"You're going to kill us both, and I'm going to let you."
Vivian's words came out as a strangled whisper as Lucien's weight crushed her deeper into silk sheets that now felt like a burial shroud. His fever-bright eyes held no trace of the calculating billionaire she knew—only primal hunger and the kind of madness that turned titans of industry into apex predators.
**[CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE]**
**[CORE TEMPERATURE BREACH: CHIP MELTDOWN IMMINENT]**
**[AUTO-DESTRUCT INITIATED: 00:00:25]**
*Twenty-five seconds before my mother's secrets burn to digital ash.*
The Red Spider coursing through Lucien's veins had stripped away fifteen years of careful control, leaving only base instinct and territorial obsession. His hands roamed her body with possessive violence, each touch burning like molten metal against her skin.
"Mine," he growled against her throat, his voice rough as shattered glass. "You're mine, and I'm never fucking letting you go."
His teeth grazed her pulse point, and Vivian felt her survival instincts scream at her to fight, to run, to do anything except lie there and take it.
**[00:00:22]**
*Physical resistance is suicide. He's too strong, too far gone, and I'm out of time.*
But Vivian hadn't clawed her way out of hell by playing fair. If she couldn't overpower him, she'd have to reprogram him—turn his own fevered body into the weapon she needed.
*The chip responds to biometric input. Neural patterns. Electrical impulses transmitted through skin contact.*
*What if I don't need a keyboard? What if I can make him into one?*
**[00:00:19]**
She stopped fighting his advances entirely. Instead, she reached for his hands with deliberate sensuality, threading their fingers together in what looked like surrender but was actually the most dangerous gamble of her life.
"Lucien," she whispered, letting her voice drop to that breathy register that made billionaires forget their own names. "I need you to touch me. Exactly where I tell you. Exactly how I need it."
His pupils dilated to black holes, the drug making him hypersensitive to every stimulus. The fever had turned his skin into a live wire, every nerve ending screaming for contact.
"Tell me what you want," he rasped, his control hanging by spider silk.
**[00:00:16]**
*Here goes everything.*
Vivian began guiding his fingers across her skin in precise patterns, each touch corresponding to a specific neural pathway she'd memorized from her mother's research notes. The chip in her system translated his movements into digital commands, his fevered caresses becoming lines of life-saving code.
"Press harder," she gasped, the sensation genuinely overwhelming as his thumb found the nerve cluster at her wrist. "Right there. Don't you dare stop."
**[BIOMETRIC INTERFACE ESTABLISHED]**
**[DECODING MANUAL OVERRIDE SEQUENCE]**
**[PROGRESS: 23%]**
Lucien's breathing turned ragged as she manipulated his responses with surgical precision. Every calculated moan, every strategic arch of her spine, every deliberate rake of her nails across his chest sent shockwaves through his compromised nervous system.
His hands began to convulse involuntarily, fingers twitching in exactly the patterns she needed. The chip registered each micro-movement, translating his body's betrayal into the complex algorithm required to abort its self-destruction.
**[00:00:13]**
"More," she demanded, her voice cracking with genuine desperation now. "I need everything you've got."
She bit down on his shoulder hard enough to draw blood, and the explosion of pain-pleasure sent his entire nervous system into overdrive. His hands spasmed against her skin like he was being electrocuted, each involuntary movement feeding precious data into the override protocol.
**[OVERRIDE SEQUENCE: 78% COMPLETE]**
**[00:00:10]**
*Almost there. Just need the final biometric signature.*
But the last command required something more than touch—it needed a neural response so intense, so visceral, that the system would recognize it as ultimate authorization. The kind of stimulus that could only come from the body's most sensitive nerve clusters.
**[00:00:07]**
*The carotid artery. Maximum nerve density. Maximum electrical response.*
Vivian didn't hesitate. She sank her teeth into the tender skin at Lucien's throat, right over his pulse point where blood and electricity converged. The shock of sensation—pain and pleasure and something beyond both—sent his entire nervous system into cascade failure.
Every synapse fired at once. Every nerve ending screamed. His back arched like he'd been struck by lightning, and the chip read the resulting electrical storm as the ultimate biometric key.
**[OVERRIDE COMPLETE]**
**[AUTO-DESTRUCT SEQUENCE TERMINATED]**
**[CHIP SECURED AND ENCRYPTED]**
The intensity proved too much for Lucien's already compromised system. His eyes rolled back, showing only white, and he collapsed against her like a marionette with severed strings.
*Finally. Holy shit, finally.*
Vivian shoved his dead weight off her and rolled to the edge of the bed, her entire body shaking from adrenaline and the aftershocks of what she'd just survived. The taste of his blood lingered on her lips like copper pennies and victory.
She'd done it. The chip was safe. Her mother's secrets would live to see another day.
But as she prepared to slip back through the hidden panel and disappear into the night, Lucien's unconscious voice stopped her cold.
"Wanwan," he mumbled, the name barely audible but clear enough to make her world tilt sideways. "I'm sorry, Wanwan. I should have saved you."
*Wanwan. My mother's pet name. The one only family knew.*
The implications crashed over her like a tsunami. This wasn't coincidence. Lucien Pei hadn't just randomly acquired her mother's stolen chip—he'd known her. Known her well enough to use her childhood nickname, to carry guilt over her death like a stone in his chest.
*What the hell were you hiding from me, Mom? What was your connection to this family?*
*Were you lovers? Business partners? Or something else entirely?*
Before she could process this earth-shattering revelation, the sound of running footsteps echoed through the corridor outside. Emergency lights strobed red through the gap under the door, and she could hear Marcus shouting orders to what sounded like a full medical response team.
"Boss's vitals crashed! Get the crash cart! Move, move, MOVE!"
*Shit. They monitored his biometrics. Of course they did.*
Vivian looked down at herself—hair wild as a storm, clothing torn and disheveled, bite marks decorating her throat like a necklace of sin. The matching wounds on Lucien's neck told a story that no amount of explanation could make innocent.
The door handle rattled as someone inserted a master key with military efficiency.
*Three seconds to come up with a miracle, or I'm dead.*
She dove back onto the bed just as the door exploded inward, positioning herself to look like she'd been trying to help rather than systematically seduce a poisoned billionaire into unconsciousness. But even as she played the part of concerned companion, her mind raced with the implications of what she'd discovered.
Lucien Pei had known her mother intimately enough to mourn her.
Which meant everything Vivian thought she knew about her mother's murder—and her own identity—was about to be rewritten in blood and secrets.
The medical team flooded in like a SWAT unit, and Vivian prepared to lie for her life.