Chapter 15 - Eve
The television plays quietly in the background as I sit curled on Nathan's sofa—my sofa now, I suppose, since this is apparently home. The morning news anchor's voice is professional and detached as she delivers the day's tragedies with the same inflection she used for the weather.
"—severe injuries sustained in what police are calling a single-vehicle accident. Bryce Royston, a prominent figure in the fashion industry, remains in critical condition. Doctors say he may never walk again—"
The coffee cup freezes halfway to my lips.
Bryce's face fills the screen—a professional photo from some gala, his smile wide and false. Then the footage switches to the accident scene. Twisted metal. Shattered glass. Emergency vehicles with their lights painting the darkness red and blue.
"The brake line appears to have failed completely," a police spokesperson explains to the camera. "We're investigating whether this was a mechanical failure or possible tampering—"
I set the coffee down carefully, my hands perfectly steady even though my heart is racing. I should feel something—shock, horror, maybe even a dark satisfaction after everything Bryce did to me. But all I feel is a cold, heavy certainty settling in my stomach like a stone.
This was Nathan.
Not a suspicion. Not a fear. A fact as solid as the marble floor beneath my feet.
The news moves on to other stories—a robbery, a political scandal, things that matter to people whose lives haven't been shattered and rebuilt by a man who destroys anyone who threatens his possessions.
I turn off the television and sit in the sudden silence, staring at the blank screen. Bryce's face is still there in my mind. Bryce, who harassed me. Who threatened me. Who cornered me at the spa.
Bryce, who will never walk again because Nathan decided he was a threat.
My stomach turns. This is real. This actually happened. Nathan did this.
A demonstration. A warning. A promise.
You're protected now, the message reads. But the protection feels like a threat of its own.
***
Lucy is waiting on a bench in Central Park, her usually perfect composure fractured by worry. She stands when she sees me approaching, and the relief on her face is quickly replaced by something harder.
"Eve." She doesn't move to hug me. "You've been avoiding my calls."
"I've been busy," I say, sitting down on the bench. The lie tastes bitter, and from the look on her face, she knows it.
"Busy." She sits beside me, but there's distance between us now—physical and otherwise. "With Nathan Hale. The man who somehow saved our company overnight. The man who now apparently owns it. The man you're living with."
Her voice gets sharper with each sentence, and I can hear the questions she's not asking. The fears.
"Lucy—"
"Did you know?" She turns to face me fully, and I see the hurt in her eyes. "Did you know he was going to swoop in like some white knight and take over everything? Is that why you disappeared for two days without telling anyone where you were?"
"It's not like that—"
"Then what is it like, Eve?" Her voice cracks, and it breaks something in me.
"Because from where I'm sitting, it looks like you made some kind of deal with a man none of us know, a man with enough power to destroy Fred Greyhound in forty-eight hours, a man who now controls your company and apparently you along with it. "
The accuracy of her assessment stings. I want to deny it, but how can I when it's true?
"He's not controlling me," I say, but the words sound hollow even to my own ears.
"No?" She pulls out her phone, scrolling quickly before turning the screen to face me. "Then explain this."
It's a news article. Bryce's accident. But Lucy scrolls down to a sidebar—a smaller story about Fred Greyhound's sudden fall from grace, the SEC investigation, the fraud charges.
"And then there's the textile supplier who mysteriously dropped you," she continues, her voice tight. "I did some digging. They got bought out by a holding company three weeks ago. Want to guess who owns that holding company?"
My blood runs cold. Of course she figured it out. Lucy is brilliant, and she knows me better than anyone.
"Eve, please." Her voice softens, and when I open my eyes, I see fear there. Real fear. Not for herself—for me. "Please tell me you see what this is. He's not saving you. He's isolating you. First, your business relationships, then your company, now you're living with him—"
"He's protecting me," I say quietly, hating how defensive I sound.
"From what? Threats he probably created himself?" She grabs my hand, and her grip is desperate. "This is textbook manipulator behavior. Create the crisis, then swoop in as the savior. Make you dependent on him so you can't leave."
"You don't understand—"
"Then help me understand!" Her eyes are bright with unshed tears, and it makes my chest ache. "Help me understand why my best friend is defending a man who's systematically destroyed her independence. Why you're choosing him over everyone who actually cares about you."
