part of the plan. A necessary discipline.
"I'll finally claim my prize," I murmured, to the glass, my breath fogging a small circle on the pristine surface. The words felt solid and right in the quiet room. "I'll fuck her. I'll finally fucking take what's mine."
The thought was a physical release, a wave of heat that was years in the making. It wasn't just about sex. Any woman could provide that. This was about possession. It was about finally laying hands on the masterpiece I had painstakingly restored.
Every book she read, every lesson she learned, every curve that had softened on her body—it was all for this moment. For me.
"Six years of waiting," I said aloud, pouring myself a glass of water, the ice clinking. It wasn't a complaint. It was a statement of fact. The wait was the investment. And the payoff… the payoff would be absolute. "Six years of watching her heal, and grow, and become so fucking beautiful it actually hurts to look at her some days."
I took a sip, the cold water doing nothing to cool the fire in my gut. My mind raced ahead, to the night after the business dinner. The black Valentino gown. I knew it would fit her perfectly. I know everything about her, her size is child's play.
I pictured leading her not back to her room, but through one of the doors of my Soma mansion. That led to my private quarters. The room with the bed large enough to get truly lost in.
"I'm going to ruin that dress," I whispered, a dark thrill shooting through me. "I'm going to peel it off her myself. Slowly. I want to see the look in her eyes when she realizes there's no going back. That every inch of her belongs to me."
The celibacy… it had been a grind. A relentless exercise in self-control. Turning away from easy pleasures, from the willing women who would have done anything for a night with me.
It was all for this.
To make this moment sweeter. To ensure that when I finally took her, there would be no other memory, no other touch, to compete with mine. I would be her first. Her only. Her beginning and her end.
"Three days," I said, finishing the water and setting the glass down with a definitive click. "Seventy-two hours." I smiled, a genuine, cold smile that felt foreign on my face. "Let her think about it. Let her imagination torture her. Let her dread it and, maybe, just maybe, let a part of her start to crave it."
The anticipation was a living thing inside me now, coiling and tightening. The game was entering its final, most delicious phase.
I turned my chair to face the door that connected our offices. I could almost feel her presence on the other side, a nervous, radiant energy. My prize. So close. And soon, she would be mine in every sense of the word. The wait was almost over.
The smile still lingered on my lips, the taste of anticipation sweet on my tongue. She would feel my love, twisted as it is. She would learn to crave the very dominance that terrified her now. I would become the air she breathes, the shadow in her dreams, the need that burned beneath her skin.
"And of course," I whispered to the silent city, "I'll always be here to take her, to fuck her." The cycle was perfect. Her fear would turn to dependence, her resistance to addiction. I would be her salvation and her damnation, and she would thank me for it.
The door to my office opened without a knock. Only one person had that privilege.
Tokito stood there, but the usual easy-going mask was gone. His face was a grim slate, his eyes sharp with an urgency I hadn't seen in years. The casual energy he carried was completely absent, replaced by a stillness that screamed danger.
"My mother," he said, the words clipped and hollow. "And yours."
The air in the room changed. The warm, possessive thoughts about Nicole evaporated, replaced by an instant, glacial cold. I didn't need him to elaborate. There was only one thing that could put that look on his face, that could make him reference our shared, bloody history with two words.
"They're planning another one," Tokito continued, his voice low and deadly. "A strike like Kyoto. The intelligence is solid. They're mobilizing. They think with your father gone, we're vulnerable."
The memory flashed, bright and brutal: the hydrangeas, the sniper's crack, my mother's falling body, my uncle's skull cracking under the pipe wrench,Tokito's mother,an unfortunate passer-by. Shuya's smiling face.
The possessive desire for Nicole didn't disappear. It mutated. It fused with the old, cold hatred, becoming something darker, more potent. She was the future I was building. The Rakurai were the past that refused to die, a disease that needed to be cauterized.
I stood up, my chair rolling back silently. The city outside the window was no longer a symbol of my power; it was a battlefield.
"Good," I said, the word ice-cold and flat. "Let them come."
Tokito stared at me, a question in his eyes.
I looked toward the door that led to Nicole's office. To my prize. My future. The Rakurai weren't just attacking my clan. They were threatening what was mine. Again.
"This changes nothing about the dinner," I said, my voice dropping to a whisper that was more threatening than a shout. "In fact, it makes it more necessary."
Tokito understood. This wasn't a distraction. It was a catalyst. Claiming Nicole was no longer just about satiating an obsession. It was an act of defiance. A ritual of ownership before the war. I would solidify my power over her just as I prepared to unleash absolute hell on my enemies.
"Their attack will be their last mistake," I said, turning my gaze back to Tokito. "But first, I have a prior engagement."
The monologue about love was over. Now, it was about blood. And both, in their own way, were about claiming what was mine.
One part was cold, clear. The Rakurai had signed their death warrant. But the other part, the hotter, darker part, was fixed on her. On Nicole. My Nicole
The threat of attack doesn't change my plans. It makes them more urgent. I will have her before the fighting starts. I will taste her fear and her surrender. It will be my armor.
Seventy-two hours. I can almost smell her skin, see the terror in her eyes when she understands there's no escape. The black dress will be a funeral shroud for her old life.
She is the calm before the storm. And I intend to enjoy every second of it.