Her Ruthless Obsession

Chapter 7 – Smoke and Restraint

Dominic’s POV

The city bleeds past the windshield in streaks of neon, blurred and distorted through smoke-stained glass. Every light looks like fire, every shadow a hunter waiting to pounce. My hands stay welded to the wheel, the leather biting into my palms as if pain might anchor me.

I should be thinking about the mission. About the voice on the phone. About the three words that cracked open the grave I’ve spent years burying….

She knows about the ledger.

That phrase should have my head filled with contingencies: where the breach came from, how deep the leak goes, who to silence first.

But my mind isn’t on the ledger.

It’s on her.

Valentina sits inches from me, close enough that the air between us carries her heat, her scent. Smoke. Gunpowder. Blood. And underneath it, something maddeningly alive—wild, sweet, untamed. She’s silent, but her silence isn’t peace. It’s a blade resting on my throat, daring me to breathe wrong.

She shouldn’t still be here.

That grenade should’ve painted the dock with her insides. But instead, she hurled death back at the men chasing us, then rose from the smoke like she was born in it.

And now every part of me aches to remind her what happens to people who steal my thunder.

She shifts in her seat, and leather creaks. “Who was that?” Her tone is steady, too damn steady.

I keep my eyes on the road, jaw locked. If I look at her now, I’ll give her more than she deserves. “Wrong question.”

A laugh, sharp and bitter, slips from her throat. “You don’t like people poking at your skeletons, do you?”

“You’ve got enough of your own to bury, bella.”

The word slips out unguarded, coated in a rasp I don’t recognize. Bella. Beautiful. Deadly. My curse.

Her eyes flick to me, sharp and assessing. She doesn’t comment, but I can feel the shift. The air thickens until it presses against my chest.

Focus.

The car smells of metal and smoke, the tang of coppery blood clinging to both of us. My pulse hammers loud enough to drown out the city noise.

I need to put distance between us. Mentally, physically, both. But instead, I hear myself ask

“Why’d you do it?”

She arches a brow. “Do what?”

“Throw yourself on a grenade like you had nothing to lose.”

Her smirk curves slowly. “Maybe I don’t.”

The words hit harder than they should. I grip the wheel tighter. She’s lying. She has plenty to lose. She just doesn’t realize it yet.

Silence stretches between us again, taut as wire. My eyes stay forward, but my awareness circles her like a predator. The way her blouse clings to her ribs, ripped and soot-stained. The pulse at her throat, beating too fast for calm. The smear of ash along her jaw that makes me want to wipe it away with my thumb—and then trace lower, across the skin I shouldn’t imagine.

My control strains. Every instinct I’ve trained into iron discipline threatens to snap.

“Pull over,” she says suddenly.

My head jerks, just slightly. “What?”

“Pull. Over.”

Her voice carries no room for argument, so I obey before I can stop myself, coasting under a dark overpass where shadows choke the light. The car idles, engine humming low, the only sound between us.

Valentina turns toward me. Fully. Deliberate. Her body angles close, blouse stretched taut, eyes glinting like she’s about to carve me open.

“Tell me about the ledger,” she says.

My chest tightens. For a moment, I don’t breathe.

I lean back against the seat, forcing air into my lungs. “Careful, Valentina. You don’t want to know the things I keep locked in there.”

She leans in too, slow and taunting. Her voice dips low, brushing against my nerves like silk. “Don’t I? Maybe I’ve already guessed. Maybe that’s why you can’t stop looking at me like you want to tear me apart.”

My jaw ticks. Heat coils in my gut, sharp and hungry.

“Stop.” My voice comes out harsher than intended.

Her lips twitch. “Make me.”

The world narrows. Her mouth is right there, parted just enough. Her scent thickens the air. My hand twitches against the gearshift, aching to reach for her throat, to close the distance and taste the fire she keeps baiting me with.

Instead, I slam my fist against the dash. Plastic cracks. The sound detonates between us like another grenade.

