Page 8 of Ambition

I know this life.

It is the furthest thing fromokay.And if Isadora could drop just an ounce of her fuckingambition, Icould provide for us.Icould take the risks and keep her safe, doing other jobs, less dangerous shit than fucking a crime lord in his own armed compound.

A drug in her drink. A blow to the head. A dog mauling her limbs.Her,where that man lay, in the warehouse.

Those things circled my brain last night as I waited for her, praying, and I don’t even like God.

Something inside my head gives.

I bite her thumb.Hard.I have never been good at pretending with her, and while I’ve shot a man in cold blood and beat another in warm gore, while I’ve used a knife to cut through the tendons of a stranger’s throat and shoved a different blade into a target’s abdomen, all without so much as a blink, I can’t let Isadora Croft walk out of here marked in someone who isn’tme,not without telling me she won’t do it again.

I want to ensure she’s safe and I don’t think Theo is that. I tried to convince my dad of this, but Mads Bentzen is too busy preparing for Solemn, a cult thing I’m not yet invited to.

It’s up to me to stop this.

Isa’s breath hitches with my teeth on her skin, her pupils edging into the darkness of her irises, one hand coming to press flat against my abs, like she might push me away.

I dare you.I fucking dare you.

“Von,” she whispers, more warning than anything.

I nip at her thumb again, then lick the pad of her finger, all while leaning down closer, getting into her space. She moves her hand, but at the last minute, she doesn’t drop it by her side.

She curls it around the curve of my neck, her thumb pressing lightly against the hollow of my throat.“Von,”she says again, but she sounds different this time.

I press my forehead to hers. “I don’t want you…fucking him.” Itkillsme.

She breathes a laugh, mint along my lips. “It’s a little too late for—”

Shut the fuck up.

I kiss her instead of saying that because she’d slap me if I did, and I don’t feel like getting hit right now.

My mouth devours her swollen lips.

For a moment, a heartbeat in time, she doesn’t react, except to dig her nails into the side of my neck.

Then she opens for me.

And I don’t hesitate.

My tongue twines with hers before I suck on it, listening to the ghost of a moan course through my own mouth from her. I step closer as she presses onto her toes, arching her body into mine like she was made to fit right there.

Right here.Thisis where you belong.

I drop my hand to her waist, pulling her even closer, no space between us. Her palm slides up my abs, hot against my chest, fingers of her other hand playing with the strands at the nape of my neck.

I bite her bottom lip, pulling away only so we can breathe, my eyes fluttering open to lock onto hers. Her lips are parted, jagged inhales uneven.

“This doesn’t mean anything,” she whispers against my mouth. “This doesn’t change my job. This doesn’t stop me from going to him again tomorrow night—”

I clamp my fingers around the back of her neck, beneath her hair, tilting her cervical spine backward, exposing her throat. I dip my head and scrape my teeth against the spot Theo’s fingers left imprints. She moans, her body stiff, but she doesn’t try to get away.

I don’t want to hurt her.

I really, truly don’t. Even when she’s asked me to, I don’t like it, but I do it, because I love her.

Yet she is the only one who can break through my control, and sometimes I wonder if I will one day do all these things I don’twantto do.

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