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THALIA POV

In my six years preparing to end Carlos, I’ve killed. I’ve almost been killed.

Marcus: Henry's older brother and the owner of Shadow lane, the mafia group where I'm trained made it a duty to always put me under life threatening situation.

Made sure I could take hits, not just deliver them.

“What a very brave way to invite a deep, painful death.”

The threat hits like a fist. My knees weaken at the pressure on my windpipe. He sure knows where to hit

“Aaaa… I...”

I truly can’t breathe. Can’t even complete a sentence.

“Too soon to show weakness now,pretty doll.” His voice drops lower, nails digging into my skin.

His hands are ice but his eyes are lava.

And that’s what pins me in place. Those dead eyes on a man in his early thirties. Deep and dark like his hair that's pulled back in a man-bun beneath thick brows on a clean-shaven olive skin.

I’ve watched him through camera lenses for years, and every time, the same thing strikes me: how utterly empty his eyes are. Like he killed his own soul long before he killed my family.

Now they’re locked on mine as he exhales cigarette smoke directly into my face.

My throat burns. My eyes water. Then he releases me.

I suck in air.

“Lucky you,I’ve always had a weakness for brave little things.” His gaze drags over my body. I'm on black lace top, black leather pants. My favorite outfit for blending into shadows and looking like a bimbo

He looks back up, completely unaware of the gun strapped to my ankle.

Before I can catch my breath, his fingers grip my jaw, forcing my face up.

"Play with me" He repeats.

One stupid information my nose decide to catalogue is his smell. He smells like sweet incense and tobacco. Raspberry melted with spice. Like something you’d want to inhale despite knowing it would poison you.

“When a stranger needs something, the word ‘please’ usually comes first.”

I commit to my grave. He flicks the ash of his cigarette then releases my jaw before taking precise steps back. His men grip my shoulders in return causing my earpiece to fall.

"Hmmmm.” He drawls, lighting a new cigarette with agonizing slowness.

“Am I… a stranger?”

Each word ease out from him like a taunt.

Anxiety floods my system instantly.

Does he know? No. Impossible. He never saw me that night.I was living with my grandmother across the country when it happened. I’ve lost the baby fat, sharpened my features. I’ve become someone else entirely.

But doubt creeps in, cold and insidious. I turn toward the door. Desperate for air, space, the ability to think without his presence scrambling my thoughts.

“Leave.”

Carlos’s lethal voice halts me.

His breath fans my neck while his chest pressing against my back. A solid wall of muscle and threat.

When did he get so close?

In one swift move, he turns me to face him, pinning my back against the door.

“Leave and you’ll find out why people disappear in my presence.”

He releases me.

I hate myself for how easily he subdued me. All those years of training, and I’m playing the helpless victim so convincingly I almost believe it myself.

I open my mouth. Close it.

The corner of his left lip lifts and he turns his back on me.

People in the lounge avert their gazes like they’ve seen nothing. Those in his path move aside immediately.

Then he seals my fate without looking back.

“Get her to the table.”

Orio’s hand clamps onto my arm. Another man pushes my shoulder.

“I’ll walk!”

I shake free and they let me.

#CARLOS POV#

In my years as Don of Viper Lane, everyone fears me. My rivals. My enemies.

Even Zara, eventually. Until now, where I'm seated across a fare skinned girl with lips that look like they were meant to wrap around my cock.

Mouth that speak words that call for spanking, punishment with a look that say there's more hidden beneath her bratty persona.

And I have never been more aroused in my life.

“I told you.” I let my temper flare.

“I. Don’t. Repeat. Myself.”

The temper isn’t about her disobedience or lack of fear. It’s about the fact that I want to watch that smart mouth form the word “please” and mean it.

I want to see her defiance crack. Watch that skin redden beneath my palm. Blindfold and suspend her, denying her release just for being rude.

But I can’t do that.

Instead, I watch her face cycle through emotions: defiance, anger, calculation.

Most people who face me realize their luck has run out and start begging. Or preparing to die.

Not her. She looks like she wants to murder me instead.

Which is interesting, because I want to do the same to her.

Pretty doll stares at the chessboard between us, then eases back into her seat with a smile that’s pure provocation.

I tilt my head, cataloging that smile. I want to swallow it whole. I want her to realize that I set the tone for every game, and a five-foot-ten woman with chaos for a mouth won’t change that.

I lift a brow at Orio.

He points his gun at her head. She goes completely still. A facade. I've seen people who are scared of gun

“Play,” Orio orders

“or never play again.”

I notice her fists clench and unclench beneath the table, trying to hide her anger.

“What are you.. ”

She stands to showcase her anger, but Orio shoves her back down with a hard push on her shoulders.

If looks could kill, I’d be ash.

I tip over two of her pawns with slow, deliberate movements.

Her eyes widen. Lips part, then close.

Full, soft lips.

“‘Never play again’ isn’t an empty threat.”

The dominance in my words infuriates her further, but she forces herself to calm.

She’s assessing. She knows she’s outnumbered. Two of my men are visible. More lurk in the shadows, and she’s probably figured that out.

Rain, her first opponent tonight is conspicuously absent.

“You didn’t introduce yourself or drop your stakes.” Her voice does things to me.

Funny.

I’m not playing stranger with you.

“You know who I am, Thalia.”

She’s lived with monsters.

Time she dances with one like me.