Chapter 271

[ 1,213 words ]

Katia’s POV

My body was a map of aches.

I woke up slowly, the cold morning light cutting through the heavy drapes of my bedroom to cast long, slate-grey shadows across the floor. As I tried to sit up, a sharp, direct wave of soreness radiated from my hips down through my thighs. The skin on my waist carried the dark, deep-purple prints of Julian’s fingers from three in the morning, a physical reminder of the relentless, unyielding way he had claimed me. My throat was dry, the taste of our collision still heavy in my mouth.

I pulled a silk robe over my shoulders, tying the belt tight around my waist, trying to rebuild the corporate armor that Julian had systematically stripped away.

Below, on the street, the distant hum of the media circus was a continuous, parasitic buzz. The paparazzi had been stationed at the lobby gates since Jude Wolfe’s broadcast, their lenses pointed toward my penthouse like a firing squad. I walked into the kitchen, my hands trembling slightly as I poured a glass of water, trying to find some thread of control in a life that was spinning rapidly out of its orbit.

A sharp, metallic clack echoed from the foyer.

I froze, the glass halfway to my lips. The security gate to my private elevator bay had just been bypassed. It wasn’t the familiar code that Julian used—the loud, dominant stride of a man who owned the space he walked into. This was different. The lift doors slid open with a soft hiss, followed by the slow, measured clicking of expensive dress shoes against the hardwood.

I stepped out of the kitchen, my chest tightening with a sudden, icy dread.

Standing in the foyer, calmly sliding a pair of leather gloves off his fingers, was Jude Wolfe.

He didn’t look like a man who had just bypassed high-level security. He looked like an executive arriving for a private board meeting. His dark suit was immaculate, his coat tailored to his broad, athletic shoulders, his face a mask of calm, cold British sophistication. But beneath the polished exterior, there was a heavy, suffocating pressure radiating off his body—the quiet, dangerous bearing of a predator that had walked into a trap and decided to make it his home.

“You have very poor security, Katia,” Jude said, his low accent carrying that unhurried weight. He tossed his gloves onto the marble console table, his dark eyes locking onto mine with a chilling, unblinkable focus. “A simple media distraction at the lobby entrance, a cloned service keycard, and your entire fortress falls apart p>

“Get out of my house, Jude,” I said, my voice dropping to a low, warning register as I stepped back, my hand reaching toward the counter where my phone was sitting.

Before my fingers could even touch the glass, Jude moved.

He was fast, terrifyingly fast for a man of his size. He crossed the living room in two long strides, his hand reaching out to clamp around my wrist with a sudden, violent tightness. His fingers didn’t just grip; they dug deep into my skin, the bone-crushing pressure making me gasp as he yanked my hand away from the phone.

He pulled me forward until my chest slammed against his chest, the scent of his cologne hitting my senses like a physical blow.

“I didn’t fly across the Atlantic to be dismissed by my wife,” Jude whispered, his voice smooth, steady, and entirely empty of warmth.

“I am not your wife,” I hissed, struggling against the iron grip on my wrist, but the physical leverage he had over me was strong.

Jude let out a short, quiet laugh—a dry, mocking sound that carried the full, abusive weight of his intent. He didn’t release my wrist. Instead, his other hand rose, his fingers rough and cold as they hooked under my chin, forcing my head up. His thumb dragged slowly across my bottom lip, pushing so hard against my teeth that I tasted the sudden, sharp copper of blood.

His eyes drifted down my neck, tracking the low collar of my silk robe.

The dark, distinct bruises Julian’s fingers had left on my collarbone were fully visible in the grey morning light. The sight of them made Jude’s eyes narrow, a dark, vicious heat flaring in his pupils. He reached down, his fingers hooking into the silk collar of my robe and ripping it back, exposing the raw, red marks scattered across my shoulders and chest.

“Well,” Jude murmured, his voice dropping to a harsh, toxic whisper as his hand moved down to grip the back of my neck, his fingers twisting into my hair and pulling my head back until my scalp burned. “It seems my wife has been keeping herself busy while I was in London. Who was he, Katia? Some cheap, desperate man you let into your bed to keep you warm p>

“It is none of your business,” I choked out, the pain in my scalp making my eyes water, but I refused to drop my gaze. “Get your hands off me p>

“You are my business,” Jude growled, his grip on my hair tightening until I was forced onto my tiptoes. He leaned in, his breath hot against my ear, his voice dripping with a cruel, emotional malice that went straight to my bones. “You think you are so smart with your corporate documents and your software licenses. But let me make the rules of this territory very clear to you. Tomorrow morning, you are going to stand in front of those cameras outside, and you are going to play the doting, grateful wife. You will thank me for clearing your name, and you will sign over thirty percent of IG Technologies’ telemetry assets to Wolfe Motorsport p>

“I will never sign anything over to you,” I spat, trying to bring my knee up to strike him, but Jude anticipated the move, his heavy thigh slamming against mine, pinning my lower body against the wall of the kitchen.

“You will,” Jude whispered, his face inches from mine, his eyes wild with a cold, systematic cruelty. “Because if you don’t, I will file an emergency custody injunction in the morning court. I will declare Aiden a bastard in the global press. I will release ’evidence’ of your fraudulent single motherhood, and I will have the court system drag your son out of that Windsor mansion before the sun goes down. Do you think Julian Windsor’s lawyers can stop a legal husband from claiming his family? I will ruin you, Katia. I will leave you standing in the mud with absolutely nothing, yeah p>

The threat to Aiden was the exact breaking point. The raw, desperate panic of a mother flared in my chest, my hands clawing at his face, my nails scratching the skin of his jaw as I tried to scream.

“You monster! Touch my son and I will kill you p>

Jude didn’t flinch. He grabbed my wrists, pinning them flat against the wall above my head, his chest crushing mine as he leaned his entire weight into me. “You won’t do anything but watch me take what is mine. Now, tell me… who is the bastard you’ve been sleeping with? Does he know his whore has a p>

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