Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 11 - Chapitre 20

Chapter 11: The Gilded Cage

The boardroom of Vale Tower felt like a cage to Noah. *********** I sat at the head of the table, my fingers steepled under my chin, staring at a PowerPoint presentation about HanTech’s Q3 logistics that looked like a blur of meaningless shapes. My VP of Finance was droning on about "synergy" and "market saturation," but all I could hear was the way Marcus’s voice had scraped against my ear the night before. I own you, Noah Vale. **************** My suit jacket was a prison. The my tie felt like it was tightening every time I took a breath. I was thirty years old, the "Golden Prodigy," the man who was supposed to have every variable under control. But under this expensive desk, my knee was bouncing like a damn piston. I was sweating profusely even when the air conditioner was on,Not because of the merger, but because I felt like my skin was vibrating, like there was something inside me trying to claw its way out. I didn't know I was a ticking time bomb. I didn't know that my

Chapter 12: The verdict room

**********The hotel room felt like a graveyard the second Marcus left. I sat on the edge of the rumpled bed, the leather collar still warm against my skin, staring at the door. My body was still vibrating from that post-orgasm high clashing violently with the terrifying realization that I was falling for a man who kept a knife in his boot and secrets in his eyes.************I didn’t know that while I was sitting there, feeling like a king in a collar, Marcus was walking into a literal hellhole.The Council of Elders didn’t meet in boardrooms. They met in the basement of an abandoned cathedral in the Bronx, a place where the air tasted like damp stagnant blood. Marcus stepped into the center of the room, his boots echoing against the cracked floor.*******Six of them sat in high-backed stone chairs, cloaked in shadows. But it was the woman standing to the left who made the hair on Marcus’s neck stand up.Elara Westborn.She was a pure-blood vampire, very loyal and ruthless

Chapter 13: The Hunter’s Mark

**********The Bronx was a jagged maze of rusted fire escapes and rotting brick, and right now, Marcus Blackwood was moving through it like a shadow with a death wish.The red dot had vanished the second Marcus hit the pavement, but the adrenaline stayed, thick and metallic in his throat. He didn’t run like a human. He didn’t even run like a normal vampire. There was a desperate, twitchy energy in his limbs that felt more like a angry wolf on the hunt.*************Kris Heather. The name echoed in Marcus’s head with every heavy thud of his boots against a rooftop. He leaped a ten-foot gap between two crumbling tenements, his fingers clawing into the brick as he carried himself up. He wasn’t just losing a hunter; he was trying to outrun a century of failure. If Kris was here, it meant the Elders were right. The peace was a joke, and Noah—his sweet, oblivious, brilliant Noah—was the punchline.Marcus paused on a ledge, his breath coming in sharp, He looked back. Nothing but the

chapter fourteen

The elevator doors didn’t just open; they were violently shoved aside, screeching against the metal frame like a dying animal. *********** Marcus didn’t wait. He didn’t think. He grabbed me by the back of my suit jacket, his other hand swinging out to sweep the entire desk clean with one fluid, monstrous motion. Papers, tablets, and expensive fountain pens went flying as he shoved me into the small, hidden service stairwell tucked behind my office partition. “Move!” he growled, and I didn’t need to be told twice. We hit the stairs at a dead run. Marcus was a blur of adrenaline, his hand never leaving the back of my neck. He was checking the walls, his eyes darting into every corner, his nose twitching like a bloodhound. He stopped mid-stair, his fingers pressing into my skin so hard it bordered on painful. *********** “He’s been listening, Noah. The walls have ears, and he’s heard everything,” Marcus muttered, his voice tight with a rage that wasn’t directed at me, but at

Chapter 15: The First Lesson

*********** The gold in my eyes didn’t just fade; it burned out like a dying star, leaving my vision blurry and my head spinning. I was slumped against the cold concrete of the basement floor, my skin still slick with sweat and… well, us. Marcus was still hovering over me, his hands gripping my shoulders like he was afraid I’d float away or, worse, turn into something he’d have to put down. ************ The silence in that room was heavy. It wasn’t the peaceful kind of quiet you get after a good lay. It was the kind of silence that happens right before a building collapses. “Noah? Talk to me,” Marcus muttered, his thumb brushing my cheek. His voice was shaky—something I’d never heard from the guy who usually moved like he was made of steel and ice. “I feel… trippy,” I croaked, rubbing my eyes. “My head is pounding, Marcus. And that sound… that howl. Tell me that was a dog. Tell me some stray dog just got caught in a fence or something.” Marcus didn’t answer. He sat back o

