I woke up to my alarm screaming and sunlight burning through curtains I’d forgotten to close.

Shit. 8:47 AM.

I was supposed to be in the office by eight-thirty, showered and professional and pretending I hadn’t spent half the night touching myself to fantasies of a criminal’s hands on my body.

The shower was scalding and too brief, my hair a disaster I attacked with bobby pins and prayer. Coffee burned my tongue as I threw on the first suit I could find—navy blue, conservative, armor against the memory of hazel eyes that had seen straight through my soul.

I’d dreamed about him. About Kane. Dark, vivid dreams where those scarred hands explored every inch of my skin while he whispered filthy promises in that whiskey-rough voice. I’d woken aching and empty, my fingers still slick with evidence of what I’d done while thinking about him.

Pathetic didn’t begin to cover it.

Patricia’s office door was already closed when I rushed past, but her assistant flagged me down with a manila folder that felt like destiny in my hands.

“New case,” she said. “High profile. Patricia wants to see you the moment you’ve reviewed the file.”

I grabbed coffee that could strip paint and locked myself in my office, spreading the documents across my desk with shaking hands. Sexual assault in the first degree. Victim: Victoria Ashford. Defendant: Kane D.

The world tilted sideways.

Kane. The stranger from Eclipse wasn’t a stranger at all—he was Kane Drax, and somehow the universe had decided to torture me by making him my client.

My hands trembled as I scanned the charges. Victoria’s accusations were detailed, brutal, exactly the kind of he-said-she-said that could destroy a career. But I’d been there. I’d seen Kane reject her, watched her rage as she stormed away from his public dismissal.

This was revenge, pure and simple.

And I was about to walk into a room alone with the man who’d starred in every forbidden fantasy I’d had since last night.

The courthouse holding area smelled like industrial soap and desperation, but all I could think about was how Kane would look in that orange jumpsuit. Would it stretch across those broad shoulders? Cling to the muscles I’d glimpsed beneath his leather jacket?

Professional. Stay professional.

Room 3 felt smaller than usual, the air thick with anticipation that had nothing to do with legal strategy. When the guard opened the door, every coherent thought scattered like smoke.

Kane Drax sat at the metal table like he owned it, one ankle propped casually on the opposite knee despite the shackles. The jumpsuit should have made him look like any other inmate. Instead, it clung to every hard line of his body, the orange fabric stretched taut across shoulders that spoke of violence and strength.

His black hair was pulled back in a knot that emphasized the sharp angles of his face, and when those hazel-gold eyes met mine, liquid fire shot straight to my core.

“Ms. Reyes.” My name on his lips was pure sin. “My lawyer, I presume.”

I forced my legs to carry me to the chair across from him, hyperaware of how his gaze tracked every movement. The space between us felt electric, charged with something that made my skin prickle and my breath catch.

“That’s right.” I set my briefcase down with hands that trembled slightly. “I’m here to discuss your case and—”

“What’s your mother’s name?”

The question came out of nowhere, sharp and demanding. His intensity pinned me to my chair like a butterfly on display.

“I’m sorry?”

“Your mother.” Kane leaned forward, and I caught that intoxicating scent from Eclipse—leather and motor oil and something wild that made my mouth water. “Elena Reyes?”

My chest tightened. Nobody mentioned my mother anymore. She’d been dead over a decade, killed in the line of duty when I was sixteen, and the wound had supposedly healed.

Kane’s casual use of her name tore it wide open.

“How do you know that?” My voice came out smaller than I intended.

Something dark flickered across his features. “She was a cop.”

Not a question. An accusation. The temperature in the room dropped ten degrees, and I felt the shift in Kane’s energy like a physical blow.

“Yes.” I lifted my chin defiantly. “She died protecting people from criminals like—”

“Like me.” Kane finished, his voice flat and cold.

He stood abruptly, the chain connecting his shackles rattling against the metal table. For a moment, he towered over me, and I felt the full weight of his presence—dangerous, overwhelming, completely magnetic. Then he stepped back like I’d burned him.

