Dangerous Possession

Rain pounded on the window like a stubborn drummer, and the busy city felt almost tranquil, but in Juliette’s apartment, everything was tense. Her coffee was cold and undrunk, steam curling off the mug like a ghost trying to escape. Instead of working on a logo design for that trendy new boutique downtown, her brain was all over the place and wouldn’t settle long enough to let her focus.

Something just felt… wrong.

She endeavored to brush it aside, convincing herself that the jitters were likely just the coffee kicking in and that today was the fifth anniversary of her leaving that old life behind. That chapter in her life felt like a book she had shelved. She had become a different person — quiet, careful, almost invisible.

But it seems that some ghosts refuse to be buried.

Then at 9:46 a.m., her phone buzzed. Once, twice, across the glass table, and she saw that the caller ID was blank. A number that she didn’t know.

She considered letting it go to voicemail, perhaps even throwing the phone into the sink to drown the past once and for all.

Her hand trembled as she reached for it instead, breath frozen in her throat.

Hello? she managed.

There was an awkward silence before anyone spoke.

Hello, bella.

It was him.

Marco Bianchi.

No. Not him. Not now.

Her legs wobbled like jelly and she barely succeeded in grabbing onto the edge of the table because everything around her seemed to be splitting in half. His voice — deep, cold, penetrating — was the only thing that broke the fragile new life she had created.

“Are you still pretending to be someone else?” he jeered, smooth as silk, dripping with sarcasm. “Well, that little fantasy ends today. You owe me.”

“That was years ago. I—”

“You do.”

The menace underlay his words, curling like smoke seeping under a closed door.

“I’m not coming back,” she said quietly.

“Oh, but you are.”

Then the line went dead.

She froze there, the phone glued to her ear, as if she could summon him back through the connection.

Five years of her life — a life that had been built on lies, shaky foundations and borrowed optimism — were at stake because that call had struck deep into her past.

Marco Bianchi was not a person who issued idle threats.

That night, sleep eluded her.

She closed every curtain, locked every door and looked into the hallway through the peephole, growing more paranoid by the second. She couldn’t eat. Didn’t want to. Every noise outside turned her stomach — every knock seemed like a violently portentous knock.

Memories came rushing back, like a flood.

A fog of darkness surrounded her mind—the stench of sweat and gunpowder, Marco’s silver watch glittering like a disco ball through the nightclub illumination, his hand snatching her arm in a possessive vice. She did not forget the power in his voice, or the twisty calm before he made decisions that could destroy lives.

And that look he’d given her — the one that promised she was his.

At the time, she believed she could put all that behind her.

Now? She had her doubts.

Three days passed with no other call.

But that silence ate at her, worse than the sound of his voice. It was that suspenseful second before a lion leaps onto its quarry.

Then there was an envelope inserted under her door — no return address, no writing. Just a photo.

Her brother.

He was smiling, blissfully ignorant. Alive—for now.

On the back, and in just one sentence: He remains safe when you come home.

It sent her hands shaking at the revelation. It had been years since she’d seen him — not since she cut contact, for his own safety. She’d even changed her name to keep him from knowing her.

But Marco? He found him anyway.

The next morning, without a word or a trace, Juliette got on a train bound for New York.

She was going back.

Coming in, the city took her harder than she had intended, louder, quicker, a staccato rush. She glided through the throng like a phantom — cap pulled down, hoodie drawn tight. Every fiber of her being screamed at her to flee, but she just kept walking toward it instead.

A glossy black, badge car was waiting for her. A man in a suit held the back door for her, saying nothing, giving her a curt nod.

She slipped inside.

They took the ride into Manhattan, a blur of colors and chaos, each street stirring memories, each turn exposing old wounds.

When they arrived at Bianchi Tower, her stomach fluttered painfully.

It hadn’t changed—still a black blade over the city, its glass ablaze with gleam, its name a beacon of power.

She disembarked, the tethers of her past tugging at her weighed down each shoulder.

The elevator hummed quietly as it lurched upward. Each ping gave a heartbeat to the hush.

Floor 52.

The doors slid apart.

And there he stood.

Marco Bianchi.

He felt more dangerous, more mesmerizing than she remembered.

He was turned from her, looking out over the city through floor-to-ceiling windows. The room was cold and hard, wrapped in steel and stone and demanding an effort simply to breathe in the aura of power that hung in the air.

“You’re late,” he said coolly.

She dried up, her brain racing around for words.

“You didn’t give me a time,” she snapped, her voice a barely audible whisper.

