3
Linnéa woke to the feeling of being watched.
For a few disoriented seconds, she didn’t remember where she was. The bed was too big, the sheets too smooth, and the light coming through the tall windows was too pale and cold. Then everything came rushing back — the man in her apartment, the papers, the locked penthouse door.
She sat up slowly, pulling the covers up over her chest even though she was still wearing the black T-shirt and shorts from the night before.
Isak stood in the doorway.
He was already dressed — dark trousers and a charcoal shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his forearms. In one hand he carried a tray. His eyes were fixed on her, calm and unreadable, like he had been standing there for a while.
“Good morning,” he said, as if this were any ordinary day.
Linnéa didn’t answer.
He walked into the room and placed the tray on the bedside table. Coffee. Fresh bread. Sliced fruit. Scrambled eggs. More food than she could possibly eat. Steam rose gently from the coffee cup.
“You were talking in your sleep,” he said, pulling the single chair in the room closer to the bed before sitting down.
Linnéa swallowed. “What did I say?”
“Nothing important.” He crossed one ankle over his knee and studied her. “Eat.”
She didn’t move.
Isak’s gaze sharpened slightly. “Linnéa. I’m not going to ask again.”
The quiet command in his voice made something inside her flinch. She reached for the coffee first, mostly because her hands needed something to do. It was perfect — hot, strong, exactly how she took it. She hated that he knew even that.
He watched her take a few sips before he spoke again.
“You have questions,” he said. “Ask them.”
She stared into the cup. Her voice came out smaller than she wanted. “Why me?”
Isak was quiet for a long moment.
“Because I saw you,” he finally said. “Years ago. During a time when I had very little reason to believe there was anything good left in this world. You were… unexpected. And once I had seen you, I couldn’t stop.”
Linnéa looked up at him. There was something in his voice she hadn’t heard before — something raw beneath the control.
He continued, eyes never leaving hers.
“Your father made mistakes that cost people their lives. One of those lives mattered to me. When I looked into him, your name kept appearing. At first I told myself it was just curiosity. Then I realized it was something else.”
He leaned forward slightly, resting his forearms on his knees.
“I decided a long time ago that you were going to be mine. The debt simply gave me the means to make it happen.”
Linnéa felt her stomach twist. She set the cup down with a trembling hand.
“You’re talking about me like I’m a thing you bought.”
“You are,” he said simply. “At least for now. Until I decide otherwise.”
He stood up and walked over to the windows, looking out over the city.
“Today we’re leaving Stockholm,” he said. “There’s a villa on a private island in the archipelago. It’s more isolated than this place. Better suited for what comes next.”
Linnéa’s heart started beating faster.
“What comes next?” she asked.
Isak turned to look at her. The morning light made his eyes look even colder.
“You’re going to learn what it means to belong to me,” he said. “Every rule. Every boundary. Every part of you that now belongs to me. And you’re going to learn it where no one can hear you if you decide to scream.”
She felt the blood drain from her face.
Isak walked back to the bed and stopped beside it. He reached down and brushed his knuckles along her jaw. The touch was light, but it sent a shiver through her.
“You can keep fighting,” he murmured. “I won’t stop you. But every time you do, I will remind you exactly who you belong to now. And eventually, Linnéa… you will stop needing the reminder.”
He straightened up.
“Finish eating. Get dressed. There are warm clothes in the closet. It’s colder on the island. We leave in forty minutes.”
He turned to go, then paused in the doorway.
“And Linnéa?”
She looked at him.
“Don’t make me chase you today. I’m not in the mood to be patient.”
Then he was gone.
Linnéa sat in the big bed for a long time after he left, staring at the tray of food she no longer had any appetite for.
Forty minutes.
She could try to run when they left the building. She could wait until they were outside and scream for help. She could fight him in the car.
But she already knew how that would end.
He had been planning this for four years.
She had been his long before he ever stepped into her apartment.
With numb fingers, Linnéa pushed the covers aside and walked to the closet. The clothes inside were exactly what he had promised — soft sweaters, thick leggings, a warm coat, and boots that looked like they would actually fit. Everything in dark, expensive fabrics.
She dressed slowly.
When she was finished, she stood in front of the mirror and barely recognized herself. The clothes were beautiful. They made her look like someone who belonged in a place like this.
She looked like his.
A knock came at the door.
Isak didn’t wait for her to answer. He stepped inside, took one look at her, and gave a single, satisfied nod.
“Let’s go.”
He didn’t touch her as they walked through the penthouse. He didn’t need to. His presence alone was enough to keep her moving forward.
In the private elevator, she stood as far from him as the small space allowed. He watched her reflection in the mirrored walls, eyes unreadable.
When the doors opened into the underground garage, a different car was waiting — black, sleek, and clearly armored. The same driver from the night before stood beside it, expression blank.
Isak opened the back door for her.
Linnéa hesitated on the concrete, the cold morning air biting at her face.
“If I get in this car,” she said quietly, “I’m choosing this.”
Isak met her eyes. There was no triumph in his expression. Only certainty.
“You were never really choosing anything, Linnéa,” he said. “You were only ever choosing how much it would hurt before you accepted what you already are.”
He held the door open.
She got in.
As the car pulled out of the garage and into the gray Stockholm morning, Linnéa stared out the window and tried not to think about how final that choice had felt.
Behind her, in the reflection of the glass, Isak watched her with the calm certainty of a man who had finally taken what he had wanted for years.
And he had no intention of ever giving it back.