Chapter 28 Permanent Guest
PERMANENT GUEST
“Unless, of course… You want me to kiss you.”
The question lingered between us and, honestly… I forgot how to breathe. Of course, I didn’t know what to say to that. Instead, I was left suspended in the moment, foolishly hoping he would close the distance and follow through on the promise in his voice.
But he stepped away first, and the loss of his closeness pulled an involuntary sound from me. At the same time, my fingers tightened against him before dropping uselessly into the space he’d reopened.
“Come,” he said quietly, and the word carried something beneath it. As though he regretted leaving the question unanswered as much as I did.
I followed, as there wasn’t much else I could do at that point.
My heart was still hammering in my chest, as the memory of his gentle touch still lingered as if now tattooed on my soul.
We turned into a secondary corridor where thick carpet swallowed the sound of our footsteps entirely.
More ornate, carved wooden doors stood evenly spaced along both sides, their surfaces polished and each adorned with a decorative brass handle.
I held my breath as we passed them, wondering which one he would finally stop at.
I became acutely aware of his jacket draped over me.
The fabric was warm against my skin and carried his scent in a way that felt far too intimate for someone who had kidnapped me.
My fingers curled unconsciously into the lapel, and I hated that the gesture felt instinctive.
Grounding even, now I was no longer holding onto his arm.
He had destroyed stone to soothe my fears, steadied me when I stumbled, and given me his jacket when I was cold.
And now he walked beside me through his home as though this were the most natural thing in the world.
And the realization that I no longer felt as though I were being led toward a cell unsettled me more than iron bars ever could have.
“You are thinking too much,” he said at last, his voice low enough that it barely disturbed the quiet, yet close enough that I felt it rather than simply heard it.
I looked up at him, not surprised that he’d noticed, but at how easily he’d read me. His expression stayed calm, though there was the faintest tension at the corner of his mouth, like he was holding something back.
“Am I?” I asked, lifting my chin slightly in challenge, though I was aware that my pulse had quickened, which was starting to feel like a habit at this point.
“Yes,” he replied, his gaze sliding over my face in a way that felt far too knowing.
“You are attempting to decide whether you should be more afraid than you are.”
The words struck closer than I would have liked.
I studied him carefully then, the steady line of his jaw, the controlled stillness in his posture.
The way he moved with quiet confidence through a place that clearly belonged to him.
He didn’t crowd me, yet there was never more than a breath between us.
As though space was something he chose to grant me, as if it were his right to do so.
“And should I be?” I asked softly.
His eyes darkened fractionally, not with threat, but with something deeper, something that felt like restraint rather than menace.
“No,” he said, and the certainty in it left no room for doubt.
We walked a few steps further before he slowed. His hand lifted, not to touch me this time, but to rest against one of the door handles at the end of the hall.
The movement was unhurried, yet I sensed intention in it, as though he had chosen this door long before we had ever reached the top of the stairs. He turned toward me fully then, and the corridor seemed to narrow further, not physically, but because his attention settled entirely on me.
“This will be yours,” he said, his voice low, the words carrying a quiet authority that felt unmistakably possessive.
Yours.
The word lingered between us. My thoughts tangled around it, trying to decide how I felt about this lavish prison.
One that came into view when he slowly opened the door.
However, he didn’t step inside first but instead, shifted slightly to the side and inclined his head toward the open doorway.
Doing so in a gesture that was almost courteous.
“Go on,” he prompted softly, and I hesitated despite myself. Not because I feared what I would find inside, but because of what this moment represented. Crossing another threshold and stepping even deeper into his world.
I was acutely aware of him behind me, close enough that I could feel the warmth of his body at my back, close enough that if I leaned even a fraction, I would make contact. Meaning that if I chose to run now, there would be nowhere to go.
And he knew it.
He stepped forward then, not touching me, but positioning himself just behind my shoulder, his presence a solid wall at my back. It was not subtle. He was ensuring I moved forward rather than away. Ensuring that whatever reaction I had to the room beyond, it would not involve flight.
