The storm hit just after midnight.
Not the kind that soaked streets or rattled windows—but the kind that scorched from within, burning everything in its path.
Cassian stood in the doorway of the gallery wing he'd closed just for tonight. Tall, still, like a god carved from obsidian. His suit jacket lay discarded on a chaise. The open collar of his shirt exposed the tension rolling beneath his skin.
Riven stood across the room, his inked chest rising and falling like he'd just run from something—or toward it.
Maybe both.
"You told me you wanted control," Cassian said, voice cool as crystal, "but everything about you begs to be undone."
Riven's jaw clenched. "You don't get to decide what I beg for."
"Oh?" Cassian stepped closer. "You showed up tonight wearing my colors. That chain around your neck? I gave that to you."
Riven swallowed, the red velvet cord catching the light as if it were glowing. "That doesn't make me yours."
Cassian's smirk curved with dangerous promise. "No. But you've tasted what it means to be. And you keep coming back for more."
The air between them turned electric—thick with unsaid truths, half-lies, and a hunger too raw to be spoken.
When Riven moved, it was fast—reckless. He shoved Cassian back against the marble pillar, fingers curling into his shirt. Their lips crashed, not in harmony, but in battle. Desperation laced every pull, every breath.
Cassian didn't yield. He pressed Riven back, spun him around, and pinned him against the cold stone. "Is this what you want?" he whispered into the crook of his neck. "Or is this just another fire you don't know how to control?"
Riven's laugh was sharp. "I want to burn."
And they did.
Their mouths collided again, heat tangled with fury. Fingers gripped, yanked, clutched. Buttons flew. Breaths turned to groans, gasps, snarls. The room pulsed with tension, every surface witness to something dangerous and sacred.
But in the haze of passion, something else bled through—rage.
It wasn't just lust between them. It was betrayal. It was obsession. It was Cassian's need to own and Riven's refusal to belong.
"You think you can trap me with velvet," Riven hissed as Cassian's hand found his jaw, thumb brushing his lips like a promise and a warning.
"I don't need velvet to bind you," Cassian murmured. "You're already mine."
Riven's gaze darkened. "Then prove it."
And Cassian did—wordlessly, forcefully, almost reverently.
Their bodies collided like thunderclouds—two storms destined to destroy or fuse. The gallery echoed with the sound of them—grunts, curses, whispered names.
By the time dawn bled over Caldris City's skyline, the velvet rope lay discarded at their feet.
But neither man had truly let go.
And as they lay in the aftermath, Riven staring at the ceiling while Cassian traced the ink over his ribs, one truth lingered unspoken:
They had crossed the point of no return.