Chapter 2 #2
He types without asking me what to say: *Got a last-minute consulting job.
Two weeks, out of state, good pay.* He shows me the screen, then hits send before I can second-guess the lie.
The message turns blue. Done. He powers the phone down with a decisive click and pockets it like he's pocketing the last piece of my independence.
"You'll get it back when the contract is complete."
The gates ahead swing open silently—iron and imposing against the night—and then the estate comes into view.
Glass and stone perched on a cliff, overlooking black water that catches moonlight.
Flood lights illuminate manicured grounds and walls that encircle everything like the beautiful cage they are.
Walls that keep the world out, or keep people in, depending on your perspective.
"This is where you live?" My voice comes out smaller than I intended.
"This is where *we* live. For the next two weeks." He watches me take in the fountain at the center of the circular drive, the marble steps, the entrance doors that belong in a museum. "My Boston residence."
*Home,* he'd said. The word feels wrong. This isn't a home. It's a fortress dressed in luxury and landscaping.
Vasily opens my door and Rafail is already there, offering his hand. I place my cold fingers in his warm palm.
"Welcome home, milaya."
***
The front door opens before we reach it. A woman with steel-gray hair and sharp eyes that assess me with practiced efficiency.
"Rina, this is Jana Spears. She'll be staying with us." His hand settles warm against the small of my back. "Jana, Rina runs this household. Anything you need, you ask her."
Rina extends her hand. Her grip is firm, and something in her expression softens—a flicker of genuine human warmth that makes my throat tight. The first I've encountered since walking into The Onyx Room.
"Your rooms are prepared," she tells Rafail. "Both of them."
*Both.* The word catches me like a hook. My own room. Some small piece of autonomy in this gilded cage.
"Thank you, Rina." She disappears down a hallway, shoes clicking sharp against marble, and leaves me alone with him in a foyer larger than my entire apartment.
"This way." His hand at the small of my back guides me toward a double staircase that curves upward like something from a film set.
We climb to the second floor. He leads me to the far end of the hall, to double doors he opens onto the master suite—his room.
Massive and masculine. Leather furniture, a king-sized bed, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the ocean where moonlight transforms black water into something almost beautiful.
Everything charcoal and cream and expensive and cold despite the wealth of it.
My feet stop just inside the threshold. My body knows before my brain does.
"What's that?" I point at a second door.
"Your room." He crosses and opens it, revealing softer tones—creams and pale grays, rose gold accents, warmer than his cold domain. "We share a connecting door."
Cold understanding settles in my stomach. "You said I'd have my own space."
"You do. Your own room, your own bathroom, your own bed." He leans against the doorframe—dark figure blocking the passage between light and shadow. "But no locked doors between us."
"That's not privacy—"
"That's practicality." He gestures for me to enter. "Come. Look around."
I follow into my room. White linens. A sitting area facing windows that mirror his view of the ocean.
An ensuite beyond another door. The closet is already filled with basics in my size—jeans, sweaters, a few dresses.
The realization that he was preparing for me before I agreed makes my skin crawl and something else I refuse to name.
"It's lovely," I admit, moving to the window. The moon paints silver across the black water, gentler than the harsh lights outside.
He comes up behind me. Close enough that his heat reaches my back. "When that connecting door is closed, you have your privacy."
I turn to face him and we're suddenly too close, the space between us charged.
"And when it's open?"
"When it's open, you're mine."
A knock interrupts us. Rina enters with a tray—soup, bread, tea—sets it on the small table, and departs through the connecting door. Her path a deliberate reminder: to get anywhere in this house, I pass through his territory first.
"Eat." He gestures to the steaming bowl. "You need your strength."
I stay by the window, arms crossed. "I'm not hungry."
"That's a lie." He crosses his own arms. "You haven't eaten since this morning."
My stomach betrays me immediately, a low growl I can't suppress. I lower myself into the chair and pick up the spoon.
"The rules are simple," he begins. "You don't leave the property without my permission and my escort." He lets that settle. "You don't lie to me. When I give you an instruction, you follow it." A pause. "And the connecting door stays unlocked. Always."
I keep my eyes on the soup. "And if I don't follow the rules?"
"Then I find you. Bring you back." Calm. Factual. "And I punish you."
My throat works, dry and tight.
When the bowl is empty he stands. "One more thing. The most important." I go still. "You sleep with that door unlocked. Every night."
"Why?"
"Because if something happens, I need to reach you." He takes a step into my room. "That's not a threat, Jana. It's how I keep you safe."
"I want one space that's mine." The tremor in my voice surprises me. "One door I can close and know you won't come through uninvited."
"Then close it." He gestures to the connecting door. "Close it right now. I won't come through it tonight unless you invite me." His eyes hold mine. "But it stays unlocked. That's the rule."
"And tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow we'll see how well you've learned." He's close enough to touch now, but he doesn't. Just stands there, giving me a choice that isn't really a choice. "Tonight, you get to settle in. Sleep in your own bed with that door closed and know that I'm keeping my word."
"Your word." A sharp exhale, not quite a laugh. "The word of a man who buys women."
Something shifts in his expression—a flicker of something real before it hardens again.
"I didn't buy you, milaya. You sold yourself." He lets that land. "And I paid far more than you asked because I wanted you to understand your value." He leans in, voice dropping low. "To me, you're worth everything I promised and more."
I'm backed against the window now, nowhere left to go. My pulse hammers visible in my throat.
“Close your door, Jana. Sleep in your sanctuary. See if it makes you feel safer knowing I’m on the other side, leaving you that illusion.”
He heads for the connecting door.
"Wait."
The word escapes before I can think better of it. He turns back slowly, and I can see the interest sharpening in his eyes.
I'm still pressed against the window, hands gripping the sill behind me, my heart pounding hard enough that I'm sure he can see it. "You didn't answer my question. What happens if I lock it anyway?"
He crosses the room in three strides.
The air locks in my throat as he cages me against the window—arms braced on either side of my head, body close enough that his heat reaches me but not quite touching.
"I break it down." Soft. Dangerous.
"That's—"
His mouth covers mine.
It isn't seduction. It's a warning—hard and brief and absolute, his lips pressing mine shut before I can finish the protest. I make a startled sound against him.
My hands come up against his chest. He doesn't move.
Just holds the kiss long enough for my body to register what's happening, long enough for heat to rush up my spine before my brain can intercept it.
Then he pulls back.
He's breathing harder than he was. So am I.
"That," he says, "is what happens when you push me."
He steps back once. Twice. Puts distance between us that his body clearly doesn't want. My lips are still burning. My hands are still raised where I'd tried to push him away and forgot to keep pushing.
"I gave you my word that tonight you'd have space." His voice is rough at the edges. "I keep my promises."
He turns toward the connecting door, every line of him taut with restraint.
"Sleep well, milaya." He doesn't look back. "Tomorrow, we begin."
He walks through the doorway and closes it behind him.
I stand there, fingers drifting to my lips, listening.
He doesn't lock it.
And somehow that's more frightening than if he had.