My Taboo Harem!

Chapter 978: Testing the First Beast

"The interface adapts," she explained, leaning slightly toward the open door. "You can keep the full assist systems, tone them down, or strip the machine closer to a purer drive. The default visibility support is active now—front sensors, integrated camera eyes through the headlights and rear visual streaming through the backlight relay—but—"

Phei started the car.

The sound that answered him was not the kind of roar that belonged to ordinary supercars.

It was deeper: Gruttal. Throaty. Dense.

The engine came alive like a beast dragging breath through a steel chest, and the low vibration rolled through the floor, the seat, his arms, his ribs. It did not simply make noise. It announced appetite.

Noor visibly stiffened, Soraya’s lips parted, Valentina smiled slowly. Maddie looked pleased with life again and even Jade’s own eyes brightened faintly, because no matter how often one heard a machine like this awaken, reverence remained the appropriate response.

Phei gave the throttle a small rev.

The answer shook the space around them.

’AGAIN!’

He revved again.

This time the note climbed harder, richer, a savage mechanical hymn that turned heads all across the floor.

’I love it!’

Jade looked at him in mild surprise.

Then in sharper surprise.

Because he was handling the controls like they already belonged to his body.

There was none of the clumsy uncertainty rich boys often had when trying to impress women with expensive machines they did not understand.

Phei touched the car the way he moved through fights—naturally, instinctively, with that strange predatory ease that made talent look offensive. He understood weight distribution before testing it fully. He understood the response lag in the steering. He understood the breathing rhythm of the engine after less than a minute.

He looked at Jade and smiled.

"Jump in."

She blinked. "What?"

"I said jump in, Princes."

The request landed before she could politely argue with it. Jade moved to the passenger side and got in, her curiosity overriding caution fast enough to alarm any future husband she might have, which was unfortunate for future husbands, because Phei was already considering having them all erased by fate.

As soon as she settled, he studied the dashboard display briefly and asked, "How do I turn off the cameras?"

Jade looked at him, surprised again, though this time a smile began forming first. "Why?"

Phei’s grin sharpened. "Because if I’m driving this baby, I want to be in control. Old school. Real." He flexed his fingers lightly on the wheel. "If it’s an SUV, an armored luxury barge, or some giant family monster, fine, keep the cameras. But for this?" He looked ahead, eyes alight.

"I want instinct. Hands. Feel. That is where the thrill is."

Jade’s smile deepened with almost embarrassing satisfaction.

"I knew you would say that."

Of course she had.

She leaned over slightly, graceful even in movement, and showed him the control sequence. One press. One hold. One confirmation.

The external camera feeds vanished.

Now Phei’s grin became dangerous.

He looked at her.

"Ready?"

Jade turned her head. "Ready for wha—"

He moved and the gear change was so fast it felt like intention becoming action without needing thought in between. His hand snapped through the motion; the engine barked and torque surged, and before the floor around them fully understood what was happening, Phei yanked the beast into a violent, controlled drift right there on its spinning display platform.

The Pagani broke into motion in a tight savage circle.

Rubber bit; then screamed.

The rear end swung with predatory grace as Phei controlled the wheel like he had been born inside the machine. The platform beneath them groaned under the sudden violence of motion while the Utopia carved a spinning circle in place, engine howling, chassis shifting, carbon body trembling with restrained ferocity.

The tires shrieked against the polished surface with a vicious, visceral scrape that sent the sound knifing through the second floor and snapping everyone’s attention toward them. Noor gasped. Soraya grabbed the nearest railing. Maddie burst into delighted excitement and Sierra swore under her breath in admiration. Staff froze. Customers turned. Somewhere downstairs, several people probably reconsidered their insurance coverage.

Jade startled hard enough that her shoulders tensed.

Then the car itself clicked.

Her seatbelt buckled automatically across her.

Phei’s own followed.

"Cute," he muttered.

The drift continued—one brutal circle, then another sharper angle, the nose correcting, the rear sliding with surgical violence while the engine roared like something chained and glorious.

Phei controlled the slide on instinct alone, feeling the machine, guiding it, not fighting it but letting beast and driver enter one brief, savage agreement.

The whole showroom seemed to tighten around the sound.

Then, as cleanly as he had begun, he stopped.

Perfectly and the car settled.

The engine idled, dark and rumbling... silence hit a second later, broken only by distant voices and the fading cry of abused rubber.

Phei turned and looked at Jade.

"I want this one."

Jade stared at him.

Her lips parted.

"It’s—it’s..." She blinked, clearly still recovering. "It’s ten million."

Phei’s expression softened slightly. "Are you okay?" he asked. "Did I startle you?"

Jade looked at him then—not at the car, not at the floor, not at the spectacle forming around them, but at him—and something bright lit in her eyes.

"That," she said, still a little breathless, "was amazing."

Phei smiled.

She leaned forward slightly, the earlier shock already transforming into fascination. "How did you learn to do that?"

Phei rested a hand on the wheel, entirely too pleased with himself. "At my current stage, Jade, I do not need to learn everything." His grin widened. "All I need are control and instinct."

Her brows lifted.

"That wasn’t learned?"

Phei looked at her.

Then grinned like a dragon being handed gold and an open challenge at the same time.

Outside the car, the rest of his women were having their own quiet reckonings with the spectacle. Maddie wiped a delighted tear and announced, to no one, "Worth every second of planning."

Valentina, arms crossed, watched the idling beast with proprietary calm — she had, after all, once been his driving instructor, and her student had just shown off horribly and correctly. "His form was clean," she conceded, as though grading him. "Reckless. But clean."

And Soraya, who had walked into this evening knowing almost nothing about the Young Dragon and was now several impossible things deeper into the night, turned slowly to Noor and said, with the flat exhaustion of total surrender, "I am going to need you to pick me something with very good brakes."

Noor, still gripping the railing, only nodded.