[CONTENT TEMPLATE HERE]
Chapter 836:
A voice cut through the tension — cool, rough with sleep, and carrying the quiet authority of someone accustomed to being obeyed.
“Both of you. Stop p>
Every head turned.
June Erickson stood in the doorway, barefoot, wearing an oversized white dress shirt that was clearly not her own. The collar hung open, revealing the delicate line of her collarbone and the red marks left by the ether cloth on her neck. Her face was pale. Her eyes were not. They moved across the two men and their armed guards with the cold, measured clarity of frosted steel.
𝗬𝘰𝗎𝗋 𝘥𝘢𝘪lу 𝖽𝗼𝘴e 𝘰𝖿 𝘯𝗈vе𝗅𝘴 𝗈𝗻 𝘨𝖺𝘭ո𝘰𝘃𝘦𝘭ѕ.𝖼о𝘮
The noise had pulled her back to consciousness. She had woken in a strange room, in Crawford’s shirt, and understood immediately. There had been no panic, no screaming — only a swift, clear assessment.
She had pushed open the door, and with the bearing of someone who had never needed permission to occupy a room, she had stopped the carnage before it began.
June stepped forward. Her bare feet met the ruined Persian rug.
Her eyes swept the debris with sharp, calculated precision. She navigated around the worst of the shattered glass with deliberate care, refusing to let a single shard touch her skin. The sheer weight of her composure — absolute and unhurried — caused the armed men on both sides to instinctively lower their weapons.
The silence in the penthouse was suffocating.
Crawford broke it first. The arrogant smirk returned to his face as he stepped forward, extending a hand toward her waist.
“Careful, darling. You’re still weak,” he said, his voice a low purr.
June shifted her weight and his hand met empty air. She didn’t look at it.
“Do not cross the line, Crawford,” she said. Her voice was rough from the ether, but it carried a physical weight that stopped him cold.
Cole stood frozen beside the overturned coffee table. His bloodshot eyes were locked on the oversized white shirt wrapped around her frame — a glaring reminder that she was standing in another man’s territory.
The last thread of his restraint snapped. His chest heaved, his breathing turning ragged. He took a heavy step forward, his boots crunching on broken glass.
“What did you do to her?” Cole roared at Crawford. His hand clamped down on the tactical holster at his thigh, knuckles going bone-white.
June did not flinch. She met his manic gaze without blinking.
“I scrubbed the ether off my skin and put on a robe because I refused to be poisoned a second longer,” she said, her tone flat and utterly devoid of emotion. “There is no conspiracy here, Cole. Only survival p>
The words landed like a blow to the jaw. His facial muscles twitched. He tried to bury the suffocating panic beneath volume.
“Get your things,” Cole ordered, his voice trembling despite itself. “You are coming home with me. Now p>
June let out a short, humorless laugh.
“Which home?” she asked. “The one built on a dead man’s identity? Or the one where you kept your mistress p>
The temperature in the room dropped.