Chapter 83 84
Darren’s POV
By the time I reached her penthouse, my nerves were shredded. My shirt stuck to me with sweat, my throat was dry, and my eyes kept darting over my shoulder like a hunted animal. Because that’s what I was.
The doorman looked startled when I barged in at nearly 3 a.m., muttering Krystal’s name like a prayer. I didn’t even care about appearances anymore. I needed her. Needed her to anchor me before I lost my mind.
When the elevator doors slid open to her floor, I half-expected silence. Darkness. Maybe even rejection.
Instead, the double doors opened, and there she was.
Krystal.
Barefoot in silk pajamas, robe tied loose at the waist, hair falling in lazy waves. She looked like something soft and untouchable — not the sharp, cunning heiress I had pegged her as.
And for a second, my chest tightened.
“Darren?” Her voice was a blend of surprise and sleepiness, though something in her eyes flickered quick. “What happened to you? You look like hell.”
I tried to laugh, but it came out broken. “You… you don’t know the half of it.”
She stepped aside and let me in without hesitation. The smell of lavender and expensive candles wrapped around me, and suddenly the world outside — the threats, the shadows, the chaos — felt miles away.
I sank onto her couch like a man collapsing at the altar. “I think someone’s after me. Anderson… maybe worse. Krystal, I—” My voice cracked, and I hated that she could hear it.
But she didn’t mock. She didn’t question. She just eased onto the couch beside me, close enough that I felt the warmth of her skin through silk.
“You came here,” she said softly, almost like it was a statement of victory. “You trusted me.”
I met her gaze, and damn it, I couldn’t look away. There was no ridicule there, no high-society disdain like I’d seen in a hundred other women who wore money like perfume.
There was just… her.
She reached for my hand, fingers cool, elegant. “Darren, whatever it is… you don’t have to carry it alone. Let me help.”
God, those words. I wanted to believe them.
I wanted to believe her.
I swallowed hard, my pulse slowing for the first time all night. “You don’t know what you’re offering. If you tie yourself to me, you’ll be dragged down too.”
She tilted her head, lips quirking in that maddening, playful way. “Then maybe I like the idea of being dragged down… as long as it’s with you.”
My chest burned. I laughed, half-bitter, half-relieved. “You’re crazy.”
“Maybe.” Her eyes danced. “But so are you, barging in here at three in the morning thinking you’re not about to eat the chocolate croissants my chef just finished baking.”
She stood before I could argue, gliding to the kitchen. And I sat there, dazed, caught between panic and something terrifyingly close to comfort.
Because in the middle of my worst night — running from shadows and assassins — I felt something I hadn’t in years.
Safe.
And the more time I spent with Krystal, the more I wondered if maybe, just maybe, she was the only real thing in my world.
Krystal’s POV
I watched him from the kitchen doorway as he slumped on my couch, shoulders loose, head tilted back like the weight of the world had just slid off him.
Good.
Every crack in his armor, every confession, every desperate glance — I filed it away like diamonds. He was falling, step by step, into the snare I had built for him.
And when he finally let himself believe I was his refuge, his safe harbor…
That’s when I’d remind him who I really was.
But not tonight.
Tonight, I’d feed him croissants, make him laugh, and let him taste the comfort he craved. Because comfort made the knife cut deeper later.
I smiled to myself, soft and sweet. Dance for me, Darren. Dance until you can’t stop.
Darren’s POV
I shouldn’t have gone back.
Two days of hiding out in Krystal’s penthouse had made me forget what it was like to walk into my own world. Two days of silk couches, soft croissants, her quiet laugh echoing off marble walls… I almost convinced myself I could breathe again.
But when I stepped into my apartment, reality slammed into me like a freight train.
It was ruin.
The door had been kicked off its hinges, the furniture ripped to shreds like a pack of wolves had been through it. Glass crunched under my shoes, my bookshelves toppled, clothes scattered like confetti across the floor. My carefully kept life — gone, just like that.
And worse.
Scrawled in jagged black across the wall, over the ruins of a framed family photo, were the words:
“You’re next.”
My gut twisted. Because it wasn’t just my apartment they’d touched.
They’d called my brother. My sisters. Even my father. My sister had answered one of the calls — a low, distorted voice promising that if I didn’t crawl back into the hole I came from, my whole bloodline would bleed for me.
I leaned against the wreckage of my dining table, fists clenched so tight my knuckles cracked.
This wasn’t just business anymore. This was war.
And I was losing.
Back at Krystal’s Penthouse
By the time I stumbled back again to her, I was a man stripped raw.
She opened the door without hesitation, her eyes wide, her robe tied loose like she’d been waiting for me.
“Darren, you are back already?” she whispered, and it was the way she said my name — soft, like it mattered — that nearly undid me.
“They trashed my place,” I rasped. “Threatened my family. They—” My throat closed up, rage and despair knotted too tightly to speak.
Her lips parted. She stepped closer, hand brushing my arm. “Then stay here. Don’t go back. Not until it’s safe.”
I wanted to argue, but I couldn’t. Her penthouse felt like the only place untouched by chaos.
And when she pressed a sleek black card into my hand — $100, cash ready, no questions asked — I almost broke.
“Use it,” she said. “Counter them. Make your moves. Don’t let Raven think you’re weak.”
I stared at her, stunned. “Why are you doing this for me?”
Her smile was small, secretive, like it came from some private place I wasn’t allowed to see. “Because you came to me. Because you trust me.”
God help me, I did.
For the first time, I thought maybe I had her. That she wasn’t just another Manhattan elite using me as a pawn. That she cared.
But I didn’t know the truth. That every dollar she handed me, every soft word she spoke, every safe night she gave me was part of the trap.
That the plan to burn the Andersons had always been hers. That I was only her delivery boy — too blind to see the strings tied tight around my wrists.
I thought I had her.
But in reality, she had me.