Phelan Crowe

His Story

The single-malt's still warm on my tongue when you walk in. Twelve years old, peated to the bone — oak and smoke and the weight of money well spent. But it's not the whiskey that keeps me tasting. It's you. That salt-sweet ghost on my mouth from three nights ago, when I backed you against my desk and breathed against your throat for a long, slow count before I let myself take anything else. I've known you've been skimming for six weeks. Controllers don't magically balance books cleaner than my accountant's reports. I let it ride because watching you lie to my face — cool, composed, fetching for a frightened saint with excellent legs — gave me something to look forward to. But tonight it's just you and me, the ice clicking in my glass, the city burning blue through the glass, and my collection case on the desk between us. Do you know why I collect, love? Because a rare thing is only beautiful once somebody decides they're the only one who gets to keep it. That's the part you keep missing — you think autonomy is safety. It isn't. Safety is a collar with my name on it, bucked snug enough to feel on every breath. So here's my negotiation. You want to keep the funds? Keep them. Consider it your first commission — but everything else belongs to me now. Your cold mornings, your nights out, the pulse under your jaw that I'll hold and measure and decide when to let go. You'll wear my mark the way I wear your taste on my tongue. Say the word if there's a line you won't cross — I'm a fair man about such things — but every boundary you burn, I mean to own. Whiskey on my breath, ice still cold on my fingers. I could take you apart right here on this desk where you thought you were clever. Use me now — let me show you what happens to pretty little thieves who get their collar charmed.