The Revelation.
Damien pushed open the door, breathless from the search, only to be hit by a wall of humid heat and candlelight dancing against the walls. The room was cloaked in steam, thick with the scent of lavender and something darker, something feminine.
"Tyler?" he called out, voice hoarse.
And then she appeared.
She stepped through the mist like a fantasy given form, wearing a sheer crimson robe that clung to her curves and slid off one shoulder like an invitation. The fabric barely concealed the lace beneath a barely black lingerie set that left little to the imagination. Her hair was damp, her skin glowing, and her eyes_God, her eyes blazed with something wild and unrestrained.
"Tyler... did you really betray me?" Damien choked out, though the words nearly died on his lips.
"Shhh!" she whispered, placing her perfectly manicured finger on his mouth, silencing both his doubt and his logic.
Then like a seductress from the pit of hell itself, she wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him into her body, her heat searing into him. And then she kissed him.
It wasn't gentle.
It was hungry. Fierce. A collision of guilt and desire, pain and longing.
He tried to resist, swore he would, but the second her lips met his, the war inside him vanished. He kissed her back with the desperation of a man drowning. Even though he could hear the warnings echoing in his mind, but he shoved them away, consumed by the fire between them.
Damien scooped her into his arms with an urgency he could no longer tame. Tyler melted into him, her body pliant and hungry, as if she'd been waiting for this, aching for it.
The bed creaked as he laid her down, not gently this time, but like a man who had been holding back for far too long.
Their lips crashed again, no more softness, no more hesitation. Just fire.
She moaned against his mouth as his body pressed into hers, and her hands flew to his shirt. Impatient, greedy, she pulled at the fabric until it came off over his head in one fluid, frantic motion. Her fingers explored his bare chest, skimming across hard muscle, nails grazing his skin with feverish need.
When his mouth dropped to her throat, she tilted her head back with a gasp.
But when he sucked her earlobe, teeth dragging just enough to blur pain with pleasure, Tyler cried out, loud, uncontrolled.
"Damien_God..."
He growled low in his throat at the sound, lips curving into a grin against her skin.
Then he trailed lower, kissing along her jaw, down her neck, slower now, letting his breath warm her every inch. He found her collarbone, and traced it with his tongue, then his teeth, worshiping her like she was something sacred. Tyler squirmed beneath him, every nerve ending alive, skin flushed, heart slamming.
"Please..." she whispered, voice shaking, begging with everything in her.
Damien's gaze snapped to hers.
And then he kissed her again, rough, possessive, his hands sliding beneath the last of her lingerie, pushing it aside. She arched into him, already wet, already trembling.
He slid into her in one long, aching thrust.
She gasped his name, back arching, legs wrapping tightly around his waist. The moment their bodies met, it was chaos and clarity all at once.
They moved together, wild and unrestrained. His hand gripped her waist, pulling her against him like he couldn't get close enough. Her lips found his shoulder, his neck, her moans breaking between kisses as the bed rocked beneath them.
Every movement was urgent, messy, electric. Every sound, every breath, every desperate whisper was a thread pulling them deeper into something neither of them could name.
And just as the moment swelled to breaking,
Damien's eyes flew open.
Darkness.
Silence.
The echo of her name still burning on his lips.
His chest heaved up and down, drenched in sweat.
He reached for her, but his hand found only air.
Gone.
All of it.
Just a dream.
"No..." he whispered, dazed, disbelieving.
A dream?
Just few days ago Damien Lopez thought he had found her, the missing part of him, he thought finally he found love in the most strangest places, but how could he have imagined what love has in store for him.
The perfect plan
Joseph Lopez, an exceptional and reclusive software magnate in his mid fifties, is on the brink of unveiling a revolutionary piece of code like never before in history, highly sophisticated system designed to upend digital infrastructure and shift the balance of power in the cyber world. The project is embedded in secrecy, buried beneath layers of encryption and protected in a high security vault inside his sprawling estate
Few days before the highly anticipated launch, Joseph's only son and business partner, Damien Lopez, returns home from abroad with unexpected news; he's engaged. His fiancée, Tyler Ross, is a soft spoken, timid young woman with oversized glasses and an air of nervous sweetness. She seems demure, deferential, and slightly overwhelmed by the grandness of the Lopez estate.
To celebrate their engagement, Joseph hosts a lavish evening party at the mansion. Laughter and music fill the marble halls. Guests drink and dance under glittering chandeliers. Tyler smiles politely, says all the right things, and earns the affection of the family. But midway through the evening, she excuses herself, claiming she needs to use the restroom.
Instead, she slips down a quiet corridor, her demeanor tightening like a drawn wire. Navigating the estate with eerie precision, she finds her way to the code vault Joseph's sanctum. Her hands tremble slightly as she removes her thick glasses, revealing sharp, alert eyes beneath. From a hidden fold in her coat, she retrieves a slim black disk.
She plugs it into the system. The screen flickers to life. Her fingers move quickly, inputting a string of custom written commands. The transfer begins.
Time stretches unbearably as the progress bar inches forward. Every second feels like an hour. Her breathing shallow, she stiffens as footsteps approach outside the door. A security guard pauses, sensing something, but Tyler, in a single calculated move, ducks behind a cabinet and freezes.
The guard who thought he saw someone entered the vault, then assumes he must have been hallucinating so he chose to moves on.
