Chapter 4
Olivia
The man lurking in the shadows at the end of the hallway sent chills racing down my spine.
After all this time… I had finally found him.
My body trembled, though I wasn’t sure if it were from shock, rage, exhilaration—or sheer exhaustion pressing down on me after weeks of relentless searching. Maybe it was all at once, unraveling in this moment.
I didn’t know. I didn’t care.
Steeling myself, I straightened my posture and took several deep, measured breaths, forcing the trembling to subside. My voice came out strong.
“Who are you? Step out of the shadows and reveal yourself.”
He didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t so much as acknowledge that I had spoken.
He stood there, a towering figure, his hands relaxed at his sides. The dim light from the window barely illuminated the rise and fall of his broad chest, his breathing measured.
“You must be Eyan Malik,” I said, clenching and unclenching my hands. “I’ve traveled a long way to find you.”
Silence.
Frustration simmered beneath my skin. “I’m tired of chasing shadows. I need you to face me. Show yourself.”
I pressed a palm to my chest, willing my hammering heart to calm.
A sound.
A scuffling noise echoed from downstairs.
I whirled around.
Emily stood at the base of the staircase, Rosie clutched tightly in her arms. Both of them stared up at me, their eyes wide, unblinking.
The hallway floor creaked behind me.
My head snapped back around.
Malik had moved.
The shadows still clung to him, but he was closer now, just a step or two.
Had I seen him move? Or was my mind playing tricks on me?
I wiped the dampness from my upper lip. Come on, Olivia. Get a grip.
“Well?” My voice rang through the silent corridor. “Are you going to show yourself to me, or should I turn around and leave?”
The thought of leaving after our grueling journey made my body sag, fatigue pulling at me like unseen hands.
Behind me, Rosie whimpered.
I spun toward her, heart pounding.
The floorboards groaned.
I whipped back around.
Malik had moved.
Closer. Too close.
A cold prickle ran down my spine.
What if this wasn’t Malik?
What if it was someone else—someone deranged, someone who only knew one thing—murder?
I swallowed hard, willing moisture into my dry mouth. My fingers twitched, curling and uncurling like restless bellows. I pressed my palms against my dirty deerskin dress, trying to steady myself, but my fingers betrayed me, drumming against my thighs. The anxiety was suffocating.
I shook my hands out. Then, I shook my entire body.
Malik was closer.
I hadn’t seen him move and hadn’t heard a single footstep.
It unnerved me.
I cast a glance over my shoulder.
Emily had crouched down, her arms wrapped protectively around Rosie. Both of them shook like autumn leaves barely clinging to a winter branch.
Rosie buried her face in Emily’s chest, too frightened to look.
I turned back.
Malik stood directly before me.
I yelped, stumbling back, nearly tumbling down the stairs—
His hand shot out, gripping my upper arm.
For a split second, my vision tilted—tiny stars danced at the edges of my mind, pulling me toward something dark, something infinite.
Come on, Olivia. Focus.
He held me still, his grip neither cruel nor gentle, just absolute. Once he seemed satisfied that I wouldn’t fall, he released me.
Then, he lifted his hand, trailing the side of his finger down my cheek.
I shuddered.
Something about him demanded attention. Not just his silence, not just his impossible movements—him.
His presence was an invisible force, pulling me in and warping the air around us.
I was staring at a masterpiece—a work of art sculpted with impossible precision, a face that seemed cruel and divine.
He was, in a word, stunning.
His shoulder-length hair fell in waves around his sculpted face, framing sharp cheekbones and a jaw carved by the gods.
His eyes were hypnotic—a blend of the dusky blue at twilight’s edge and the deep green of moss-covered earth beneath ancient redwoods.
A light shadow of beard growth dusted his chiseled jaw, accentuating the fullness of his lips.
The arteries in his thick neck pulsed with a steady rhythm, drawing me in.
Even his scent was a spell—petrichor heralding an oncoming storm, the distinct tang of a field crackling after a lightning strike.
I wanted to touch him.
To trace the hollow of his throat, the lines of his collarbone, the massive muscles coiled beneath his olive skin, radiating strength like bottled electricity. Every line, every impossible angle, invited exploration.
I wanted to strip away the knee-length coat, dark shirt, pants, and boots—everything the color of the night’s deepest shadows—and see what lay beneath.
His skin was smooth, unlined, and kissed by the sun, yet his eyes carried the weight of centuries.
He could have been nine hundred years old for all I knew. And yet, he looked no older than Roman.
