Chapter 3--- the engagement dinner

# UNHINGED OBSESSION

### Chapter Three — The Engagement Dinner

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The Vane estate exudes power, wealth, and blood — the kind of environment that smells like war itself, the kind of environment that sends cold shivers down your spine.

The whole estate had been decorated for the event.

Marble floors shining bright under the light like they'd been scrubbed a thousand times.

Black roses in crystal and ceramic vases.

Candlelight fully on display in every corner of the hall.

Chandeliers hung, shining a bit low, adding more beauty to the decorations.

A table long enough for two rival syndicates who had spent years trying to end themselves.

Upstairs, Scarlett stood in front of the mirror while Kyla made adjustments to her dress, fingers steady despite the heavy tension radiating through the whole estate.

Her dress was red. Not the type of red for soft love or romance, but a deep, dark red for seduction.

Like something already spent, something already tainted.

It moved with her like she was born with the cloth, rather than wearing it.

Tracing every line of a figure built for temptation, seduction, and warfare.

The dress clung to her body like a second skin.

An off-shoulder dress.

Her body looked like it was carved out of perfection — like it was made for seduction.

A temptation you couldn't resist.

A slit cut high enough to promise both danger and invitation, stopping at her thighs.

Her long red hair flowed down her back, stopping at her ass.

A few strands crossed her face, framing a face that looked carved out of perfection rather than born — full lips painted the same wine-red as her dress, sharp emerald eyes lined in smoke and gold.

She was tall, nearly six feet even without heels, and she wore the height like a crown rather than an apology.

She didn't look soft. She never did. She looked like sweet poison — one you'd drink without a second thought, knowing exactly what it would cost you.

"You look like you're about to go to war, in a seductive way, though," Kyla said, smirking as she finished with Scarlett's dress.

"Maybe I am," Scarlett said, looking at her reflection, meeting her own eyes. "Just better I'm wearing shoes for it."

Kyle leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, eyes sharp and calculating, baby face deceptively soft — the kind people underestimate right up until it costs them something. "Say the word and I start a problem before dessert."

"Behave," Scarlett said, her lips twitching. "Tonight, at least. Now go. I'll be down when I'm down."

The Blackwoods arrived exactly on time. Not a minute late. Not a minute early. The kind of precision that felt like its own quiet threat. Robert and Angela first, composed, practiced beneath the tension. Stacy behind them. And then... Azreal.

He filled the doorway before he'd fully stepped through it — six foot five, very broad shoulders.

Wearing a tailored black suit without a tie, a few buttons open.

His dark hair was cut in a wolf style, the kind of style that belonged on something wild rather than civilized.

His eyes stayed shadowed, hidden behind his hair, unreadable in the low light.

His lips were set in a hard, unbothered line — the only part of his face fully visible, and somehow the most unsettling part of him.

Luciano and Cecilia greeted them in the foyer, warm in the practiced way of a man who'd hosted hundreds of deals disguised as dinner.

Introductions started, beginning with the Blackwoods.

Starting with Stacy...

"I'm Stacy Blackwood," she said. "Twenty years old," she continued. "Azreal's sister... Don't worry, I'm not like the rest of the family, but don't mess with me, or else you'll see my dark side."

Addison and Madison shifted, adjusting themselves, feeling uncomfortable.

Next, Azreal. "Azreal Blackwood," he said. Everywhere became uneasy, his deep bass voice radiating across the hall. "Twenty-five years old," he continued. "Heir to the Dark Shadows Syndicate." Everywhere became so calm that even a dropped needle could be heard.

"Ahem." Luciano cleared his throat nervously, trying to clear the awkwardness.

"Over to you, Madison," he said.

Madison blinked her fake lashes in a practiced way before speaking up too eagerly, which Stacy and Azreal noticed — Azreal stayed calm, but Stacy couldn't hide her disgust.

"I'm Madison Vane, twenty-one years old, Scarlett's sister... well, stepsister," Madison said, her voice sweet, but beneath it was eagerness, trying to get attention.

Next was Addison. "I'm Addison, twenty-one years. Madison's twin. Scarlett's stepsister," she said flatly.

Next was Kyla. "I'm Kyla, twenty-one years old. Scarlett's sister... her favorite," she said with a smile that made Stacy's mouth almost twitch.

Next was Kyle. He grinned before he spoke, one person who didn't feel the heavy tension. "Kyle," he grinned, easy, boyish, and the kind of face that makes a person relax around him. "Twenty-one years old, Kyla's twin brother... Scarlett's other half. Don't let the face fool you. I get that a lot."

Luciano cleared his throat as a warning, reminding him of the situation at hand.

"Oops, sorry," he said, half-smirking, half trying hard not to laugh, making Stacy let out a short laugh.

Azreal noted every single detail. The heiress herself was nowhere in the hall.

"Scarlett will be down shortly," Luciano said, as if he'd read the question off Azreal's mind. "She loves to make an entrance."

