Twisted Vows

A Poisoned Invitation

By morning, Ava didn’t need an alarm to wake up—Kian’s absence did the job for her.

The bed was warm on her side and cold on his. A silent message. He hadn’t slept beside her all night.

She rose slowly, slipped into a silk robe, and padded across the penthouse. The scent of espresso wafted from the kitchen, but it was the soft, rhythmic punching of boxing gloves that drew her attention toward the gym across the hall.

Kian.

Alone.

Shirtless, sweat-slicked, fists wrapped tight. Hitting the bag like it owed him an apology.

She leaned on the doorway, arms crossed.

“Who are you fighting this morning?” she asked lightly.

He didn’t pause. “Everyone.”

She smiled, but there was no humor in it. “Including me?”

He stopped, chest heaving, eyes dark.

“No,” he said. “Especially not you.”

A beat passed. His jaw clenched. “I needed to hit something that wasn’t Selene’s smug face.”

“Tempting,” Ava murmured. “But messy.”

He tore off the gloves and grabbed a towel. “She sent something this morning.”

The invitation arrived wrapped in white silk ribbon, tucked inside a gift box of preserved black roses.

Ava opened it while Kian was still on a call. Her nails traced the heavy, cream cardstock—no logo, no sender, just four words in glossy ink:

“Join me for absolution.”

The Crimson Room. 9 p.m.

Tonight.

She knew exactly what it meant.

The Crimson Room was one of Manhattan’s most exclusive, deliberately hidden venues—a private club for billionaires and their sins. Membership required not money, but leverage. A scandal. A secret. An untraceable edge.

It was Selene’s domain. A room designed for masks and mirrors. And now, she was summoning them like pawns on a board she thought she still controlled.

Ava smiled.

Not amused.

Armed.

At 8:56 p.m., Kian guided Ava from the back of the car, hand warm on the small of her back. They didn’t use the front entrance—Selene’s message included a side alley code.

The building looked like an abandoned art gallery, its windows blacked out, the facade covered in graffiti. But the moment they stepped through the hidden door behind the rusted fire escape, the world changed.

Red velvet walls. Noir jazz melting through the air. Every table lit by candlelight, shadows licking the edges of the room like hungry whispers.

And at the center of it all—Selene.

Seated alone on a circular couch shaped like a rose petal. Dressed in deep emerald silk that shimmered like poison, she looked up as they entered, her lips curving in something dangerously close to affection.

“Ava. Kian. You’re early.”

Ava stepped forward first, a half-smirk gracing her lips. “We like to see the battlefield before the shots are fired.”

Selene laughed softly. “Oh, darling, this isn’t a battlefield. This is the opera. And you’re tonight’s duet.”

Kian didn’t sit. He stood behind Ava like a shadow with a temper. “Say what you want to say, Selene.”

Selene gestured toward the open bottle of Saint-Émilion on the table. “Do relax. The curtain hasn’t even risen yet.”

Ava tilted her head. “You brought us here for a performance. Let’s skip the overture.”

Selene poured herself a glass. “Very well. I want to propose… a correction. You’re spiraling. The headlines are too predictable. Your marriage too manicured. It’s boring.”

Ava leaned in, voice low and sharp. “And you think we need your choreography?”

Selene took a sip of wine. “I think you’re dancing on a wire strung over a graveyard.”

Kian’s jaw flexed.

Selene’s eyes flicked to him. “You, Kian, used to be… feral. Now you’re someone’s husband playing PR prince. That’s not love. That’s a leash.”

“I’m not leashed,” Kian said flatly.

“You’re wounded,” Selene corrected. “And you’ve convinced yourself this—whatever this is with her—is healing. But it’s only hiding your infection.”

Ava stood, wine untouched.

“You brought us here to preach, not to negotiate,” she said. “So let’s end the sermon.”

Selene’s smile was slight. “If you ever get tired of pretending, Kian, you know where to find me. I still remember what your real instincts feel like.”

Ava turned on her heel. “And I remember what your funeral will feel like if you touch him again.”

They didn’t speak on the drive home.

Not until the elevator doors closed behind them, and the penthouse swallowed them whole in its cool quiet.

