Chapter 1

POV DEFNE

No one knows the battles that others have to deal with, so don't be too tough. You never know what a person can suffer in silence.

I, of course, was no exception.

As I arranged several folders on my desk, the simple rubbing of the fabric of my blouse against my ribs elicited a moan that I choked with a feigned cough.

Berat had hit me harder this time; The discovery of his infidelity did not make him feel guilty, on the contrary, he unleashed all his anger on me before leaving me on the street.

I looked at myself in the mirror I kept in the drawer. Life was very ironic. I was barely twenty-eight years old, and the sadness in my eyes sounded like that of a woman of seventy.

Daughter of professional swindlers, heiress of millionaire debts, and the prisoner of a man who had sworn to love me before turning my life into a fucking hell.

"Defne"

His voice broke the silence. He pulled me to my feet immediately, ignoring the pain in my side.

Mr. Adem Sahenk was at the door of my office. Tall, always impeccable in his suit and with that calm look, as if he did not own half of Turkey.

"Yes, Mr. Sahenk?" My voice sounded smaller than I wished.

He didn't move, his eyes swept over my face, stopping suddenly on my jaw. I cursed quietly, he had noticed that blow that I tried to cover with makeup.

"I need you to review these invoices." He asked, approaching. "You know that I trust your judgment more than that of my accounting department"

"I'll have it ready this morning." I replied by lowering my gaze. I was not able to look him in the eye because I was afraid that he would see everything that was hidden under my professionalism.

"Are you feeling good, Defne?" He asked.

The world stopped, so I felt his hand, a small light touch, brushing my cheek. The electricity of his touch reminded me that my body could still feel something other than pain.

"Yes.. I'm fine." I lied.

"Nice..." He whispered to me, I saw something in his eyes that terrified me: pity mixed with nascent obsession. "If there's anything I can help you with, let me know. I'll do whatever it takes to make you okay. I only care about you."

At that moment I knew.

Adem was not the savior I was looking for, but the married man who would end up buying my soul in exchange for my freedom.

"I only care about you." He repeated, his voice a whisper that reminded me of how silk felt brushing an open wound.

My breath got stuck in my throat.

The silence in the office was so dense that I could hear the clock on the wall... Although my heartbeat was much stronger. His desires were still there, on my cheek, and for an instant, the memory of Berat's raised hand disappeared in my mind, and was replaced by the protective warmth of a man who shouldn't be touching me.

He was my boss, the owner of an empire and a married man.

And I was just a woman who was falling apart, trying to go unnoticed while the world made me pay debts that didn't belong to me.

"Mr. Sahenk... I..." I tried to speak, but nervousness got the better of me.

He didn't move an inch away, but leaned a little more. The smell of his expensive, manly perfume clouded my judgment. In his eyes I saw a determination that made me tremble.

He felt no common pity, that was the look of a man who had finally found something he wants to possess with all his might and does not intend to let it go.

"Don't hesitate to ask me for help with anything, Defne." He sentenced, withdrawing his hand slowly, although his gaze was still fixed on mine. "See you tomorrow, precious Defne."

He turned around and left the office immediately, leaving me there in shock at how he made me feel. I sat down in my chair, feeling my legs tremble, I touched my cheek, right where his hand was until a few seconds ago. The trace of his touch was still there, like an invisible mark that my life had just changed forever.

I felt like a cat whose tongue had been eaten, my mind issuing thousands of warnings at a thousand per hour.

Why was my boss acting like this with me? I knew he was looking at me, I noticed that from the moment I was hired as his assistant, and that look was always present... When we were in meetings, when I brought her coffee, when she appeared out of nowhere in front of my writer and bit her lip intensely and brazenly. But this time it had been very different.

He had crossed a professional line that was going to be impossible to rebuild.

I looked at the bills on the desk, but that didn't matter to me at all.

They say that the forbidden is what attracts the most and in my current situation, Adem Sahenk was the most forbidden fruit in the garden.

He had a wife, Enise, and a daughter to take care of. I had a boyfriend who was my jailer and a list of creditors who were breathing down my neck.

We both had different prisons, but when we looked at each other, I could feel that we were the antidote to each other.

The sound of my cell phone took me out of my thoughts, it was a message from Beret.

"Where the are you? You better get home with the f*e money or I'm going to kill you for real this time."

Fear oppressed my chest. I slid into the chair dropping down, hiding my face in my knees as the tears I held back all day began to fall.

I could be beautiful and smart, but at the time I felt like trash.

Berat cheated on me with an employee of Cinet, my old job, and when I tried to confront him, the only thing I got was a beating.

He stole my savings, threatened to send me to jail using my parents' debts. He had me cornered.

I cleaned my face quickly, I couldn't give up yet.

I looked towards Adem's office, he was still working in his office and had offered to help me. He had called me beautiful in a way that he didn't even with his wife.

I didn't know that by accepting the shiver that ran through me when I saw him, I was signing a contract with the devil. But when you have a noose around your neck and the devil offers you his hand, you don't stop to ask if his intentions are pure.

I just wanted to breathe.

And Adem Sahenk was the only one who was willing to help me, even if it meant burning me in hell for his sin.