“You don’t know what you’re playing with.”

She doesn’t flinch. She smiles. Slow. Wicked. “Neither do you.”

That smile should piss me off. Instead, it unravels me. I want to crush it off her lips until there’s nothing left but gasps and the bite of teeth.

The car is suffocating with heat. I hear my own pulse in my ears. I see her pupils blown wide, her chest rising faster, the faint tremor in her fingers she probably thinks I didn’t catch. She’s not unaffected. She’s playing the same game.

And one of us is going to break first.

The phone buzzing on the console slices through the tension like a blade.

I snatch it up, dragging air into my lungs as if it might clear the haze. One message glows on the screen.

They’re coming for her.

Ice douses the fire instantly. My gaze jerks to Valentina. She watches me, expression unreadable, but her body is coiled—ready.

For the first time, I realize the war isn’t just circling me anymore.

It’s circling her.

And God help us both, I don’t know if I’m more furious at the threat

Or at how much the thought of losing her already burns.

I gun the engine. Tires shriek against the asphalt as I peel out from under the overpass. Neon blurs back into firelight, the city’s heartbeat pounding against ours.

“We’re not going back to your penthouse,” I say.

Valentina’s eyes narrowed. “Why not?”

“Because if they know about the ledger, they know about you. And if they know about you—”

“They’ll come for me,” she finishes, calm as steel. Then she tilts her head. “Let them.”

My grip tightens on the wheel. “Don’t be stupid. You’re not bulletproof.”

“Neither are you, Ghost.”

Her voice is cool, but her fingers drum against her thigh. A tell. She’s rattled, no matter how hard she tries to hide it.

I take a sharp turn, cutting down into the industrial district, weaving through shadows where cameras don’t reach. Ten minutes later, I pull into an unmarked garage, keying in a code only three people alive know.

The steel door groans shut behind us, sealing out the city.

Safe house. My third one in this sector. Concrete walls, blacked-out windows, racks of weapons lining the walls. The air is cool, metallic.

Valentina slides out of the car, eyes roaming the room like she owns it. She doesn’t flinch at the sight of enough firepower to start a war. She just quirks a brow at me.

“Cozy,” she says.

“It’s not supposed to be.”

I move past her, checking locks, securing blinds, resetting sensors. Muscle memory. But my awareness stays hooked on her every movement.

She trails a finger across the table where I’ve laid out maps, leaving a streak through the dust. Then she turns, leaning against it, arms crossed, blouse clinging to curves I can’t stop noticing.

“So,” she says softly, “what’s the plan?”

The plan.

My mouth is dry. My head is full of tactics—cut comms, relocate assets, smoke out Luca’s men. But every time I try to speak, I see the grenade spinning between us, her hand throwing it back, the smoke painting her in fire.

What I want isn’t tactical. It’s primal.

I want to slam her against that table. I want to taste the blood and smoke on her lips until neither of us can breathe.

But if I start—if I give in—I won’t stop.

I drag a hand through my hair, pacing, trying to burn the thought away. “The plan is to stay alive long enough to find who leaked the ledger.”

“And then?”

“And then,” I rasp, “I burn them all.”

Her gaze sharpens, something sparking in it. Approval. Maybe even hunger.

“You talk about fire a lot, Dominic.” She steps closer, deliberate. Her scent coils around me again, choking restraint. “Maybe you’re just afraid to admit you want to burn with me.”

I pivot sharply, pinning her with a look that should cut her in half. Instead, it only seems to feed her.

“Don’t test me.”

She smiles. “What if I want to?”

The air between us is electric, a fuse waiting to be lit. My chest heaves. My fists clench. Every inch of me screams to close the gap.

And then—

Bang.

A sharp crack shatters the night. Glass explodes inward from the far window. A bullet embeds itself in the wall an inch from her head.

Valentina doesn’t scream. She just tilts her head toward me, lips curving in a smirk.

“Looks like they found us.”