Chapter 176: The Devil’s Woman Likes His Friend

​Damian leaned forward, his knuckles turning white as his fingers curled tightly over the cold steel railing of the hospital bed. It was infuriating. It drove him utterly out of his mind.

Anastasia walked through life with her chin held high, spitting fire and defying him at every turn, pretending she was made of stone... and yet, the moment the real world touched her, she snapped like brittle glass.

​Every single time. If she wasn’t walking directly into crosshairs, she was choking on a microscopic grain of dust, leaving him to scramble through the wreckage to keep her heart beating.

​"Always suffering," Damian rasped, shaking his head in dark, bitter disbelief. "Always finding a new, creative way to bleed. Do you actively seek out ways to let this world crush you, my doll? Or are you just that fragile?"

​He hated how pale she looked against the white cotton pillows. He hated the purple bruising spreading across her collarbones from where the rash had burned her, and he despised the faint purr of the machine that was doing the work her own lungs should have handled.

​A sharp curse left his lips, thick with fury... not at the assassins, not at the club, but at the infuriating reality of her mortality.

​Slowly, almost against his own will, Damian reached out. His large, rough hand caught the edge of the thin hospital blanket, dragging it up over her bare shoulder to tuck her in against the chill of the air conditioning.

His fingertips lingered on the curve of her neck, feeling the fragile, shallow flutter of her pulse beneath the skin.

​He didn’t pull away. He sat back in the shadow of the chair, his dark eyes burning in the dim amber light, watching her sleep with the lethal, watchful exhaustion of a beast guarding a cracked prize he refused to let shatter.

************************

The harsh scent of clinical antiseptic stung Ana’s nose before she could even register the steady, rhythmic beeping beside her head. Her eyelashes fluttered, feeling heavy as lead, her throat parched like dry desert sand.

​Muffled voices cut through the fog.

​"...field office has the kitchen sealed," Julian was saying, his voice low, measured, and stripped of all warmth. "I had Special Agent Vance’s team lock down the back alleys before dawn. Nobody is sweeping the prep stations under the rug."

​"And the feds?" Damian’s voice was a rough, gravelly rasp, sounding like he had swallowed broken glass. "Did they pull the server logs?"

​"They’re on site now," Julian replied, the rustle of a tailored suit fabric indicating he was pacing near the window. "Forensics took swabs from the pastry platter. This afternoon, federal techs are pulling the hard drives from Nocturne’s subterranean server room. We’ll have the unedited surveillance footage by lunch. If someone steps out of line, we will see every single second of it."

​A faint, involuntary breath caught in Ana’s chest as she shifted against the stiff hospital cotton.

​Damian went completely rigid.

​Without breaking stride, his gaze sliced downward. His dark, bloodshot eyes locked squarely onto hers.

​Ana lay there beneath the thin blanket, the plastic oxygen cannula resting over her upper lip, her hazel eyes wide, unfocused, and staring up at him with cautious, unblinking curiosity.

She took in the dark stubble shadowing his sharp jaw, the bruised knuckles resting on his knee, and the sheer, exhausted darkness in his face.

​Damian’s brow furrowed into an immediate, irritated frown.

​He didn’t soften. He didn’t breathe a sigh of relief. He merely leaned back in the heavy leather armchair, his jaw hardening as he surveyed her dazed expression with cynical disdain.

​"Look at you," Damian scoffed, his gravelly voice dripping with dark mockery. "Staring like a half-drowned stray cat."

​Ana’s brow pulled together in a tight, offended frown beneath the oxygen prongs.

​She swallowed hard, her throat burning raw from the intubation tube that had scraped it hours earlier. Her voice came out thin, raspy, and thoroughly unimpressed.

​"Is that... the first thing you’re supposed to say to someone... who just woke up in a hospital bed?"

Damian leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, his dark eyes narrowing into twin slits of cold steel.

​"You’re lucky you woke up at all," he said, each word coated in a harsh, bitter bite. "If you weren’t so damn busy drowning yourself in tequila and playing the defiant martyr, you would have realized what you were putting in your mouth before your throat clamped shut. You practically walked yourself onto that gurney."

​The words hit her like a physical slap.

​Ana’s throat tightened... not from the allergen, but from a sudden, sharp ache in her chest. Her hazel eyes glistened with unshed tears of pure indignation and hurt. She dragged the thin blanket higher against her collarbones, glaring at him with raspy venom.