The question hangs between us. A street vendor calls out, offering hot dogs. A jogger passes by. The world continues, oblivious to the chasm opening between us.
Because I don't have a choice, I want to say.
Because he's taken every other option off the table.
Because my company is failing, my suppliers abandoned me, my reputation is in ruins, and he's the only one offering a lifeline.
Because I'm drowning and he's the only hand reaching down, even if that hand is the same one that pushed me under. Because if I hadn’t taken his offer, Lucy would have most probably been out of a job.
But I can't say any of that. Lucy wouldn't understand. How could she, when the choice between survival and freedom isn't really a choice at all? When saying no to Nathan means losing everything I've built, everything I am?
"I'm sorry," I whisper instead, my voice breaking. "I'm sorry I can't explain it in a way that makes sense. But I need you to trust that I know what I'm doing."
Even though I don't. Even though I'm just choosing the least terrible option from a menu of catastrophes he created.
But I can't say that either.
"Do you?" She searches my face, and I have to look away. "Because it doesn't look like it from here. It looks like you're drowning and calling it swimming."
I stand, pulling my hand from hers. The loss of contact feels like tearing. "I have to go."
"Eve—"
"I'm sorry, Lucy. I really am."
I walk away, leaving her on that bench, and the distance between us feels like miles instead of feet. My eyes burn with tears I won't let fall.
She doesn't understand. No one would. The prison Nathan built for me is lined with silk and safety, and I'm too tired to want my way out.
But losing Lucy—that hurts more than I expected.
***
Nathan is in his study when I return to the penthouse, his attention focused on whatever financial reports glow on his screen. He looks up when I enter, his expression shifting from concentration to something warmer.
"How was your meeting with Lucy?" he asks casually, as if he didn't know exactly where I was and what we discussed.
The question ignites something hot and reckless in my chest.
"Bryce is in the hospital," I say, my voice sharper than I intended. "The news says his brakes failed. That he might never walk again."
Nathan's expression doesn't change. He simply watches me, waiting.
"It was you," I continue, taking a step closer, anger and fear warring inside me. "You did that to him."
He stands slowly, moving around the desk with that predatory grace that makes my heart race for all the wrong reasons. "And if I did?"
The casual admission—the complete lack of remorse—should terrify me. It does terrify me. But beneath the fear is something darker, something that thrills at the power he wields so carelessly.
And that terrifies me even more.
"You could have killed him," I say, my voice shaking now.
"I could have." He stops directly in front of me, close enough that I have to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. "But I didn't. I showed mercy. He gets to live—in a wheelchair, with permanent reminders that there are consequences for threatening what's mine."
My breath catches. "I'm not—"
"Yes, you are." His hand shoots out, gripping my wrist and pulling me against him. "You are mine, Eve. You agreed to this. And part of being mine means I eliminate threats. Permanently if necessary."
He backs me up until I hit the wall, his body a cage around me. One hand braces beside my head, the other still holding my wrist in an iron grip.
"Bryce harassed you," he says, his voice dropping to that low, dangerous register that makes my skin prickle. "He cornered you at the spa. Followed you. Threatened you. Made you afraid."
His free hand cups my jaw, forcing me to hold his gaze.
"So I made sure he'll never be a threat again," he continues. "Just like I'll make sure anyone who even thinks about hurting you regrets it for the rest of their life. That's what protection means, Eve. Not asking permission. Not showing mercy to people who would show you none."
I should push him away. Should be horrified. Should run screaming from this man, who admits to violence like other men admit to buying flowers.
But my body is frozen, a traitorous heat pooling low in my stomach despite—or because of—the threat in his words.
"You're a monster," I whisper, and I mean it. He is. He absolutely is.
"Yes." His thumb strokes my cheek, gentle despite the steel in his grip. "But I'm your monster. And I will burn down the world for you. Do you understand?"
His proximity is suffocating. His scent—sandalwood and danger—fills my lungs. His body pressed against mine is all heat and power, and I hate that my pulse is racing with more than just fear.
I hate that some sick part of me wants this.
"I understand," I breathe, and I do. God help me, I do.