But not before I’d seen it. The flash of heat in his eyes. The way his pupils dilated when he looked at my mouth.

He wanted me too.

The knowledge hit me like lightning, setting every nerve ending ablaze. Kane Drax—criminal, everything I should avoid—wanted me with the same desperate hunger that was eating me alive.

“I don’t want you as my lawyer.”

The words were like ice water over flame. I felt my face crumple before I could stop it, the rejection hitting somewhere deep and vulnerable I’d forgotten existed.

“Mr. Drax—”

“No.” He moved to the far wall, putting as much distance between us as the small room allowed. “You don’t understand. You can’t—this isn’t—”

He stopped, jaw working like he was swallowing broken glass. When he looked at me again, his eyes were wild with something between panic and hunger.

“Find me another lawyer. Someone who isn’t—” His gaze raked over me, lingering on the conservative cut of my suit, the careful way I’d pinned my hair back. “Someone who isn’t you.”

The dismissal was quiet. Almost gentle. But it landed like a physical blow, and I felt tears threaten behind my eyes.

I didn’t understand this. The intensity, the connection, the way his rejection felt like losing something I’d never had. I barely knew this man. Had no right to feel gutted by his dismissal.

But I did.

“I see.” I gathered my papers with hands that shook despite my best efforts. “I’ll speak to my supervisor about reassigning—”

“Calla.”

My name on his lips stopped me cold. When I turned, Kane was pressed against the wall like he was trying to push himself through it, his hands clenched into fists.

“You felt it too, didn’t you?” His voice was rough, desperate. “At Eclipse. This—whatever this is between us.”

I opened my mouth to lie, to maintain some shred of professional dignity. But the words that came out were pure truth.

“Yes.”

Kane’s eyes closed like I’d hurt him. “That’s why you can’t be my lawyer. That’s why you need to walk away and never look back.”

“But—”

“There’s no but.” His eyes snapped open, burning with intensity that made my knees weak.

The words should have frightened me. Should have sent me running like any rational woman would. Instead, they sent heat spiraling through my core, because they sounded less like a warning and more like a promise.

I reached for the door handle with shaking fingers, desperate to escape before I said something that would destroy us both. The moment my skin touched metal, electricity shot up my arm like I’d grabbed a live wire.

I gasped and jerked back, staring at my tingling hand in shock. When I looked at Kane, he was frozen against the wall, his face pale beneath his tan.

“You felt that,” I whispered.

Kane’s throat worked soundlessly. Then, in a voice like broken glass: “Static electricity. Old building.”

It felt like a lie.

But I was too rattled, too confused, too desperate to escape the way he made me feel to call him on it. I fumbled the door open and fled, leaving Kane alone with his secrets and his warnings.

Only when I was locked in my car did I let myself fall apart.

I sat in the courthouse parking lot with my forehead pressed against the steering wheel, trying to understand why a stranger’s rejection felt like the end of the world. I hadn’t flirted. Hadn’t made any advances. Hadn’t even acknowledged the attraction that was eating me alive.

But somehow, Kane had looked at me and found me wanting.

The worst part was how much I still wanted him.

I should have been angry—at his rudeness, his assumptions, his complete dismissal of professional courtesy. Instead, I felt hollow, carved out, like something essential had been ripped from my chest.

Which made no sense.

I barely knew Kane Drax. Had spoken to him for maybe fifteen minutes total. There was no logical reason for his rejection to hurt this much, no explanation for the ache spreading through my ribs like poison.

But as I sat there surrounded by the ordered world I’d built my life around, all I could think about was the desperation in Kane’s voice when he’d warned me away. Like he was drowning, and I was salvation he couldn’t reach.

The scalding water did nothing to wash the feeling from my skin.

I stood under the spray for thirty minutes, scrubbing at flesh that still tingled with electricity, trying to drown the memory of his voice saying my name like a prayer. But every time I closed my eyes, I saw him pressed against that wall like I was something dangerous.

Maybe I was. Maybe that was the problem.

