Chapter 3 - The Sanctuary of Blood and Cedar
By the time the sirens began wailing in the distance, the interior of my shop looked like a combat zone. Shards of glass covered the floor like fresh snow, shelves had been overturned, and the lingering haze of gunpowder hung thick in the air.
The four intruders had been zip-tied and dragged out into the alley by Roman’s men, leaving us alone in the quiet wreckage.
Roman stood near the shattered front window, holstering his weapon with slow, deliberate movements. He pulled out a silk handkerchief, wiped a smudge of soot from his cuff, and finally turned his dark, unreadable eyes back toward the counter.
Slowly, I stood up, my legs trembling from the sudden adrenaline crash. I looked down at Titan, who slowly rose to his feet, letting out a long, shuddering sigh before shaking his massive coat.
“Are you hit?” Roman asked. His voice was completely devoid of emotion, yet his eyes scanned every inch of my body, checking for blood or injury.
“I’m fine,” I said, my voice sharper than I intended. I gripped the edge of the counter to steady myself. “You brought a war into my store, Mr. Calder. You and whatever enemies you’re running from.”
Roman didn’t deny it. He took a slow step forward, his polished Italian leather shoes crunching softly against the broken glass. He stopped a few feet away, his gaze shifting down to Titan. The massive dog lowered his head slightly, emitting a low, warning rumble in the back of his throat, placing himself squarely between Roman and me.
A faint, bitter smile touched the corner of Roman’s mouth.
“He really does prefer you,” Roman murmured, almost to himself.
“He knows who isn’t trying to control him,” I retorted, kneeling back down to inspect Titan’s raw, chafed skin where the luxury tactical harness had rubbed him raw. I pulled a bottle of antiseptic spray and a clean gauze pad from a nearby shelf. “Look at him, Mr. Calder. This isn’t a pet. This is a weapon you broke. Or tried to.”
Roman stopped. The air between us grew tense again, but this time, there was no gunfire—only the heavy, suffocating weight of truth.
“He’s not a weapon,” Roman said quietly, stepping closer despite the dog’s warning growl. He stopped just out of biting range. “He’s the last remaining asset of Calder Global’s bio-defense security division. Or at least, he was supposed to be.”
“Asset,” I spat out the word like poison. “He’s a living, breathing animal. He was terrified, freezing, and starving when those men dragged him into my shop. If you care about him as much as you pretend to, you wouldn’t have let him end up on a street corner in a broken harness.”
For a long moment, I thought Roman would explode. Men like him—billionaires who commanded corporate empires and treated human beings like chess pieces—did not take lectures from small-town pet store owners.
Instead, Roman did something that stunned me completely.
He unbuttoned his expensive charcoal coat, let it slide off his shoulders, and tossed it carelessly onto an overturned display rack. Then, he unbuttoned his cuffs, rolled up his sleeves, and knelt down on the glass-strewn floor directly across from me.
“Help me check his flank,” Roman instructed quietly.
May you like
I stared at him, dumbfounded. “What?”
“You heard me,” Roman said, his dark eyes locking onto mine with an intensity that made it difficult to breathe. “If you want to save him, stop arguing with me and help me look at his wound.”
