To turn this marriage into something real, even if it destroys us both in the process.
Chapter Seven - Elara
Living in Nikola’s penthouse is like existing inside a beautiful clock—everything moves with precise, calculated rhythm, but I can never see the mechanism that drives it all.
My days have no natural beginning or end. There are no alarm clocks because I wake to the sound of Nikola’s shower running in the guest bathroom down the hall. No morning news because the information I’m allowed to consume is carefully curated, filtered through sources I don’t recognize. No schedule because my time belongs to someone else now, measured in increments of his availability and approval.
I learn to read the subtle signals that govern this place. The barely audible hum that means the security system is cycling through its hourly checks. The soft ding of the elevator that announces Nikola’s return from whatever business keeps him away for hours at a time. The careful cadence of conversations conducted in Russian behind closed doors—words I don’t understand but can feel in the tension that follows.
Every freedom I have is conditional. I can use the gym, but only during certain hours when additional security is posted. I can access the library, but the internet connection is restricted, filtered, monitored. I can cook in the kitchen, but the ingredients that appear in the refrigerator tell their own story: my favorite coffee, the specific brand of yogurt I prefer, berries from the organic market three blocks from my old apartment.
He knows things about me that I never told him. Small things. Intimate things. The way I take my tea, the books I read when I can’t sleep, the fact that I pace when I’m anxious and bite my lower lip when I’m concentrating. It should feel invasive, and it does.
It also feels like being seen in a way that’s both unsettling and oddly comforting.
The first argument happens on day three.
I’m standing at the floor-to-ceiling windows, watching people move through their lives forty stories below, when Nikola emerges from his office. He’s been on calls all morning—I can hear the rise and fall of his voice through the closed door, speaking in languages that sound like music and weapons combined.
“I want to go for a walk,” I announce without turning around.
“No.”
The response is immediate, calm, final. Like he’s commenting on the weather.
I face him, jaw tight. “I wasn’t asking permission.”
“Yes, you were. You just didn’t realize it.”
He moves to the kitchen island, pours coffee from a pot that’s always somehow fresh and perfectly brewed. His movements are economical, controlled, and I want to throw something at his perfectly composed face.
“I’ve been here three days without leaving this building. I need air, I need sunlight. I need to feel like a human being instead of an exotic pet.”
“You have air. There’s a terrace.” He gestures toward the sliding doors that lead to an outdoor space I haven’t explored yet. “Sunlight comes through the windows. You’re not a pet, you’re a protected asset.”
“Jesus Christ, listen to yourself.” My voice rises, echoing off the stark walls. “Do you hear how you talk about me? Like I’m a thing you own instead of a person with needs and agency and basic human rights.”
“Your agency is what got you cornered in a restaurant by human traffickers,” he replies, taking a measured sip of coffee. “Your needs are secondary to your survival. Your rights don’t extend to making decisions that could get you killed.”
The casual dismissal in his tone makes my teeth ache. I cross the room, stop just close enough to invade his space without touching. “You can’t keep me here forever, Nikola. This isn’t sustainable.”
“It’s sustainable as long as Marcus Hale is breathing.”
“Then kill him,” I snap. “You’re so good at solving problems with violence. So solve this one.”
Something flickers behind his eyes—surprise, maybe, or approval. “It’s not that simple.”
“Because you enjoy having me trapped here. Because controlling me gives you some kind of sick satisfaction.”
Now I’ve hit a nerve. His coffee cup hits the marble counter harder than necessary, and when he looks at me, there’s heat in those pale blue eyes that makes my pulse jump.
“If I wanted to control you for the pleasure of it, Elara, you’d know. Trust me on that.” His voice drops lower, rougher. “This isn’t about satisfaction. This is about keeping you alive long enough to neutralize a threat you’re too stubborn to take seriously.”
“I take it seriously, but I won’t disappear into your fortress and pretend the rest of the world doesn’t exist.” I lean closer, close enough to smell his cologne, to see the faint scar along his jawline. “I had a life, Nikola. A career, friends, obligations. People are going to notice if I just vanish.”
“Let them notice. Let them wonder. Let them write whatever stories they want about the scandalous model who married into the Bratva and disappeared.” He doesn’t backdown, doesn’t give me an inch. “Their curiosity isn’t worth your life.”
The argument continues in circles for twenty minutes, him implacable in his certainty, me increasingly frantic in my need for something resembling normalcy. We’re standing too close, voices carefully controlled but bodies radiating tension that has nothing to do with safety and everything to do with the space between us that neither of us will cross.
