The Villains Must Win-Chapter 150: Reid Graves 30

"W-what . . ." she croaked, groggy, confused. "What’s going on?"

Her voice echoed off the cold metal walls.

Then she noticed the photos.

Dozens—no, hundreds—of pictures, plastered everywhere. Candid shots. Glamour shots. Paparazzi pics. Screenshots from her wedding livestream. One particularly haunting image of her mid-bite into a bagel.

"Oh hell no," Tabitha muttered, scooting back and scanning the room with wide eyes.

This wasn’t just creepy.

This was obsessively curated Pinterest-board levels of creepy.

Her gaze landed on a table across the room. There was a slice of her wedding cake—frozen, perfectly preserved, sitting next to a locket with her initials engraved in glitter glue and what looked suspiciously like . . . was that her eyelash?

She squinted at a handwritten sign above it all.

"For My One True Wife (Version 2.0) ♥"

"What the . . . hell?" Tabitha groaned as she tried to move—only to realize, to her horror, that she was tied to a chair. A very cramped chair.

She squirmed, wincing. "Seriously? At least kidnap me in a plus-size chair, you monsters."

A voice echoed from the shadows.

"Oh, you’re awake," it said smoothly, like it had been waiting hours for a dramatic entrance.

From the shadows emerged a tall figure—broad-shouldered, effortlessly poised, and devastatingly handsome. Too handsome. The kind of handsome that made you suspicious. And unfortunately, familiar.

"Wait . . . Roman?" Tabitha choked, her voice climbing two octaves and a half-scream away from full-blown panic.

Roman stepped into the light with a smile that had once made women’s heart somersault. The same tousled hair, chiseled jaw, and those dangerously seductive eyes that always seemed to whisper bad decisions ahead.

Only now, those eyes were doing a lot less whispering and a lot more stab-you-in-your-sleep glaring. Especially since he was holding a knife—casually, like it was a wine glass.

"What is this?! Why did you—why the hell did you kidnap me?" Tabitha demanded, yanking at her restraints, which were suspiciously well-knotted for someone who once failed a home economics class.

Roman tilted his head with a slow, bone-chilling grace. "Why?" he echoed, his voice suddenly sharp. "Why?" He let out a short, barking laugh—maniacal, unhinged, the kind you hear right before someone gets monologued to death.

"You know why, Tabitha," he hissed, taking a step closer. His charming façade dropped like a stage curtain, and in its place was a storm of bitterness and obsession. "You married him. That knockoff Einstein lab rat with social anxiety and six calculators. Him."

"Oh my god." Tabitha blinked, both terrified and offended. "Are you seriously trying to murder me over my wedding registry?"

Roman’s eye twitched. "You were supposed to be mine. I waited for years. Years, Tabitha! I watched you from afar. Through grad school. Modeling agencies. The FBI wedding photos, for god’s sake—do you know how humiliating it is to cry into a Costco cake while zooming in on you on your wedding day?!"

"Oh sweet cheese fries," she muttered. "You’ve gone full Pinterest psycho."

He began pacing, ranting now. "I did everything to move on. Therapy. Goat yoga. I even tried dating a girl named Tiffany—she was also like you! Fat with no fashion sense!"

She blinked. "Yeah... you’re not okay. Wait, aren’t you supposed to be chasing after Gwendolyn?"

Roman frowned. "Who?"

Tabitha pressed her lips into a tight, unimpressed line. Yep. Roman had gone full psycho—unhinged, spiraling, and clearly freelancing off the original plot. This wasn’t just a red flag moment. It was a whole parade.

And yet . . . something didn’t add up.

When did this happened? She blinked at him through the harsh light, eyes narrowing. "Okay, but like . . . seriously? I’m fat. I eat cheese fries in bed. I snore. Loud. I’m not even your type."

Roman stopped mid-pace, his knife-wielding hand twitching.

"I mean, come on," she continued, raising a brow. "Back in highschool you were drooling over yoga influencers and girls who drank kombucha for fun. I was the girl with three meal prep containers and a secret stash of Nutella under my pillow. So when exactly did this"—she motioned vaguely to her generously curved, tied-up form—"become your dream girl?"