He spun slowly around, and those eyes — still midnight, still unreadable — never ceased regarding her as though she belonged to him.

Something she didn’t want to acknowledge raced through her.

“You look different,” he said, walking up closer.

“I’m not the girl that you used to know.”

“No, you’re not.” His eyes darted down to her mouth for a heartbeat then returned to her eyes. “But you’re still mine.”

She recoiled slightly. “That was ages ago.”

“You abandoned us without paying what you owe. That doesn't just vanish.”

Her fists balled at her sides. “You think I have to give you anything?”

“To run, I protected you,” it said. I let you vanish. That mercy's done.”

“But what about my brother?” she replied, her voice steady through a storm raged inside.

A smile of amusement flitted across his mouth. “He’s safe. For now.”

Anger surged within her. She felt like screaming, maybe slapping him. Instead she just said, “What do you want, Marco?”

He took a step toward her, encroaching on her.

“Everything.”

After that the days twisted together.

Marco housed her in his luxurious penthouse, a lovely cage with a view that taunted her freedom. He didn’t imprison her — he didn’t need to. She had learned not to run.

She wasn’t quite a prisoner but a trophy — his trophy.

And the divide between those definitions was starting to fray.

For the time being, he stood apart. But the way he gazed at her told her it wouldn’t take long.

Juliette fought against it. Of all the reasons she should hate him. All the secrets he had buried and the lives he had ruined.

But then there were nights, when he’d catch her watch him from across the marble kitchen, or find him standing on the balcony in his loosened tie, a hunted look flitting across his face, that something inside her broke.

He wasn’t just a monster. He was the man who had once had her back. The man who could wring promises from the shadows.

And a part of her remembered what it had been like to be his.

One night, she faced him.

“Why me?” She challenged me. “There are so many women who would kill to be in your penthouse.”

His face darkened. “They don’t matter.”

Then why me? she pressed.

Marco’s gaze was riveted on her—stared at her.

“Because you left,” he said tersely. “Because you got to me and then disappeared. You can’t just leave me.”

His breath caught in his throat.

“You’re obsessed,” she whispered, aghast.

He moved closer, voice low and dangerous. “I warned you.”

Her heart raced, beating loudly in her ears.

She should shove him away.

But now, nearly meeting her lips, an almost touch, she felt the world come to a stoppage.

Because deep inside, she couldn’t help but acknowledge that a part of her yearned to yield.

Outside, the city pulsed with life, yet here in that tower time was suspended.

Marco gave her everything except freedom — elaborate meals and designer outfits and books arranged on the shelves just the way she liked. But every present came like another fetter.

And each time he looked her way, it made her ask what kind of person she was slowly becoming.

She could have put up more of a fight.

But she was losing her fight.

And perhaps the truth was that she wasn’t merely escaping Marco —

But what it felt like, too, when he looked at her as though she were the only real thing left in his life.

Then came the knock.

Late. Urgent.

Marco jerked the door open, and instantly went rigid.

A man came in, fi­e­bre­at­ado ( the Spanish word for out of breath). “There’s a leak.”

Marco’s jaw tightened. “Where?”

“At the docks. Someone’s talking.”

Juliette could sense the change in the air as he transformed — fire singeing his eyes, adrenaline coursing through his veins.

The king was back.

He looked back at her. “Don’t leave this apartment.”

She nodded, and her response was immediate.

But the moment he left, she grabbed her phone.

If she wanted to escape, it was now or never.

But when she looked in her contacts… her brother’s name was gone.

Deleted.

Instead, there was a message: You leave, he dies.

Juliette’s digits felt cold to the touch.

She was his, liked it or not.

And buried inside it, hers, part of her that remembered the feel of his skin…

Wasn’t quite sure she wanted to run away anymore.

The rain began pouring the second her plane touched down.

Juliette rested her forehead on the glass of the black sedan,... I can see it sliding down like it was racing the other drops of raindrops to the bottom, to wherever it was trying to escape. Outside the city loomed in its familiar greyness — cold, unfriendly, but all too well known. The skyscrapers bled into the low-hanging clouds like shards of teeth in a beast’s maw, and the streets thrummed with life. That buzz had once thrilled her; here and now, it was more like a dull weight pressing down on her chest. The air was laced with money and danger — a blend she hadn’t enjoyed in years, though it welcomed her like an old foe.

She tightened her grip on the handles of her worn leather bag. She had even tried to pack light. After all, there’s not much to take with you when you know you won’t be coming back.

The driver hadn’t spoken since picking her up from the airport, and, honestly, he didn’t need to. The busi