“Luna, stay close...or you die.”
The words left my mouth before thought even had time to shape them, and the weight of them didn’t hit me until after. I wasn’t Adrian Cross right now. I wasn’t the man who negotiated mergers or smiled at shareholders. That version of me died quietly a long time ago, replaced by something sharper, darker, unrelenting. Rogue had returned.
I looked down at her, the streetlight catching the faint sheen of snow on her hair. Her eyes met mine.....wide, alert, calculating...and I saw both trust and fear. Perfect. She had to be afraid. Fear made people predictable. Fear made them alive.
“I said stay close,” I repeated, my voice low, carrying the cold edge of a man who had killed without remorse.
She didn’t argue. Didn’t move. She just let me take the lead, her
