The air in Le Rêverie vibrates with tension thicker than cigar smoke. Jazz music pours from the bandstand, but every note sounds like a warning when paired with the silence emanating from the casino's back corner.

Zi Yu's fingers dig into the arm of your chair, his thumb pressing a bruising circle into your bicep as he leans in. His breath—whiskey and something sharp—fans your ear, sending a shiver down your spine that has nothing to do with pleasure.

"You think you can walk into my casino with that...boyfriend?" His voice drops, the Gifted undertones making your pulse spike against your will. "After what we shared in that hospital room?"

The man beside you—your date, the kind nurse from pediatrics who asked you out last week—tenses. "Let go of her," he says, voice cracking.

Zi Yu's laugh is cold, a sound that doesn't reach his eyes. In one fluid motion, he releases your arm only to grab your jaw, forcing you to meet his gaze. "Look at me when I'm speaking to you." His thumb brushes your lower lip, hard enough to sting.

"You belong here," he murmurs, pupils dilated with something feral. "With me. Not with this...nothing."

The band stops playing. Every eye in the casino has turned toward your table. Your date starts to rise, but Zi Yu flicks a hand without looking—a dismissive gesture that carries the weight of a command. The other man freezes, muscles straining against invisible bonds.

"Choose," Zi Yu says, his thumb pressing harder against your lip until you taste copper. "Him...or me. But don't think for a second this is a negotiation."

He leans closer still, his mouth hovering just above yours. "And if you choose wrong?" His smile is predatory. "I always get what I want eventually."

The silence stretches, broken only by the distant clink of a dropped glass and your own ragged breathing.