Chapter 30
Glass Walls and Ghosts
Violet
The penthouse feels hollow. Not empty—too curated for that—but stripped of anything that might echo a real life. Like a museum after hours, luxury is preserved exactly as intended. Nothing out of place. Nothing breathing.
What’s left is me. And my thoughts, bouncing back sharper every time they hit.
And my body.
Because the worst part isn’t what he did.
It’s that my body remembers it differently than my pride does.
I try to ignore the way everything still feels… off. Too sensitive. Like my nerves are turned too high, humming under my skin. I hate that a single memory can do that. Hate that it follows me from room to room, settles low and traitorous in my stomach.
I don’t know what I expected when he brought me here. Something harsher, maybe. Guards. Locked doors. A constant reminder that I wasn’t free.
Instead, there’s this.
No one posted outside my door. No rooms sealed shut—at least not that I’ve found. Just open space, dark wood, and endless walls of glass that make it feel like I’m standing on the edge of the city, one wrong step away from falling straight into it.
At first, I move carefully. Testing the limits of this place—and myself—like either might snap if I push too hard.
They don’t.
Asher doesn’t stop me. If anything, he seems content to let me roam, like I’ll wear myself out eventually. He spends most evenings here—sometimes reading across from me in the sitting room, or sometimes joining me for dinner like this is normal. Like this is a choice we’re both making.
Occasionally, we watch movies together on the massive screen in the theater room.
It’s never planned. Just something that happens after dinner, the lights dimmed low, and the city thrown back at us in reflected glass.
He usually lets the news run for a minute or two first—headlines scrolling, and anchors talking too fast—before switching to whatever we’re pretending is distraction.
One night, he doesn’t turn it off in time.
The anchor’s voice cuts through the quiet, sharp, and rehearsed.
“—NYPD confirming tonight that a new street drug, laced with fentanyl, is responsible for at least seven deaths—”
My breath stalls.
I don’t look at Asher. I don’t move at all. The city outside the glass feels suddenly too close, like it’s pressing its face to the windows, watching.
Footage rolls. Red and blue lights. A stretcher half-covered by a sheet. The words manhunt and suspect crawl across the bottom of the screen in blocky white letters.
Asher shifts beside me.
Not away.
Closer.
It’s subtle—the brush of his knee against mine, and the solid weight of his thigh anchoring me in place—but it steals my attention anyway. My body reacts before my brain can catch up, heat flaring low and traitorous even as dread curls tight in my chest.
The screen changes.
A composite sketch fades in.
I don’t recognize it at first. My mind skims past it, cataloging details the way it always does. The hair’s wrong. The jaw too sharp. The eyes not quite right.
Then the shape of the face settles.
My stomach drops.
It’s not me.
But it’s close enough that I stop breathing.
The sketch lingers. The anchor keeps talking—about tips, about sightings, and about how the public can help—but the words blur into static. All I can see is the suggestion of myself staring back at me from the screen. Generic. Replaceable. Close enough to be dangerous.
Asher’s hand comes down on the armrest between us.
Steady. Grounded.
His fingers don’t touch me, but the space between them is deliberate. Claimed.
“That’s not you,” he says quietly.
Not reassurance. Not a question.
A statement.
I swallow, throat tight. My phone buzzes in my lap like it knows.
He doesn’t look at the screen again. Just reaches for the remote and changes the channel with an efficiency that feels practiced, final. The movie starts mid-scene, sound swelling to fill the space the news leaves behind.
Only then do I realize my heart is racing.
I feel my phone start to vibrate with multiple texts. I don’t unlock my phone.
I don’t need to see the messages to know what they say. I can already hear the jokes forming. The disbelief. The casual cruelty of people who’ve never had to worry about being mistaken for something dangerous.
Asher doesn’t move away.
The heat of him is there, solid and unavoidable, and I hate that it works. Hate that my breathing evens out because of it. Hate that part of me is relieved—and ashamed—because he’s right here, and the city isn’t.
I don’t understand it yet, not fully. I only know that something shifts. When the glass walls stopped feeling like a view and started feeling like armor.
After that, things settle into a rhythm.
He watches me instead of the screen sometimes. I feel it before I see it—the weight of his attention, steady and unashamed. When I glance over, amusement plays at the corner of his mouth, like he knows exactly what’s running through my head.
Like he’s waiting for me to break first.
But he won’t tell me anything. Not about the imposter. Not about the threat.
