Hook
The screen flickers with static, but I don’t blink, refuse to miss a single frame. Not when she’s like this.
She’s pacing. Fast. Uneven. One sock missing, her hair a mess of snarled blonde waves, hands knotted into trembling fists that swing too close to the mirror. The bed’s a wreck. The blankets shredded and half-draped across the floor, like they tried to hold her together and failed miserably.
She’s muttering something I can’t quite make out through the audio feed, but her lips are wet with fury.
With fire. With something that makes my throat clench like I’m the one suffocating in that room.
It’s all unravelling now—she is unravelling—and it’s beautiful in a way that shouldn’t be possible.
The kind of beauty that only comes right before something breaks completely.
Her rage isn’t loud anymore. It’s quieter now, like she’s conserving it for something specific. Letting it simmer under her skin, waiting for the next moment to strike with precision. There’s blood on her knuckles. She must’ve punched the wall again. Or maybe the door. Maybe herself.
And God, the sight of her rage—the pure, unfiltered defiance burning in her eyes—it’s divine.
She isn’t crying.
No.
Not Tahlia Fernwynd.
Tears are too easy for someone like her. She’s boiling. She’s splintering. She’s waging war in a cage made of silk and surveillance, and she doesn’t even know that every time she spins, every time she kicks at something, I’m watching her fall apart.
That monitor is my drug, and she’s my sickness spreading through my veins.
My pulse is thunder. My cock is stone.
I want to ruin her all over again. Not gently. Not sweetly.
Violently.
But not with fists or force.
With truths she can’t escape.
With time that stretches until she breaks.
With the ache of knowing she can fight every inch of me and still—still—never be free of what I’ve made her feel.
She hurls the necklace like it bit her, like it burnt her skin.
It arcs through the air—just a glint of silver, a streak of defiance—and then shatters against the mirror with a sound that makes me exhale through my teeth. Not surprise. Not anger. Just satisfaction. Bone-deep, pulse-tight satisfaction that settles in my chest.
I lean closer to the monitor, hand gripping the edge of the desk.
The broken glass rains down in slow motion, catching the light from the chandelier in little slashes of brilliance. Pieces of her reflection scatter across the floor like she’s finally broken the illusion of safety she’d been clinging to. Finally seen the bars for what they are.
And fuck, she’s magnificent.
Chest rising too fast. Hair falling in tangles across her face. That look in her eyes—unhinged, betrayed, furious. Not because she’s here. But because she feels something. And it scares her.
Good.
She should be scared.
She’s mine.
And not because I touched her. Not because I’ve hurt her. Not yet in any permanent way.
But because I know every tick of her pulse, every crack in her voice, every way she pretends she’s fine when she’s coming undone like silk seams ripped open by a blade.
I gave her that necklace.
And she threw it like it meant nothing.
She doesn’t know what it meant to me.
She doesn’t know I picked it because it looked delicate but was sharp as hell where the clasp met the chain. She doesn’t know I watched her trace her fingers over it like maybe—just maybe—she liked the weight of belonging to someone.
Now it’s in pieces.
And so is she.
My jaw ticks. My hand closes around the edge of the desk, knuckles white with pressure. I should go to her. I should drag her back to the bed and make her wear what she broke, make her beg to be claimed again just to feel something solid beneath her feet.
But I don’t move.
Because watching her break?
It’s better than any drug I’ve ever tasted, more addictive than anything I’ve found before.
She stands there like she’s waiting for someone to come stop her. Someone to tell her she’s gone too far. But I don’t move from my chair.
She’s alone.
And I want her to feel it.
Let her sit in the wreckage. Let her watch her reflection fracture across the walls, a dozen broken pieces staring back at her. That’s what this room is now—just jagged versions of a girl trying too hard to pretend she hasn’t already submitted to the cage around her.
She’s pacing now. Back and forth. Wearing the floor thin with her movement. Nails digging into her palms like pain is a leash she can hold onto.
I lean forward, watching the tension twist through her like it’s a lover’s hand sliding beneath her skin. Every rage-fuelled inhale. Every too-fast movement. Every glance over her shoulder like she knows I’m watching but can’t find the eyes.
You don’t have to find them, darling.
I’ve already marked you.
She crouches near the shattered glass, trembling fingers hovering like she’s thinking about picking it up. I don’t blink. I don’t breathe. My whole world shrinks to that one second—will she?
She doesn’t.
She stands, trembling, arms crossed over her chest like she’s trying to hold herself together. Good luck with that. I already pulled the stitching out of her spine. It’s only a matter of time before she collapses under the weight of everything she thinks she’s hiding.
But I won’t go to her yet.
Not until she asks for something.
Not until she needs something.
Not until that fire in her turns to ash and she chokes on it.
Because this part? This is where most men get it wrong.
They rush in. Offer comfort. Feed the delusion of rebellion. But me?
I wait.
I watch.
I study the way her walls come down when no one’s in the room but her reflection—and even that she can’t look in the eye anymore.
Because she knows.
She knows she’s not going home.
And soon, she’ll stop trying.
Not because I broke her.
But because deep down, she’s always wanted someone to.
It’s the sound, not the movement, that undoes me.
Not the way her knees buckle. Not the way she crumples by the dresser like a broken marionette whose strings were cut in the middle of a performance.
But the sound.
A single, choked breath, fractured and ragged like glass grinding beneath bare skin.
And then I see it—
That fucking tear.
Trailing down her cheek like it escaped without permission.
She doesn’t sob. Doesn’t shatter loudly. No theatrics. No tantrum. Just… breaks. Quietly. As if even her suffering is something she feels the need to apologise for.
She reaches for the glass.
Not clumsily. Not like a girl desperate for attention.
