Ana didn't speak as the black SUV wound through the narrow Roman streets. She sat beside Hayden, their legs touching, his hand resting loosely over hers. But the silence between them wasn't peace—it was pressure. The kind that came before a storm.
She hadn't asked where they were going. Hayden had simply told her, *"You need to see something."*
That was hours ago.
Now, as the car slowed to a stop outside a gated estate nestled in the hills just beyond the city, she felt her stomach tighten.
"This place," she murmured, "looks like a fortress."
"It is," Hayden replied. "Used to belong to a man named Dario Vega. Arms dealer. Laundered money for half the European underworld."
"Used to?"
"He's dead."
Ana turned to him. "Did you—?"
"No," he said smoothly. "But I let it happen."
The iron gates creaked open and the car pulled through.
The estate was cold and beautiful—glass, marble, and brutal architecture. Guard towers. Cameras. The kind of place that whispered violence in every stone. It wasn't just protection. It was a message.
Power lived here.
"Why bring me here?" Ana asked as they stepped out of the car. The wind tugged at her coat, and she instinctively stepped closer to him for warmth.
Hayden didn't answer immediately. He walked ahead, motioning for her to follow. Inside, the house was eerily silent. Dimly lit. Spotless.
Ana trailed behind him down a hallway lined with old oil paintings—men in suits, their faces cold and expressionless. Mafia bloodlines, she realized.
He led her into a room at the end of the hall—a study. Massive oak desk. Crystal decanter. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves.
But what made her freeze was what sat on the desk.
A file.
Her name stamped across the front in bold black ink.
ANA NICHOLAS.
She stared at it.
"What is this?"
"Everything," Hayden said. "Everything I've learned about you over the past two years."
Her throat closed. "You kept a file on me?"
He nodded. "It's what I do."
She moved toward it like it was a bomb. Slowly, she opened the folder.
Inside: surveillance photos. Her apartment. Her gallery. Her walking through Hyde Park with her headphones in, smiling at nothing.
Receipts. Bank records. Phone logs.
Her entire life dissected.
"You invaded everything," she whispered.
Hayden stepped closer. "Yes."
"Why show me now?"
He reached past her and flipped to the last page. It wasn't a report. It was a photograph—of her. Sleeping. Her head on a pillow, lips slightly parted, golden hair spread around her like a halo.
Taken just a few nights ago.
"This one's not in the file," he said softly. "It's mine."
She looked up at him, her heart racing. "Why did you really bring me here, Hayden?"
"Because you still don't understand what I am," he said. "What I've done. What I'll still do."
She held his gaze. "Then show me."
He stared at her for a long time, then stepped closer, his hands sliding around her waist.
"You think you can handle the monster?"
"I've already let him inside me," she said, voice trembling. "I might as well meet him face to face."
He growled low, something primal and furious and aroused all at once, and then he kissed her—hard. Lifting her onto the desk, scattering the pages like ash, pushing between her thighs with a hunger that bordered on cruel.
"You're playing with fire," he breathed against her skin.
"I already burned," she whispered.
And the flames consumed them both.