Max lifted a brow. “Not wise to threaten me.”

“Not wise to put your hand on a woman who is spoken for. If the situation were reversed, how would you react?”

“I start breaking legs.”

“I’m less civilized.” He flashed his teeth. “I’d break your face.”

Max shook his head. “So much violence in building. Might be contagious. Time for me to go.”

And he left the room with a flourish, his long jacket flapping like bat wings.

Shiori spoke first. “This might sound weird, but did that remind you of—”

“Dracula? Yeah.”

“Poor Ivan.”

“I’m sure Daddy’s millions take the sting out of humiliation.” As soon as he’d said it, he wished he hadn’t.

His beloved gave him a cool once-over. “If you’re done swinging your big dick around, we actually have some work to do.”

Knox boxed her in. “Let. Me. Make. This. Clear. He had his fucking hand on you. He’s goddamn lucky I didn’t break it off and shove it up his ass.”

“Knox—”

“Don’t.” He moved in until they were almost nose to nose. “No man gets to touch you. Especially not a rich asshole who acts like it’s his fucking right. The only man who has that right is me. And I will fuck up any man—I don’t give a shit who he is—for even thinking he can freely touch what’s mine.”

“You done?” she asked coolly.

“I don’t know. Is there anything else I need to clarify for you, Mistress, before I take my big swinging dick out of here and punch the fuck outta the heavy bag?”

Shiori framed his face in her hands. “You’ve made your point.”

“Good.”

“Can we kiss and make up now?”

He crushed her lips beneath his, intending to prove his ownership of her with a brutal kiss. But she wouldn’t allow it. She gave him tenderness instead. Letting her fingers stroke his cheeks and the line between his eyebrows. There was plenty of passion between them, but her forcing him to keep it contained had a staggering effect. It showed her deep understanding of him. Her acceptance of this side of him. And he understood that he’d needed her to take control because he had none.

She eased back on the kiss, but her hands remained on his face. “Better?”

He could only nod. Because he had the overwhelming urge to shout out his love for her.

“Now go punch something. I’ll put that big swinging dick of yours to good use later.”

*   *   *

THE following Friday night Knox draped his arm across the back of Shiori’s chair and surveyed the group that’d overtaken the corner booth at Diesel. It’d been a hellish week at Black Arts. As they counted down the days to the smoker, he decided everyone deserved to cut loose, if only for a few hours.

Even Maddox had accepted the drink invite. Deacon and Gil were on the far end of the booth, with Maddox in the middle, Fee sitting between him and Katie. Blue and Terrel were providing security for some teen concert, so they’d skipped out, as had Fisher, who had to be on the job early. Knox preferred to keep things informal, so he wondered how the dynamic would change when Ronin returned.

“I wish we could convince these guys to go someplace other than Diesel for a beer,” Fee said to Shiori. “Before you and Knox started sneaking around, we had a great time at Jackson’s.”

“We weren’t sneaking around that long before we let everyone know we were involved,” Knox said, leaning in to swipe one of Shiori’s fries.

“And some of us figured it out,” Katie said smugly.

“How did you think you knew something was going on?” Shiori asked.

“I saw you two the night of Ivan’s party at Fresh. When you went to ‘look around.’” She made air quotes.

“Jesus, Katie, way to be a creeper. Did you follow them?” Fee asked.

“No. I’d had too many shots and went to barf in the bathroom.” Katie also swiped one of Shiori’s fries. “I got lost on my way back. And I saw these two together at the rope demo station. Knox was tying her up in some fancy rope pattern. Like he’d done it a hundred times before, which kinda freaked me out. So anyway, I figured something had to be going on.”

Shiori patted Katie’s hand. “Can’t pull anything over on you.”

Fee choked on her drink, and Katie smacked her hand into the table. “That’s what I try to tell everyone, but no one believes me.”