Silas Thorne's gaze finally slid away from Elara's petrified stare, drifting dismissively over her delicate face – now bleached of all colour. That face. Just moments ago, flushed peach-pink and radiant in Julian's embrace. Now, it was a mask of terror.
"Julian," Silas's voice cut through the strained silence, cold as fractured ice. "Your girl seems unwell."
The sound snapped Elara back to reality. That voice. That face. Denial was impossible.
Julian instantly noticed her distress. "Elara? You're shaking." His hand shot out, capturing hers–startlingly cold–while the other brushed her icy cheek. "What happened? You were fine just now."
Panic clawed at Elara's throat. She ducked her head, fingers twisting desperately in Julian's jumper. "S- sudden migraine," she stammered. "I need air. Now, Julian—please."
"Miss Hayes appears afflicted by the cold," Silas interjected, his tone a velvet-wrapped command as he claimed his seat at the head of the table. "Seat her beside me. Hot tea." His gesture towards the empty chair brooked no refusal.
Trapped.
Julian guided her to the chair. "Sit, sweetheart. Warm up." He poured tea, steam curling like ghostly fingers.
Elara perched rigidly, sipping scalding liquid, gaze locked on the tablecloth. When Julian turned to fetch her cape, she felt stripped bare in the shimmering fishtail skirt.
"Miss Hayes," Silas's voice sliced through her composure. "My presence unsettles you."
Elara's breath hitched. She bit her lip until copper flooded her mouth. Look at him. Don't look. She forced her head up, eyes skittering from his face—that face—to her teacup. "You're... intimidating, Mr. Thorne." The lie hung between them, thin as vapour. He knows.
Silas's fingers paused on his cup. The corner of his mouth tightened—a blade's edge of a smile.
His gaze flickered as Julian returned, draping the pink cape around Elara's shoulders with tender concern. "Feeling any warmer?" he murmured, oblivious.
Elara managed a jerky nod, clinging to the fraying threads of normalcy. Just get through dinner. Survive. The mantra pulsed in time with her frantic heartbeat. She picked listlessly at her food, the once-appealing aromas now turning her stomach. Appetite had vanished, replaced by a cold, leaded dread sitting heavy in her gut. Julian, misinterpreting her frozen silence and untouched plate as lingering illness, piled delicate morsels onto her dish. "Try to eat something, Elly," he urged softly, his voice thick with concern. "You need your strength." His kindness, so genuine and misplaced, felt like another chain binding her to this nightmare.
Silas's dark eyes swept over her intermittently, each glance landing like a physical brand. She flinched internally, muscles tensing as she braced for the inevitable exposure, the shattering humiliation. Yet, it never came. He remained pointedly silent towards her, engaging Julian only in terse, formal exchanges about corporate affairs — market fluctuations, quarterly reports, distant acquisitions. Julian responded with eager deference, leaning slightly forward, his voice laced with a palpable hunger of for approval. Silas offered only noncommittal murmurs, his gaze drifting past Julian even as he spoke to him. The conversation was sterile, icy, utterly devoid of paternal warmth or even casual interest. Elara watched this stilted performance, a flicker of doubt piercing through the thick veil of her fear.
Julian's father?
Silas Thorne looked barely into his thirties, impossibly young for a man with a twenty-two-year-old son. The lack of resemblance was stark. Julian's softer features, lighter colouring, and expressive eyes stood in sharp contrast to Silas's chiseled intensity, ghostly pale eyes, and aura of contained power.
How? The question hammered against her skull, louder than her pounding heart. Is Mr. Thorne really Julian's father?
As Silas set down his chopsticks and checked his watch, Julian recognised the cue. He turned to Elara, catching her staring blankly across the table, lost in her turmoil. "Elara?"
She jolted, vision snapping into focus – and collided head-on with Silas Thorne's gaze. He leaned back, a picture of indolent power, studying her with unnerving intensity. Her heart lurched violently. She wrenched her eyes away.
"Julian," she breathed, voice thin. "Time to go?"
He nodded, misinterpreting her dazed look as boredom. "Yeah." He stood, pulling her up gently. "Dad, we're heading out."
Silas took a slow, deliberate sip of tea, his unsettling gaze fixed on their joined hands. "Ethan will see Miss Hayes home now," he decreed, his tone brooking no dissent. "You, Julian, will stay. We have matters to discuss."
Julian's grip on Elara's hand tightened reflexively. "Elly, Ethan's my father's driver. He'll get you home safe. I'll come by soon, okay?" His eyes pleaded for understanding.
