Chapter 1 #2
“I want to see Nikolai!” I yelled finally, the name leaving my mouth with more certainty than I expected. “Now! ”
It took hours. Or maybe it didn’t. Time had stopped making sense somewhere in the middle of my third rant about the food—if you could even call it that. The food that they had been sliding into the room like I was some kind of animal.
I hadn’t eaten most of it. Partially out of principle. Partially because it looked disgusting. Mostly because if I was going to be kidnapped, I at least deserved decent meals.
I was lying back on the bed when I heard it. A click. Loud enough in the silence to snap my attention toward the door immediately, my body going still as I pushed myself upright.
Light spilled into the room as the door opened, slicing through the darkness so sharply it made my eyes water, my hand coming up instinctively to shield them as I squinted.
A figure stepped inside. Tall. Broad shoulders. Movement smooth and controlled in a way that felt intentional rather than casual. The door shut behind him with a quiet finality that sent something strange down my spine.
My vision adjusted all the way and I saw him. Once he was fully in view, I paused. Because he wasn’t what I expected. Not a guard. Not faceless. Not forgettable. He was… handsome.
Every part of him felt chosen. From the way his dark hair was slicked back, one piece falling loose like it refused to be controlled, to the tattoos that stretched across his skin, creeping up his neck, disappearing beneath his shirt like they had stories of their own to tell.
There was something about him that didn’t ask for attention.
It demanded it. And the worst part? He knew it.
Our eyes met. And there it was. That darkness. Carefully contained like he carried it on purpose.
I pushed myself fully to my feet, brushing my hands down my clothes as I squared my shoulders, lifting my chin just slightly as I met his gaze head-on.
“Well,” I said, my voice cool, unimpressed despite the way my pulse had picked up just a little. “It’s about time someone with a personality showed up.”
He didn’t respond. Didn’t move. Just watched me. And something about that, about the way he didn’t rush to fill the silence, didn’t react the way people usually did around me, made irritation spark again.
“Oh, good,” I continued, gesturing vaguely toward him. “You’re another one of the quiet types. Is that like a requirement here? Or do you all just lack basic social skills?”
His head tilted slightly. Like he was studying me. Then—
“I’m giving you a moment,” he said, his voice low, smooth, edged with something dangerously close to amusement, “to get whatever this is out of your system.”
I blinked. Once. Then slowly smiled .
“Oh, you think this is a moment?” I asked sweetly, taking a step closer. “That’s adorable. No, this is just the beginning .”
I closed the distance between us without hesitation, stopping just shy of him, close enough to study the details most people would miss; the faint tension in his jaw, the way his shoulders remained loose despite the space I’d invaded, the quiet stillness in him that didn’t feel passive so much as intentional.
It wasn’t submission. It wasn’t uncertainty.
It was control, the kind that didn’t need to prove itself because it already knew exactly what it was capable of.
And that, more than anything, irritated me.
“Since you’ve finally decided to grace me with your presence,” I said, folding my arms as I tilted my head slightly, my tone purposely annoying, “we’re going to go ahead and fix a few things.”
He didn’t respond. Of course he didn’t. I let out a quiet, disbelieving laugh, dragging a hand through my hair before immediately regretting it when my fingers snagged again, my nose wrinkling in disgust.
“First of all,” I continued, holding up a finger as if I were explaining something painfully obvious, “this situation? Horrible. Truly terrible execution. If you’re going to kidnap someone, at least make it comfortable.
I haven’t had a shower, my clothes are a disaster, and whatever that food is supposed to be—” I paused, glancing toward the untouched tray near the door before looking back at him with narrowed eyes.
“Actually, I don’t even want to know. It’s offensive. ”
Still nothing. Not even a flicker. I studied him for a second longer, searching for any kind of reaction, any sign that what I was saying was landing somewhere, but he remained exactly the same—still, quiet, watching.
It made something tight coil low in my chest, not quite anger, not quite unease, but something close enough to both that I didn’t like it.
“So here’s what’s going to happen,” I said, pushing past that feeling before it could settle.
“You’re going to get me clean clothes. Something decent, not whatever…
situation this is.” I gestured vaguely to myself.
“You’re going to let me shower—an actual shower, not whatever medieval setup you probably have hidden somewhere—and then you’re going to tell me where I am and why I’m here, because I’m not in the mood for games. ”
His gaze didn’t leave mine. Not once. Then, slowly, his mouth curved. Not into anything warm. Not into anything friendly. Just enough to make it clear he found something about this—about me—amusing.
“Are you finished?” he asked, his voice low, smooth, carrying that same quiet edge it had before, like every word was placed exactly where he wanted it.
I blinked. Then narrowed my eyes.
“Oh, I can keep going,” I shot back immediately, lifting my chin a fraction higher. “Don’t tempt me. I have a lot of opinions, and I’m more than willing to share all of them. ”
Something shifted in his expression then, subtle but noticeable, like he was recalculating something, adjusting to the fact that I wasn’t going to fold the way most people probably did under his stare. Good.
“Emerald Deveraux,” he said instead, not a question, not even really an introduction—just a statement, like he already knew exactly who I was.
I froze for half a second internally, my mind catching on the way he said my name like it belonged here, like I wasn’t some random person who had been dragged into the wrong place at the wrong time. I didn’t like that.
“Congratulations,” I replied, recovering quickly, my tone light but edged. “You know my name. That doesn’t answer any of my questions.”
His head tilted slightly again, his gaze sharpening just enough to make it feel like he was looking past the surface, like he was trying to see something underneath it.
“Nikolai Voss,” he said.
The name landed differently. For a split second, something almost like excitement flickered through me, cutting through the irritation, the confusion, everything else.