My body was a traitor. Even now, with soap suds sliding down my curves and steam fogging the mirror, I could feel the phantom weight of his gaze on my mouth. The way his pupils had blown wide when I’d whispered “yes” to feeling whatever this impossible connection was between us.

I’d never reacted to a man like this. Sure, I’d had relationships—safe lawyers who understood my ambition, men who fit neatly into my ordered world without causing ripples. But none of them had ever made me feel like I was coming apart just by existing in the same room.

Kane Drax was everything I should run from. Criminal. Violent. Dangerous in ways that had nothing to do with his record and everything to do with how he made me forget every principle I’d built my life on.

So why did his rejection feel like losing a piece of my soul?

I turned off the water and caught sight of myself in the mirror—skin flushed pink, hair wild with curls I’d finally freed from their professional prison, eyes dark with want I couldn’t hide. For a moment, I looked like someone who belonged in Kane’s world of leather and sin.

The thought should have terrified me.

Instead, heat pooled low in my belly as I imagined those scarred hands mapping every curve, that whiskey voice whispering filthy promises against my throat while he—

My phone rang, shattering the fantasy before I could do something really pathetic like touch myself again.

Patricia’s name flashed on the screen. Calling after hours meant either very good news or very bad news, and given my luck lately, I wasn’t betting on good.

“Calla? Sorry to bother you at home, but there’s been a development with the Drax case.”

My pulse jumped so hard I nearly dropped the phone. “What kind of development?”

“He fired his previous attorney this afternoon. Specifically requested for you.” Patricia’s voice carried surprise that mirrored my own shock. “Apparently, he was quite insistent about it.”

I sank onto my bed, towel clutched around me like armor. “That doesn’t make sense. He told me to find him someone else. He said he didn’t want me.”

“Well, he changed his mind. Are you interested, or should I assign it to Marcel?”

The thought of Marcel handling Kane’s case sent an unexpected spike of possessiveness through my chest. Marcel kith was competent but predictable. He’d plea bargain Kane into a cell without bothering to dig into Victoria’s real motivations.

Kane deserved better.

The thought surprised me. Yesterday I would have written him off as another criminal gaming the system. Now, after seeing the desperation in his eyes when he’d warned me away, I couldn’t shake the feeling there was so much more to this story.

“I’ll take it,” I said before I could second-guess myself.

“Good. He wants to meet tomorrow morning. And Calla? Be careful with this one. My sources say Kane Drax is… complicated.”

If only she knew what he could do to me without saying a word.

I arrived at the courthouse forty minutes early, armed with coffee strong enough to wake the dead and a determination to keep things strictly professional. Whatever this thing was between Kane and me—this electric connection that made my skin burn and my pulse race—it had to take a backseat to his legal defense.

I could do this. I was a lawyer first, a woman second. No matter how Kane affected me, I wouldn’t let it compromise my ability to represent him.

The lie tasted bitter even as I thought it.

Kane was already waiting when the guard led me to the interview room, and the sight of him made every carefully constructed wall crumble to dust. He’d showered since yesterday, his black hair still damp and loose around his shoulders. The jumpsuit clung to his frame like it had been tailored, emphasizing every hard line and dangerous curve.

He stood when I entered—a courtesy that shouldn’t have affected me but did—and the space between us immediately crackled with tension.

“Ms. Reyes.” His voice was carefully neutral, but I caught the rough edge beneath the politeness. “Thank you for coming.”

“Mr. Drax.” I set my briefcase on the table, using the familiar ritual to center myself even as my hands shook. “I understand you’ve reconsidered your position regarding representation.”

“I have.” Kane settled back into his chair, but there was nothing relaxed about his posture. He looked like a predator trying to appear harmless. “Turns out you’re the best criminal defense attorney in the city under thirty.”

The compliment should have pleased me. Instead, it felt like armor—something to hide behind instead of acknowledging what had really passed between us yesterday.

“Flattery isn’t necessary, Mr. Drax. Just honesty.”

Something flickered in his eyes at that. “Honesty. Right.” His smile was sharp enough to cut. “How honest do you want me to be, Counselor?”

The way he said “counselor” made my thighs clench. There was something darkly intimate about it, like he was testing how the word tasted on his tongue.