That realization gnaws at me. He’s too comfortable with me trapped in his space, like he doesn’t need me to be grateful—or cooperative—or even scared.
Just present.
He comes and goes, but when he’s home, he makes sure I feel it. A brush of fingertips when he hands me a glass of wine. A look that lingers a second too long. A remark weighted just enough to make me wonder if I’m imagining the double meaning.
A door closing somewhere down the hall. A voice murmuring, always just out of reach.
And no matter how pristine the nights feel, I can’t stop thinking about that one—the night I slept while someone stood close enough to touch me. Watching like a ghost stitched into the walls.
The words still echo, sharp and ugly.
You killed my family. I will kill yours.
The space should unsettle me.
It does, but I refuse to let it make me small.
And if I’m going to be afraid, I won’t do it blindly.
So I start searching.
The upper level is designed with purpose—minimalist, precise, and impossibly expensive.
Everything feels intentional, like it was placed once and never meant to be disturbed.
The master suite takes up an entire corner of the penthouse, an open-concept sprawl with a sitting area and floor-to-ceiling windows that wrap around the city like it belongs to him.
My bedroom is smaller, but no less impressive. A sitting room leads into the sleeping space, as if I’m supposed to entertain guests before I rest. As if this is a life someone planned for me without bothering to ask.
His office is locked.
I check once.
Then again.
Nothing. No give. No sound. Solid.
Fine.
So I move on.
The private gym. The bar. The vast living area that looks untouched—staged more than lived in. Bookshelves built seamlessly into the walls, sleek and modern, and lined with expensive first editions that don’t look like they’ve ever been opened.
The kitchen is the only place that feels lived in. Used. Real.
And it’s there—standing barefoot on cold tile, surrounded by stainless steel and morning light—that I find the first person who speaks to me like I belong here.
Boris is nothing like Asher.
That’s the first thing that hits me.
He’s the private chef—the one who keeps the kitchen stocked, the meals planned, and the entire operation running without ever making it feel like an operation. He’s built like a man who’s spent his life on his feet. Broad. Solid. The kind of presence that fills a room without trying.
Where Asher is cold precision, Boris is warmth and motion. Constant movement. A steady rhythm that doesn’t feel performative.
The first time I wander into the kitchen, he gives me a slow, approving nod, like I’ve passed some invisible test I didn’t know I was taking.
“Finally,” he says, Polish accent thick but warm. “You come to eat properly.”
He doesn’t even look up when he says it.
He’s working at the cutting board, sleeves rolled to his elbows, and shoulders broad enough to block half the counter. The kitchen smells incredible—garlic, butter, and something sizzling that makes my stomach tighten in a way that surprises me.
I hover near the doorway.
Boris doesn’t comment. Doesn’t rush me. But I can feel his attention like a weight—not sharp, and not invasive. Just… aware.
Measuring.
So I stay.
I watch.
I listen.
I learn.
He’s not wrong—I haven’t been eating much. Not as a protest. Not intentionally. It’s just that nothing in this place feels like it belongs to me. Everything is too polished. Too perfect. Plates arranged like they’re meant to be admired instead of used.
But here—here it’s different.
Here there’s heat. Noise. Movement. Something real.
“Asher doesn’t eat much, does he?” I ask one afternoon, leaning against the counter while Boris kneads dough that smells like heaven.
He snorts. “He eats when he remembers. So I remind him.”
I watch his forearms flex as he works the dough, methodical and unhurried. “What does he like?”
Boris glances at me from the corner of his eye, mouth twitching like he knows exactly why I’m asking. “Meat. Rare. Spicy. But he eats what I make.” A beat. “He trusts me.”
The word lands heavier than I expect.
Trust.
“And you,” Boris adds, eyeing me critically. “You are too thin. Eat.”
I laugh, sharp and surprised. Too thin. No one has ever said that to me in my life. The absurdity of it makes me grin, but Boris just gestures toward the counter like the conversation is over.
Before I can argue, he slides a plate toward me.
Something golden. Flaky. Lightly dusted with powdered sugar.
“P?czki,” he says. “Polish pastry. Like doughnut. But better.”
I hesitate. Habit more than resistance. Then I pick one up and take a cautious bite.
My eyes widen instantly.
It’s soft—pillowy—with a crisp fried edge that gives way to rich filling. Sweet, but not cloying. Tart enough to make my mouth water.
Raspberry.
Powdered sugar coats my fingers as I take another bite.