Chapter 17
982 Words
The moment Nyah finished speaking, Dominic knew something irreversible had shifted.
This wasn’t rebellion anymore.
This was threat.
Not loud. Not reckless.
Precise.
The kind that came from someone who had finally stopped begging to be spared.
“You’re exhausted,” he said calmly. Too calmly. “You don’t understand what you’re implying.”
Nyah didn’t blink. “I understand exactly what I’m implying.”
The phones kept buzzing. Messages stacking. The world outside clawing its way in.
Dominic ignored all of it.
His focus narrowed to her.
The way she stood without the collar now, chin lifted, shoulders squared like she’d already accepted the cost of defying him. That alone made something violent coil in his chest.
“You don’t get to weaponize your proximity to me,” he said. “Not after everything I’ve done to keep you alive.”
She scoffed. “You don’t get credit for keeping what you trapped.”
That was it.
He crossed the room and reached for her—not roughly, but decisively—gripping her jaw between his fingers and forcing her to look at him.
“Listen to me very carefully,” he said quietly. “This scandal? This pressure? It changes nothing.”
Her pulse jumped under his thumb.
“You are not leaving,” he continued. “You are not speaking to anyone. And you are not threatening me again.”
Her breath shook, but she didn’t pull away. “Or what?”
“Or I stop pretending this is about restraint.”
The words landed heavy.
He released her and turned away, already dialing.
“Activate Protocol Grey,” he said into the phone. “Effective immediately.”
Nyah’s stomach dropped. “What did you just do?”
He ended the call and faced her.
“I closed every door you could run through,” he said. “Financial. Legal. Digital. You don’t exist outside this house anymore.”
Her face went pale. “You can’t—”
“I already have.”
She backed away a step. “You said you wouldn’t erase me.”
“I said I’d protect you,” he replied. “This is what protection looks like when the world wants blood.”
Her nails bit into her palms. “You’re punishing me.”
“No,” he said. “I’m securing what’s mine.”
That word again.
Mine.
“You don’t own me,” she whispered.
Dominic stepped closer, towering over her. “Then stop acting like you’re disposable.”
Her eyes flashed. “You’re the one treating me like a liability!”
He exhaled sharply. “Because you are—to everyone but me.”
The admission hung between them.
“You think they care what happens to you?” he continued. “My father’s advisers already drafted three narratives. In two of them, you’re a villain. In the third, you’re dead.”
Her breath hitched.
“I stopped that,” he said. “I buried those drafts. I made you untouchable.”
“At what cost?” she asked.
He leaned in, voice low. “Me.”
Silence.
She searched his face, finally seeing it—the pressure, the fury, the fear he refused to name.
“This isn’t about control anymore,” she said slowly. “This is about you being afraid to lose.”
His jaw tightened. “I don’t lose.”
“You’re losing yourself,” she said.
Something dark flickered in his eyes.
“I’ve already lost worse things,” he replied. “You’re not joining that list.”
Her voice dropped. “You’d destroy me to keep me.”
“No,” he said immediately. “I’d destroy the world first.”
That was the truth.
She felt it.
And for the first time since the scandal broke, Nyah was truly afraid—not of what he could do to her, but of what he would do for her.
“You’re suffocating me,” she said.
“I’m shielding you,” he corrected.
“You’re terrified,” she whispered.
He stared at her, unmoving.
Then, softly: “Yes.”
The word cracked something open.
“I don’t know how to protect you without control,” he admitted. “Every time I loosen my grip, someone reaches for you. Uses you. Turns you into a weapon.”
She swallowed. “That doesn’t make you better than them.”
“I never said it did.”
Another phone buzzed. He ignored it.
“You think letting you go would save you?” he continued. “It wouldn’t. It would make you prey.”
“So you’d rather cage me?” she asked.
“I’d rather you hate me and live,” he said, “than love me and be destroyed by them.”
Her chest ached.
“That’s not love,” she said.
“No,” he agreed. “It’s obsession.”
The honesty stunned her.
He stepped closer, stopping just short of touching her.
“I don’t expect forgiveness,” he said. “I expect survival.”
She looked up at him, eyes bright with unshed tears. “And what happens when I stop surviving and start fighting?”
His mouth curved—not in a smile, but something sharp.
“Then,” he said, “I’ll fight with you.”
She shook her head. “No. You’ll fight me.”
His gaze locked onto hers. “If you make me choose—”
She cut him off. “You already have.”
They stood there, locked in a stalemate neither could afford to lose.
Outside, the world circled.
Inside, the lines between protector and captor blurred beyond recognition.
And Dominic knew one terrifying truth:
He wasn’t holding onto Nyah anymore.
He was holding himself together through her.
And he would burn anything that tried to take her away—even if it meant burning her too.
- Writer
