Chapter 5

The next day was a blur of ancient ledgers and forced focus. I avoided the main house, terrified that if I saw Ethan, he would clearly see what was written across my face. But Ethan Vale wasn't a man you could avoid. He was the sun of this dark solar system, and I was just a planet caught in his gravity.

At 6:30 PM, the internal phone in my room chimed making my heart skip a beat.

"Get up here," his voice crackled through the speaker. It sounded a bit different, thicker and lower, like velvet dragged through gravel.

I checked on Leo, who was finally breathing clearly, his fever a ghost of the night before. I smoothed my hair, squared my shoulders, and turned on the small bedside light in the room before heading for the elevator.

When the doors opened to his private study, the air hit me first. It smelled of expensive peat, aged oak, and the sharp, medicinal tang of high-end scotch. The room was dark, lit only by the amber glow of a single desk lamp and the dying embers in the fireplace.

Ethan wasn't behind the desk, but was standing by the floor-to-ceiling window, a crystal tumbler in his hand. I immediately recognized the window as the same one he had stood the night I arrived here, same place he had masturbated. His jacket was gone, his tie discarded on the rug, and his white shirt was unbuttoned halfway down his chest. He looked unraveled, and an unraveled Ethan Vale was a thousand times more dangerous than a composed one.

"You’re late," he murmured, not turning around.

"I had to check on Leo," I said, my voice sounding thin in the vast room.

He turned then, and the breath left my lungs. His eyes, usually like shards of ice, were clouded, dark with a brooding intensity I hadn't seen before. He took a slow sip of the scotch, his gaze never leaving mine. He was slightly drunk, not the stumbling, slurring kind, but the kind where the inhibitions are stripped away, leaving nothing but raw, unfiltered hunger.

"Come here, Claire."

It wasn't a request but a command and I moved forward, my feet sinking into the plush carpet, until I was standing just a few feet from him. The heat radiating off him was almost tactile and I could feel it. 

“I told you not to work today.” He started. 

“Uhm, sir. I…I just didn’t want to stay idle.” I stammered and watched his frame. He simply nodded and took a deep breath. 

"The 1890 grants," he began again, his voice a low vibration. "You found the discrepancies. You’re efficient, too efficient for a girl who supposedly spent her life working dead-end retail."

My pulse hammered. "I’m just a fast learner."

He set the glass down on a side table and took a step toward me. I should have backed away, but my feet felt rooted to the floor. He reached out, his hand hovering near my face before his fingers finally brushed against my temple, tucking a stray lock of hair behind my ear. 

"You have the eyes of someone I used to know," he whispered, his face dipping closer. "But there’s a fire in yours that she never dared to have. She was a lake and you, a forest fire."

My heart stopped at his statement, I knew he was talking about Sarah. He was looking at me and seeing her, yet he didn't know. Or did he? Was this a trap? Was he playing with me before he finally kills me too?

"I don't know what you're talking about," I breathed, my lungs desperate for air.

"Don't you?" He moved closer, his chest nearly brushing mine. "I’ve see you watching me, Claire. I see the way you look at me when you think I’m not looking. You hate me, I know.  But you also want me. You cannot resist the urge. It’s a delicious, violent little war you’re fighting with yourself."

He didn't give me a chance to argue as his hand slid from my temple to the back of my neck, his fingers tangling in my hair, as he pulled me forward.

The kiss wasn't a question but rather a collision.

It tasted of scotch and desperation, a deep, bruising possession that made the room spin. I told myself to pull away. I told myself this was the man who killed my sister, but my body was a traitor. My hands, which should have been clawing at his face, found their way to the back of his neck, pulling him closer, needing the friction and heat.

He groaned into my mouth, a low, husky sound that vibrated through my entire body. He backed me up until I hit the edge of his massive mahogany desk, his hands sliding down to my waist and lifting me until I was sitting on the edge of the wood. He stepped between my legs, his body a wall of hard muscle and heat.

His mouth left mine, trailing a path of fire down my jawline to the sensitive spot beneath my ear. "Tell me to stop," he rasped against my skin, his breath hot and smelling of oak. "Tell me to stop, and I’ll let you go back to your basement."

I couldn't speak or even think, every of my nerve ending was screaming. The intimacy was suffocating, a high-tension wire stretched to the breaking point. His hands were moving under the hem of my dress, his palms rough against my skin, mapping the curve of my waist with a frantic, rhythmic intensity.

For a moment, the mission was gone. The letter, the revenge, it all burned away in the heat of his touch. I was just a woman, and he was just a man, and the world was nothing but this dark room and forbidden hunger.

His hands moved higher, possessive and frantic, as he began to unbutton my dress. With one swift, predatory movement, he flipped the fabric off my shoulders, letting it pool around my waist on the desk. I sat there exposed, my breasts bare in the amber light, wearing nothing but a pair of black lacy panties.

Ethan froze, his gaze dropping to my chest, his eyes darkening until they were almost black. A slow, wicked smirk tuged at the corner of his mouth.

"I see," he rumbled, his voice thick with a teasing, dangerous edge. "No bra. You’ve been wanting this all along.”

I couldn't answer, I just moaned as his mouth launched onto my nipple, his tongue swirling and sucking with a hunger that made my back arch off the desk. My fingers dug into his scalp, pulling him closer as the movement sent sparks through my core.

