Chapter Three

Anna

The Mandell estate did not feel like a home. It felt like a mausoleum constructed from imported limestone, double paned ballistic glass, and cold, polished granite.

By sunrise, the entire estate was placed on Level Four lockdown. Iron gates that usually stood open were chained shut. Armed guards with visible sidearms patrolled the manicured lawns in pairs, their radios crackling through the damp morning mist. Upstairs in my bedroom, the heavy velvet drapes had been drawn tight, shutting out the grey light of dawn.

I paced the length of my hardwood floor, my velvet house slippers making quiet, frantic friction against the rug. I hadn't slept a second. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw those narrow slits in the skull mask, dark and bottomless, staring straight through me. I felt the iron vice of his gloved fingers around my wrist, pinning me effortlessly while the world narrowed down to the edge of a blade.

A sharp double knock echoed against my bedroom door.

"Anna," my father’s voice called out, raspy and stripped of its usual smooth command. "Come down to the foyer. Now."

I pulled a silk robe tighter over my chest, tying the belt with a hard knot. "I'm not in the mood for another lecture, Father."

"It isn't a lecture," he snapped through the heavy oak. "Your security detail has arrived. Downstairs. Immediately."

I pulled the door open, ready to fire off a scathing response about how his useless guards had let a masked man pin me to a vanity table six hours ago. But the look on Clifford Mandell’s face made the words freeze in my throat. The media tycoon who commanded boardrooms and dictated news cycles looked hollowed out. Dark circles bruised the skin beneath his eyes, and his tailored collar was unbuttoned, exposing the stressed pulse in his throat.

I followed him down the sweeping spiral staircase, my hand trailing along the cold marble balustrade.

Standing in the center of the double height foyer, bathed in the sharp morning sunlight filtering through the high clerestory windows, was a giant.

He didn't wear a uniform. He wore a crisp, tailored black suit that looked almost custom cut to accommodate the broad, imposing width of his shoulders and the dense frame beneath it. His dark hair was cropped short and precise, revealing sharp, angular cheekbones, a harsh jawline shaded with dark stubble, and a faint, thin scar that cut through the edge of his left eyebrow.

He was effortlessly, violently handsome, the kind of stark, dangerous strikingness that made your breath catch in your throat for all the wrong reasons.

He stood perfectly still, his hands folded loosely behind his lower back. He didn't look up when our footsteps echoed against the stone floor. He didn't shift his weight. He existed in the space like a piece of iron sculpture, radiating an aura so cold and unyielding that the temperature in the foyer felt ten degrees lower than the rest of the house.

"Anna," Clifford said, stopping at the base of the stairs and motioning toward the man. "This is Klaus Dominic. Starting today, he is your personal security specialist."

The man turned his head slowly. His eyes locked onto mine.

They weren't brown, blue, or grey. They were a shade of dark hazel so deep they looked almost entirely black under the foyer lights. There was no warmth in them. No polite deference. He looked at me not as a client, nor as a Mandell, but as an object he had been tasked with keeping intact.

A strange, prickling sensation swept over my skin, a sudden, sharp echo of the terror I’d felt in the gallery last night.

"I don't need a bodyguard, Father," I said, keeping my voice steady as I stepped off the last stair. I deliberately avoided looking into Klaus's dark eyes, focusing instead on my father. "I need you to tell me who was in that gallery. I need to know why our family is being hunted."

"You don't need to know anything except that Mr. Dominic's authority regarding your safety is absolute," Clifford said, his voice rising in panic. "If he tells you to jump, you jump. If he tells you to stay in your room, you stay. You do not leave this house without him standing six inches away from you."

"Six inches?" I laughed bitterly, turning to look directly at the giant in the black suit. "So what, he's going to stand in my bathroom while I shower? Stand over my bed while I sleep?"

Klaus Dominic didn't blink. His voice, when he finally spoke, was a low, gravelly baritone that vibrated straight through the soles of my shoes.

"If the threat assessment requires it, Miss Mandell," he said quietly, "yes."

I stiffened. The deep, rumbling timbre of his voice hit me like a physical blow. It was smooth, dark, and utterly devoid of hesitation.

"This is my life," I said, taking a step toward him, trying to use my height to assert control. He towered over me by at least a foot, forcing me to tilt my head back to meet his gaze. "I am an adult. I have classes at the university. I have a life outside this fortress."

"Your classes are suspended," Klaus said smoothly, his expression unreadable. "Your external engagements are canceled. Your private vehicle has been moved to off-site storage. From this moment onward, your perimeter extends only as far as I permit it."

"You can't do that," I snapped, my cheeks flushing with a sudden flare of heat, half anger, half humiliation at how easily he dismissed my authority. "Father, tell him!"

"He has full authority, Anna!" Clifford interjected, his voice high and strained. "Do not argue with him!"

I stared at Klaus, my chest rising and falling heavily. Up close, I could smell him, not expensive cologne or sweet aftershave, but a subtle, clean scent of cedar, cold rain, and dark leather. His posture remained rigid, his dark eyes tracking the frantic pulse jumping in the crook of my neck.

He was infuriating. He was a prison warden dressed in an expensive suit.

And yet, as I stood there in my silk robe, bristling under his cold command, a traitorous thought crossed my mind: He is terrifyingly beautiful.

"I will not be treated like a prisoner in my own home," I whispered, holding his gaze, refusing to be the first one to break eye contact.

"You are not a prisoner, Miss Mandell," Klaus replied, his voice dropping an octave, carrying a quiet, lethal weight that made the air between us feel razor-thin. "You are an asset under high-risk protection. Treat me accordingly, and this process will be seamless."