Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 115388 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115388 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 462(@250wpm)___ 385(@300wpm)
Reo snickered one more time, which was a world record for him.
Hiro put the lollipop back in his mouth, crunched on it, and spoke between bites. "So, you’re saying, Reo, if we make this deal, it might look like power, but we’re actually walking into ruin?"
Reo nodded. "If we’re not careful."
"Then we’ll be careful." I kept my focus on the black door ahead.
"That’s the thing about Faustian pacts, Kenji," Reo sighed. "They never feel dangerous in the beginning. They feel like winning. We just should never forget that."
I said nothing.
Because he was right. Because even now, I could feel the thrill threading through my spine. Power. Proximity. The momentum of strategy and war. And beneath it all. . . a tick.
A clock.
Finishing the lollipop, Hiro placed the stick in his pocket. “Why do you think the Butcher picked this venue for the meeting?”
Reo’s expression went neutral. “Opera is all about pretending. Lovers, gods, kings—none of them real. Just men playing roles until someone bleeds onstage.”
“Then let’s play beautifully.” I placed my hand into my pocket.
A Faustian pact sealed with death.
The phrase coiled in my thoughts.
We passed a statue of Orpheus with his fingers forever frozen mid-pluck across a lyre. His face was twisted in longing; eyes lifted toward a ceiling he would never reach. Orpheus had been a man who tried to bring his love back from the dead—and lost her again because he looked back too soon.
I won’t make that mistake.
Minutes later, we arrived at the door.
Corsican guards stood on either side, suited and still. One had a scar that crept from temple to lip. The other’s knuckles were bruised from something recent.
They opened the door and we entered.
The box was a study in decadence. It was not just private—it was the highest, largest, and probably the most forbidden in the entire opera house.
From here, one could look down on the city’s elite like powerful gods surveying weak mortals.
Red velvet banquettes lined the curved walls. Gilded panels gleamed. Every corner had carved angels.
To the left, a private bar shimmered, tended by a woman whose only clothing was diamonds. Crystals clung to her nipples, her hips, the delicate triangle of her sex. Her skin sparkled when she moved, as if she’d been dusted in starlight and soaked in champagne.
Reo murmured, “Well. . .this is much better.”
Across the box, more women lounged like felines, nude save for artful arrangements of diamonds on their most sacred places. They watched us with slow, sultry eyes—some stretched across velvet cushions, others rested on their knees, hands in their laps as if waiting for the command to crawl to us.
And they weren’t there to serve us drinks, they were there to seduce us.
But they could stay right where they were, I had a tiger to tame.
We continued past them.
At the edge of the box, half-lit by stage light and shadow, stood Jean-Pierre Laurent.
The Butcher.
Keeping his back to us, he had one hand resting on the gold rail.
His three cousins stood off to the side further away from him. All three were dressed impeccably. French tailored. No visible weapons.
Rafael leaned casually against the wall, his jacket undone, that signature scar running from cheekbone to jaw like a lover's scratch. The smirk on his face was permanent—half amusement, half bloodlust. They called him the Comédien in the Corsican underworld, a man known for laughing mid-murder, like each kill was a punchline only he understood.
His eyes flicked over us now, gleaming with the promise of future entertainment.
Louis stood beside him, hands folded neatly, his expression unreadable. His gaze scanned us slowly, likely cataloging every shift in fabric, every bulge that might conceal a blade or gun.
He was the Corsicans’ top hacker.
Louis had eyes everywhere. Cameras tucked into vents. Mics hidden behind paintings. No doubt he had monitoring equipment in our suites. He’d probably watched me stroke myself to the scent of my Tiger’s panties.
I smirked at Louis.
I hope you enjoyed the show.
If Louis had seen anything, he gave no indication. Silence was his power.
And then finally, Giorgio.
He stood a little removed from the others, spine straight, silent, unmoving. White gloves covered his hands, pristine and spotless.
From what I understood, the man was obsessive about germs.
Therefore, Giorgio didn’t kill quickly. Before he laid a finger on a man, he’d scrub him down with hospital-grade disinfectants, muttering prayers for sterility.
Germs disgusted him.
But pain?
Pain, he adored.
He was their secret enforcer—their ghost in tailored wool—and he hadn’t blinked once since we entered the box.
I checked Reo. He scanned the box, eyes narrowing at the angles, exits, and tech tucked into the velvet and gold. Then, with a quick nod to me, he moved to the side, choosing a spot with a full view of the Butcher’s cousins.
Hiro followed, unwrapping another lollipop with one hand, his other never straying far from the knife he kept tucked under his jacket. He took a seat on the arm of a banquette, one leg draped lazily over the edge, but I knew better—he was coiled, watching everything.