“Honest enough to mount a proper defense.” I uncapped my pen with hands that trembled slightly. “Your record suggests you’re familiar with the legal system.”

“Guilty.” Kane’s gaze tracked the movement of my fingers, and I felt heat bloom under my skin. “Though most of those charges were dropped. Amazing what money can buy.”

“And this time?”

“This time I’m being framed by a princess who doesn’t like hearing ‘no.’” His voice hardened, and I caught a glimpse of the man who commanded respect through presence alone. “Victoria Ashford thinks daddy’s money can buy her anything. Including me.”

I scribbled notes, grateful for something to focus on besides the way Kane’s jumpsuit stretched across his chest when he leaned forward. “Tell me what happened Friday night. Everything.”

Kane was quiet so long I started to wonder if he’d heard me. When he finally spoke, his voice was carefully controlled.

“You were there.”

My pen slipped, leaving an ink blot across my legal pad. “Excuse me?”

“Eclipse. Friday night.” Kane’s eyes never left my face, and I felt pinned like a butterfly under glass. “Red dress, brunette sister, looked like you wanted to bolt the second you walked in.”

Heat flooded my cheeks. Of course he’d noticed me staring. I’d been practically drooling over his public display, my body responding to his dominance in ways that still horrified me.

“I was there briefly,” I managed.

“Long enough.” Kane leaned forward, and his scent hit me like a drug—leather and something wild that made my mouth water. “Tell me what you saw.”

This was insane. I was supposed to be interviewing him, not the other way around. But something in Kane’s voice compelled honesty.

“You were… entertaining someone. Victoria approached afterward, and you rejected her.” I kept my voice clinical despite the memory of how watching him had made me wet. “She didn’t handle it well.”

“Understatement of the century.” Kane’s laugh was harsh. “Victoria’s been circling me for months like a shark scenting blood. Friday night, she decided to make her move public.”

“And when you refused?”

“She threatened to destroy me.” Kane’s eyes glowed with remembered anger, and for a moment, they looked almost inhuman. “Said she’d make sure I rotted in prison if I didn’t give her what she wanted.”

I made notes, my legal mind already cataloging defense strategies even as my body responded to the dangerous energy radiating off him.

“There were witnesses—”

“Who won’t testify against Senator Ashford’s daughter.” Kane’s voice was flat with resignation. “The kind of people at Eclipse don’t risk their necks for bikers.”

He was probably right, but I hadn’t built my career on probably impossible cases by accepting defeat.

“Let me worry about that. Right now, I need details about Victoria’s allegations.”

Kane recited the accusations with clinical precision, but I could see the rage building beneath his controlled surface. Victoria claimed he’d cornered her in a private room, forced himself on her despite her protests, and threatened her when she tried to leave.

It was textbook he-said-she-said, and without physical evidence or cooperative witnesses, it would come down to credibility. A biker with a record versus a senator’s daughter with unlimited resources.

We were fucked, and we both knew it.

“There’s something else,” Kane said when I’d finished taking notes. “Something you need to understand.”

I looked up, and the intensity in his gaze made my breath catch. He looked like he was about to confess to murder or declare war or—

“What is it?”

Kane stared at me for a long moment, some internal battle playing out across his features. His hands were clenched into fists on the table, and I could see the tension thrumming through his body like a live wire.

“This case isn’t what it seems. There are people—powerful people—who want me gone. Victoria’s just their latest weapon.”

“What kind of people?”

“The kind who don’t hesitate to eliminate threats.” Kane’s voice dropped to something almost like a growl. “The kind who might hurt you just for being here.”

The words should have frightened me. Should have sent me running like any sane woman would. Instead, they sent liquid fire straight to my core.

“Is that a threat, Mr. Drax?”

“It’s a warning.” Kane’s gaze burned into mine. “Walk away, Calla. Drop this case and forget you ever met me.”

“Why?” The question slipped out before I could stop it. “Because I’m not good enough? Because I’m some cop’s daughter who doesn’t belong in your world?”