He didn't stop nor pause, his hands caressed every inch of me, my thighs, my stomach, the curve of my hips, while I twisted under him, my voice breaking in a series of breathless moans. He was a master of my body, knowing exactly where to press to make me unravel.

Then, he stepped back just long enough to shed his own clothes. I watched, transfixed, murmuring a broken "Oh god" at the sight of him. He was a masterpiece of hard muscle and scarred skin, and as he grew hard, I saw just how much power he held. He was massive, his dick a heavy, demanding weight that promised to fill the emptiness I’d carried for years.

He reached for a condom, his fingers trembling slightly as he rolled it on, before he surged back to me. It took a moment before he finally got to my entrance and slid himself in. 

The impact was visceral as he filled my core completely, a stretching, burning sensation that quickly turned into a rhythmic, carnal bliss. It was the most beautiful, intense connection I had ever felt in years. Every thrust was deep, intentional, and slow, driving me toward an edge I had never reached before.

“Fuck! He gasped as he held my waist tighter and increased his pace, slightly making me also adjust in my position to accommodate him. 

Oh, gosh!” I moaned, throwing my head backwards. 

He kissed my neck, sucking deep into the skin there. I was certain I was going to get a hickey by the time he was done but I didn’t mind anyway. 

For a long, agonizingly perfect hour, the world was nothing but the sound of our skin meeting and greeting, the raw, heavy gasps of two people drowning in each other. When he finally came, he let out a guttural roar, his body tensing against mine before he slowly pulled away.

The silence that followed was deafening.

Without a word, he stood up and pulled on his pants. He didn't look at me, the heat was gone, replaced by the icy wall of the billionaire titan.

"Leave," he said coldly, fastening his buckle. 

The rejection hit harder than his thrusts, I felt like a discarded toy. I scrambled off the desk, shaking so hard I could barely stand, and grabbed my dress from the floor. I didn't try to put it on properly, I just clutched it to my chest and ran. I ran like a scared little mouse through the dark corridors, my skin still tingling from his touch while my heart shattered.

How could I be so foolish? I cursed myself as I reached the elevator. I had forgotten my sole purpose here and let him use me to satisfy a drunken urge, and then he’d tossed me out like trash.

When I burst back into our room, I found Leo sitting up on the rug, playing with his toy cars. His eyes were bright, and he looked completely recovered.

"Mommy! Look!" he chirped, holding up a truck.

"That's great, baby," I whispered, forcing a smile as I ducked into the bathroom to dress and wash the scent of Ethan and scotch off my skin.

As I sat on the edge of the tub, I couldn't stop the memories from flooding back. Despite the cold way he ended it, I couldn't deny the truth, it was the best sex I’d ever had. I thought of my exes, men who were either clumsy, have small dicks, or finished before I’d even started. I thought of the flings and the friends with benefits that always felt like a chore. But this with Ethan, was different like a great storm. I hurriedly washed off, put on my pajamas and headed out of the bathroom. 

“Leo, let’s go to bed.” I said quietly, stretching out my hands to him. He climbed onto the bed and I tucked him in, kissing his forehead. “Goodnight baby, dream sweets dreams.”

“You too mommy.” He told me. 

I layed on the bed but sleep deluded me, I just sat there, lost in the dangerous reminiscing of his body against mine. 

A dull, rhythmic throb began to pulse behind my eyes, a slight headache at first, just a nagging pressure at my temples. I reached up and massaged the skin, trying to rub away the tension, but the pain only sharpened. It felt like a warning, a physical manifestation of the mental war I was fighting. 

I stood up and headed to the drawer, the medicine bag was right there and I needed an aspirin to feel better. But as I deepened my hand in, the bag tipped slightly, and something shifted in the small, mesh side pocket.

My fingers brushed against something cold and metal. I pulled it out, expecting to probably see another pack of condom or something familiar but it wasn’t. 

It was a small, silver locket dented and stained with what looked like a dark, ancient tarnish. My heart hammered against my ribs as I held it up to the dim light of the bedside lamp, I clicked the clasp open with a shaky thumb.

Inside was a tiny, faded picture of my sister, Sarah. She was happier there, laughing at someone behind the camera, her eyes bright with a life that had been stolen from her.

Engraved into the silver, polished by years of what could only be someone’s thumb rubbing against it, was a symbol. It was a heart, the same imperfect, hand-drawn heart that Sarah had traced on the map hidden in the wall. Then there were three words that changed everything I once thought. 

"My Eternal Heart."

The weight of the locket in my palm felt like a leaden curse. I just stared at the silver heart, the exact twin of the symbol Sarah had died to leave behind and felt the foundations of my hatred begin to crumble. If he was the monster who had discarded her like trash, why was he carrying her memory in the pocket of a medical bag? Why did the silver look so worn, as if it had been rubbed by a thumb in the quiet hours of the night?

I didn't sleep, not that I could. I sat by Leo’s bed, watching the moonlight crawl across the floorboards of our basement cell. By the time 8:00 AM arrived, my mind was a fractured mess of "what ifs." I hid the locket in the bag where I had kept the letter too. Two pieces of evidence, two different stories. One said he was a killer while the other said he was a mourner.