Deliberately.
Her fingers wrap around the jagged shard, the sharp edge pressed white against her palm—and I move.
Fast.
Too fast.
The chair behind me screeches across the floor as I shove away from the monitors. The door slams against the wall as I rip it open. My boots are pounding down the hall and I don’t fucking care who hears.
All I can see is red.
All I can hear is her breath catching as the glass flirts with her skin.
And all I can think—
The only fucking thought hammering through my skull—
“She doesn’t get to leave me.”
Not even like that.
Not even in death.
My hand is on her door, wrenching it open, and she flinches when I enter like she expected a ghost and got the devil instead.
“Drop it,” I snarl, voice low, breathless, breaking. “Now.”
She stares at me like she doesn’t recognise me.
Like the man in front of her isn’t the one who locked her in this cage but the one who’s bleeding from it too.
“Drop. It.”
Her eyes—red-rimmed, wide, wet—lock onto mine, and for a second, neither of us moves.
Then she lifts the glass.
Just a little.
Just enough.
I’m on her in an instant, knocking it from her grip with a force that’s more panic than precision. The shard clatters across the floor and skids under the bed. Her gasp is sharp, furious, but I don’t back off.
My hands are on her wrists, pinning them to the mattress as I crowd her space, shaking with something I don’t even have a name for.
“You don’t get to fucking leave me,” I grit out. “Not like that. Not ever.”
Her chest heaves beneath mine. Her eyes search my face like she’s trying to find the crack in the armour—and I think she sees it.
Because it’s there.
Right now.
Raw and splintering.
I meant it. Every word.
She can scream. She can spit. She can hate me with every breath she’s got left in her body—but she doesn’t get to fucking disappear. Not when I’ve carved this much space inside myself for her.
Not when her blood would stain a part of me that might still be capable of feeling.
And maybe that’s what scares me most.
She’s beneath me, barely breathing, her wrists pinned to the mattress, her chest rising like her ribs are trying to tear their way out from under her skin.
And still—
She glares at me.
Like I’m the monster.
Like I’m the one who’s broken her.
She’s right, of course. I am. I did.
But that doesn’t mean I’ll let her end it.
“You think I’d just let you go?” I ask, voice lower now, dangerous in its softness. “That I’d stand there and watch whilst you bled out all over my fucking floor?”
Her lips part. No sound comes out.
Good.
She should be speechless.
Because I’m not finished.
I lean closer, so close her scent is the only thing I can fucking smell—salt, and fear, and the sharp, sickening tang of something too close to grief.
“You don’t get to die,” I whisper against her cheek. “You belong to me.”
She shudders. Just once. But I feel it all the way through my bones.
“You want to punish me?” I breathe. “Break something? Then do it. Scream. Burn the whole fucking place down. I’ll rebuild it. I’ll chain you to the ashes and call it home.”
I loosen my grip—just slightly.
Just enough for her wrists to move if she wants.
She doesn’t.
She just looks at me, hollow and trembling, and for a second… I wish I were different. I wish I could pull her into my arms and say something kind. Gentle. Human.
But I’m not kind.
I’m not gentle.
And whatever scraps of humanity I have left are too bloodstained to offer without making her dirtier too.
So I settle for this.
Leaning in.
Pressing my forehead to hers.
Breathing her in like it’s the only thing keeping me alive.
“Next time you try to leave me,” I whisper, voice shaking, “you won’t get a second chance.”
I release her wrists. One at a time.
Step back like it costs me something. Like there’s a leash digging into my throat and I just gave her the end of it.
She doesn’t move.
Doesn’t speak.
But she watches me as I walk away—like she’s finally seeing the kind of man who doesn’t just want to possess her body, but her despair too.
Because if she’s going to unravel, it’s going to be in my hands.
And nowhere else.
I leave the room, but I don’t get far.
The door clicks shut behind me and I freeze, palm still pressed to the wood like I’m waiting to feel her heartbeat through it. Like I could.
She didn’t scream.
She didn’t cry.
And that silence—it’s so much worse than any sound she could make.
I pace.
Back and forth in the hallway, boots pounding the floor like the storm in my chest needs an outlet, like movement will scrub the image of her tear-streaked face from behind my eyes.
It won’t.
I can still see the glass in her hand.
The way her fingers trembled—not from fear, but from something deeper. Something that says this isn’t desperation, it’s decision.
And that?
That fucking ruins me.
Because if she had screamed, I could’ve punished her.
If she had fought, I could’ve won.
But this?
This quiet ache she’s drowning in?
I can’t reach it.
Can’t leash it.
Can’t own it.
I lean against the wall and drag my hand through my hair, dragging at the roots, needing the pain to anchor me.
Because for the first time—I didn’t want her to suffer. Not like that.
Not in a way that didn’t include me.
And I hate it.
I hate her for making me feel something that isn’t lust or power or twisted pleasure. I hate the way my stomach churned when I saw her fold in on herself, like her bones were too tired to hold her up.
I wanted to tear the world apart in that moment.
Not for control.
Not for the game.
But for her.
And fuck, that makes me dangerous in a whole new way.
I head for the control room, needing to see her. Needing to know she’s still breathing, still whole—still mine.
The monitor flickers to life.
There she is.
Knees drawn to her chest. Back against the far wall. Staring at nothing.
Her fingers are wrapped around the necklace again—what’s left of it. She’s turning the sharp edge in her palm, over and over, like she wants to feel the pain but not commit to the wound.
Good.
Let it sting.
Let it mark her.
But don’t let it take her from me.
Because the next time she lifts something to her skin with the intent to disappear, I won’t knock it from her hand—I’ll break her fucking fingers for trying.