The kiss from moments ago still burns on my lips.
But this—what's happening right now—feels different. That first kiss was victory. This is something else entirely. Something slower. Something more deliberate. Something that feels like the moment before a storm breaks and destroys everything in its path.
"I belong with you." The words hang between us, echoing in the sealed conference room like a confession I can never take back.
Dominic's hands drop from the wall, releasing me from the cage of his arms. But he doesn't step back. He stays close enough that I can feel the heat radiating from his body, close enough that if I leaned forward even slightly, we'd be touching.
"Say it again." His voice is rough, raw in a way I've never heard from him. "But this time, look at me when you say it."
I force myself to meet his eyes. They're dark, burning with an intensity that should terrify me. That does terrify me. But underneath the fear is something else—something that feels dangerously close to relief.
"I belong with you."
His expression shifts. Something cracks in the controlled mask he wears, and for a split second I see genuine emotion break through. Not possession. Not victory. Something deeper. Something vulnerable.
Then it's gone, replaced by that familiar darkness.
"You understand what that means?" He reaches up slowly, giving me time to pull away. Giving me the illusion of choice even though we both know I'm not going to move. "What you just admitted?"
His fingers brush against my cheek, feather-light, testing. My instinct is to flinch, to step back, to create distance between us.
I don't move.
His hand settles against my face, his palm warm against my skin. His thumb traces my cheekbone with a gentleness that contradicts everything terrifying about this moment.
"It means you're not just my secretary anymore." His other hand finds my waist, spanning it with possessive certainty. "It means you're not Marcus's fiancée. It means you're mine in every way that matters."
"Dominic—"
"No." His thumb moves to my lips, silencing me. "No more protests. No more denials. No more pretending that what we have is professional or appropriate or anything other than what it actually is."
"Which is?"
"Obsession." He says it like it's the most natural thing in the world. Like it's something to be proud of instead of something to be concerned about. "You're not a possession, Bella. A possession is something you own. Something that has no will of its own."
His hand on my waist pulls me slightly closer, eliminating what little space remained between us.
"You're an obsession. Which means I think about you constantly. I plan around you. I make decisions based on what will keep you in my orbit. I've restructured my entire life around the hope that one day you'd stop running and admit what we both know."
His face moves closer to mine. Not kissing me. Not yet. Just close enough that I can feel his breath against my skin.
"You're the first thing I think about when I wake up and the last thing I think about before I sleep. You're the reason I come to work early and stay late. You're the reason I dismissed every other woman who tried to get close to me over the past three years."
"That's not healthy—"
"I don't care." His lips are inches from mine now. "I don't care if it's healthy or appropriate or sane. I care that it's real. I care that you feel it too. I care that you're finally being honest about it."
My heart is hammering so hard I'm sure he can hear it. My breathing has gone shallow, uneven. Every nerve in my body is screaming at me to do something—push him away or pull him closer, I don't even know anymore.
"What happens now?" My voice comes out as barely a whisper.
"Now?" His hand slides from my waist to the small of my back, pressing me against him. "Now I tell you what I'm going to do for you. What I'm going to do to anyone who tries to come between us."
His lips hover near my ear, and his voice drops into that dangerous register that makes my entire body respond.
"I'll destroy anyone who tries to take you from me. Anyone who looks at you the way I look at you. Anyone who thinks they have a right to touch you or claim you or make you feel the way I make you feel."
"You're talking about Marcus—"
"I'm talking about anyone." He pulls back just enough to look into my eyes. "Marcus is just the beginning. Any man who tries to get close to you after this. Any colleague who thinks he can flirt with you. Any friend who suggests you could do better than me. I'll eliminate every single one of them from your life until I'm the only one left."
The words should horrify me. They should send me running for HR and security and possibly the police.
Instead, they make something dark and twisted inside me feel seen. Feel wanted in a way I've never been wanted before.
"I'll keep you safe," he continues, his hand cupping my face with that same gentleness. "I'll make sure no one ever hurts you or disrespects you or treats you as anything less than extraordinary. I'll protect you from everything—including yourself when you try to run from what we have."
His thumb traces my lower lip, and the sensation shoots straight through me.
"I'll keep you close. Always within reach. Always where I can see you and know you're safe and know that you're mine. I'll arrange your life so that we're never more than a room apart. So that I can always feel your presence."
"That's controlling—"
"Yes." He doesn't deny it. Doesn't apologize for it. "It is. And you're going to let me do it because you want to be controlled by me. Because you've spent your entire life making your own decisions and carrying your own burdens, and the idea of someone else taking that weight is intoxicating."
He's right. He's absolutely, devastatingly right, and I hate him for seeing it so clearly.
"I'll keep you mine," he whispers, his lips so close to mine that I can almost taste him. "Not through force. Not through coercion. But by making sure that every other option looks empty and meaningless in comparison. By being so present in your life that you can't imagine existing without me."
"Is this supposed to be romantic?" The question comes out more breathless than I intended. "This declaration of obsession and control and destruction?"
His smile is dark, honest, terrifying in its certainty.
"No." His voice is barely above a whisper now. "It's not supposed to be romantic. It's supposed to be honest."
The word lands between us like a bomb.
Honest.
Not pretty. Not socially acceptable. Not the kind of love that people write songs about or make movies celebrating.
Just honest.
"I'm not going to lie to you, Bella." His hand slides to the back of my neck, his fingers tangling in my hair. "I'm not going to pretend I'm a good man who wants what's best for you. I'm not going to claim that my feelings are healthy or that this relationship will be easy or that you should choose me."
He pulls me closer, his lips hovering millimeters from mine.
"I'm just going to tell you the truth: I'm obsessed with you. I will control aspects of your life. I will be possessive and jealous and probably suffocating at times. I will make decisions that prioritize keeping you over doing what's right."
His eyes are burning now, consuming.
"And you're going to let me. Because you're obsessed with being obsessed over. Because you want someone who sees you so completely that hiding becomes impossible. Because you'd rather be owned by me than free with anyone else."
I should argue. I should tell him he's wrong about me. I should prove that I have agency and self-respect and the ability to walk away from toxic situations.
But I can't.
Because he's stripped away every lie I've been telling myself for three years and laid bare the truth I've been running from:
I want this.
I want him.
I want to be his in ways that probably make me deeply broken and codependent and psychologically damaged.
But I want it anyway.
"What if I said yes?" The words escape before I can stop them. "What if I said I choose you? That I'll be yours the way you want me to be?"
His entire body goes rigid. His hand in my hair tightens almost imperceptibly. His breathing changes, becomes deeper, more controlled.
"Then everything changes." His voice is rough with want and possession and barely controlled intensity. "Then you walk out of this conference room with me. You come to my penthouse. You stay with me for the seventy-two hours we discussed. And by the end of those three days, you understand completely what it means to belong to me."
"And if at the end I still want to leave?"
His smile is predatory.
"You won't want to leave." He says it with absolute certainty. "By the end of three days, the idea of being without me will be unbearable. You'll understand that what we have isn't something you walk away from. It's something you surrender to completely."
He leans in.
His lips are a breath away from mine.
I can feel the anticipation building between us like electricity. Can feel the moment stretching out, suspended in time, waiting for one of us to close the distance.
I should pull away. Should create space. Should do literally anything except stand here waiting for him to kiss me.
I don't move.
I don't pull away.
I don't do anything except wait, breathless and terrified and desperate, for him to finally, finally close the distance between us.
His eyes search mine, looking for any sign of resistance, any indication that I'm going to bolt.
He doesn't find it.
Because I'm not going to run anymore.
"Say yes," he whispers against my lips. "Say yes and everything changes."
"Yes."