Chapter 6

• Collette’s POV
• The thing about haunting Hudson Cross?
• I’d seen it all before.
• Every thrust, every groan, every arrogant smirk he wore while he fucked some other woman—I had the memories to compare them to. And believe me, they always fell short. Because once upon a time, I was the one spread across his sheets, nails in his back, screaming his name loud enough to echo off the penthouse glass.
• I’d been his favorite. His obsession. His
• Angel.
• And like a fool, I thought that made me safe.
• Flashback: his office, late at night. The city glittering below us. Me bent over his desk, silk blouse shoved up, his cock filling me in a way that made my toes curl. He had one hand on my throat, the other gripping my hip so hard I knew I’d bruise.
• “Say it,” he demanded, teeth grazing my ear.
• “Hudson,” I gasped, voice breaking. “I’m yours.”
• He groaned, slamming into me harder, like ownership itself turned him on. “That’s right, Angel. Mine.”
• And I believed it. Every word. Every filthy whisper. That his world was mine, that I was more than a possession.
• God, I was stupid.
• Back in the present, I perched on the edge of his bedframe, watching him toss and turn in restless sleep. Sweat slicked his chest, his lips parted like he was whispering my name even unconscious.
• Because he was. He always did.
• Another flashback: his lips between my thighs, tongue ruthless, pinning my hips to the mattress when I tried to writhe away. “Don’t run from me, Angel,” he growled into my cunt. “You take everything I give you.”
• And I did. Every last drop of pleasure, every filthy command. He’d drag orgasm after orgasm out of me until my throat was raw from screaming. I used to laugh at how desperate I was for him, even when I could barely breathe.
• Until the night I saw it—the difference.
• The way his eyes changed when he wrapped that hand around my throat. Not with lust. Not with possession. With calculation. Cold. Precise.
• That’s the look I remember when I died.
• The news spun it into an accident. Hudson smiled for cameras, gave generous donations in my name, pretended grief like it was a tailored suit. But I knew the truth. He killed me. Or had me killed.
• What I didn’t know—what keeps me lingering in this half-life—was
• why.
• Why did the man who once called me his Angel decide I had to die?
• “Sweet dreams, Hudson,” I whispered into the dark, leaning close to his ear.
• He stirred, lips forming my name.
• I laughed softly.
• “Remember how good I was? Remember how no one screamed louder than your Angel?”
• His hips shifted under the sheets, cock swelling even in sleep.
• Pathetic. Beautifully pathetic.
• I could almost feel it again—his weight pressing me down, his voice rough against my skin. The memories were still sharp enough to make my thighs ache, still filthy enough to curl my ghost lips into a smirk.
• But here’s the difference now: I wasn’t his Angel anymore. I wasn’t his to command, to fuck, to kill when I became inconvenient.
• Now, I was the ghost who wouldn’t let him rest.
• And before I was finished, I’d ruin him, ruin his empire, and tear the truth out of him piece by piece.
• Because if I had to crawl out of the grave to get my answers, then so be it.