"Okay," Elara blurted, the word rushing out like a trapped bird fleeing its cage. She wrenched her hand free from Julian's grasp. "I-I'll just grab a cab. Really, no need to trouble Ethan—"
She turned, ready to bolt, but the door swung open before she took a step. Ethan Cross leaned against the frame, arms crossed over his leather-clad chest, a sharp grin splitting his face. "C'mon now, Miss Hayes," he drawled, amusement dancing in his eyes. "Boss's orders. Let's get you home."
Julian blinked, surprised. When had his father summoned Ethan?
Elara's heart plummeted into her stomach. Had he been listening? Was the room bugged? Dread, cold and absolute, washed over her.
Julian walked her to the doorway, pressing a quick, worried kiss to her temple before letting Ethan guide her away. As the door closed behind them, Silas's voice, colder than the night outside, stopped Julian in his tracks.
"Marriage. You raised the prospect. With her."
Julian turned back, squaring his shoulders like a soldier facing a tribunal. "Yes, I love her, Dad. Deeply." His voice thickened, raw with conviction. "Her parents died when she was young — raised by her uncle. But Elara… she's… gentle. Patient. Understand people in a way that…" He faltered, searching for words. "It's heartbreaking, sometimes. I've known her since freshman year. Took me three years at uni just to get her to agree to coffee." His voice vibrated with youthful fervour, the boldness of twenty-two untainted by true consequence.
Silas observed him, this son who bore neither the Thorne steel nor his own likeness. He leaned back, steepling his fingers like a predator settling in for the kill. "Ashbourne last month," he began, his tone smooth as polished ice. "Who accompanied you?"
Julian's blood ran cold. A trap. The realisation hit him like a physical blow. He fought to keep his voice steady. "Just... a colleague. Marketing department."
The silence that followed was suffocating, thick enough to strangle the air from Julian's lungs. Silas's obsidian eyes dissected him, peeling back layers of lies with surgical precision. Cold dread pooled in Julian's gut — he'd failed. Catastrophically. His face drained of colour. "Dad, I swear it wasn't —"
Silas lifted a single finger. An imperial command that snapped Julian's mouth shut. "If this," his voice could have frozen hell, "is the foundation upon which you build a marriage, abandon the delusion." He held Julian's gaze until the younger man flinched. "Rectify. This. Disorder." Each word landed like a hammer blow.
He pushed back his chair with deliberate finality, retrieved his black leather gloves from the table, and stood. The unspoken verdict hung in the air: Your filth is yours alone to clean.
Julian stood petrified as Silas shrugged on his overcoat and exited without acknowledgment. The magnitude of his stupidity crashed over him in waves. Of course he knew. The bastard always knows. He'd panicked, lied like a cornered child, hoping to outmanoeuvre the inescapable.
A guttural roar ripped from Julian's throat. His fist crashed onto the table. China leapt, a delicate teacup shattering near the edge. Shadows carved ravines into his face as he stood trembling, surrounded by the jagged ruins of his dignity. Silence hung, thick with the e scent of spilled tea and rage. Then, moving with feral speed, he snatched his phone. His thumb stabbed the screen:
[DO NOT CONTACT ME AGAIN. EVER. THE PANSY GARDEN APARTMENT IS YOURS. KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT. OR I WILL DESTROY YOU. YOU'LL WISH YOU WERE BACK IN THE GUTTER.]
Sent. Contact deleted. Messages deleted. Scorched earth. His jaw locked, tendons standing rigid like steel cables.
The Meridian suite blazed under clinical lighting, every gilded edge and marble surface harshly exposed—a gilded cage masquerading as sanctuary. SpongeBob SquarePants' tinny laughter ricocheted off the walls, the cartoon's manic glee clashing with the room's glacial stillness. Ethan sprawled across the sofa, feigning absorption in the screen, a panther playing house-cat.
Elara exploded from the bathroom. "Open. The. Door." Each word cracked like a whip, fury sandpapering her throat. Of course. Silas Thorne didn't release prey—he relocated it.
He'd herded her here with silken menace after the restaurant: "Run, and I'll have to chase you, little bird. Boss prefers his gifts… undamaged."
But the locked door was merely the frame. The true violation hung in the air itself:
This suite. That night.
Moonlight leeched colour from the acres of carpet where she'd once fallen. Across the void, the obsidian wet bar threw back splintered reflections of her face—a funhouse mirror of panic. On the distant dining table, blood-red orchids bloomed like wounds in the gloom. And the scent… bergamot and cold stone. It flooded her mouth, thick as smoke, dragging her back: Silas's hands biting into her wrists. His breath, winter-sharp, against her neck in this same suffocating expanse.
She froze mid-stride, twenty feet from Ethan. The vastness didn't liberate—it magnified. Every phantom touch ignited across her skin. A ragged gasp tore from her.
Too much dark.
Too much memory.
Can't—
—breathe.