Page 17 of Sweet Venom

We've been in the car for almost two hours now, and Vivian is still asleep. After we left my office, we headed downstairs to meet with the fire marshal. I was concerned about how Vivian might act around people after our little spat upstairs. But, surprisingly, she did well. She didn't try to make a peep and even stepped in to supply a few details the fire marshal asked about the amount of staff and safety protocols we had for evacuating. The woman dutifully stood by my side as if I hadn't borderline assaulted her upstairs. Even if I hadn't been holding a firm grip on her hand the entire time, I believe she still would have played the part. I might have been rough, but so was she, and I know she reveled in every minute of it. It's one of the things I hate about her. The one woman who could take me the way I am belongs to the one man I could never hurt. The irony.

"Where are we?" she mumbles, finally waking in the seat beside me. Ellis's penthouse is about thirty minutes from the club, but it only took Vivian five minutes to pass out. The woman barely slept this week with my antics. I drove her to the brink of insanity with my need to break her and bend her to my will.

"We are ten minutes from the Serra Estate."

She perks up, pulling her dress that had ridden up down and wiping the edges of her eyes to fix the black eyeliner that had smeared. I wish she hadn't done either of those things. I appreciate seeing her as less than perfect.

"Why are we going to the Serra Estate? I can't go in looking like this, and why did you let me sleep so long?" She flips down the mirror as she attempts to smooth her wild hair, and I quickly flip it back up. I want her to go in the house looking exactly as she does now so my brother can see for himself the games she plays when he's not around.

"Hey, what the hell?"

"Stop trying to hide what you are. This is the card you played tonight, and now you get to own it." I don't have to look at her to know that her brown eyes are attempting to burn me alive from the passenger seat, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy it. Pissing her off is one of my favorite things to do. "I have business to discuss with Nico as it relates to what happened tonight, and since you were there playing an active role in my loss of revenue for the night, I thought it would only be fair to let you explain in person."

Crossing her arms, she huffs a sigh of aggravation before giving me her bratty attitude. Why I expected anything less is beyond me. "Fine, I'm not shy. I have no problem giving Nico a detailed account of the fuckery that took place against my bedroom door all week."

I'm pulling into the circle drive that leads to the sprawling Tuscan-inspired estate that overlooks Napa Valley just as she utters the last word. I give it to her for the moment, but she should know better by now. I never back down. If she pushes me, I'll push back harder. I quickly exit the Range Rover and round the car to open her door, ensuring I get my chance to make myself clear before we enter the estate.

As her feet meet the cobblestone drive, I close the door and pin her to the car. "Seb—" she goes to yell, but I bring my hand to her mouth as my body crushes her with my weight against the car.

When her eyes finally focus on mine, I say, "You will not mention a word of what I did to Nico unless you would like me to explain in detail how much you liked it."

The cameras never caught her masturbating, but they did catch her relentless shifting as she tried to create the friction I knew she desperately craved. They also caught multiple changes of underwear that I'm sure were soaked from her desire. "Do I make myself clear?"

She may not be shy about airing my dirty laundry to dear ole Dad, but I doubt she cares for him to hear hers. I loosen my hand enough for her to speak and she says, "For now."

The fucking vipera. She's just like me. Venom is running through her veins, dying for release, but I'll take 'for now' because I know what's waiting on the other side if she chooses to disobey me.

Chapter 7

The Mastermind

It's been two weeks since I returned to California. I had planned on going to my home in San Jose, but just as my plane touched down, I received an alert on my phone that Vivian had used her fingerprint to enter my penthouse. Her return gave me pause for more reasons than one. We haven't spoken a word since the day she left. When she took off, she did so with a text stating she was going home and needed space. The move caught me off guard. I knew Vivian wasn't giving me herself completely. Our relationship started out differently than most. It was very unconventional, but it was ours, and I thought it had been working.

Vivian's return to St. Louis didn't upset me. Although it may have appeared otherwise, I didn't focus on things beyond my control. Sebastian laid into me after she had left, going on about how she was wrong for me and not marriage material. He said her leaving made me look weak. In his eyes, I was letting a woman rule me, but he couldn't have been more wrong. Through his rant, where I listened as he spewed his fraudulent hate, I found my only way forward—our only way forward. Now I just have to make them see it.