The imposing nature of it sent a small ripple of heat through me that had nothing to do with fear.
“You’re not going to let me bolt, are you?” I asked quietly, not turning to look at him, though I felt the faint shift of his breath near my hair.
“No,” he replied, and there was no teasing in it this time. Only calm certainty.
“I am not.”
For reasons I could not fully articulate, the honesty steadied me rather than unsettled me, and enough that I stepped inside.
The room opened gradually rather than all at once, lamplight casting warm gold across even more paneled walls that absorbed the glow rather than reflecting it.
The space was not cavernous like the hall below, nor was it as stark as I might have expected a spare, unused room to be.
But instead, it felt oddly lived in, making me frown in question.
It was in that moment that he finally followed me inside.
The room unfolded further, and my eyes started to take in more details of the space he had now declared was mine.
Heavy drapes framed tall windows that revealed something entirely unexpected, not the urban warehouses I had prepared myself to see.
It seemed the exterior of his home was not the only thing he kept hidden from the world.
A wide rug softened the floor beneath my steps, its muted tones echoing the quiet richness of the sconces mounted along the walls. But my eyes finally landed on the center of the room, where there stood a huge bed. In fact, I didn’t think I had ever seen one so big!
It looked like something torn straight from the pages of a dark fairytale.
The bed dominated the space, dressed entirely in deep charcoal and black, the heavy covers swallowing the light rather than reflecting it.
There were no soft pastels here, no delicate touches meant to soothe.
Everything about it felt substantially controlled and undeniably masculine.
The kind of bed that belonged to someone who took up space without apology.
It was large enough that four or five people could have slept there comfortably, the sheer width of it beyond excessive. And I wondered if lying on it meant that I could disappear into it entirely, lost somewhere in the dark sweep of fabric and shadow.
My fingers drifted along the edge of the sheets, the material thick beneath my touch, warmer than I expected. It didn’t feel decorative but instead was chosen for another purpose. Perhaps solely to intimidate me, and that thought sent a faint shiver down my spine.
Because even imagining someone like Oblivion stretched out across those dark sheets felt…
intimate in a way I hadn’t prepared for.
The weight of him. The breadth of his shoulders against the pillows.
The quiet control that never seemed to leave him.
I let out a shuddered breath as my thoughts spiraled.
As now I was thinking that if this were merely a guest room, what must his bed look like?
The thought unsettled me more than it should have.
“You expected something else,” he observed quietly from behind me, clearly trying to read my thoughts again. And why I was shocked that he was watching my expression so closely, I didn’t know. Not when he seemed to always be watching me.
So, I turned slightly, meeting his gaze.
“I wasn’t sure what to expect,” I admitted, allowing my eyes to roam once more across the room, deliberately avoiding the bed before I started blushing like an idiot.
The room was vast, far larger than any bedroom I had ever seen. Bigger, I realized with a faint flicker of disbelief, than my entire apartment. And yet it didn’t feel empty, but intentionally divided, almost as though it held more purpose than to simply sleep.
To one side, a heavy antique desk stood beneath a cluster of shelves lined with dark-spined books, their titles worn and aged.
Beyond that, a low seating area had been arranged around a substantial marble fireplace.
Its mantel was carved with intricate detailing that caught my attention, with winged warriors stood like frozen sentinels on either side.
A pair of thick armchairs upholstered in deep charcoal velvet flanked it, the kind that swallowed you whole when you sat down.
The perfect place to curl up and read a good book.
Paintings lined the walls, though these were not gentle countryside landscapes or ancestral portraits I had seen lining his gallery.
These depicted darker places. A jagged fortress rising from black rock.
A castle carved into the face of a mountain, its spires vanishing into storm-heavy skies.
Vast, dramatic landscapes that felt less earthly and more… ancient and Hellish.