LOGINI woke to the sound of the lock turning. My body ached in layers—welts from the belt, the deep residual stretch from the plugs, the dull throb where the clamps had bitten. I was still naked under the sheet. The door opened and a woman I had never seen before stepped in carrying folded black clothing and a glass of water. She set both on the side table, looked at me once without expression, and left. The lock engaged again.I drank the water. The clothes were simple: soft black pants, a fitted long-sleeved top, nothing underneath. I dressed slowly. Every movement reminded me what he had done the night before.Less than an hour later the door opened again. This time it was Kane.He wore a black shirt with the sleeves rolled once, the same controlled stillness as the club. His eyes moved over me, cataloguing the way I stood, the marks that still showed above the neckline of the top, the careful way I held myself.“Downstairs,” he said.I followed him through the quiet corridors of the ho
The black car was already waiting at the private rear exit.Kane’s hand stayed at the back of my neck as he guided me into the back seat. The dual plugs shifted hard with every step; the moment I sat, the pressure drove deeper and forced a broken sound out of my throat. He slid in beside me, closed the door, and the vehicle pulled away without a word from the driver.I wore only the oversized black shirt he had thrown at me. The hem barely covered the tops of my thighs. The welts from the belt still burned. Between my legs I was sore, stretched, and leaking him. The city lights moved past the tinted windows like something that no longer applied to me.Kane didn’t speak for the first ten minutes. He simply watched me in the dark, one arm resting along the back of the seat, the other holding his phone as he typed short messages. When he finally pocketed it, he turned his full attention on me.“Crowe will know by morning that the job failed,” he said quietly. “He’ll assume you’re either
I stood in the center of the room holding the clutch like it still mattered. The red dress that had been my weapon now felt like a joke. Lucian walked past me without hurry, set his jacket over the single chair, and turned.The winter-glass eyes were colder up close.“You can drop the act,” he said. “The soft voice, the dramatic movement,I saw it the moment you stepped onto the upper level.”I opened my mouth. He raised one hand and the words died.“Crowe sent you. The drive in your clutch is standard issue for his people—four-minute upload, short-range, designed to look like a makeup compact if anyone bothers to check. You’re the third girl he’s tried in eighteen months. The other two left the city. One of them left pieces of herself behind.”My fingers tightened around the clutch until the edges bit into my skin.“I don’t know who Crowe is.”Kane’s mouth curved, small and humorless.“Lie again and I’ll make this worse than it already has to be.”He crossed the space between us in tw
I climbed the last step onto the upper level with the red dress moving against my skin like a promise I wasn’t sure I could keep.The two men at the entrance of Lucian Kane’s booth looked at me the way security looked at everything—measuring distance, threat, usefulness. I gave them the hostess smile, the one that said I belonged here and posed no danger. One of them stepped aside without a word. The other stayed exactly where he was, eyes never leaving my face.Inside the booth the air was cooler, quieter. The music from the main floor reached us only as a low, distant pulse. Lucian sat alone in the center of the curved black leather, one arm resting along the back of the seat, the other holding a glass of something dark that still hadn’t been touched. The third man stood near the far wall, hands folded, gaze moving between the entrance and his employer.Kane’s eyes were already on me.I felt the weight of them like a physical thing—cold, assessing, completely uninterested in the usu
The office sat on the forty-first floor of a glass tower that never truly slept. From the windows you could see the entire southern half of the city stretched out like something waiting to be owned. Mr. Crowe liked the view. He liked reminding people that he sat above most of them.I sat across from him with my legs crossed, the short black dress riding high on my thighs the way he preferred when he wanted to test whether a woman still knew how to use her body as a weapon. He didn’t look at my legs. He looked at the open file on his desk like it was the only thing in the room that mattered.“His name is Lucian Kane,” Crowe said in a voice that was almost bored. “Thirty-eight. Head of the Kane family since his father was put in the ground six years ago. Controls the docks, three of the largest high-end clubs on the east side, and half the private security contracts in this city. Cold doesn’t begin to cover it. The last woman who tried to get close to him ended up with two broken finger
I woke to Mei’s hand on my hip.The dual glass plugs were still locked inside me—heavy, unyielding, the curved one pressing deep enough that every breath reminded me they were there. Mei checked both bases with practiced fingers, then nodded once toward the doorway where Dylan stood watching.“They held,” she reported.“Remove them and clean her. Then begin.”Mei worked the plugs free one after the other. The emptiness that followed made my hips twitch against the sheets. She cleaned me thoroughly, the warm cloths and mild solution stinging the tender, stretched flesh, then dried me with the same detached efficiency.Dylan stepped fully into the room. He was already dressed in black trousers and an open shirt. His eyes moved over my naked body with calm ownership.“Today Mei uses you first,” he said. “I will watch and direct. After that I will take you while she assists. The recordings from last night will be reviewed when we finish. On your back. Legs open.”Mei positioned me at the







