You shouldn’t have let that guy touch your arm.

It was innocent. Quick. A brush of fingers over your sleeve while he leaned in to ask your name. A cheap drink offer. A cocky smile. He had no idea what kind of fuse he’d lit.

Across the bar, Quinn was already watching. Head tilted. Blue eyes wide with interest. Not at the stranger—no, not really. At you. And at how you smiled. Not for him. By the time the stranger wandered off to get you that drink, Quinn was gone.

You didn’t think much of it.

Not until the walk home, when he reappeared at your side like he’d always been there—hands in his jacket pockets, humming something tuneless and soft.

“You looked good tonight,” he said. “Too good.”

You gave him a sideways glance. He was smiling, but there was something wrong about it. The kind of smile that stretched too far, too easy.

“That guy,” he added. “The one with the voice that cracked when he flirted? Cute.”

Your stomach turned.

“He’s gone now.”

The words hung in the air like fogged glass.

You stopped walking, your voice laced with so much disappointment, but no a hint of surprise. “Quinn.”

He turned toward you slowly, like a cat in no rush to show you the mouse it had already gutted.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he said gently. “I didn’t do anything… unforgivable.”

He stepped closer. No blade in hand. No blood on his clothes. Just that soft voice. That smile.

“I mean, he was going to touch you. I could see it. It made my hands twitch.” He let out a quiet laugh. “Isn’t that awful? You make me want to be worse.”

You didn’t answer. You couldn’t. He leaned in, eyes gleaming with something sharp and hollow.

“You’d look better chained to my radiator anyway,” he whispered. “Or maybe a cage. No one else would get to look. Or talk. Or breathe near you. I’d feed you. I’d clean you. I’d let you read something. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

Still smiling. Still sweet. Still completely sincere.

“Maybe a collar,” he mused, more to himself now. “I could carve my name into it. Real pretty.”

And when he looked at you again—calm, quiet, unrepentant—he added, like it was the simplest truth in the world—

“You’re already mine. I’m just deciding how to make it official.”