Roman’s eye twitched again. "You don’t get it, Tabitha. You never got it."

"That’s because you never said anything," she snapped. "If you liked me, you probably should’ve said something before trying to reenact a Netflix true crime episode."

She shook her head, letting out a sigh. "I took so many precautions. I changed my number, blocked your socials, even asked Reid to run FBI-level background sweeps just in case you were stalking me—and yet this still happened. Amazing."

Her voice dropped to a mutter. "Honestly, I’m more mad about that than the whole kidnapping thing." All that precaution and she still indeed up in here.

"What are you talking about?" Roman hissed, eyes narrowing.

"Never mind," Tabitha sighed. This was becoming like Celeste all over again.

"I was fine! Until I saw it. You. In that white dress. Looking like you just stepped out of a ’Wife of the Year’ commercial. And suddenly—snap—I knew. I had to have you back."

"With zip ties?! And what do you mean get back? We were never together. We were never a thing!"

He lunged forward suddenly, the knife flashing under the flickering bulb like it was part of the horror movie soundtrack playing in his head.

"What do you mean never a thing?!" he roared, his voice cracking with rage.

His eyes were wild now—unhinged, glassy, haunted by years of obsession he’d clearly marinated in like a psychopath crockpot.

"This is your fault!" he hissed. "With your—your suggestive eyes, that laugh that haunted me, and those damn curves that kept me awake for years! I couldn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t breathe without seeing you everywhere!"

Tabitha blinked. "Okay but . . . my eyes? Really?"

"I would rather see you dead than in someone else’s arms!" he snarled.

Tabitha rolled her eyes—because of course he’d say something that peak dramatic. "Wow. You really skipped therapy, huh?"

"See those?" Roman pointed toward a shadowy table in the corner.

Tabitha followed his gesture—and instantly wished she hadn’t.

Her breath caught in her throat as her eyes widened in horror. A row of women’s heads stared back at her.

"They’re just like you," Roman said coldly. "Women who rejected me." His voice dropped, dark and smooth like poison in a glass of wine. "So choose your next words very carefully."

Tabitha recoiled, her voice dripping with sarcasm despite the fear in her gut. "Wow. Hallmark really missed out on this storyline."

Funny how she’d spent years derailing Reid from becoming a potential serial killer—one suspicious chemistry set and emotional breakdown at a time—only for Roman, the actual male lead, to spiral right into that role like it was part of his character arc all along.

Guess fate really said, "Pick your poison, girl."

Tabitha blinked rapidly. Yep. Definitely crazy. Like restraining order wrapped in a straightjacket kind of crazy.

Roman was approaching with a twisted smile, the knife gleaming in his hand like he thought this was a rom-com and not a full-blown true crime documentary waiting to happen.

"This time," he said, voice soft and delusional, "I have the real Tabitha. No more fakes. No more impostors. Just you and me . . . forever."

Tabitha raised a brow despite the situation. "Okay, but forever is a really long time. You sure you wanna be trapped with someone who snores like a leaf blower and eats Pop-Tarts in bed?"

Roman didn’t laugh. He didn’t even blink. He just kept walking toward her with the kind of look that said I’ve named all my knives and this one’s called "commitment."

"You don’t want to do this, Roman," she said, trying to talk him down. "You need help. Like, court-mandated, therapy-three-times-a-week, group-sessions-for-men-who-collect-heads kind of help."

"I’m not crazy!" he snapped, pressing the blade lightly to her neck.

Tabitha froze. Her brain was screaming panic, but her mouth, ever the rebel, decided sarcasm was still on the table.

"I mean, the heads on the table say otherwise, Romeo."

Roman flinched. "Those women didn’t understand me. But you do, Tabitha. You always did. That sass, those curves . . . you haunted me. And now that I have you, we can finally start our life together. We’ll get married. Have kids. Build a happy family in a soundproof basement."

