Chapter 18
1046 Words
The first message came through an encrypted channel Nyah didn’t know existed.
You don’t belong to him.
If you want out, I can help.
It arrived at 2:11 a.m.
She stared at the screen, heart hammering, every instinct screaming trap.
Then another message followed.
I have proof. Contracts. Orders. Names.
He’s not your protector. He’s your handler.
Her throat went dry.
Someone knew.
Not rumors. Not headlines.
Details.
She didn’t reply.
She didn’t need to.
The next afternoon, the man introduced himself anyway.
They met in the garden—her garden, the one Dominic believed was sealed tight. The guards were still there, but positioned farther back, instructed not to hover. A calculated mercy.
The man was older. Polished. Calm. The kind of smile that promised safety while measuring how much you’d cost.
“My name is Calder Ross,” he said, extending a hand she didn’t take. “I work with people your… partner has crossed.”
Nyah folded her arms. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Neither should you,” he replied easily. “Yet here we are.”
She felt it then—the manipulation sliding into place.
“You’re being used,” Calder continued. “You’re leverage in a war you didn’t choose. Dominic Vale doesn’t protect what he loves. He weaponizes it.”
She swallowed. “You don’t know him.”
“I know his pattern,” Calder said. “Women vanish around powerful men. Usually quietly. Sometimes permanently.”
Fear crept up her spine.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“To help you disappear,” he said. “For real. New identity. New country. No collars. No cages.”
The word made her flinch.
Calder noticed.
“I have evidence,” he added softly. “Enough to destroy him. But I don’t want to use it—unless I have to.”
A choice wrapped in silk.
Nyah’s voice shook. “If you have proof, why come to me?”
“Because he’ll burn the world to protect you,” Calder said. “And I’d rather point that fire in the right direction.”
The air shifted.
Behind them, a shadow moved.
Dominic.
He hadn’t made a sound.
Calder turned slowly, smile faltering just a fraction.
“Well,” he said. “That was fast.”
Nyah spun. “Dominic—”
“Go inside,” Dominic said calmly.
“No,” she said. “You’re not—”
His gaze flicked to her. Sharp. Commanding. Final.
“Now.”
She hesitated.
That hesitation would haunt her.
She turned and walked inside.
The doors slid shut behind her.
She didn’t hear the argument.
She didn’t hear the threat.
She didn’t hear the gun.
Only later, when the house went unnaturally quiet, did she feel the weight of it settle into her bones.
Dominic came to her that night.
There was blood on his cuff.
Not splattered.
Placed.
Intentional.
Her stomach dropped. “What did you do?”
He didn’t answer right away. He walked to the bar, poured a drink, didn’t touch it.
“He wasn’t going to help you,” Dominic said finally. “He was going to sell you.”
Her breath caught. “You don’t know that.”
“I do,” he replied. “He’d already made the calls.”
She shook her head. “You killed him.”
“Yes.”
The word landed like a verdict.
“For me?” she whispered.
“For us,” he corrected.
She backed away. “You didn’t have the right—”
“He was going to use you to tear me apart,” Dominic snapped. “I won’t allow that.”
“You don’t get to decide who lives because of me!”
His eyes burned. “I already did.”
Silence crashed between them.
“You said you wouldn’t burn the world,” she said, voice breaking.
“I said I’d burn it first,” he replied. “Before it touched you.”
She laughed weakly. “You think this makes me safe?”
“It makes you untouchable.”
She wrapped her arms around herself. “It makes me complicit.”
Dominic stepped closer.
“This is the cost of standing next to power,” he said. “You don’t get clean hands.”
“I didn’t ask for this,” she said.
“I know,” he said softly. “I chose it for you.”
That—that was worse.
He reached into his pocket.
The collar caught the light.
Her heart slammed. “No.”
“You took it off in defiance,” he said. “The world took that as an invitation.”
She shook her head, backing away until she hit the wall. “I won’t wear it again.”
“You will,” he said.
“Dominic—”
He closed the distance and pressed the collar into her hands.
“This isn’t punishment,” he said quietly. “It’s a warning. To them.”
“And to me?” she whispered.
His jaw tightened.
“To you,” he admitted, “it’s a promise.”
Her hands trembled. “You’re forcing this on me.”
“Yes.”
The honesty stole her breath.
“If you walk out there without it,” he continued, “someone else will try what Calder did. And next time, I might not be fast enough.”
Tears burned her eyes. “You’re making me a symbol.”
“I’m making you untouchable,” he said again.
She looked at the collar.
At the blood drying on his cuff.
At the man who had killed for her—and would do it again.
Slowly, with shaking fingers, she lifted the collar.
He fastened it himself.
The click echoed like a gunshot.
“There,” he murmured. “Mine.”
Her chest ached. “You’ve crossed a line you can’t come back from.”
He rested his forehead against hers. “I crossed it the moment I chose you.”
She closed her eyes.
Outside, a body was already being erased.
Inside, Nyah understood the truth with terrifying clarity:
Dominic Vale wasn’t protecting her from the world anymore.
He was declaring war on it.
And she was the reason.
- Writer