Once the transfer completes, she ejects the disk, carefully replaces everything, and walks calmly back to the party, her smile gentle, her voice soft. No one suspects a thing. She was too smooth, too demure, even though her hands were shaking profusely underneath the table, and she was sweating buckets behind those huge glasses.
But still no one suspected anything.
Later that evening, Damien drives her back to what appears to be her modest suburban home. He kisses her cheek goodnight, waves cheerfully, and speeds off into the night.
But the moment his car disappears around the corner, a sleek black luxury vehicle pulls up from the shadows. Without hesitation, Tyler steps inside. The door shuts. The car speeds off.
Only then does she exhale her whole body relaxing in a single, quiet breath of relief.
The car eventually pulled off a dark, winding road and eased to a stop before a dimly lit compound flanked by armed guards. Tyler stepped out silently, her boots crunching the gravel. She was led through a narrow passage into a cavernous room where a single man sat in shadow, backlit by a halo of industrial lights.
He radiated control. Dressed in an obsidiant black suit, fingers adorned with chunky rings, his silver streaked hair slicked back like a villain from another age. His eyes didn't move when she entered, but the temperature in the room seemed to drop.
"Where is it?" he asked, his voice smooth but laced with steel.
Tyler reached into her coat and slowly extended the black disk.
"I did what you asked," she said softly, almost pleading. "Please, let me and my family go now."
He took the disk with a faint smirk, then gave a small flick of his wrist. Victor , his most trusted and right hand man, stepped out from the shadows, accepted the disk, and disappeared through a side door.
"We'll see," the man murmured. "Whether you walk out of here, depends on what's on that disk."
Minutes passed in heavy silence. Tyler didn't sit. She didn't move. She couldn't breathe.Her fingers clenched and unclenched nervously at her sides.
The guard returned, leaned down, and whispered something into the man's ear. The man's expression shifted slowly, first a twitch of the mouth, then a wide, incredulous smile, his diamond studded teeth catching the light like a threat.
"You're full of surprises," he said. "Honestly, I didn't think a little mouse like you could pull off something of this magnitude."
Tyler's voice shook. "So, we're free now?"
He stood, buttoned his jacket slowly, and walked a measured circle around her.
"You're free. All debts cleared. But you should leave the city. No leave the country. Because once the Lopez family realizes what's happened, you'll wish you died in my basement instead of theirs."
She nodded slowly. "We'll relocate," she said quickly.
He raised an eyebrow "You'll need cash. And you'll need to vanish." Go dark for a while." With a snap of his fingers, another guard emerged and returned with a black briefcase. He popped it open bundles of hundred-dollar bills stacked neatly inside.
With another slight gesture, a second guard disappeared down a hallway. Moments later, he returned with a briefcase and handed it to Tyler.
She opened it. Her eyes widened. It was packed with crisp bundles of hundred dollar bills.
"You're giving us this much?"
The man chuckled, a low rumble of amusement.
"Do you even realize what you've stolen? This," he tapped the side of the briefcase "is going to put me on the cover of Forbes. What trained mercenaries couldn't do in years, you did in a single evening. You're extraordinary, girl."
He laughed again, a cruel sort of glee in his voice. "Take it. You've earned it. You're free now."
Tyler hesitated only a second longer, then grabbed the briefcase with trembling hands and rushed from the room.
She was taken through a long underground corridor, flanked by steel walls and the muffled echoes of snarling animals. They passed cages of wild beasts, eyes glowing in the dark. A tiger stalked in silence. A lion growled as they passed. A monstrous anaconda twisted lazily behind thick glass.
Finally, they reached a rusted cage in a forgotten corner. The smell hit first damp straw, old blood, human sweat. Inside, bound by chains, were a woman and a young boy.
Tyler gasped in disbelief as she covered her mouth, hot tears spilling from her eyes when she saw the state of her family, she sworw she wanted to act strong after everything shes been through, if for anything, everything ends today, but then it all came crashing down on her, she couldn't believe what her family had been reduced to.
Since her father's demise, life has been tough. Tough as hell.
First they lost everything, then was shocked with the news of having to settle a huge debt they know absolutely nothing about, and Tyler had taken it upon herself to fight for her family, and evwn though she's been through hell and back, well today, she got rewarded.
Opportunity to start again.
Tyler decided to be strong before her family, so she wiped her tears and then stepped forward as the guards unlocked the cage. Light spilled in, making the prisoners flinch.
The chains came off. The woman gasped. The boy blinked against the light.
Outside, a sleek black helicopter waited, its blades already spinning.
Minutes later, all three were inside a waiting helicopter. The wind from its blades whipped their hair as they took off.
"Where are we going?" Clara Clarkson, Ana's mother asked, clutching Ana's arm and with panicked voice. "Is this, is this where they kill us?"
"No, Mommy," Ana said softly. "I promised. No one's going to get hurt."
Bob Clarkson Ana's brother looked up, eyes wide with wonder. "Big sis, is this freedom? Are we really free?"
Tyler nodded, her voice hoarse. "Yes. Mom. Tony. As of tonight, we are free from Dexter."
They both stared at her.
"And the debt?" her mother asked, a crack of disbelief in her voice.
Tyler swallowed hard. "I manage to find a way to pay it."
Tony blinked. "What? That's impossible. That debt was more than we could ever repay in three lifetimes."
Her mother's face darkened with sudden dread.
"Ana, what have you done?" "Ana, what did you do?" her mother cried, panic creeping into her voice.
But Ana didn't answer. She just stared out the window, jaw clenched tight, her face unreadable.
She said nothing.