Chapter 15: Ice vs. Inferno

  Dust rained down from the pulverized ceiling. Arms shrieked relentlessly. Smoke billowed from the mangled front end of Kat’s car, embedded impossibly in Isabel Leone’s private study. For a stunned moment, the only sound besides the arms was the ragged breathing of the three figures amidst the chaos.

  Isabel recovered first, pushing herself to her feet with feline grace despite the jarring impact. Her molten gold eyes, moments ago filled with possessive heat for Kenji, now bzed with incandescent fury directed solely at the intruder. The remnants of her carefully constructed composure shattered, revealing the raw, volcanic rage beneath. Her lion ears were fttened against her skull, her lips pulled back in a silent snarl, revealing dangerously sharp canines.

  "Volkov!" she roared, her voice shaking the already unstable room. "You insane bitch! You dare—!"

  "Dare what, Leone?" Kat interrupted, her voice dangerously calm, a chilling counterpoint to Isabel's fiery outburst. She took another step forward, crunching over broken masonry, utterly unfazed by the destruction she'd wrought or the blood trickling down her face. Her emerald eyes were chips of gcial ice, fixed on Isabel with lethal intent. "Dare retrieve what is rightfully mine? You seem to have mistaken my property for a pything." Her gaze flickered dismissively towards Kenji, who was scrambling to pull the torn remnants of his robe together, then snapped back to Isabel, colder than ever.

  "Your property?" Isabel spat, stepping forward protectively, positioning herself slightly between Kat and Kenji. "He came to me. He recognized true passion, something your frozen little heart couldn't possibly offer!" Her hands clenched at her sides, nails likely digging into her palms. "He belongs in the fire, Snow Queen. Not locked away in your sterile cage!"

  "He belongs where I decide he belongs," Kat stated ftly, her voice dropping lower, colder. "And he certainly doesn't belong being groped by a desperate, overheated jungle cat pying CEO." She took another deliberate step closer, the temperature in the room seeming to plummet further. "You overstepped, Leone. A fatal miscalcution."

  "Miscalcution?" Isabel ughed, a harsh, grating sound. "My only miscalcution was underestimating how quickly you'd lose control! Look at you! Crashing through walls like a common thug! Where's the icy precision now, Katarina? Lost it along with your boy toy?"

  Kat's jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. A faint shimmer, like heat haze over ice, seemed to emanate from her skin. Subtle, silvery patterns, like frost creeping across a windowpane, became faintly visible along her cheekbones and the backs of her hands – her Snow Leopard nature surging closer to the surface under extreme duress. "My methods are irrelevant. The only thing that matters is that you put your hands on him. And for that," her voice became a deadly whisper, "there are consequences."

  "Bring them on!" Isabel roared back, her own form seeming to radiate intensified heat. The air around her shimmered, and the fur on her ears bristled. Her already sharp nails seemed to elongate slightly, glinting like polished cws in the chaotic light. "I'll burn you down to your frozen core and take pleasure in watching you melt!"

  They were circling each other now, like predators sizing each other up before the final pounce. The air crackled with opposing energies – Kat’s lethal, focused cold cshing against Isabel’s explosive, consuming heat. Kenji, trapped between them, felt like he was standing at the nexus of a blizzard and a wildfire. Their argument wasn't just about him anymore; it was years of rivalry, hatred, and now, obsessive possessiveness colliding head-on.

  Isabel lunged first, not directly at Kat, but snatching possessively at Kenji’s arm. "He's mine!"

  Kat moved with impossible speed, intercepting the move. Her hand shot out, grabbing Isabel's wrist in a grip that must have felt like biting frost. "Don't. Touch. Him."

  For a split second, they were locked, gold eyes bzing into emerald, inferno meeting gcier. The tension snapped.

  Isabel snarled, wrenching her arm free and swinging, her sharpened nails aimed at Kat’s face. Simultaneously, Kat moved, her own hand fshing out, cws fully extended this time, aiming for Isabel’s throat.

  Time seemed to slow. This was it. The cws were out. Blood was about to be spilled.

  "STOP!"

  Driven by pure, instinctual panic, Kenji lurched forward. Ignoring the potential for colteral damage, ignoring the sheer terror gripping him, he threw himself bodily between the two enraged women just as their attacks were about to connect. He smmed into both of them, arms flung wide in a desperate attempt to physically separate them.

  He ended up stumbling, caught between two forces of nature radiating murderous intent. Kat’s icy gre and Isabel’s fiery fury, momentarily diverted from each other, snapped onto him. He stood there, heart pounding, half-dressed and utterly terrified, directly in the crossfire of two powerful, lethally obsessed yanderes whose catfight he had just dared to interrupt. The air hung thick with menace, the next second stretching into an eternity.