Kane’s face went absolutely still. “Because you’re too good for it.”

The words hung between us like a confession, and I felt something crack open in my chest. Not rejection. Protection. Kane wasn’t pushing me away because he didn’t want me.

He was trying to save me from something.

“Everyone deserves proper representation,” I said quietly. “Even you.”

Kane’s breath hitched like I’d hit him. For a moment, his careful control slipped, and I saw raw hunger flash across his features before he shuttered it again.

“Your funeral,” he said, but his voice was rough with something that sounded suspiciously like gratitude.

I gathered my papers and stood on unsteady legs, trying to ignore how Kane’s presence filled the small room like smoke. “I’ll be in touch when I have more information.”

“Calla.”

I paused at the door, my hand hovering over the handle. When I turned, Kane was watching me with an expression that made my knees weak—desperate, conflicted, like he was fighting a war with himself.

“Be careful,” he said quietly.

The simple request shouldn’t have meant anything. But as I looked at this dangerous man who was trying to protect me even as he pushed me away, I felt something shift in my chest.

“I will.”

Kane’s eyes closed like I’d hurt him. “That’s what I was afraid of.”

I walked out of that courthouse carrying his words like a secret flame, warming the cold places his rejection had left behind the day before. Because now I understood.

Kane Drax didn’t want me to walk away because he didn’t want me.

He wanted me to run because he probably wanted me too much.

And that knowledge was the most dangerous thing of all.

I couldn’t concentrate.

Three hours I’d been sitting at my kitchen table, case files spread across the surface like tarot cards predicting disaster, and all I could think about was the way Kane had said my name. Like it hurt him. Like it was something precious he wasn’t allowed to have.

Be careful.

The memory of his desperate plea sent heat spiraling through my core for the hundredth time today. I shifted in my chair, pressing my thighs together against the persistent ache that hadn’t left me since walking out of that courthouse.

This was insane. I was a professional woman, not some lovesick teenager obsessing over her first crush. Kane Drax was my client—a criminal accused of sexual assault—and I was supposed to be preparing his defense, not fantasizing about his hands on my body.

But God, the way he’d looked at me. Like I was salvation and damnation wrapped in a conservative suit.

I forced myself to focus on Victoria’s statement, reading through her accusations with growing skepticism. Her timeline didn’t match the witness reports. She claimed Kane had followed her to a private room around midnight, but the bartender’s statement put him at his table until at least 12:30, surrounded by his crew.

Someone was lying, and it wasn’t hard to guess who.

My phone buzzed with a text from Sofia: How’s the mysterious client? Still thinking about Mr. Tall, Dark & Dangerous?with a smirking devil face

If only she knew.

I’d been thinking about Kane since the moment I’d left that interview room. Thinking about the electricity that had shot between us when I’d touched the door. The way his voice had roughened when he’d warned me away. The desperate hunger I’d glimpsed before he’d shuttered his expression.

What would have happened if I’d walked back to his corner that night?

The thought was dangerous. Intoxicating.

My hand drifted to my throat as if pulled by an invisible thread, imagining Kane’s fingers there instead—strong, unyielding, commanding. Would he have been gentle, coaxing? Or would he have claimed me with the same ruthless dominance I’d watched him unleash on the brunette?

Heat coiled low in my belly, spreading molten and relentless until it pooled between my thighs. The memory looped through my head: Kane’s hands gripping her waist, guiding her every movement while she writhed against him like her sanity depended on it. And that sound he’d made—that guttural growl, not quite human—when she kissed him with tongue and teeth like she wanted to devour him whole.

I wanted to make him sound like that.

The realization hit like lightning, sharp and impossible to ignore. My body moved before my mind could stop it. My hand slid beneath the waistband of my yoga pants, finding the slick heat of my own need already waiting for me.

Kane.

Just his name in my head was enough to make my pulse stutter. I pictured his voice saying mine, rough and low, whispering Calla like a command only I could obey. My fingers brushed against my slick folds, circling with the same rhythm I’d watched that brunette grind out against his lap.

