Chapter 7 - Burn Marks

It started with a name. Raven didn’t mean to find it. She was just filing. Organizing the chaos Jaxon called his empire, ledgers, rosters, invoices from shell companies that all looped back into Club Eden’s bloodstream. She was supposed to be focusing on the liquor shipments, but her fingers slipped, and a folder tumbled to the floor, spilling across the polished concrete.

She knelt, cursing under her breath, gathering sheets into a pile, until one name stopped her cold. Isabelle Voss.

She knew it. Knew the name like a knife she’d once kept hidden in her coat pocket. Isabelle had been a dancer at another upscale club on the east side. She disappeared three months ago. No note. No family contact. The only thread Raven had ever found was a whisper from another girl who claimed Isabelle was “recruited” for something “better.” Her body was never found.

Raven’s heart pounded as she scanned the document. Club Eden employee roster. Isabelle’s name was there. Dated two weeks before her disappearance.

Raven blinked, hands shaking. It was the first concrete proof she'd found that one of the missing girls had been inside Eden. That she’d been under Jaxon’s roof. On his payroll. And then gone.

Her stomach flipped. “Fuck,” she whispered and then the guilt hit, because her first instinct wasn’t to call it in. It was to hide it.

She slipped the page into her waistband, beneath her blazer, and covered it with her shirt.Then she stood. Adjusted her face. Breathed.

She found Talia in the dressing room, sitting cross-legged on the makeup counter, painting highlighter across her collarbone.

“You ever heard of Isabelle Voss?” Raven asked, voice too low, too sharp.

Talia froze. Didn’t answer. That was answer enough.

“She was here, wasn’t she?” Raven pressed. “She danced at Eden.”

“I don’t know anything.”

“That’s bullshit.”

Talia turned slowly. Her smile was all teeth, but her eyes weren’t smiling at all. “Rae. You don’t get to waltz in here, wear silk and sit in the king’s lap, and then pretend you care about girls you never met.”

“I do care.”

“Then stop asking questions.”

Raven stared at her. “You knew her.”

Talia looked away.

“Did Jaxon...”

“No,” Talia snapped. “He doesn’t have to do the dirty work. That’s what makes him clean. That’s what makes him untouchable. Girls disappear because we break the rules. Or we don’t play nice. Or we get too curious. Or too close.”

“Isabelle was one of us. She was too much of us.”

Raven’s throat tightened. “What does that mean?”

“She started thinking she mattered,” Talia whispered.

Raven flinched. It was too close. Too familiar. And then Talia’s tone changed, bitter and brittle. “He sees everything, Rae. And he always tests the ones he wants to keep. You think he’s watching you because he cares? No. He’s deciding if you’re strong enough to survive him.”

Raven turned to leave.

“Wait,” Talia said, quieter now. “You find out too much, they’ll take you to the Black Room.”

Raven paused. “What’s the Black Room?”

Talia didn’t answer. But her silence screamed.

That night, Raven danced for the first time. Not on the stage. Not for tips. In his private lounge, under low lights and soft jazz, with no audience but Jaxon.

She hadn’t planned it. She hadn’t known what he wanted when he summoned her, but when she arrived, he was already seated in the center of the room, a tumbler of whiskey in one hand, his gaze unreadable.

He didn’t speak. Just nodded to the speaker system in the corner.

She crossed to it, chose a song, slow, smoky, sultry, and pressed play. Then turned. The music filled the space like heat rising. And Raven began to move.

It wasn’t a performance. It was an offering. Her hips rolled with rhythm. Her eyes stayed on him. Every step was deliberate, each sway a question she already knew the answer to.

Jaxon didn’t move. Didn’t drink. Just watched.

Like a man watching fire burn too close to the curtains.

She peeled off her blazer first. Then her blouse. Then the black lace bra beneath it. Her fingers skimmed her ribs, her thighs, her pulse points.

She danced closer. Between his knees now. She straddled his lap. Still, he didn’t touch her.

“Are you trying to seduce me?” he asked, voice low.

“No.”

“Then what are you doing?”

“Reminding you I’m still me.”

He smiled, dark, hungry, impressed. “Not for long.”

He finally touched her. His hands gripped her hips and slammed her down against his thighs. She gasped. The friction sent shockwaves through her.

“You want to dance?” he growled. “Then feel the burn.”

He didn’t undress her further. Just moved beneath the lace and silk, sliding two fingers down the seam of her panties.

She was soaked. “You’re such a greedy little thing,” he murmured, thumb brushing her clit. “You think this makes you powerful?”

Her moan answered for her.

He pulled back. Stood. Walked behind her. “Bend over the table.”

She hesitated. He said nothing. She bent.

The wood was cool against her skin. Her chest flattened against it. Her hands braced.

Jaxon pushed her skirt up and pulled her panties down with one swift tug.

“You’re still wet from dancing for me,” he said.

She nodded, panting.

“Use your words.”

“Yes, Daddy.”

He groaned. “You’ll earn the rest.”

His hand came down hard. The first slap landed square on her ass. Not cruel. Not light. It burned.

She gasped, body jerking.

Another slap. Then another. Each one harder than the last. Each one followed by the soft brush of his fingers, soothing, only to strike again.

She cried out. But it wasn’t pain that made her sob. It was release.

“You’ve been holding back,” he said behind her. “Trying to stay in control. Even when you kneel. Even when you break.”

He leaned in, voice in her ear. “I’m not punishing you, Raven. I’m freeing you.”

Another slap. Her knees buckled. And then, heat.

His mouth, on her skin. His tongue licking the sting. “You taste like desperation,” he murmured. “And pride.”

His fingers slid between her thighs again. She whimpered. “You don’t come yet.”

He stopped. Left her there, panting. Exposed. “Get dressed.”

She stood on trembling legs, pulled her panties up, her skirt down, chest heaving.

“You’ll feel that for days,” he said, sipping his drink again. “A reminder.”

“A reminder of what?”

“That I don’t need to fuck you to own you.”

Later, in the silence of her hotel room, Raven looked in the mirror. Turned. Her skin was streaked in red. Five perfect handprints. She touched one gently and hissed at the sting, but she didn’t cover it. She stared at the reflection of those burn marks and felt the strangest thing: Pride.

She opened her journal: He left marks on me tonight. Not bruises. Not damage. Something deeper. I danced for him to prove I still had power.

But when he touched me, I didn’t feel weak.

I felt stripped. Honest. Like he’d peeled away everything false.

Talia said girls disappear because they think they matter. But maybe they disappear because they do.

She closed the book and lay back on the bed, thighs still sore, body still thrumming.

Tomorrow, she’d dig deeper into Isabelle’s past, into the Black Room and into him, but tonight, she’d sleep in the burn.