로그인Clara thought marrying billionaire Victor Draven would save her family and give her peace. But peace doesn't exist inside the Draven mansion— In fact, it has never existed. Only secrets, temptations, and danger wrapped in luxury. And when his son returned home, things took a dark turn. His gaze burned, his words without filters, and his touch felt like sin wrapped in a handsome face. She shouldn't want him. But in a house built on lies, desire might be the deadliest secret of all.
더 보기Clara's POV
Dear Diary,
“I don't know why I'm writing this but maybe it's because if I don't, I'll explode. You think you've heard scandal? No, not like mine I was a wife… and this is how I got tangled in a sinful web with my husband's son.”
It started the night after our wedding our first family dinner. My hands wouldn't stop shaking as I sat my fork down. I told myself it was just nerves from being the new wife. But when he walked in… tall, a little older than I expected, the air shifted like I wasn't supposed to breathe it.
The table stretched endlessly, my own reflection clear in the polished wood. I sat, fingers trembling in my lap as I rehearsed smiles and little jokes slipping from my mind.
Tonight was the night tonight, I met Nikolai. My new husband's only son.
Victor squeezed my hand under the table, his voice soft. “Relax, sweetheart. He'll love you.”
“You're sure?” My heart pounded.
“Yeah… and you'll love him too. Although he's just a bit… Protective.”
Protective? Was this like his own way of saying difficult? Still, I smiled. I badly wanted his son's acceptance.
The door opened, followed by footsteps.
I looked up.
Nikolai. Tall, broad shoulders. His face carried the same strong jawline as his father, but sharper, younger and cold. His suit jacket draped carelessly over his arm. He didn't look like who just came from the airport, he looked like he owned the whole place already.
He didn't smile when Victor stood proudly. “Son,” Victor said, lifting his arms. “Welcome home.”
They hugged briefly, Nikolai's eyes already drifting past him… to me.
“This is Clara,” Victor introduced, his voice laced with pride. “My wife.”
Nikolai's gaze traveled over me slowly he stopped at my face. Silence followed for a moment, then:
“Wife?” his mouth curled, but it wasn't a smile. “She looks closer to my age than yours, Dad.”
The air was tense and my chest tightened.
Victor chuckled nervously. “You've always had a sharp tongue.”
I forced a smile, my voice softer than I wanted. “It's nice to finally meet you, Nikolai.”
He sat across from me, pulling his chair back with a drag. “Sure.”
The butler poured wine, steaming plates were placed before us and I reached for my glass to steady my hand.
Victor tried to lighten the air. “Clara's been looking forward to meeting you. She's been asking about you since even before the wedding.”
Nikolai cut his steak, the knife grinding harshly. “Oh, I'm sure she has. Every gold digger wants to know what kind of stepson she's inheriting.”
The words hit me like a slap.
My throat closed. “That's not—”
“Nikolai,” Victor warned lightly, “enough.”
But he kept going, stabbing a piece of meat with his fork. “Tell me, Clara. What was it? His company shares? The penthouse? Or maybe the yatch?”
My fork clattered against the plate. I bent my head, heat burning my cheeks. “I married him because I love him.”
He scoffed. “Right. You fell head over heels for the man who could be your father. That's the kind of fairytale they don't publish.”
Victor sighed, sipping his wine. “Ignore him, Clara. He'll come around.”
But Nikolai's eyes didn't stop, they locked on me, sharp and unyielding. “You'll forgive me if I don't toast to the happy couple. Some of us actually loved my mother.”
The words hit deeper than I expected with my chest squeezing and guilt clawing at my ribs.
Silence fell, forks clicked. Although my appetite was gone, I forced myself to eat each bite turning to ash in my mouth.
Victor changed the subject to business, stocks, politics things I barely understood. Nikolai answered curtly, but every so often, his gaze slid back to me. Watching. Measuring. Judging.
When the plates were cleared, Victor leaned back, satisfied. “See? That wasn't so bad, was it?”
I shook my head but felt Nikolai's stare burning into me, cold and merciless, and I knew this wasn't the end. It was the beginning of a war.
✷✷✷✷✷✷
Hours later, the house had gone quiet and Victor was fast asleep, snoring peacefully. But somehow, I just couldn't fall asleep I felt suffocated. So I decided to go outside, maybe to the pool… I want fresh air.
As I stepped closer, I found him by the pool. Nikolai. Shirt half buttoned, laptop opened, and a glass of whiskey sweating beside him. He didn't look up but from the sudden change of air, I could tell he noticed me.
I shouldn't have said anything. I should've just stayed quiet but I wanted to speak to him I knew he had something against me and I only wanted him to know I meant no harm. Not to him. Not to his father.
I cleared my throat softly. “Nikolai… Can we talk?”
His eyes flicked up, cold and unreadable. “About what? How I hurt your feelings at dinner?”
“I just…” My voice faltered. “I wanted to clear the air. I'm not here for your father's money.”
He gave a wicked laugh as he leaned back in his chair. “Of course you're not. Women like you always marry old men for love.”
“That's not true,” I said firmly. “I care about him.”
He shut his laptop almost immediately, the sound snapping through the night made me flinch. When he stood, the shift in his body felt like a storm rolling in. His height swallowed the space between us as he walked forward.
I stepped back, my spine brushing the old wall of the patio. “Nikolai, I know you don't like me, but—”
“Don't like you?” His laugh was sharp, butter. He leaned closer, his breath warm against my cheek. “You've got some nerve.”
Confusion knotted in my chest. “What do you mean?”
