The Price
395 Words
Chapter 16 – The Price
The mansion gates burst open with gunfire.
Alesia was in the shower, Nico’s scent still on her skin, the brand on her chest still healing—when chaos exploded outside.
Guards shouted. Alarms wailed.
Then—
“Alesia!”
Her heart stopped.
It was her brother’s voice.
He had found her.
Before she could reach the door, Nico was there—wet with rain, blood spattered across his white shirt, gun in hand.
“You said you had no family,” he growled.
“I thought he was dead!”
“Now he is.”
She gasped. “You didn’t—”
“No,” Nico snapped. “But I will if he tries to take you.”
She ran to the window.
Her brother stood outside the front entrance—hands up, shouting her name, begging her to come with him. A dozen armed guards surrounded him. Nico’s men.
“Alesia!” he called. “They took you! You don’t belong to him!”
She trembled. She didn’t know what to do.
Nico stepped behind her, wrapped a hand around her waist. Pressed the barrel of his gun to her hip.
“He’s your past,” he whispered. “I’m your fate.”
Tears slid down her face.
“You said I was free to choose.”
“You are,” he said, voice tight with fury. “But just know this—if you walk out that door, I won’t stop you. I’ll drag you back. And this time, I’ll chain you where no one will ever find you.”
She looked at her reflection in the glass.
The bruises on her neck. The brand on her chest.
The woman staring back wasn’t the girl who had been kidnapped.
She was someone new.
Someone darker.
Someone his.
She turned away from the window.
Walked past him.
And locked the door.
“I’m not leaving.”
Nico exhaled, slow and ragged. The gun dropped from his hand.
Then he kissed her.
Hard.
Rough.
Full of relief and rage.
And when he lifted her onto the bed to claim her again, it wasn’t about s*x.
It was about ownership.
Each thrust was a warning to the world: She is mine.
And she welcomed it all.
Because the price of freedom was too high.
And belonging to him… was worth everything.
- Writer