"Does she." Azreal said, raising one brow, even though no one could see it because of his hairstyle. Voice flat. But beneath that, curiosity sparked.

It didn't take long.

The sound of sharp heels echoed across the dining hall. Every conversation died at the same time.

Scarlett descended slowly, unhurried and unbothered, each step deliberate and gracious.

Her red dress pouring down the marble tiles of the staircase like something spilling rather than walking.

She didn't rush.

She never did. She let the room come to her.

Azreal's eyes traveled from her head to her toes, worshipping the person he was supposed to marry, memorizing every part of her.

Scarlett expected to see a monster but saw someone worse than a monster — a man who never needed to raise his voice for a room to go silent.

He didn't smile. Neither did she.

"Miss Vane." His voice was low, unhurried.

"Mr. Blackwood." She let the silence stretch a bit longer. "I was told you were terrifying," she said.

"And?"

"Jury's still out."

Something flickered behind his eyes — not quite amusement, something colder and more interesting.

"It usually is... until it isn't."

Luciano cleared his throat for the umpteenth time, loudly, to end the moment.

Scarlett smirked and went to sit down.

Dinner unfolded the way these things always did — careful conversation stretched thin over old wounds, wine poured a little too generously.

Jane performed warmth she didn't feel.

Madison and Addison stared daggers at Scarlett when no one was looking.

The Killer twins aka the K twins (Kyla and Kyle) sat close to Scarlett.

Stacy stayed near her parents, quiet and observing, the way she did in unfamiliar places.

It was working. Barely. Until the doors burst open.

Four men in black tactical gear moved into the dining hall fast, guns raised.

"Nobody move," the lead man said with a thick Russian accent.

A Wellington calling card, unmistakable. "Mr. Vane, Mr. Blackwood — you're going to listen carefully."

Anger exploded like wildfire inside Scarlett, without a second thought.

She grabbed a knife strapped to her skin before he'd registered anything.

His gun clattered to the floor as she stabbed the man's wrist, picking up the gun in one fluid motion.

Chaos had erupted.

Kyle vaulted the table, smirk gone, replaced by a murderous look on his pretty face.

Closing the distance between him and the second gunman, he smashed a bottle on his head, driving a heavy blow into the man's stomach and then his face. His nose cracked with an ugly, wet sound, followed by a scream.

He drove his knee into the man's ribs, making him drop to the floor.

Kyla was right behind her twin, moving fast and low, removing her heel — sharp as a blade — plunging it into his eye, snatching the gun from his hand, putting a bullet straight into his forehead. He dropped dead.

Even Madison and Addison, who always spent most family functions performing helplessness like a second language, dropped the act entirely.

Madison snatched a serving fork, burying it deep into the forearm of a man near her, twisting until he screamed, blood gushing out, dropping the blade underneath his sleeve.

Addison moved with quiet precision, snapping necks.

Stacy, who had looked like she wanted to disappear moments earlier, snatched a fallen pistol, putting a bullet in the forehead of a man near her.

Azreal didn't move.

He stood exactly where he'd been standing since the chaos began.

Untouched by the panic rippling through the room.

Watching Scarlett.

Not the chaos. Not the blood. Her.

The way she moved — economical, precise, no wasted motion, no fear at all, almost lazy but sharp.

That held his attention completely, like everything happening around him had disappeared — except her.

He'd read files. Seen photographs.

Nothing had prepared him for watching her work in real time.

Scarlett blew out a man's brains, breathe even and steady despite the whole fight.

Glancing across the hall, her eyes found Azreal already looking at her. Not the bodies. Not the blood. At her.

Something passed between them that had nothing to do with fear.

The fourth man, cornered by Kyle, bled from a deep cut above his eye.

Azreal finally moved — unhurried, almost lazy, closing the distance between himself and the kneeling man, like the chaos of the last thirty seconds hadn't touched him at all.

He crouched down to the man's eye level — still taller than him — and then he spoke.

"You're going to answer to her," his voice sliced through the room, quiet.

Nodding once toward Scarlett, "the same way you'd answer to me."

"The only difference is... she's faster to lose patience."

Scarlett stepped forward without missing a beat, gun in her hands.

Pressing the gun to the man's throat, the man's breath hitched. "Who sent you." Her voice was uneasily calm, making the whole family flinch a little, except Azreal, who stood watching, expression unreadable.

"Wellingtons," the man finally said, voice shaking. "Just a message. A warning. There's more of us than you—"

*BANG!*

Scarlett had shot the man.

The guards arrived. Late.

Guns still in her hands, Scarlett shot down three head guards.

"Fucking useless," she said, hissing, when the bullets finished.

The remaining guards went to their knees, begging.

Scarlett didn't listen.

She never did.

Snatching a gun from Kyle, she shot the remaining two head guards, leaving the rest pleading for their lives.

Nobody dared to stop her.

"Take them downstairs," Luciano said, voice shaking with adrenaline he was trying to hide.