?Chapter 1381:


    Inside the tinted car, Darian’s expression was carved in shadow, his voice low and dangerous. “Find out who that man beside her is.”


    “Yes, Mr. Lloyd,” came the stiff reply.


    Darian leaned back, his eyes glinting with a chilling possessiveness. Anyone who dared stand beside his woman was already living on borrowed time. He wasn’t sharing her with anyone.


    Inside an abandoned factory, the air reeked of rust and decay.


    A loud p cracked through the darkness, sharp and vicious. A hand struck flesh, and the force of it jolted Darian awake. His head snapped to the side, pain blooming across his cheek.


    Blinking rapidly, he squinted against a blinding beam of light. The re was harsh, searing into his eyes until everything blurred into white.


    And then—just as suddenly—the light vanished. Darkness swallowed the room.


    A low, uneasy dread began to crawl through his chest.


    Where the hell was he? Just moments ago, he’d been in thepany of two stunning women, ready to indulge in histest pleasure.


    Now, his wrists and ankles burned from tightly knotted ropes, and cold concrete pressed against his back.


    The darkness stretched. Only a thin sliver of moonlight seeped through broken windows, sketching faint, wavering shadows across the floor. In that uncertain light, something—or someone—seemed to move.


    Darian blinked hard, his vision struggling to adjust. Was that a figure… or was his mind ying tricks on him?


    He jerked against the ropes binding his wrists, muscles straining, but the cords only bit deeper into his skin. The more he struggled, the tighter they held.


    Panic began to rise like ice water in his chest.


    “Is… is anyone there?” he stammered, his voice cracking despite his effort to sound calm.


    No reply.


    Cont3nt hozt3d at g??l??ovels.??o??


    Only the hollow hum of silence answered him—broken now and then by the chirping of distant insects and the pounding of his own heartbeat echoing in his ears. The air felt too still, too heavy.


    A suffocating dread crept through him—the unmistakable sense that death was lurking.


    Darian gritted his teeth and thrashed harder, the chair scraping against the concrete floor.


    And then he heardughter—mocking and cruel.


    It echoed through the darkness, slithering around him like a serpent. Each note carried amusement, as if whoever was there found his struggle entertaining.


    “Who’s there?!” Darian shouted, forcing his fear down with anger. “Show yourself if you dare! Stop hiding in the shadows!”


    His voice wavered, but he pushed harder, clinging to fury as hisst weapon against terror.


    .


    .


    .