“Well, I do. My professor called it one of the city’s most persistent myths,” I say. “Disappearances. Sightings. Enough stories to keep people distracted.”
“That’s the point.”
The car slows near a side entrance, tucked out of view.
“My father bought it in the early two-thousands,” he adds. “It was falling apart. No one wanted it.”
Savage.
The name clicks into place before I can stop it. “Robert Stone,” I say quietly. “You’re his son.”
He glances at me then, sharp and assessing. “See, I told you that you were smarter than most. You catch on fast.”
My stomach tightens. Of course. The Stones don’t hide in the shadows. They hide in plain sight.
Ridge raises a brow. “What gave it away? How did you figure out I was a Stone?”
“When you said your father bought the mansion, I remembered my father talking about the sale and restoration. I was young, maybe four or five, but I remember hearing something about the Stones buying up this ghost house.”
I glance at him, piecing together fragments from a distant memory. “He talked about it like it was a statement. Buying something everyone else avoided and turning it into something untouchable.”
A faint smile crosses his face. “Close enough.”
I gesture toward the mansion as it looms closer behind the iron gates. Dark windows. Perfect sightlines. A place everyone knows, and no one really looks at.
“So which one are you?” I ask.
He studies me for a moment, long enough that I start to wonder if answering is a mistake. Then he says, “Ridge.”
The name lands hard, like a weight dropping straight into my chest.
Ridge Stone.
This isn’t a man who makes threats. This is the kind of man people plan around. The kind of name that gets spoken carefully, if at all. A cold thought slides into place, unwelcome and impossible to ignore.
If the Stones decide I’m inconvenient, the system won’t notice when I stop being a priority.
“Nice to finally have one,” I say, because silence feels more dangerous than sarcasm.
His mouth quirks, barely. “The cabin was compromised. This place isn’t. You’ll stay here until we’re finished.”
Until we’re finished. There’s no question in it or room for negotiation.
I look up at the house again, at the ironwork and theshadows waiting inside. A Stone property disguised by its own reputation.
“Guess I should be honored,” I say. “Not everyone gets confined in a city landmark.”
He opens the door and steps out, the night air rushing in.
“Let’s get you inside,” Ridge says, leading the way.
As I follow him toward the entrance, a chill creeps up my spine, and for the first time since he took me, I understand exactly how small my margin for error really is.
NINE
Ridge
Jacques St. Germain:A wealthy and mysterious man, hosted extravagant parties in his Royal Street home but was rumored never to eat, only drink wine. Legend says a woman escaped his home, claiming he attacked her and tried to drink her blood. When authorities searched the house, they allegedly found bottles of wine mixed with human blood, but St. Germain had vanished, fueling his vampire legend.
