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CHAPTER 106: AFTERMATH
Fecha de publicación:
2026-07-24 17:48:46
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OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 110: JAMES'S ANGER
CIARA The glass facade of Horizon Holdings loomed over the Manhattan skyline like a monument to a life I barely recognized anymore.Standing in my top-floor corner office, I looked down at the toy racing car sitting on the edge of my sprawling mahogany desk—the same little car Adam had been clutching in his fist at the safehouse just weeks ago. The contrast was enough to give me vertigo. One day I was cleaning Matthew’s blood off the floor of a cramped bathroom in a remote cabin, and the next, I was stepping out of a town car in a tailored designer suit, pretending that the billions of dollars flowing through Horizon’s accounts were the only thing occupying my mind.We were supposed to be safe. Matthew had locked his family away in their own home, turning their palace into a prison. But the phantom weight of the Vance name still hung over us, a suffocating pressure that made every shadow in the corporate hallways look like an ambush.A sharp, demanding knock shattered the quiet of my
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 109: BREAKOUT
MATHEW The iron in my hands was the only thing that felt real anymore.The local gym I’d found on the outskirts of town wasn’t like the pristine, high-end athletic clubs in Manhattan where Alexander and my father used to sweat in tailored activewear. This place was a concrete bunker. It smelled of rusted iron, stale sweat, and cheap chalk. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered with a dull, irritating hum, casting harsh shadows across the rubber-matted floor. It was exactly what I needed. I lay back on the flat bench, my boots planting firmly into the floor. My right shoulder was still stiff, the jagged laceration from the assassin’s nitrate wire a tight, pulling ache beneath my dark gray t-shirt. The stitches Ciara had put in were mostly holding, though a faint, dull throb pulsed through my upper back with every movement. My cracked ribs grumbled a protest as I arched my spine, settling my shoulder blades against the vinyl pad.I gripped the knurled steel of the barbell. Three h
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 108: DESIRE UNLEASHED
CIARA Without a word, I met Mathew in the center of the main room. I didn't care that Carlista was asleep on the sofa or that men were outside keeping watch. I just needed to touch him. I wrapped my arms carefully around his uninjured side, avoiding the freshly bleeding gauze on his shoulder, and pressed my face against his chest. He let out a low, ragged groan, his massive left arm coming around to pull me impossibly close."It's done," he rumbled against my hair, his voice completely spent. "They're trapped. They're never coming for us again.""Come with me," I whispered, taking his large, calloused hand. "Let's clean you up."The bathroom of the safehouse was small, cramped, and smelled faintly of pine cleaner and old wood. A solitary, warm yellow bulb cast long shadows across the frosted glass of the standing shower and the porcelain sink. I turned the handle of the shower dial all the way to the right, letting the pipes groan before a thick, heavy stream of hot water began to hi
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 107: A SON'S DEFIANCE
MATHEW The smell of old coffee and vanilla didn’t wash the copper taste of adrenaline out of my mouth. Every breath I took dragged against my cracked ribs like broken glass, the thick gauze Mary had wrapped around my shoulder already feeling tight and wet.I looked down at Ciara, her forehead pressed against the hollow of my throat. She was my anchor, the only clean thing left in a world covered in soot and blood. But as I stared over her shoulder at Adam, watching the peaceful rise and fall of our son's chest, I became numb.My father had sent an assassin. Not to negotiate, not to threaten, but to erase us. He had reached out from his golden cage to touch my family, and in doing so, he had signed his own death warrant."Stay here," I rumbled, my voice a low vibration against Ciara’s hair. I gently disengaged my arms from around her, the movement sending a sharp, white-hot spike of agony through my upper back. I didn't flinch. I couldn't afford to. "Carlista is still here but Louis i
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 106: AFTERMATH
CIARA The ride back to the cabin was a masterclass in annoying silence.I sat in the passenger seat, my fingers clamped so tightly around the strap of my camera bag that my knuckles turned a ghostly white. The leather felt cold, a stark contrast to the thick heat that seemed to radiate from the man sitting next to me.Mathew kept his left hand glued to the steering wheel, his jaw clamped shut with enough force to crack bone. His right shoulder was heavily bandaged under his torn leather jacket, a temporary fix Mary had thrown together before she and Louis hauled Arthur’s failed assassin into the back of the SUV. The dark stain of his blood had stopped spreading, but the scent of it—mixed with the sharp, bitter stench of the nitrate wires he’d just ripped out with his bare hands—filled the tight cabin of the truck.We had just overthrown an empire, but the ghosts of the Diamond syndicate weren't going down without trying to drag us into the dirt with them.When Mathew finally pulled t
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 105: SUICIDE BOMBER
MATHEWThe van doors hadn’t even slammed shut on James’s departure before the hairs on the back of my neck stood up."Mathew?" Ciara asked, her shoulder still pressed against my arm as we walked toward the gravel road. She felt the sudden, rigid shift in my posture. Her hand immediately went to the side of her coat, her fingers searching for the familiar shape of the weapon she wasn't carrying today."Stay behind me," I grated, my voice dropping into that low, gravelly vibration.I didn't look at her. My eyes were already scanning the perimeter. The production crew was scattered near the two white utility vans parked where the wooden pier met the gravel turnaround. Two technicians were rolling up heavy black power cables; another was carrying a silver reflector panel toward an open side door and then there was the runner.He was moving down the gravel incline from the main road, his boots skidding slightly on the loose stones. At a glance, he looked like a late arrival from the local
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 6: THE FIGHT
MATHEW I stood in the centre of the ring, my knuckles wrapped in tape, looking at the guy opposite me. Tony. The same guy who had been buying drinks for Ciara at the university bar for months. The same guy who looked at her with those smarmy, possessive eyes and the same idiot who came with her to
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 5: THREAT
CIARAMaggie's eyes narrowed as she took in our dishevelled state-mud-caked shoes, rain-soaked clothes, and the undeniable scent of sex clinging to us like a second skin. I instinctively stepped back, crossing my arms over my chest as if that could hide the evidence of our encounter."Well, isn't t
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 4: ARGUMENT
CIARAMaggie's eyes narrowed as she took in our dishevelled state-mud-caked shoes, rain-soaked clothes, and the undeniable scent of sex clinging to us like a second skin. I instinctively stepped back, crossing my arms over my chest as if that could hide the evidence of our encounter."Well, isn't t
OWNED IN THE DARK CHAPTER 3: FORBIDDEN FRUIT
I began pacing around. "Go check out Ciara's movement, and if she's recently made new friends. "Damn .. I need to fix this fast." What did you find?""She's just recently started seeing Tony. She's not made new friends, and she just got out of the hospital."I still go very still at the word hosp
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