Chapter 8: Twisted Ties

Life inside the main villa under Roman’s strict lockdown settled into a quiet, suffocating routine.

I was no longer allowed to step onto the courtyard, but Roman did not keep me locked in the dark, isolated bedroom either. Instead, he kept me close to his side throughout the day. When he worked in his study on the third floor, I was required to sit in the leather armchair directly across from his desk. When he ate dinner in the grand dining hall, I sat at the opposite end of the long mahogany table under the silent eyes of four armed guards.

It was a strange, silent war fought over small, daily details.

On Thursday evening, the storm outside rattled the tall glass panes of the dining hall. The long table was set with heavy silver cutlery, crystal glasses, and porcelain plates filled with pan-seared salmon and steamed vegetables.

I sat stiffly in my high-backed chair, staring down at my plate. I held my silver fork in my right hand, casually moving a single piece of green asparagus from one side of the plate to the other. I hadn't taken a single bite since we sat down twenty minutes ago.

At the head of the table, Roman was reviewing documents on a sleek black tablet. He cut his steak with slow, precise movements, his silver knife making no sound against the fine china.

"You are picking at your salmon," Roman said flatly, his deep voice slicing through the quiet room without him even looking up from his screen.

I set my fork down with a loud, deliberate clink against the edge of the plate. I folded my hands in my lap, leaning back against the carved wood of my chair.

"I am not hungry," I said. My voice was thin, but my tone was firm.

Roman set his tablet face down on the table. He picked up his linen napkin, wiped his fingers, and finally raised his pale, ice-blue eyes to meet mine across the long expanse of dark wood.

"Your appetite is not a matter of preference," Roman replied smoothly. His tone was sharp, and entirely matter-of-fact. "Doctor Garrick inspected your blood panel this morning. You are six hundred calories short of the baseline required to maintain your health. Eat three more bites of the salmon, or Mrs. Gable will bring the liquid nutrition supplement."

I glared across the table at him, my eyes flashing with pure defiance.

"You treat me like a farm animal," I spat out, my hands clenching into tight fists beneath the table. "Like something you are fattening up just so you can use it for your family."

"I treat you like an investment," Roman corrected immediately, his voice dropping into a low, controlled baritone. "A very expensive, very difficult investment. And right now, my investment is being needlessly stubborn."

I turned my head away, looking toward the dark, shuttered windows. "Then let me starve."

Roman’s jaw tightened slightly, a tiny muscle flexing along his sharp jawline, but his expression remained impassive. He picked up his wine glass, taking a slow sip of dark red wine before setting it back down.

"If you do not pick up your fork in five seconds," Roman said softly, "I will have two guards hold your arms while Mrs. Gable feeds you herself."

I locked eyes with him across the room. I searched his face for any sign of a bluff, but there was none. Roman never bluffed. Slowly, with my heart burning with hot resentment, I picked up my silver fork, stabbed a piece of salmon, and brought it to my mouth. I chewed and swallowed in bitter silence.

"Good girl," Roman said simply, picking up his tablet once more.

Yet, despite his cold words, the atmosphere between us began to show little, confusing cracks over the days that followed.

Late on Friday night, a freezing wind blew down from the northern mountains, driving temperatures inside the stone villa down significantly. I was sitting on the broad window seat in Roman’s study, wrapped in my thin white cotton dress. Roman had been working at his desk for three hours straight, signing papers and taking phone calls in foreign languages.

I shrank back into the corner of the window seat. My bare arms were covered in goosebumps, and my teeth began to chatter softly despite my efforts to stop them. I wrapped my arms tightly around my knees, tucking my cold feet under the hem of my dress, refusing to speak up or ask him for anything.

Roman stopped typing on his laptop, his fingers hovered over the keyboard.

Without saying a word to me, Roman tapped a small silver button on his desk intercom.

"Mrs. Gable," Roman commanded flatly into the speaker.

"Yes, Master Roman?" the housekeeper’s voice came through clearly.

"The temperature in the west wing study has dropped two degrees," Roman said, his tone sharp and demanding. "Turn the central heating up immediately, and bring a thermos of hot tea."

"Right away, sir."

