12
Night had fallen over the island.
The rain had returned, softer now, a steady whisper against the glass. The fire in the bedroom burned low, casting long shadows across the walls. Linnéa stood naked in the middle of the room, exactly where Isak had told her to wait.
He circled her slowly, fully dressed, like a predator deciding exactly how he wanted to devour what was already his.
She didn’t try to cover herself. She didn’t look away. Something fundamental had shifted in her since that morning on the couch. The fight was still there — quiet, but present — but it no longer had the same sharp edges.
Isak stopped in front of her. He reached out and traced the fading bruises on her throat with one finger.
“Tonight,” he said quietly, “I’m going to take everything that’s left. Every last piece of the girl who used to exist before me. And when I’m done, there will be nothing left but what belongs to me.”
Linnéa’s breath trembled, but she didn’t speak.
Isak’s eyes darkened.
“On the bed. On your back. Legs spread.”
She moved without hesitation.
He undressed slowly, never taking his eyes off her. When he was naked, he climbed onto the bed and settled between her thighs. For a long moment he simply looked at her — at the marks he had left on her skin, at the way her chest rose and fell, at the wetness already glistening between her legs.
Then he leaned down and kissed her.
It wasn’t gentle.
It was deep, claiming, and desperate in a way she had never felt from him before. Like he was trying to crawl inside her skin and never leave.
When he finally pulled back, his voice was rough.
“Tell me what you are.”
Linnéa met his eyes.
“I’m yours.”
“Again.”
“I’m yours, Isak.”
He pushed inside her in one slow, devastating thrust. She was still sore from earlier, but she welcomed the burn. Welcomed the way he filled her completely.
Isak didn’t fuck her hard at first. He moved deep and deliberate, one hand braced beside her head, the other wrapped loosely around her throat — not squeezing, just holding. Claiming.
“Every time I come inside you,” he murmured, “I’m rewriting you. Every time you come on my cock, you become a little more mine. Do you feel it?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
He squeezed her throat just enough to make her vision blur at the edges.
“Say you want it.”
“I want it.”
“Say you need it.”
Linnéa’s voice broke. “I need it. I need you.”
Something in Isak snapped.
He fucked her then — hard, relentless, almost brutal. The hand around her throat tightened and loosened in time with his thrusts. Every time she got close, he slowed down or pulled back just enough to keep her on the edge until she was shaking and desperate.
Tears streamed down her temples.
“Please,” she gasped. “Isak— please—”
“Please what?” he growled.
“Please let me come. Please— I’m yours. I’m fucking yours. Just— please—”
He released her throat and slid his hand between them, rubbing her clit with merciless precision.
“Come for me,” he ordered. “Come while you say my name.”
She shattered.
The orgasm ripped through her so hard her back bowed off the bed. She sobbed his name like a prayer and a curse at the same time. Isak fucked her through it, chasing his own release until he buried himself deep and came with a low, guttural groan, filling her with heat.
For a long moment, the only sounds were the fire and their ragged breathing.
Then he pulled out slowly and rolled them so she was lying on top of him, still connected. He stroked her hair with one hand while the other rested possessively on her lower back.
Linnéa lay there, cheek against his chest, listening to his heartbeat. Her body felt heavy. Used. Owned.
And for the first time, that didn’t terrify her.
Isak’s voice was quiet when he finally spoke.
“There’s no going back now.”
“I know,” she whispered.
He tilted her chin up so she had to look at him.
“If you ever try to leave me again, I will find you. And I will bring you back. And the punishment will be worse than anything you can imagine.”
Linnéa held his gaze without flinching.
“I won’t leave.”
Something raw and unguarded moved across his face.
“Say it again.”
“I won’t leave you.” Her voice was steady. “I’m yours. Completely. I don’t… I don’t want to be anything else anymore.”
Isak closed his eyes for a second, like the words had physically hit him. When he opened them again, the look in them was almost reverent.
He kissed her — slow and deep and full of something that felt dangerously close to love, if love could be this dark and obsessive.
When he pulled back, he rested his forehead against hers.
“Then we burn the rest of it,” he said. “Tomorrow I’ll have everything from your old life destroyed. The apartment. The debt records. Every trace of the girl you used to be. And you will stay here with me. On this island. In my bed. In my life. Until the day we both die.”
Linnéa didn’t flinch.
She simply nodded.
“Okay.”
Isak held her tighter.
Outside, the rain continued to fall over the dark water.
Inside the villa, Linnéa Berg lay in the arms of the man who had destroyed her old life and given her a new one in its place.
She was no longer fighting.
She was no longer running.
She was exactly where she was always meant to be.
And for the first time since Isak had walked into her apartment, Linnéa felt something dangerously close to peace.