Chapter 16
NASH
She’s standing there in the middle of my library like she belongs in it, like my house has already decided she’s part of its bones.
The afternoon light catches in her hair and turns her eyes wide and bright with a mixture of fear and defiance that makes my chest ache and my cock twitch at the same time.
I step fully out of the hidden door and let it click shut behind me. For a long moment, we simply stare at each other—the masked stranger and the girl who was never supposed to find me. But it’s gone beyond that now. So far beyond. There’s no going back. No pretending we both didn’t cross lines.
Slowly, I reach up and pull the mask off.
The cool air hits my face, and just like that, there’s no barrier, no more anonymity. Just me, Nash Everett, standing bare in front of the daughter of the man I hate most in this world.
Blair’s breath catches audibly. Her eyes trace every line of my face, casting over the silver at my temples, the scar along my jaw from a fight years ago, and settling on my gaze. We stare at each other, and recognition flickers, then deepens.
“Nash,” she whispers, as if she’s testing the name on her tongue.
I nod once. “Yeah. It’s me.”
She doesn’t back away. If anything, she lifts her chin, stubborn and brave in a way that makes me want to pin her against the nearest shelf and remind her exactly who she’s dealing with.
“Why did you run away?” I ask, my voice rough after so many nights of speaking only through the mask. “I heard your father had plans for you. An arranged marriage to some old associate of his. Is that why you ended up here?”
Her expression shifts to pain, then anger, and something vulnerable flashes across her features. She looks away for a moment, toward the windows and the gray ocean beyond.
“He didn’t even ask me,” she says quietly.
“He just… decided. Like I was something to be traded for a better deal. Brooks…he’s almost forty years older than me.
Just another cold and calculating person my father surrounds himself with.
” She laughs, bitter and soft. “So I ran. I took what money I had, drove until I couldn’t drive anymore, and found this house.
I thought it was empty. I thought I could disappear here for a while. ”
I watch her carefully, clocking every small movement, every flicker of emotion. She’s so young. So fucking brave. And she has no idea how completely she’s ruined me.
“It’s only a matter of time before he works it out,” I tell her. “He already suspects you’re here. I’ve had intel that he’s on the move. If he comes to check the house himself, he’ll see the truth. He’ll see what I’ve done to you.”
Her gaze snaps back to mine. “And what have you done to me, Nash?”
I take a step closer. Then another. Until I’m close enough to smell the faint trace of her shampoo and the lingering scent of sex on her skin from last night.
“I’ve ruined you,” I say simply. “I’ve fucked you in my bed. Filled you with my come. I’ve watched you sleep, touched you while you dreamed, carried you when you couldn’t walk. You’re mine now, Blair, in every way that matters. You understand that, don’t you?”
Her breathing quickens. I can see the pulse fluttering in her throat. She doesn’t deny it. She doesn’t run.
“If you want to go back to him,” I continue, my voice dropping lower, darker, “I won’t be able to allow that.
I won’t let you walk away from me. Not after everything.
Not after I’ve had you. I’d rather burn this house down with both of us inside it than hand you back to the man who destroyed my life. ”
She stares at me for a long moment, eyes searching my face as if she’s trying to find the monster she expected and finding something far more complicated instead.
“You’re insane,” she whispers, but there’s no proper heat in it. “You know that, right?”
A dark smile tugs at my mouth. “Completely. But I stopped pretending otherwise the first night I laid eyes on you.”
I reach out slowly and brush my knuckles along her jaw. She doesn’t flinch, but lets out a shuddery breath as she leans into the touch.
“I hate what my father did to you,” she says softly. “But I’m not currency. Not for him. Not for you. If I stay, it’s because I choose to. Not because you won’t let me leave.”
My hand slides to the back of her neck, fingers threading into her hair. I pull her closer until our foreheads nearly touch.
“Then choose,” I murmur, my voice rough with everything I feel for her…
obsession and something dangerously close to ownership.
“Choose me. Choose this house. Choose the man who would rather die than give you up. Because the second you say yes, Blair, there’s no going back.
I’ll keep you here. I’ll keep you safe. I’ll keep you fucked and satisfied and so thoroughly claimed that you’ll never want another man again. ”
Her lips part. Her eyes drop to my mouth for a heartbeat before returning to mine, bright with a storm of emotions. The air between us feels thick enough to choke on.
“I’m still so fucking angry,” she says, voice shaking with fury. “I’m angry that everyone keeps trying to use me as a pawn. My father tried to marry me off as if I were some business asset. And now you…you’ve turned me into yours. Just another piece in your revenge.”
I lean in until my lips brush hers, my hand sliding to grip the back of her neck.
“Pawn or prisoner,” I murmur against her mouth, voice low and dark, “it’s the same thing in the end.
So choose, Blair. Do you want to be your father’s pawn to be sold off to whoever benefits him most?
Or do you want to be my prisoner? Kept here.
Owned. Fucked and cherished and never allowed to leave my side. ”
Her breath hitches sharply. I can feel the war raging inside her, the desire clashing with fear, and something deeper that neither of us wants to name yet.
She pushes up on her toes and presses an urgent kiss to my mouth.
It’s not soft or sweet; it’s desperate and furious, her hands fisting tightly in my shirt as she presses herself hard against me.
I growl into her mouth, the sound raw and possessive, and lift her easily onto the edge of the desk, stepping between her thighs.
My hands slide under her sweater, finding warm, bare skin, and she moans against my lips when my thumbs brush over her hardened nipples.
I break the kiss just long enough to rest my forehead against hers, both of us breathing hard.
“Say it,” I demand, voice rough with need. “Tell me you’re staying. Tell me you’re choosing this. Choosing us…even if it means being my prisoner.”
She looks up at me, eyes glistening with angry tears and fire and something that looks dangerously like surrender.
“I’m staying,” she whispers, voice breaking. “I choose you, Nash. God help me, I choose you.”
The words snap the last thread of my control.
I kiss her again, claiming her while my hands work frantically to strip away the layers between us.
The library fills with the sounds of our quickened breathing and the rustle of clothes hitting the floor.
Outside, her father may be coming, but in here, in this moment, Blair Russo is already mine.
And I am never letting her go.