Tonight.The word hit me like a physical blow.“I thought… I assumed I’d have time to…”
“To what?Change your mind?”That predatory smile again.“The terms are clear.You’re mine for one year, starting now.”He checked his watch, a casual gesture that somehow made everything more real.“My driver will collect you at eight o’clock.Pack what you need for the week.Clothes, toiletries, any personal items you require.The rest can be retrieved later.”
“I’m… I’m living with you?”
“You’ll have your own room.For now.”The way he said those last two words made my skin prickle.“You’ll have access to the common areas of the residence and staff who will attend to your needs during the day.But every night, Lena…” He paused, letting the silence stretch.“Every night, you come to me.”
I swallowed hard.My mouth had gone dry, my tongue thick and useless.“And what… what will you want me to do?”
He stood, coming around the desk until he was standing over me.Close enough that his scent surrounded me, that heat radiating off his body made me want to lean closer and pull away at the same time.Close enough that I had to tilt my head back to look at him.
“Whatever I tell you,” he said softly.“That’s what you agreed to.That’s what you signed.”
I looked up at him, this man who now owned me in every way that mattered.The afternoon light caught the strange ring of gold around his pupils, making his eyes look almost inhuman.His face was hard, unreadable, but something in his gaze made my breath catch.
“I’ll be ready at eight,” I said.
“Good.”He stepped back, the moment broken.“My assistant will show you out.I have business to attend to before tonight.”
I was being dismissed.I stood on legs gone weak and made my way to the door.My hand was on the handle when his voice stopped me.
“Lena.”
I turned.
He was watching me with an expression I couldn’t read.For just a moment, something almost like doubt crossed his features.A crack in that controlled mask.Then it was gone, replaced by cold certainty.
“Don’t be late.”
The elevator ride down felt longer than it had going up.The numbers ticked by on the display.Forty-seven.Forty-six.Forty-five.Each floor taking me further from what I’d done, closer to what came next.
I stared at my reflection in the polished metal doors.Same face.Same eyes.Same woman who had walked in twenty minutes ago.
But everything had changed.
I walked through the lobby and out into the afternoon sun.The brightness made me squint after the cool dimness of his office.The city bustled around me, people rushing to lunch meetings and coffee shops and all the normal activities of a Friday afternoon.A man argued into his phone about a shipment delay.A woman typed furiously on a laptop at the cafe across the street.Two teenagers skateboarded past, laughing at some joke I couldn’t hear.
None of them knew.None of them could see that the woman walking past them had just signed her life away.
Seven hours.That’s how long I had.Seven hours until his driver arrived.Seven hours until I walked out of my old life and into whatever waited for me at Raphael Antonov’s residence.
My car was where I’d left it, baking in the parking lot sun.I sat behind the wheel and gripped it with both hands, staring straight ahead at nothing.The engine ticked as it cooled.The leather seat was hot against my back.
I didn’t know what he would do to me tonight.I didn’t know what “whatever I tell you” meant, what “I won’t be gentle” looked like in practice.I didn’t know if I was strong enough to survive a year of belonging to a man who looked at me like I was prey.
But I knew one thing: I would survive it.I had to.For the hotel.For the staff.For my father lying silent in his hospital bed, unable to save me or himself.
For Marjorie, who had helped raise me.For Michael, who was trying so hard to keep things running.For the housekeepers and the cooks and the maintenance workers who would lose their jobs if the hotel closed.All of them depending on me, even though they didn’t know it.
Some things were worth sacrificing everything for.
I thought about my mother’s jewelry, already sold.My father’s first editions, gone to collectors who would never love them the way he had.I’d given up so much already.What was one more thing?What was one more year?
I just hoped, when the year was over, there would be something left of me to salvage.
I started the car and drove toward home.Toward packing.Toward eight o’clock.
Toward him.
