Page 21 of Owned & Bred by the BRATVA

But she’s not his anymore.

And if he comes near her, I will end him.

Not quietly. Not cleanly. Butpublicly.

Because no one—no one—touches what’s mine and lives.

I kiss her temple, trying to soften the fury rising in my chest. Her eyes flutter closed like she feels it, the storm under my skin. She doesn’t flinch from it.

She trusts me now.

“I’m going to take you upstairs,” I whisper. “Wash you. Feed you. And tomorrow, we’ll meet with the notary. We’ll say the words. We’ll sign on the line. And from that moment on, it won’t matter what anyone says. You’ll be mine in every way that counts.”

She lets out a slow breath and nods once, small and sure.

It’s done.

And if Raymond wants to see what happens when someone tries to cross me, he can try to stop me.

Clara

I should be terrified.

After everything I’ve given him, my body, my trust, my life, I should feel like I’ve stepped off the edge of something irreversible. I know I have. I’ve let myself fall. I let him touch me in places no one else ever has. I let him speak to me like I’m his to keep. I let him bend me over a desk and take me until my body forgot it had ever belonged to anyone else.

But here I am, wrapped in his sheets, tangled in the scent of him, and instead of fear, all I feel is a quiet, dangerousknowing.

I’ve never been safer.

His hand is still resting on my stomach. Not possessive this time, not claiming, justthere, like an anchor. His thumb strokes absently over the soft skin below my navel, and even in his sleep, he’s holding me. Some people lock doors. Maksim never needs to. He knows how to keep things where he wants them.

And yet, something inside me has shifted.

Not in rebellion.

In recognition.

Because as much as I’ve let him do to me, let him take from me, I’m starting to understand that I’ve done something to him, too. I’veundonehim. I’ve watched a man who commands armies and controls empires fall to his knees between my thighs and whisper my name like it’s holy. I’ve seen him lose control, notbecause he’s careless, but becauseImade him that way. There’s power in that. Not a sharp, cruel kind. A quiet one. A sacred one.

And it’s mine.

For so long, I thought strength looked like distance. Like control. Like silence. I thought being protected meant being hidden. Covered. Owned. I let my father tuck me into the edges of his world, convinced that if I stayed small and quiet and obedient, I’d be safe.

But I was never safe.

Not really.

And now I’ve been taken by a man who is brutal and ruthless and terrifying to everyone else, but when he looks at me, his eyes soften like I’m the only thing that still makes sense to him. When I touched him today, when I dropped to my knees and opened my mouth for him, he came apart like he hadn’t been touched in years. Like no one had everseenhim before. And when he took me over that desk, it wasn’t about power or punishment. It was about possession. Aboutworship.

And God help me, I liked it.

I liked the way he groaned my name. I liked the way his hands shook when he gripped my hips. I liked knowing I did that to him.

He may be dangerous. But I’m not powerless.

I roll over slowly, not wanting to wake him yet. He looks younger in sleep, less guarded. One hand still holds me loosely, but the other is curled against his chest, fingers twitching like he’s dreaming of something he wants to keep close. I watch the rise and fall of his chest and wonder what it says about me that this man, this brutal, obsessive man, is the only person who’s ever made me feel like I belong to myself.

Because that’s the truth, isn’t it?

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