I stumble, catch myself. Gravel gives to wood beneath my boots, and he pauses. A key scrapes in a lock. A latch throws. The door swings.
“Please…”
Heat rolls out and touches my frozen cheeks, laced with something—antiseptic? No. Concrete and paint, the raw scent of a place not yet lived in.
The step up is higher than I expect. My boot snags the threshold and I lurch forward. His hand tightens on my arm and steadies me before I pitch onto my face.
“Careful.” One word. Neither warning nor kindness.
Inside, the heat is immediate, seamless—no draft, no delay, and the door thumps shut somewhere behind me. The silence is instant, too perfect to be natural, like it’s engineered. Weighted like stone.
He doesn’t speak as he pulls me farther in. His boots strike the floor with a dead sound, the kind that swallows noise instead of making it.
“Please,” I say again and flinch at the way it sounds. I hate begging. I hate it more because it rises out of me so easily. “Whatever you think I did, I didn’t.”
He doesn’t answer, and that only forces more panic into my pulse.
My teeth clatter with the violence of my shiver, and my knees buckle, boneless, adrenaline burning out into freefall. “Please don’t hurt me.”
There’s this sound he makes, almost like a growl, but isn’t. Like my plea offended him somehow.
He steadies me with a hand at the small of my back and leaves heat there, but it doesn’t stop me from shaking.
“Where are you taking me?”
More agonizing silence.
The fibers binding my wrists slice deeper with every small movement. My head’s jerking from left to right, the darkness soaking my tears as I try to stay calm even though every breath takes heart-stopping effort.
He turns me, and the backs of my knees hit something, forcing me down. I collapse onto what feels like a mattress—a bed—and I shudder at the implications. The blindfold cuts out the world so completely that my other senses feel loud, absurdly vivid. The scrape of his shoes, the soft thud of a bag being set down, the whisper of fabric when he moves.
“Please,” I say, softer. “I can’t—” I tilt my face toward him though I can’t see. “I can’t breathe with this on.”
There’s a beat of silence, and I can feel his gaze like pressure. Surprisingly, fingers touch the blindfold, brushing my hair away, and loosen it. He doesn’t rush. He doesn’t fumble. He tugs once, and then another when the fabric loosens and the blindfold is gone, snatched away, leaving me lightheaded, the world too bright, too sudden.
The room swims into focus in sharp planes. Glass walls swallowed by night and framed in steel, snow pressed against the panes like a living mural. A fireplace, unlit, cut into blackstone, and beside it, a single birch log arrangement leans artfully against the wall—decorative, not meant to burn.
My eyes find him last.
He stands a few feet away, a shadow carved out of the dim. The hood is up, draping his head in black, a soft shroud that swallows light. A buff stretches across the lower half of his face, hiding his mouth, leaving only his eyes visible—blue and burning, sharp enough to cut through the gloom. He’s tall, yes, but it’s more than height. It’s the way space bends around him, as if the room tilts slightly to make room for him.
The hoodie is layered under a black leather jacket, shoulders broad enough to strain the seams. Long legs under black denim are planted firmly, weight distributed with the ease of someone trained to fight. Nothing about him is accidental—every line of him is measured, controlled, built for violence. His hands are covered with black gloves that he peels off one finger at a time with a patience that feels obscene.
He watches me take him in. Unhurried. Like he wants me to see exactly what I’m up against before he says a single word.
My mouth is dry, and I realize I’m shaking visibly, a fine tremor running through my arms and shoulders, my legs clamped together to keep them from bouncing. I’m aware suddenly of my clothes in a way that feels naked—sweater with stupid tiny wreaths, flannel pajama pants with candy canes that felt cute in my apartment and feel childish here.
He slides the gloves into his jacket pocket, then crouches and pulls a knife from an ankle sheath. The blade glints, and I flinch so hard the bed squeaks.
“No, no, no.” My voice quivers, tears prickling. “Please don’t hurt me.”
He doesn’t comment; he simply steps in close enough that I can smell the cold still clinging to him. Tears are running down my cheeks in panicked rivulets, my heart beating so fast, I’m sure I’ll pass out. Fear isn’t getting a flu shot or finding a spider in the shower. True fear? Debilitating, bloodcurdling fear? It’s this. Feeling every pulse in your veins, every breath in your lungs, and knowing, absolutely, you might not get another.
He takes my wrists in one hand, fingers surprisingly gentle as he angles the blade.
I brace.
“Don’t move.”
