Chapter 3 - THE ENEMY AT THE GATESBy 3:00 AM, Ghost had eaten half a bowl of broth and drifted into a deep, natural sleep, his heavy snores echoing softly through the penthouse. Willa sat cross-legged on the rug, her back resting against the base of a glass wall, her eyes heavy with exhaustion from her sixteen-hour day.
Jared stood a few feet away, watching her with an intensity that felt like physical weight.
"You can't go back to Brooklyn tonight," Jared said. It wasn't a suggestion.
"I have a shift at 6:00 AM," Willa fired back immediately, her eyes snapping open. "And I have an apartment. And a life."
"You have a basement clinic that smells like bleach and a stalker ex-boyfriend named Brendan who has been asking local bars if anyone has seen a girl matching your description," Jared replied smoothly, walking closer.
Willa’s blood ran cold. She scrambled to her feet, her hands balling into fists. "How do you—"
"I own this city, Willa," Jared interrupted, his voice dangerously low. "Nothing happens in the five boroughs without my knowledge. Brendan found your clinic three hours after you left with my men. He’s waiting for you."
Panic, sharp and suffocating, clawed its way up Willa’s throat. She had run. She had changed her routine, hidden her phone, erased her footprint. And yet, the cage had simply followed her.
"If I go back..." Willa whispered, her voice trembling despite her best efforts. "He’ll kill me. Or worse, he'll make me wish he did."
Jared closed the remaining distance between them. He stopped just inches away, towering over her. There was no warmth in his eyes, but there was an absolute, terrifying promise.
"Then don't go back," Jared said. "Stay here."
"And become your prisoner instead?" Willa spat out, tears of frustration stinging her eyes. "What’s the difference, Jared? You buy people. You own them. You keep them in golden cages!"
"I keep what is mine safe," Jared growled, his voice dropping an octave as a flash of dark fury ignited in his flinty eyes.
Before Willa could retort, a deafening sound shattered the quiet of the penthouse.
CRASH.
The private elevator doors didn't chime this time—they exploded inward, twisted metal and shattered glass spraying across the marble floor.
Jared’s head snapped toward the entrance, his entire body shifting into lethal, predatory readiness in a fraction of a second. He pulled a silenced pistol from his shoulder holster with terrifying speed, shoving Willa behind him.
"Stay down," Jared hissed.
Out of the smoke and ruined elevator shaft stepped a figure holding a heavy assault rifle, wearing tactical gear with a masked face. But behind him stepped someone Willa knew all too well.
Brendan.
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His face was bruised, his eyes wild and bloodshot, a psychotic grin spread across his lips as he pointed a pistol directly past the armed intruder toward where Willa was hiding.
"Found you, you little bitch," Brendan screamed over the ringing alarms. "Did you really think a few blocks in Brooklyn could hide you from me?"