chapter 16

The gun felt like a block of ice in my hand, heavy enough to make my wrist ache. Beyond the steel door, the world had turned into a literal horror movie. I could hear the sound of bodies hitting walls, the sound of breaking glass, and those horrible, high-pitched snarls that didn’t sound like anything a human throat could produce. Marcus was out there, fighting for me—fighting his own kind—and I was shaking so hard I could barely stand. ********** I didn’t stay by the wall. I couldn’t. The “gold” feeling was still sounding in my ears, making every sound ten times louder. I crept toward the doorway, my breath hitching as I saw a flash of movement in the red-lit hallway. ********** Marcus was a blur. He didn’t just fight. He moved with a speed that made my head hurt, snapping limbs and throwing bodies like they were made of straw. He looked like a god of death, his face splattered with dark blood, his eyes glowing of pure red color. But he was distracted. There were four of

chapter 17

The drive to the safehouse was a total mess, One minute I was staring at the sleek, glass-and-steel skyline of Manhattan, and the next, Marcus was whipping his beat-up SUV off the main road, the tires crunching over gravel and pine needles like they were breaking bones.*********He didn’t say a word. I didn't either. What was there to say? My life as a suit-wearing billionaire, a guy who obsessed over quarterly earnings and perfect board meetings, felt like it belonged to some other guy. That guy was dead. The guy in the passenger seat was shaking, sweating, and feeling like his veins were full of molten lead."We’re here," Marcus grunted, killing the engine.It wasn't a mansion or a retreat. It was a concrete box of a cabin, half-buried in the side of a hill. It looked like the kind of place where things go to be forgotten."Get inside," he commanded.I stumbled out of the car, my legs feeling like they were made of jelly. The air out here was freezing, smelling of damp earth a

Chapter 18: The Best Friend’s Mistake

“Ethan?” I whispered, the name feeling so strange in my throat.********Under the black silk blindfold, my eyes were wide open. The world was completely dark, but my head was exploding with sound. I could hear the crunch of dry leaves outside. I could hear the heavy, agitated panting of someone who had just run a mile uphill. And worst of all, I could hear that familiar, stuttering heartbeat.**********Marcus went completely still against me. The heat of his body, the heavy, dominant weight of his hands on my shoulders—it all vanished in a split second. He wasn’t my lover or my Master right then. He was an assassin who had just realized his safehouse was compromised.“Stay quiet,” Marcus ordered, his voice dropping to a dangerous, barely-there whisper.Before I could even nod, the heavy wooden door of the cabin didn’t just open—it crashed inward, slamming against the log wall with a bang that made my newly sensitive ears ring like a fire alarm.“Noah? Holy shit, are you—”The voice

chapter nineteen

Marcus didn’t wait for the glass to finish hitting the floor.He moved swiftly with the kind of grace that made my head spin, catching Ethan by the back of his jacket and literally throwing him toward the back of the cabin. I was right behind them, my heart hammering against my ribs so hard I thought it might actually crack a bone.“Get in the cellar! Now!” Marcus yelled out.*********We didn’t make it to the cellar. The next shot didn’t hit the glass; it ripped through the heavy log wall like it was made of wet cardboard. The sound was very loud, It carried a high-pitched, bone-chilling whistle—a sound that vibrated deep in my mouth and made my hybrid ears feel like they were about to bleed.***********“Silver-Siphons,” Marcus spat, his was face pale. He grabbed my arm, his grip bruisingly tight. “Change of plans. The cellar is a coffin. We run for the car.”He kicked out the back door of the cabin, and we tumbled into the freezing night air. Ethan was completely unraveled, his br

chapter twenty

Back in Manhattan, the Vale penthouse which is usually a fortress of quiet luxury and high-stakes power but now it felt like a damn morgue. ************ Mr Vale, a man who routinely commanded rooms of cutthroat executives with a single, icy stare, was currently pacing the length of his massive living room like a caged animal. He had ripped his expensive silk tie off hours ago, his tailored shirt wrinkled,He looked completely flustered, his face pale and aged ten years overnight. ************ “You’re telling me my son, a man who moves actual global markets, just evaporated?” Noah’s father yelled glaring at the lead detective standing uncomfortably by the broken glass of Noah’s home office. “You have his blood on the desk! You have a multi-million dollar security system that was wiped clean in sixty seconds! And your best guess is a *kidnapping*? *********** “Mr. Vale, we are exploring every avenue—” the detective started, looking thoroughly agitated by the billionaire’s wra

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