But in my fantasy, it wasn’t my hand. It was his. His rough, calloused fingers—stronger, firmer, far less forgiving—working me with practiced precision. He’d know every place to touch, every spot to press, every way to drag out the pleading he craved.

“Please,” I gasped into the silence of my apartment, my other hand gripping the table edge so hard my knuckles ached.

In my mind, Kane’s mouth was at my throat, hot breath trailing fire down to my chest. His teeth grazing, his lips claiming. His hand holding me open while his fingers drove me higher, deeper, faster. He wouldn’t stop until I was undone, until I shattered against him. He’d want it all. Demand it all. And I’d give it, because he would leave me no choice.

You’re mine, Calla. Say it.

The phantom command vibrated through me, as real as if his lips brushed my ear. My body clenched around my own fingers like he was really there, pulling the sounds from me that I swore I’d never make.

Say you’re mine.

“I’m yours,” I cried out, the words torn from my throat as release ripped through me. My back arched, my body convulsing with wave after relentless wave of pleasure. His name spilled from my lips like a prayer, like a curse, like the only truth that had ever mattered.

And when the last shudder passed, I collapsed against the chair, breathless, trembling, every nerve still singing with the echo of him. Kane wasn’t here. But God, it felt like he had been.

For a moment, I floated in that post-orgasmic haze where nothing mattered except the satisfaction thrumming through my veins.

Then reality crashed back.

I was sitting in my kitchen, hand still buried in my pants, having just masturbated to fantasies of my client. My criminal client. The man accused of sexual assault who I was supposed to be defending with professional objectivity.

“Jesus Christ,” I whispered, yanking my hand away like I’d been burned.

What was wrong with me? I’d built my career on logic, on evidence, on maintaining appropriate boundaries. I didn’t lose control. I didn’t let emotion cloud my judgment. And I certainly didn’t get off thinking about dangerous men who warned me away for my own good.

But the evidence was literally on my fingers, and the satisfied ache between my legs made it impossible to pretend this was just professional curiosity.

I was in trouble. Deep, dangerous trouble that had nothing to do with Kane’s legal case and everything to do with the way he made me feel like a woman instead of just a lawyer.

My phone rang, shattering the guilty silence.

Unknown number. I almost didn’t answer, but years of legal training had taught me that important calls often came from unexpected sources.

“Calla Reyes.”

“Ms. Reyes.” The voice was cultured, refined, with the kind of old-money accent that spoke of boarding schools and trust funds. “I believe you’re representing Kane Drax.”

Ice formed in my veins despite the lingering heat in my body. “Who is this?”

“A concerned citizen with advice for a promising young attorney.” The man’s tone was conversational, but there was steel beneath the silk. “Mr. Drax is a dangerous man with dangerous enemies. It would be… unfortunate if an ambitious lawyer found herself caught in the crossfire.”

“Is that a threat?”

“It’s practical advice. Drop the case, Ms. Reyes. There are other clients, other opportunities. Ones that won’t end with you following in your mother’s footsteps.”

The mention of my mother hit like a physical blow. “What do you know about my mother?”

“I know Elena Reyes thought she was untouchable too. Right up until she wasn’t.” The man’s chuckle was soft, almost gentle. “Car accidents happen so easily in this city. Especially to lawyers who don’t know when to stop digging.”

The line went dead.

I sat there staring at my phone, my earlier satisfaction replaced by something cold and sharp. Someone was watching me. Threatening me. Using my mother’s memory as a weapon.

They’d made a mistake.

My hands shook as I gathered the scattered case files, but it wasn’t fear making them tremble. It was rage. Pure, clean fury at whoever thought they could intimidate me into abandoning a client.

They didn’t know me very well.

I’d built my career on impossible cases, on fighting for people the system wanted to forget. I wasn’t about to start backing down now, especially not for some anonymous coward who hid behind veiled threats.

But as I locked my apartment door and checked the windows twice before bed, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d just crossed a line I couldn’t uncross.

Whatever this case really was, it was bigger than Victoria’s wounded pride. Bigger than Kane’s criminal record.

And somehow, it was connected to secrets that had gotten my mother killed.