The hallway was drenched in golden dimness, as though time itself had slowed to a breathless crawl. Thick carpet silenced their footsteps. The silence between them, however, screamed.
He stopped outside a door—unmarked, pristine, almost too clean. With a slow turn of an antique brass key, he pushed it open and held it for her. No words. Just an invitation.
Aarya stepped inside, unsure whether it was bravery or madness guiding her.
The suite was unlike any hotel room she'd ever seen. Dark velvet drapes. Candles flickering low. A grand window revealing a fractured view of the city lights through the fog. Shadows danced across the walls like silent voyeurs.
He closed the door behind her.
For a moment, neither of them moved. The tension was alive—thick, trembling, desperate.
Then, he walked up behind her. Not touching. Just close enough that she could feel the heat radiating from his chest against her bare back.
"Are you afraid?" he whispered.
"No," she lied.
He chuckled softly. "You should be."
His hand found the zipper of her dress, fingers brushing her spine like a dare. "Say stop," he murmured. "And I will."
She didn't.
Because something deep within her didn't want to.
The dress slipped from her shoulders like falling petals, pooling at her feet.
He stepped around to face her. His mask still on. Eyes unreadable. But his fingers—God, his fingers were poetry and destruction both.
She'd never been touched like this before.
It wasn't just lust.
It was obsession.
But the scariest part wasn't his intensity.
It was how much of herself she was willing to give—
To a man whose name she didn't even know.
Aarya's skin ignited under his touch. Every graze of his fingertips felt deliberate—like he wasn't just exploring her body, but unearthing every fear, every buried desire she thought she had silenced long ago.
He never rushed.
He didn't need to.
He watched her like he could read her pulse through her breath, like he knew exactly how to ruin her and remake her in the same moment.
She tried to stay quiet. Dignified.
But dignity had no place in that room.
His lips brushed the hollow of her throat—not a kiss, just a breath, and yet it shattered her control.
Still, he hadn't told her his name. And she hadn't asked again.
Because if she did, she feared the spell would break… or worse, reveal something she couldn't handle.
"Tell me what you want," he said lowly, as his hands slipped along her waist, pressing her back against the cold mirror behind her. She could see herself there—flushed, undone, unrecognizable.
"I don't know," she whispered honestly.
"Good," he breathed. "Then let me show you."
And he did.
But it wasn't just lust, or heat, or the thrill of the forbidden.
It was too much.
Too intimate.
Too dangerous.
Because the way he looked at her—possessive, like she belonged to him—felt terrifyingly final.
And in that moment, beneath the low flicker of candlelight, she realized:
This wasn't a one-night mistake.
This was the beginning of something far, far darker.
Something she wouldn't walk away from unchanged.
The world outside seemed miles away. The pulse of the city, the hum of reality, all felt so distant as she stood there, vulnerable in his gaze. Every inch of her skin tingled with his touch, yet every part of her was on edge. The man in front of her wasn't just a stranger. He was a question with no answer, a mystery wrapped in the heat of the moment.
She felt his hands trace the curve of her jaw, lifting her chin slightly, as if he were deciding whether to devour her or let her go. His lips hovered just inches from hers, and her breath hitched.
"What's your name?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper.
He didn't answer right away. Instead, his eyes bored into hers, searching for something—permission, maybe?—before he slowly leaned forward, his lips brushing against her ear.
"You don't need to know my name," he replied, voice like velvet. "Not yet."
The word yet lingered in the air, heavy and dangerous.
Aarya shivered, torn between the desire to give in to him and the instinct that screamed to pull away. She stepped back, but he was too quick, his fingers curling around her wrist and pulling her back to him with terrifying gentleness.
"What's the matter?" he asked, his voice laced with amusement. "Afraid of getting lost in me?"
Her heart hammered in her chest. "You don't even know me."
"I don't need to," he said, his gaze darkening. "I know what you need."
Aarya's mind screamed to break free, to run. But her body—her body betrayed her, leaning closer, drawn to the magnetism he exuded. She was locked in his orbit, unable to escape.
The man behind the mask was nothing like what she expected. His power wasn't in the way he touched her, or the way he looked at her. It was in the silence, the unspoken words between them, the promise that he was more than just a man he was an enigma.
And the deeper she fell, the less she could remember why she wanted to leave.
Cliffhanger-
The candlelight trembled as if sensing the shift in the air, shadows stretching like claws across the room. Aarya stood silent, his grip firm around her wrist, his eyes darker than before. "You think this is a game?" he said, low and calm, but something inside the words coiled like a threat. She followed him without protest, deeper into the suite—into something far more dangerous than she had prepared for. The room he led her into was elegant, quiet, too quiet. And when he locked the door behind them and draped a gold chain around her neck, whispering, "This is yours now. Until it's time…"—her breath caught. She didn't know what he meant. Not yet. But when the lights flickered and that strange, cold voice echoed from the corner—"She's not supposed to be here."—Aarya spun around.
But no one else was in the room.
Or so she thought.