Chapter Twenty-Four: The Golden Ransom (Pt 2)

Dominic pushes the heavy doors open, and the lights comes to life, revealing a space that is less of a bedroom and more of a private sanctuary of excess.

Rhea stumbles slightly as he leads her inside. The room is vast, dominated by a king-sized bed draped in charcoal silk, but it is the perimeter that stops her heart. To the left, a walk-in closet the size of her entire old apartment stands open.

Rows of designer dresses - Hermès, Chanel, Dior - hang like silent sentinels, arranged by color from softest cream to the deepest black. Below them, hundreds of pairs of shoes glitter under individual spotlights. 

On the marble center island, gold-lined drawers are partially open, revealing watches that cost more than her father’s surgery and necklaces dripping with diamonds that catch the light, throwing fractured rainbows across the ceiling.

Dominic steps toward a sleek glass console and picks up a heavy, leather-bound key fob. He drops it into her palm, the weight of it forcing her hand down.

"A customized Aston Martin is in the private bay downstairs," he says, his voice flat, as if he is reading a grocery list. 

"The title is already in your name. There is a black Centurion card in that wallet on the vanity."

Rhea stares at the keys, her vision blurring. "I can't drive an Aston Martin to the office, Mr. Ashcroft. I don’t want to wear a ten-carat diamond. This... this isn't the life I want."

"It is your life now," he hisses, stepping into her space. He reaches out, his thumb tracing the line of her lower lip. "Everything money can buy for a lady is within these four walls. You wanted money right, isn’t that why you signed the contract? Now, you have everything."

"Except my freedom," she whispers, her voice a broken thread.

Dominic’s expression darkens, his obsession flaring in his eyes. He doesn't want to hear about her freedom. She doesn’t get to leave like everyone in his life. He wants to hear her thank him. He wants her to crumble under the weight of his generosity.

He grabs her jaw, his fingers firm but not bruising, and bends his head. His kiss is an explosion - a violent, desperate claim that tastes of bourbon and possessiveness. Rhea gasps into his mouth, her hands clutching his lapels as the world spins. She hates him, but her body betrays her, her pulse leaping to meet his rhythm.

With a low growl, Dominic hoists her up. Rhea wraps her legs around his waist instinctively as he carries her the short distance to the bed. He lays her back against the charcoal silk, his large body following her down, pinning her into the mattress.

His hands are frantic now, tearing at his shirt button, sliding the silk of her robe off her shoulders. He buries his face in her neck, his breath hot and jagged. "Tell me you're mine," he gasps against her skin. "Tell me all of this is enough to make you stay."

Rhea looks past his shoulder, her eyes landing on the open closet - on the thousands of dollars of silk and gold that look like bars of a cage in the dim light. 

A sob escapes her. "I don’t want all this, I want my freedom Mr. Ashcroft."

Dominic freezes.

The heat in the room evaporates in a heartbeat. He lifts his head, his eyes searching hers. He sees the tears, but more than that, he sees the hollow emptiness. 

She isn't looking at him with love; she is looking at him with the vacant stare of a prisoner who has accepted her fate.

He stiffens, his muscles locking. The Monster in him wants to take her anyway, to force her to feel him until she forgets her own name. 

But the part of him that is obsessed with her - the part that wants to truly own her - cannot stomach the sight of her surrender being so... cold.

He shoves himself off her, standing up abruptly. He jerks his shirt back into place, his hands trembling with suppressed rage and a rejection he wasn't prepared for.

"Get dressed," he snaps, his voice a jagged edge of ice. "Not in that robe. Pick something from the racks. If you're going to be a prisoner, you should look like one who is well taken care of."

"Mr Ashcroft—"

"I said get dressed!" he roars, turning his back on her. He walks to the window, staring out at the city skyline, his silhouette imposing and solitary. "I won't claim a woman who looks at me like a ghost. You have thirty minutes. If you aren't at the dining table, draped in the things I bought for you, I will call the hospital and have your father moved to the public ward."

He strides out of the room, the heavy doors slamming behind him, leaving Rhea alone in a sea of silk, gold, and the deafening silence of her own worth.