"That’s not how families work," she deadpanned. "Also, basements are bad for children. Low vitamin D."

He growled. "If you don’t agree with me, I’ll start with a finger. If you try to run, it’ll be your toes. I don’t need all of you, Tabitha. I just need enough for you to be alive with me."

And just as Tabitha was mentally preparing to go full WWE with a chair if she could wiggle free, the container door slammed open.

Cue dramatic wind and a god-tier entrance.

Reid stood there in full FBI gear, suited like an action movie lead despite still being technically lanky and slightly under-caffeinated. Gun raised. Eyes blazing.

Tabitha, despite the knife at her throat, blinked and whispered, "Hot."

Behind Reid, a team of agents swarmed in, barking orders and sweeping the room, but she barely noticed. Her eyes were glued to her husband, who somehow managed to look both threatening and like someone who alphabetized his spice rack.

"Roman," Reid said, his voice calm but steely. "Step away from my woman."

"Your wife," Tabitha corrected automatically, even as the blade still hovered near her neck. "We married. Vegas. You weren’t invited."

Reid gave her a side-eye like not now, babe, but his lips twitched.

Roman’s eye twitched instead. "She was mine first!"

"No, you were just a badly written alpha male bully and you always were," Reid snapped back. "Now drop the knife, or I’ll personally ensure you wake up in a psych ward so padded you’ll forget what sharp corners look like."

Tabitha sighed dreamily. "Ugh. So hot when he talks crime and consequences."

Roman’s eyes were wild—unhinged, teetering on the edge of no return. The knife trembled in his grip, pressed dangerously close to Tabitha’s throat.

"If I can’t have you," he whispered, voice trembling with manic devotion, "then no one will. We’ll die together. You and me. Forever."

"Okay, Romeo and Juliet, let’s take a breath," Tabitha muttered, sweat sliding down her temple. "And by breath, I mean you let go of the murder utensil, and I continue my life goals of not dying violently before lunch."

But Roman wasn’t listening. His lips moved in deranged mumbling as he raised the knife, eyes locked on her like she was some twisted fairytale princess and he was a deeply problematic prince.

Tabitha saw it in his eyes. He was going to do it. Kill her . . . and then himself.

Nope.

Not today. Not when she was this close to getting that damn five-star survival badge and advancing to a B-rank world. She was not about to die in a storage container at the hands of a rejected plotline.

With a sudden growl that would’ve made a jungle cat proud, she lunged forward and bit his hand like her five-star ranking depended on it. (Because, in a way, it did.)

"AAARGH!" Roman screamed, dropping the knife.

BANG!

A shot rang out—the bullet slicing clean into Roman’s shoulder. He spun back with a howl as Reid, now fully action-hero mode, stood at the doorway with his smoking gun like a tall glass of vengeance topped with FBI swagger.

Two agents surged forward, tackling Roman to the ground. Screams, shouts, cuffs, blood—chaos erupted in every direction.

But Tabitha only had eyes for Reid.

He sprinted toward her, dropping to his knees and cupping her face with the kind of desperation that only came from nearly losing your wife to a stalker with a knife and a scrapbook full of your photos.

"You bit him?" Reid asked, equal parts impressed and horrified.

"I like to snack when I’m stressed," she panted.

He laughed—then kissed her. Deep. Desperate. Tongue and all. The kind of kiss that screamed I almost lost you to a crazy man. Tabitha melted into him, blood pressure dropping as his arms wrapped around her like armor.

When they finally pulled apart, Reid pressed his forehead to hers.

"You okay?" he whispered.

"I just bit a man and earned a five-star ranking in trauma. What do you think?"

Reid smiled, brushing her hair back. "Next time you’re going to spas, I’m gluing myself to your side."

She raised a brow. "With cuffs?"

He grinned. "You’d like that, wouldn’t you?"

Behind them, Roman was being dragged away, still shrieking about their imaginary wedding.

Tabitha didn’t look back.

She had Reid, a mouth that could defend itself, and a future in a higher-ranked world.

Plus, she was totally making him buy her a castle after this.