His Name Is Kenai: Now I Own You, Little Sister

Chapter 7

KENAI.

I saw that dress on a prison TV with the volume muted and a guard snoring three feet away. Red satin. Off-shoulder. A slit that was made to start arguments and end promises.

The model wore it like merchandise. I pictured my little sister in it and felt the cell shrink around me. Some things choke you without hands.

Shannon would wear it better.

I memorized the brand, the collection, and the stitch at the hem the camera caught when the model turned. Weeks later, I bought the dress. Not the lookalike. The exact same dress. Paid for the alterations before I even had her measurements, because I already knew them. I had known them since she was seventeen and still thought oversized sweatshirts made her invisible.

It’s not magic. It’s obsession and math.

Yeah, it cost a fortune, but that was fine. Except that I wasn't the one standing beside her when she wore it. Her f*****g husband, who didn't know a thing about luxury, kept running his hand over her body like he had the right to.

The tulip came after. White. She used to trace tulips in the margins of her notebooks when she was supposed to be doing algebra. I was the only one who noticed. Of course I was.

I wanted the box to arrive in the afternoon when she’d be alone. I wanted her to hesitate at the door, sign with a shaking hand, carry it in like a bomb. I wanted her to lift the lid and forget how to breathe. And I wanted her to think of me before she found the note. She did. I can always tell when she’s thinking of me; the fear hums under her skin.

And, f**k, did I forget to mention that I had one or two hidden cameras planted in strategic corners of her house?

I watched her walk into my party wearing my dress, and every civilized thing in me went very, very quiet.

She is not beautiful in the way magazines sell it. She is feral and soft at once. Her shoulders move like she remembers how it felt to be prey. That’s what people don’t understand about her. She’s not fragile. She’s hunted.

And he — her husband — put his hand on the curve of her hip like a man checking a price tag.

One look at him, and I was a second away from solving a problem in front of two hundred witnesses. Snap, drop, silence. The angle would be quick. The cameras would catch nothing but surprise. But I have learned patience. I took my rage and polished it until it became restraint.

I let him live because I needed him as my pawn. Then I'll send him away.

He doesn’t know I own his flights, his schedule, his supervisor’s enthusiasm, his new apartment key in Charlotte, the lamp in the corner that flickers because I like the thought of him not sleeping well. He thinks he’s working his way up. He is being moved like furniture.

When the host started reciting his script, I stood behind the curtain and watched Shannon pretend to drink. She kept looking for him, then for her friend whom she would not be seeing for a while, then back at the floor.

I sent the text when the room leaned into the drumroll—I hope you liked the dress. You look stunning in it. Not a question. Not a compliment. A statement of ownership.

She read it. The blood left her face so fast I could have sworn I felt the temperature drop from here. She tried to look normal for five whole seconds and failed beautifully. Then the room applauded, and the lights softened, and I stepped out into the life I built.

I walked to the center stage and found her easily. She always thinks she’s good at hiding in crowds. She forgets I learned her tells before she learned to drive. Her chin lifts when she’s pretending to be brave. Her fingers worry the seam of whatever she’s holding. When she’s about to run, her left foot angles toward the nearest exit. Tonight it pointed at the main doors. Predictable.

Our eyes met.

She said my name in a voice so small I could have put it in my pocket. The glass fell from her hand and broke like our past.

I smiled the way civilized men are taught to smile. It was a shallow, professional curve that tells other people I am human. While it was a courtesy for the audience, it was a warning for her. She actually heard what it really said.

Then I went to meet her husband.

“Mr. and Mrs. Walker,” I said, and held out my hand, eyes on the only person in the room who mattered. He took it like a starving man takes a free meal — too eager, too grateful, not aware there’s a hook. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”

“The pleasure is ours, Mr. Grayson,” he said. Polite. Bright. Trying. I could smell his nerves through the cologne. He wanted to impress me so badly that he was sweating under his jacket. He didn’t notice I hadn’t looked at him once.

Up close, the dress was better than I imagined. The fabric remembered the last hand that touched it. I could read the map of where he’d smoothed his palm over her hip, where he’d held the small of her back like a man waiting for permission. I wanted to take his wrist and bend it until he learned something about ownership.

She smelled like lilac and nerves.

If I’d been the one standing beside her tonight, I wouldn’t have palmed her like a possession I didn’t understand. I would have caged her with a hand at her waist and a hand at the base of her neck. I would have told the room, without raising my voice, that she was not available for conversation.

I would have taken her glass and offered mine, and watched her mouth the rim just to mark it. I would have told her to breathe, and she would have, because her body listens to me even when her brain is pretending not to.

And when she said my name — because she would have, sooner or later — I would have put my mouth to her ear and reminded her that good girls don’t say private names in public.

Does that sound cruel? It’s not. Cruelty is leaving a girl to drown in the consequences you took for her.

Shannon stared like she’d seen a ghost and realized it had teeth. Good. Reality should hurt when you’ve ignored it this long.

It also meant the little efforts I had put in just to look a little different from what she'd been paying the prison guard to see in prison had worked.

I bet she was as confused as she was nervous.

She whispered, “Kenai…?” and my name fit in her mouth exactly the way it used to. I could have answered. But I f*****g didn’t.

Because tonight, I was Greyson. And Greyson was the professional bastard who was about to take her husband away from her tonight.

Tonight would be a night of reckoning for my little sister.

You think that’s jealousy. It’s not. Jealousy is insecure. I am certain.

She’s always been mine. All this is correction.