Sitting in the hearth room next to a fire lit more for ambiance and reflection than warmth, I wait. I wait for my brother to bring me a woman he thinks I don't deserve and one he believes I know nothing about in his quest for rectitude. But because he can't get past his anger, he can't see my truth. I don't expect people to understand my level of enlightenment. Our experiences shape us differently. My brother and I are proof of that, thrown into the same fire, yet cast out differently. Unlike my brother, I am slow to anger, whereas I would argue he is angry to a fault. He'll tell you his rage makes him strong, and on the surface, when he compares himself to me, I suppose you'd think he's right.

Sebastian believes I let a girl walk in and out of my life on her own free will, accepting whatever pieces she'll give me. And in some ways, I am, but that's not all of it. I stopped putting expectations on people years ago. I had to if I wanted to keep my sanity. I didn't want to be bitter or mad. I didn't want to take drugs to numb the pain. I saw firsthand how those choices played out in my youth, and I refused to be a product of my environment. For myself, I was able to find a level of mental peace where the noise could not reach me simply by releasing my expectations of others. If you're not waiting for someone to wrong you or hurt you, they can't. I care for Vivian deeply, more than I've ever cared for another woman in my life, and I've only known her for a few short months. From the moment I met her, I knew she was meant to be mine.

I'm topping off my whiskey with the decanter when I hear the front door open. I don't stand in greeting or alert anyone to my presence. Instead, I wait, as I've done for the past two weeks. These are the two most important people in my life. They mean something to me, and it's imperative that they get along. I've made my choice. I know what must be done, and since they can't seem to figure out what I already know, I will intervene. No one will leave this estate until things are settled. But before my thought can even finish, the hushed undertones of bickering accompany the clicking of their shoes.

"The house seems pretty fucking empty. I thought I was walking into an interrogation. You are such a fucking prick, you know that? I guess you need all that inflated, pompous BS to make up for what you lack in other areas."

"I know you're not insinuating I have a small dick."

"If the ego—"

This is all I hear before her words are cut off, and I immediately stand, clearing my throat to announce my presence and gain Sebastian's attention. I know he likes pain with his pleasure. For him, it's a thrill, but right now, she's still mine and mine alone, and I will not allow him to hurt her. "Brother, I'm going to need you to remove your hand from my girl's throat." I don't need to raise my tone to posture or intimidate. He is my brother, and I know he respects me the same way I do him, faults and all.

Releasing her, he turns to me and says, "Good. You’re back. Do you have any idea of the stunt your girl pulled tonight? She cost the club thousands of dollars in lost revenue while simultaneously aiding the robbers that have been targeting Covet for the past two months."

I don't bother listening to anything Sebastian has to say. I'm already fully aware of what transpired tonight. Besides always having eyes on my properties, I have them on her. Once I decided I was all in, I made it my business to know everything about Vivian, which meant keeping tabs on her. While I give her space and I can't make choices for her, I'm also not naïve. If I wasn't the one, I needed to know. I would have let her go.

I was well aware when Vivian booked a return ticket to San Jose, but I couldn't be sure of her intent. I am not the only thing for her here. Her best friend, Mason Croft, lives in San Jose. But as she stands before me now, I know without question her return was for me. Her eyes never leave mine as I make my way across the room. Once I'm a few feet away from her, I wait to see if she'll close the distance, and she does. Her eyes fill with tears before she throws herself into my arms. "I'm so sorry," she mumbles into my chest.

I wait to respond to her words. They are inconsequential at the moment. She never had anything to be sorry for. All that matters is that she came back. Her body melds into mine the way it always has, and the sweet smell of the floral lotion she loves to wear assaults my senses. I breathe her in like it's the first time, but our moment is cut short when Sebastian starts back up with his biased rhetoric. We both know he is not innocent in tonight's events.

"You have got to be kidding me. The two of you haven't spoken in months, and she rolls in without warning and shuts down our club for the night, and you act like it's no big deal. It's clear she has our staff eating out of the palm of her hand. After tonight's stunt, it's obvious she plans on recruiting our staff to help run her female-only gym."

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