“Voss?” I repeated, my brows lifting slightly as I let out a short breath that almost sounded like a laugh. “As in that Voss?” His expression didn’t change, but something in the room did .
“Well,” I continued, pushing forward before the moment could shift into something else, something I didn’t fully understand yet. “This is… unexpected.”
That was one way to put it. Because the truth was, I had heard the name.
Of course I had. It wasn’t exactly avoidable.
But hearing something and knowing something were two very different things, and in the Deveraux house, the Voss name wasn’t something that came with explanations.
It came with silence. With tension. With conversations that stopped the second I walked into the room.
Which, in hindsight, was incredibly rude.
“So,” I said, shifting my weight as I studied him more openly now, curiosity threading its way into my tone whether I liked it or not. “You’re just… here? In your creepy, poorly designed kidnapping setup?”
“Something like that.”
I rolled my eyes, exhaling sharply.
“You’re really not big on details, are you?” I muttered. “That’s going to be a problem for you, because I am.”
He didn’t rise to it. Didn’t react the way I expected.
Instead, he moved. One slow step closer, closing the already small distance between us until I had to tilt my head to maintain eye contact, his presence pressing into the space in a way that should have felt overwhelming.
But it didn’t. Not in the way it probably did for other people.
If anything, it made something in me straighten, sharpen, like I refused to be the one to give ground .
Then there was the smell of him. Which honestly felt unfair.
Dark cologne, clean skin, something smoky underneath it that made him smell expensive, dangerous, and entirely too good for a man who was currently pissing me off.
It hit me the second he stepped closer, wrapping around me in a way that should’ve been illegal, and for one embarrassing half second my brain completely lost the plot.
Seriously. Who gave this man permission to smell like that?
I caught myself just as fast, mentally slapping some sense back into my own head before he could notice the microscopic lapse in judgment. My chin lifted another inch, expression staying perfectly unimpressed even while my nervous system was out here betraying me like it had a death wish.
“How much do you know?” he asked.
The question caught me off guard; not because of the words themselves, but because of the shift in his tone. I shrugged, brushing it off even as something unsettled flickered beneath the surface.
“Not much,” I said. “It’s not exactly a bedtime story in my house.”
His gaze didn’t waver. Didn’t soften. Although something in it changed. He began talking as if telling a story. Every word felt deliberate, measured, like he was choosing exactly how to tell the story rather than just telling it .
He spoke about Lucien. About Cecilia. About the past in a way that didn’t feel like a story so much as something sharper, something darker, something that had been twisted over time until it barely resembled whatever it started as.
I listened. At first, with interest. Then with a faint edge of impatience. Because parts of it weren’t new. Parts of it I had heard before, in fragments, in passing comments that weren’t meant for me but had been impossible to ignore.
So, when he got to the part about my father, about how things had ended, I exhaled sharply and lifted a hand.
“Yeah, I know that part,” I said, cutting him off. “You’re not exactly telling me anything groundbreaking here.” I threw my hands up and wiggled my fingers just to be a tad dramatic.
He went still. Like something in him had paused, recalculated, but he continued. This time, the words felt heavier. Darker.
He talked about the feud, about years of something that went deeper than I had ever been told, something that stretched beyond simple disagreements into something that felt personal in a way I didn’t fully understand.
And then—
“Roman killed Lucien two nights ago.”
The world didn’t shatter. It didn’t tilt or spin or collapse into chaos the way it probably should have.
The space between us suddenly felt too small, too quiet, the words hanging there like they didn’t belong in the same reality as everything else.
I blinked. Unable to inhale the air that was quickly leaving the room.
“That’s not funny,” I said, though my voice didn’t carry the bite it had before. He didn’t smile. Didn’t take it back. Didn’t soften it.
“He wouldn’t do that,” I added, the words coming out more automatically than confidently, like I was saying them because I needed them to be true rather than because I believed they were. “Roman isn’t—”
I stopped. Because suddenly, I didn’t know how to finish that sentence. Nikolai’s gaze held mine, steady, unyielding. A small flicker in his eyes.
“Isn’t what?” he asked.
I opened my mouth. Closed it again, because every answer I tried to land on slipped just out of reach. My mind racing for explanations I couldn’t put into words, so, I didn’t. I straightened, lifting my chin again, forcing control back into my posture, into my voice, into the space I occupied.
“I’m not staying in this room,” I said, redirecting sharply, because that was easier, safer, something I could control. “If I’m here, I’m not doing it locked in the dark like this.”
His gaze lingered on me for a moment longer, like he could see exactly what I had just done, what I had avoided, but he didn’t call it out .
Instead, he asked, “Where would you go?”
The question should have been simple. However, the truth was…I didn’t know. The uncertainty flickered through me, uncomfortable and unfamiliar. I pushed past it quickly, refusing to let it settle.
“I want to see it,” I said instead, my voice steady again. “Whatever this is. I’m done being kept in the dark. I want the truth, and I’m not getting that sitting in here.”
Something in his expression shifted again. After a pause that stretched just long enough to make me wonder if he would refuse—
“Fine,” he said. The word was simple. “You can roam the house.”
Relief flickered through me, but I didn’t let it show fully, didn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing just how much that mattered. Instead, I rolled my eyes lightly, brushing past him as I moved toward the door.
“Took you long enough,” I muttered.
As I stepped into the light for the first time, as the world beyond that room opened, I couldn’t ignore the quiet, unsettling realization settling beneath everything else.
I wasn’t just annoyed; I was starting to wonder what exactly I had been dropped into.
And why it felt like I had been living in the dark long before that room ever closed in around me.