Then Ava dropped her clutch onto the marble counter and turned.

“You didn’t answer her.”

“I didn’t need to,” Kian said.

“That’s not the same as defending me.”

He stepped forward. “You really think I let her get to me?”

“No,” she said. “But you let her talk like she could.”

Kian didn’t argue. He reached out, but Ava stepped back.

“I need a shower.”

“Alone?” he asked, voice low.

She paused. “Not if you remember who I am in there.”

The water was blistering hot.

Ava stood beneath it, letting it sear the words Selene had etched onto her bones. Kian stepped in behind her silently, wrapping his arms around her waist, forehead resting between her shoulder blades.

“I don’t want to lose you,” he murmured.

“You won’t,” she said, turning in his arms. “Unless you let her make you forget me.”

His mouth found hers—slow, then urgent.

This wasn’t desperation. It was desperation’s answer.

She reached for the soap, but he took it from her. Lathered her body with reverence, like she was made of fault lines and he worshiped earthquakes.

And when she pushed him against the tile, kissed his jaw, and whispered, “Don’t speak. Just listen,” he obeyed.

Water dripping, lips parted, eyes fierce.

She sank to her knees, looking up at him like a prayer with teeth.

Because Selene had tried to make her feel like a placeholder.

And Ava?

She was the damn monument.

Her fingers trailed up his thighs, deliberate and unhurried, nails grazing the sensitive skin just above his knees. Kian's breath hitched. She didn’t touch his length—not yet. She let the anticipation coil like smoke in the air between them.

He looked down at her, lips parted, chest rising with tension. But she wasn’t asking for permission.

Ava pressed a kiss to his hip bone first—soft, reverent—then another to the base of his abdomen, just above where he ached for her. His hands tightened at his sides, resisting the urge to grip her hair. She could feel his restraint trembling.

Then, finally, she wrapped one hand around him—slowly, possessively.

“You belong to me,” she whispered, her voice rough silk.

And then she took him into her mouth.

Hot. Wet. Controlled.

There was no frantic rhythm. No rushed pleasure.

Ava gave him powerlessness disguised as ecstasy.

She let him feel every stroke of her tongue, every tightening pull, every calculated pause where her eyes met his, daring him to lose control. She hollowed her cheeks, her pace maddeningly slow—enough to make him curse under his breath and rock forward instinctively.

But she gripped his hips and pinned him back.

“No,” she said, her lips brushing his tip. “You don’t f**k my mouth. You receive it.”

Kian growled, his eyes dark, pupils blown wide.

And she gave it to him again—deeper, faster this time—until his thighs quaked and a broken moan fell from his lips.

When he was close, when his body trembled like a wire strung too tight, Ava pulled back and used her hand to finish him—firm, unrelenting, with her lips still teasing the edge.

He came with a strangled gasp, chest heaving, hand fisted in her damp hair at last. She didn’t flinch. She held his gaze the whole time, watched him unravel, owned every inch of his surrender.

When he was spent and gasping, she kissed his hip again—gentler now, almost comforting—and stood.

She didn’t ask how it was. She didn’t need to.

He looked wrecked.

Worshipped.

Ruined.

She walked past him toward the bed, tossing her towel aside like a challenge over her shoulder.

“You still think I’m a leash?” she called, voice low and amused.

Kian laughed under his breath, shaky and raw. “No,” he said. “You’re a goddamn guillotine.”

Ava turned, smirked over her bare shoulder. “Then kneel next time.”

And Kian knew—with bone-deep certainty—that no matter what war Selene started, it would end on Ava Monroe’s terms.

Later, wrapped in towels and exhaustion, they lay in bed without speaking. Ava’s fingers danced over Kian’s chest, tracing invisible truths.

Finally, he asked, “Do you think she’s going to strike next?”

Ava looked up at him. “No. She already did.”

“And?”

“I just haven’t decided how I’m going to return it.”

Kian smiled. Not his usual smirk. Not his public grin.

A real one.

“You scare me when you talk like that.”

She kissed the side of his neck. “That’s because you know I’m not bluffing.”