His eyes burned, darker than the pool water glimmering behind him. “Two years. That's how long I wasted on you. Two fucking years. And one day you just disappeared like I never mattered.”
My breath caught this wasn't something I was prepared to talk about. “Nikolai…”
“You left me broken,” he said through clenched teeth. “I searched all over for you and then I came home and found you here in my father's house. Wearing his ring.” His jaw flexed. “Tell me, Clara. Was this your plan all along?”
Tears stung my eyes. “No. It wasn't like that. I swear—”
“Save it,” he hissed. “You ran from me straight into his arms. And now you want my approval? You want me to believe you love him?”
He stepped even closer, pinning me against the wall with nothing but the weight of his presence. My heart pounded, my hands shook at my sides.
“Nikolai, I didn't mean to hurt you…”
His smirk cut me like a blade. “Then prove it.”
“What?”
And just like that, I became my ex-boyfriend’s stepmother and no, this shit didn't end, there's more.
Clara’s POV“Keep your head up, Clara, we are almost to the rocks!” Nikolai shouted, his voice hoarse as a massive wave crashed over our heads, burying us in a swirl of freezing white foam.“I cannot feel my legs anymore, Nikolai!” I screamed back, my teeth rattling so violently that the words barely made sense. My fingers were completely stiff, frozen solid around the rough plastic edge of the single orange life ring that had kept us afloat for hours. The biting cold of the open sea had long since numbed my limbs, leaving me with nothing but raw survival instinct to cling to the only thing keeping me above water.“I have the ground beneath my feet,” he called out, his powerful arms suddenly locking under my shoulders with a desperate, heavy grip. “I have you. Just let go of the ring.”With one final, desperate surge of energy, he dragged my freezing body out of the crashing surf and onto the sharp, jagged rocks of a completely deserted shoreline. I collapsed onto the wet stones, gasp
Clara’s POV“Did you get the override codes?” I shouted over the deafening mechanical horn that suddenly started screaming from the lower decks.The heavy metal door burst open, and Nikolai came running back up to the main deck. My chest tightened in instant horror when I saw he wasn't alone. He was dragging Victor by the collar of his ruined jacket. Victor’s face was completely white from blood loss, his hand clutching a fresh, bleeding bullet wound in his right shoulder. Blood dripped heavily onto the polished teak wood floorboards, leaving a gruesome trail behind them.“There are no codes, Clara!” Nikolai yelled back, his chest heaving violently as he hauled his father toward the stern of the luxury yacht. “The entire core tracking system is locked from the main grid. We have to move right now!”“You think you can outrun them in a plastic dinghy, boy?” Victor sneered, coughing up a spray of dark crimson as Nikolai threw him roughly against the side rail. Even with a bullet in his s
Nikolai’s POV“We have less than twenty minutes before they breach this perimeter and execute us both,” I said, my voice cutting through the sharp, rhythmic tracking blips of the radar console.Clara grabbed my arm, her fingers digging through the coarse fabric of my shirt. “You cannot go back down there, Nikolai. He wants you to come to him.”“If I do not get the master control sequence from him right now, that cutter vessel will blow us out of the water anyway,” I told her, gently but firmly removing her hands from my wrist. “Stay in the wheelhouse. Lock the cabin door behind me and do not open it unless you hear my voice.”I didn't wait for her argument. I turned on my heel and moved down the narrow companionway stairs, the heavy automatic pistol steady in my right hand. The constant, low thrumming of the twin diesel engines vibrated violently through the steel soles of my boots. The air down in the lower corridor felt incredibly thick, reeking of fuel, salt water, and cold iron.I
Clara’s POV“Don't touch that lever, Nikolai, please!” I cried out, my hands trembling as I grabbed his massive arm to pull him back from the glowing navigation console.“He is running us straight out into the deep sea, Clara,” Nikolai growled, his knuckles turning entirely white as he stared down at the cluster of exposed wires beneath the metal casing. “If I do not disconnect the primary autopilot relay right now, we cross the international border line in less than half an hour.”“But you heard what he said through the ventilation system,” I reminded him, my voice shaking as I stepped closer to him in the cramped bridge cabin. “The entire console grid is rigged. If you try to force a manual turn back to the city harbor, the whole engine room block detonates instantly. He wants you to pull that lever. It is a trap.”Nikolai let out a sharp, frustrated breath, his shoulders dropping slightly as he pulled his hand away from the open panel. He looked down at the complex wiring, then out
POV: CLARAVictor stood in the driveway, his hands moving over every inch of the new vintage car he had bought that morning. “This thing is perfect,” he said. “Nikolai, you and Clara take it for a full test drive to the valley and back. I have a conference call starting in five minutes and I need t
POV: ClaraThe greenhouse smelled of damp earth and rot, a heavy scent that stuck to the back of my throat. It was supposed to be a sanctuary, a glass-walled escape from the marble and steel of the mansion, but even here the air felt thin.I found my mother sitting on a stone bench, her hands folde
Clara's POVThe black SUV pulled up the circular driveway, and my stomach performed a slow, agonizing flip. My parents stepped out, looking so small against the backdrop of the Draven estate.My mother looked even more slender than the last time I had seen her, her kind face was etched with that pe
POV: Nikolai The beach at six in the morning was grey and flat, the tide pulling back from the sand in long, slow sheets.Victor walked ahead, hands behind his back, talking. Quinn kept pace beside him, nodding at the right intervals. I walked a half step behind them both, which was where Victor p






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