​"This is your fault," she choked out, her damaged vocal cords straining against the raw whisper. "Don’t you dare twist this onto me. Everything... every single terrifying thing that has happened to me since you brought me back into your life... is because of you. I wouldn’t even be in the crosshairs of this sickening world if you hadn’t dragged me into it."

​Damian let out a sharp, derisive scoff, rolling his eyes with cynical disgust. "Bullshit. You love throwing yourself into the fire, Anastasia, just so you can complain about the burns."

​Julian, standing by the foot of the bed with his hands buried in his slacks, cleared his throat awkwardly. He shifted his weight, watching his best friend handle the delicate situation with all the finesse of a wrecking ball.

Jesus, Damian, Julian thought, shaking his head faintly. The man could dismantle an international cartel before breakfast, but when it came to speaking to the woman he had nearly torn the city down to save, he was an absolute disaster.

​Stepping into the line of fire, Julian softened his posture and offered Ana a warm, gentle smile.

​"Ignore him, Ana," Julian said, his voice dropping into a calm, reassuring cadence. He leaned over slightly, resting a supportive hand on the metal footboard. "How are you actually feeling? Your lungs took a heavy beating, but the doctors managed to clear the swelling before it caused any permanent damage. Does your throat hurt terribly?"

​The contrast was like night and day.

​Ana’s rigid defenses melted by a fraction. A faint, tired smile touched her pale lips, the relief obvious in her soft eyes as she looked at Julian. "It burns a little... but I can breathe. Thank you, Julian."

​Beside the bed, Damian’s jaw clamped shut so violently a muscle jumped beneath his stubble. His obsidian gaze flicked from Ana’s soft, appreciative smile directly to Julian.

He didn’t like it. He didn’t like the warmth in her voice, he didn’t like the look in her eyes, and he sure as hell despised the way she leaned toward another man’s gentleness while giving him only ice and thorns.

​Then, Ana let out a weak, raspy sigh, still looking at Julian with tired fondness.

​"I really wish Damian was at least half a bit of you, Julian," she murmured faintly. "You’re always so good to me. No wonder women fight to get your attention."

​The temperature in the private ICU room instantly plummeted below freezing.

​The steady, rhythmic beep of the cardiac monitor seemed to grow deafening in the sudden, suffocating silence. Julian froze, the polite smile on his face entirely vanishing as his spine stiffened into stone. He slowly cut his eyes toward Damian, mentally calculating his own chances of surviving the next five seconds.

​Damian didn’t scoff this time. He didn’t blink. A lethal, predatory stillness washed over his broad frame, his dark eyes fixed onto Anastasia with an intensity so chillingly possessive it could have cracked the glass windows.

​Ana, still hazy from the sedatives and genuinely just making an innocent observation, simply blinked, completely oblivious to the catastrophic landmine she had just detonated.

***********************

The gentle, rhythmic roar of the Atlantic tide rolled up against the private, sun-bleached sands of the Hamptons estate.

​On the expansive teak terrace overlooking the water, a pristine linen table was laid out with fresh porcelain, sliced tropical fruit, and steaming black coffee.

Dante Sullivan sat relaxed in a low wicker armchair, clad in an immaculate, unbuttoned cream linen shirt, idly cutting into a poached egg with a silver knife.

​Across from him, Vivian Stark sat stiffly, dark designer sunglasses concealing the sleepless, manic exhaustion carved around her eyes. She hadn’t touched her mimosa.

​Dante chewed deliberately, set his silver fork down with a faint, crystalline chime, and wiped the corner of his mouth with a cloth napkin. The ocean breeze fluttered the edges of the linen tablecloth between them.

​"The ocean air is particularly clear this morning, isn’t it, Vivian?" Dante murmured, his voice deceptively smooth, bathed in a lazy, aristocratic cadence.

​Vivian swallowed, her throat tight. "Dante, if we need to discuss the extraction timeline..."

​"I was actually thinking about the news out of Mount Sinai," Dante interrupted mildly, picking up his espresso cup. His pale blue eyes flicked up, locking onto her with the calm, dead stillness of a deep-sea predator. "Anastasia Vance was admitted to the trauma unit at three in the morning. Anaphylaxis. A poisoned garnish on the VIP mezzanine at Nocturne."

​He took a slow, measured sip, setting the porcelain down without making a sound.

​"Tell me, Vivian," Dante asked, his tone almost pleasant, entirely devoid of inflection. "On whose authority did you touch her?"