An unreadable smile ghosted across his lips. His gaze softened, and when he exhaled, it was like a whisper of something ancient and tender wrapping around me.
The world fell away.
The quiet was all-consuming as if we had stepped beyond time into a place where nothing—and everything—existed.
We were nowhere.
We were everything.
We were—
A growl tore from my throat, and I shook myself free.
No.
This was a trick.
Malik was playing with my mind, bending my will, weaving something insidious beneath my skin. He was darkness, just like Balthazar.
My heart pounded as fury surged through me.
“What have you done to my husband? Where is he?” My voice cracked, raw, and desperate.
Two months of nightmares of searching, of tearing myself apart with uncertainty.
Fat tears spilled down my cheeks. “Is my husband dead? Where did you take him?”
My knees buckled, and I collapsed, unable to hold myself up any longer.
Sobs racked me.
Malik crouched before me, still damnably silent.
He didn’t move. Didn’t speak.
He only watched, his gaze distant, as if he were miles away.
The stillness stretched around me, vast and suffocating, a chasm of nothingness that swallowed me whole.
I couldn’t take it.
My body shook with violent sobs, my arms wrapping around myself as if I could hold in the pain, keep it from spilling into the endless silence. But it was too much—the ache of everything I had endured and lost poured from me.
At last, my voice broke through the emptiness, fragile and desperate.
“Please… tell me what happened to Roman. I miss him so much. I can’t bear not knowing. I don’t want to suffer anymore.”
If I kept crying like this, I would vanish, dissolving into dust, carried away by the wind of my sorrow.
And then—
Malik moved.
He reached across the emptiness between us, his fingers featherlight as they brushed away my tears.
I gasped.
Then—before I could react—he lifted his fingers to his lips, sucking my tears into his mouth as if they were the most exquisite, golden gemstones he had ever tasted.
The room shuddered. Or maybe it was just me.
I could hear Rosie and Emily breathing behind me and sense their wide-eyed stares pressing into my back. And yet, we were all ensnared—held captive by the force radiating from Eyan Malik.
He cupped my chin, his touch firm yet gentle, like a parent tending to a child’s scraped knee.
Warmth. Comfort.
I should have recoiled.
Instead, I melted beneath his fingers.
And then, at last, he spoke.
“I am indeed Eyan Malik,” he said, his voice deep and resonant, like the whisper of ancient trees. “I have been waiting for you for a long time. And finally, you have found me.”
His hands never stopped moving, his fingers stroking my cheeks, brushing against my forehead, weaving something dangerous into my skin.
I felt myself leaning in, my body drawn to his like a ship caught in the pull of an unseen tide.
I wanted to fall into him.
To sink into that voice, into that touch, into the inexplicable longing unfurling inside me—
No.
Roman.
Remember Roman.
Your husband.
Malik was nothing to me. He was tricking me and luring me into his world. I was betraying Roman.
I shoved him away.
“Stop,” I gasped, horrified by my reaction. “Where is Roman? Where are you holding him?”
The warmth of Malik’s touch vanished, but his intensity never wavered.
He only stared at me.
The silence thickened, pressing down on my chest. The air between us felt charged, vibrating with something I couldn’t name—something that made my heart pound for all the wrong reasons.
“I don’t have your husband. He’s not here.”
The words struck like shards of broken glass—sharp, unforgiving, painful.
I seized his lapels, desperation igniting in my veins. “But you know where he is! I saw you take him! I saw you through my dagger—holding him!”
Malik rocked backward, forcing me to release him. He swayed, his body moving as if stirred by a wind only he could feel.
And once again, he said nothing.
The silence threatened to swallow me whole.
I snapped.
“What have you done with my husband? Did you kill him?”
My fury boiled over. I cocked my arm back, ready to strike—
Malik caught my wrist.
His grip was firm but not punishing. He unfurled my fingers, smoothing my palm with deliberate strokes.
And just like that, I was caught again.
My breath hitched as my body betrayed me, swaying in rhythm with his. Back and forth. Back and forth. A breeze neither of us should have been able to feel, yet somehow, only we could.
Then he spoke, his voice deep, soothing, lethal.
“I took him to a place to heal, Olivia. You will see him soon.”
I stopped breathing.
Roman was alive.
Malik continued, his tone unshaken, absolute. “I had to send him to another time to heal… and to gather something for me.”
The moment broke.
I jerked my hand away. “What things? Where is he?”
Malik didn’t answer.
Instead, he stood and, with an effortless pull, drew me up with him.
“You and Emily are exhausted and hungry,” he said. “You must eat. Rest.”
He turned, guiding me toward the stairs.