He wants to hurt Jonathan

Selina

I didn’t need a report. I didn’t need any headlines. I didn’t even fucking need Vera to confirm what I already felt thrumming beneath my skin like static.

Lucas was making moves, but I knew it was not toward me. It was around me.

The kind of moves a man makes when he’s too angry to be reasonable — and too possessive to let go.

The kind of moves that mean something far more dangerous than a game of power.

It started with a whisper. A client of Jonathan’s pulled a deal — vague reasons. Timing too convenient. Then a journalist reached out to my PR team “off the record,” asking questions that made my stomach drop. Financials. Misfiled taxes. Employment gaps from six years ago. Dirt that had no business resurfacing unless someone had gone looking for it — hard.

And that someone? Had claws.

I confronted Vera in the war room — a private office laced with biometric locks and lined with soundproof steel. The kind of place you build when you trust no one.

Her arms were folded, tablet glowing with data. “It’s coming from Blackwood territory,” she said.

“Lucas?” I asked, already knowing.

She didn’t answer. She didn’t need to because we both knew that man was up to no good.

I turned to the wall monitor. A map lit up — red dots for searches, blue for leaks, and black for paid inquiries.

He wasn’t just snooping. He was circling.

“Why?” Vera asked softly. “Why him?”

Because Jonathan kissed me in public, and I let him touch me while Lucas watched. Lucas Blackwood doesn’t share.

My jaw clenched as I stepped away from the screen. “Pull everything.”

Vera raised an eyebrow. “Everything?”

“Every move Lucas made in the last 48 hours. Surveillance, proxies, shell companies. I want to know who he called, what he paid, and what he bought.”

“And when you find out?”

I looked her straight in the eye.

“I burn it.”

That night, I didn’t sleep. Not because I was afraid, but because I was angry.

Lucas had walked into my life uninvited. Touched me like nothing had changed. Whispered things that made my body betray me. And now — now he was trying to break the only peace I had managed to build after him.

He wasn’t trying to win me. He was trying to destroy the man I’d allowed into the life he abandoned. I wasn’t some object to be repossessed. And Jonathan wasn’t his collateral damage.

At sunrise, I stood on my penthouse balcony, sipping coffee I didn’t want, watching the skyline turn gold.

Damon stirred behind me, wrapped in his favorite blanket, yawning.

“Mommy, why are you up?”

“Because the world never stops moving.”

He came to stand beside me, tugging at my hand. “Did someone make you mad again?”

I looked down at him. That sweet, fierce little face.

“Yes,” I said softly. “But not for long.”

Later that day, I made a call.

Not to Lucas. To someone older. Someone dangerous.

An old family contact — the kind you pretend doesn’t exist until you remember why power stays in bloodlines.

“I need pressure applied,” I said.

“To whom?”

“Lucas Blackwood.” He paused and took a deep breath and then chuckled.

“Interesting.”

“I want his pressure points exposed. Not his holdings — his shadows.”

“Understood.”

I hung up before hearing more.

I didn’t need details.

Only results.

By noon, Vera delivered the intel.

A dossier.

Twenty-six pages of names, movements, contacts, and off-record decisions.

She handed it to me like a weapon.

I took it like a queen taking back her crown.

Jonathan hadn’t called all day.

He knew. He could feel the tension bleeding into the air like poison. And I knew he was questioning everything — me, my past, what this meant.

But he was still here.

He hadn’t run. And that? That meant something.

When I arrived at his apartment that evening, I didn’t knock.

He opened the door before I raised my hand, like he’d been waiting on the other side.

“You’re late,” he said.

I stepped inside.

“You’re being hunted,” I replied.

He didn’t flinch. He closed the door.

“By him?”

“Yes.” Jonathan poured a drink. Not for me. Just for himself. His hands were steady.

“Why?”

“Because you touched something he thought he still owned.”

He looked at me then, eyes dark. “Do you?”

I blinked. “Do I what?”

“Belong to him.”

I didn’t lie."No, he's actually Damon's father."

He looked at me and raised an eyebrow. "Does he know he has a son, Sel?"

I didn’t say no. I said, “That’s not the point.”

He laughed once. Dry. Bitter. “It’s exactly the point, Selina.”

I stepped closer. “I never promised you anything.”

“You didn’t have to. But I deserve to know if I’m collateral.”

He was brave. Too brave and not nearly afraid enough of what Lucas was capable of.

“You’re not collateral,” I said. “You’re the shield.”

He stared.

“What?”

“Lucas is trying to crack me. To control me. To mark territory, he forfeited.”

“And me?”

“You’re the only proof I’ve moved on.”

I didn’t say, even if I haven’t. I didn’t need to. He saw it in my silence.

That night, I didn’t stay. I kissed him — slow, soft, and tender — not for desire, but for goodbye.

And when I left, I knew the war had changed.

Lucas wasn’t just attacking my peace.

He was testing my loyalty and I was done being tested.