Roman released the button and returned to his typing, never once acknowledging that I was shivering in the corner. Ten minutes later, as the room began to warm up, Mrs. Gable set a steaming cup of chamomile tea on the small wooden table next to my seat.

An hour past midnight, my eyelids grew impossibly heavy. The exhaustion of my captivity, combined with the warm air now circulating through the room, finally broke my defenses. My head leaned back against the dark wood framing of the window seat, my breathing turned soft and even, and I fell fast asleep.

The soft sound of typing stopped.

Roman sat back in his leather chair. He adjusted his dark cuffs and slowly turned his head to look across the dimly lit room.

Sunny was curled into a small ball on the window seat. Her long dark hair spilled over her pale shoulders, and her lips were parted slightly in her sleep. In the soft light of the desk lamp, she looked fragile—completely stripped of the defiance she wore like armor whenever she was awake.

Roman stood up from his desk. He walked silently across the thick Persian rug until he was standing directly beside the window seat.

He stood over her in complete silence for several long minutes, his hands tucked into his trousers pockets. His pale blue eyes traced the line of her cheekbones, the faint dark circles under her eyes, and the small mark on her wrist where her skin had bruised days ago.

Slowly, Roman reached out. His fingers hovered just an inch above her cheek, close enough to feel the soft heat rising from her skin. A strange, tight knot formed deep in his chest—a dark, possessive wire pulling tight.

He pulled his hand back before he touched her.

Instead, he turned to the back of his desk chair, picked up his heavy black cashmere coat, and unfolded it. Leaning down with quiet care, he draped the heavy coat over her sleeping body, tucking the soft fabric around my shoulders to keep the draught away.

He stood there for a moment longer, watching her shift under the warmth of his coat, before turning back to his desk. He told himself it was purely natural. A sick surrogate was a useless surrogate. He was simply protecting his property from catching a cold. He ignored the strange, heavy silence that filled his chest as he sat back down to work while she slept under his coat.

Hundreds of miles away, back in the bustling heart of the city rain tapped steadily against the glass windows of the central police precinct.

The bright fluorescent lights overhead flickered, casting harsh shadows across the worn linoleum floor of a small, windowless interview room.

Lena Jane sat at a low metal table, wrapped in an oversized beige cardigan that made her look small, fragile, and utterly heartbroken. Her eyes were red and puffy, her nose flushed, and a wet, crumpled tissue was clutched tightly in her trembling hands.

Across the metal table, a tired detective closed a thick manila folder labeled MISSING PERSON: JANE, SUNNY.

"Miss Jane, we have gone through the security camera footage from the café three separate times," the detective said, his voice soft and full of sympathy. "We see your sister get up from the table, walk out the front door to answer her phone, and turn down the side alley. She simply doesn't come back into the frame. There are no signs of a struggle, no broken glass, and no witnesses."

"She would never just walk away!" Lena cried out softly. Her voice cracked on the last word, pitch-perfect in its fragile, heartbroken delivery. She dabbed delicate tears from her lower eyelids with the tissue. "Sunny is everything to me! She wouldn't abandon her job, her apartment... or Aiden!"

Beside her, Aiden Hope sat slumped in his chair, his head buried in his pale hands. His knuckles were white, his shoulders shaking with silent, relentless grief. He hadn't shaved in four days, and dark circles bruised the skin beneath his hollow eyes.

"We need to put out a formal missing-persons alert," Aiden rasped out, his voice hoarse from days of barely sleeping or eating. He lifted his head, reaching out to wrap a tight, trembling hand around Lena's smaller one. "Please, Detective. She has been gone for over a week now. Something terrible must have happened to her. Someone had to have taken her!"

"I am filing the official missing-persons report right now, Mr. Hope," the detective assured them, turning to his desktop computer and typing quickly. "We are putting her picture out to every precinct in the state."

Lena buried her face into Aiden’s shoulder, letting out a heavy, shuddering sob that vibrated through his coat. Aiden pulled her closer, wrapping a protective arm around her shoulders to comfort her.

Underneath the metal table, hidden completely from the detective's view and from Aiden's grief-stricken eyes, Lena's expensive designer handbag rested against her knee.

Inside the bag, her smartphone screen lit up silently with a brief text notification:

Grey Holdings: Transaction Confirmed $5,000,000.00.