(TW)
-Devon.
Gracie's office always had the faintest smell paper and her sugary perfume, like the walls themselves had absorbed years of schedules, contracts, deadlines, and the smell of burnt sugar. I couldn't keep still in it. My sneakers marked a restless path across the floor, the leather squeaking faintly every time I turned. Ten minutes had passed this way, and I hadn't even realized how much ground I'd covered until Gracie finally groaned from behind her desk.
"Can you stand still? You've been pacing for ten minutes. I have seasickness just watching you."
I stopped mid-step and narrowed my eyes at her. "I'm not even going to ask what that has to do with anything."
She leaned back in her chair, tapping a pen against her knee like she was timing my outbursts. "Then tell me what's chewing at you."
I rubbed the back of my neck, exhaling sharper than I intended. "What the hell am I supposed to get Bryce for Christmas?"
Her face lit like she'd just been handed gossip worth millions. "Awwww—"
"For fuck's sake, Gracie." I cut her off before she could make it worse.
She laughed anyway, the sound bubbling up as if my irritation was fuel. "This will never get old. You know what, Devon? In the six years I've been around Bryce, I've seen about eight failed relationships. And when I say failed, I mean spectacular failures. People I didn't approve of at all. Well—" She squinted, as though correcting herself. "Except for one girl. She was such a sweetheart, but then she cheated, so I don't approve of her anymore either. Point is, this is the very first seed I've seen that I actually want to watch grow into a big plant."
I groaned. "Gracie—"
"Don't get me wrong," she added quickly, raising her hands in mock surrender. "If it doesn't, that's fine. No pressure. I'm just saying."
I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. "I appreciate the sentiment, Gracie. I do. But that doesn't solve the actual problem. I still don't know what the hell to get him."
Her smile sharpened with mischief. "I know what he got you."
I froze. "He already got me something?"
She nodded with smug satisfaction, leaning back like a cat stretching after a nap.
I dropped into the chair across from her, slumping low, rubbing my jaw. "I'm fucked."
"Relax," she said, spinning her pen like a baton. "You could give him a pebble you picked off the sidewalk and he'd probably frame it. He adores you."
"He deserves a mountain, Gracie," I muttered, staring at the desk.
Her grin widened. "Awwww."
Without thinking, I reached across the desk and shoved her cup of pencils to the floor. They scattered in a clatter, rolling under her chair.
"HEY!" she barked, glaring at me like I'd just stolen her car.
"If you're not going to be helpful, then get yourself busy with something," I said flatly.
She pushed her chair back with exaggerated drama, muttering as she bent to gather them. "You've been spending too much time with Milk. You're starting to act like her."
Her words made me falter. Guilt pricked at me. I slid out of my chair and crouched down too, my hand reaching for a pencil that had rolled near the leg of the desk. She looked up at the same time I did, her braid falling over her shoulder, both of us frozen in the middle of the floor surrounded by scattered pencils.
"I got it," I said quickly, snatching the pencil before she could.
Her smirk returned instantly. "Of course you did."
I stood first, dropping the pencil back into the cup with a little more force than necessary, but the edge of my mouth betrayed me with a twitch upward.
I straightened and set the pencil cup back on her desk with more noise than required, like a stamp to end the conversation. Gracie stayed crouched, deliberately slower in gathering the last few strays, grinning up at me like she was savoring every second of my unease.
That was when the door opened.
Bryce strolled in with his jacket slung over his shoulder, meeting adjourned, his hair a little mussed from running his hands through it too many times. He stopped dead in the doorway, eyes narrowing on the sight of me standing over Gracie while she crouched on the floor with pencils fanned around her feet.
"Well," he drawled, tilting his head. "Do I want to know what's going on in here?"
Gracie looked up instantly, her grin flashing sharper. "Team-building exercise."
Bryce raised both brows. "On the floor?"
I pressed my palm to my face and groaned. "She dropped her damn pencils."
"You knocked them over," she corrected, holding one aloft like evidence in a trial.
Bryce's mouth quirked, half amusement, half suspicion. "So let me get this straight. You're in here, pacing like a lunatic, and now you're… helping her pick up pencils? That what we're calling it?"
"Jesus Christ," I muttered under my breath. "Yes, that's what we're calling it."
He stepped inside, letting the door swing shut behind him. His grin widened as he leaned against the desk, just enough smugness in his tone to set my teeth on edge. "You two look awfully cozy down there. Should I be worried?"
Gracie finally stood, dusting her hands off like she'd just finished real work. "Depends. How jealous are you feeling today?"
"Gracie," I warned, my voice low, but she only smirked wider.
Bryce laughed, the sound bright and unbothered, though his eyes flicked back to me with something sharper. "Good to know my bodyguard moonlights as a pencil boy."
I dropped back into the chair with a heavy sigh, running a hand down my face. "I hate both of you."
They laughed together, like I was the punchline they'd both agreed on without me.
But even as I shook my head, I caught Bryce still watching me from the corner of his eye, a little too closely, like he was turning the whole scene over in his head, wondering what exactly he had walked in on.
-Treasure.
The impact sent me skidding across the polished floor, the sting biting up my spine as I scraped to a stop, palms braced hard against the ground. My breath snagged in my throat, copper heat already blooming along my ribs. I lifted my head, and before I could find my balance, Elias was on me again. His hand clamped my arm, yanking me upright with such force I almost lost my footing.
"I tried," he said, his voice sharp, the kind of tone that cut deeper than the hands that had just thrown me. His grip bruised, his teeth bared. "I really tried to be nice to you. I tried to contain myself. But you—" he shook me once like a ragdoll—"you just never know when to stop, do you?"
The rage boiled up before I could think. I spat it in his face, my voice tearing out raw, loud enough to shake the air between us. "You're nitpicking for any issue just to get angry!"
His eyes narrowed into slits, pupils flaring like black fire. "Do you call slapping me nitpicking?"
My chest heaved, fury pounding through me. "I told you I don't want to do it! What, are you going to force me to bed with you now?"
For a moment his mouth twitched, then he gave a mocking laugh that tasted like venom. "Wow. Look at you, all rebellious." His face leaned closer, the words hot against my cheek. "Who would believe this is the same boy who used to beg me to fuck him? Do you remember that, Treasure?"
The words made my skin crawl, but I closed the distance myself, nose almost brushing his, my voice breaking into a hiss. "I do remember. And I pity that boy. He's pathetic, Elias. Pathetic. But you—" I curled the last syllable with all the hatred I could sharpen into it—"you enjoyed every second of it."
His response was the crack of his palm. My head snapped to the side, heat exploding across my cheek. The world tilted and my ear rang with a high shrill tone that drowned out everything else for a beat. I tasted blood in my mouth where my teeth had cut into my lip.
My thoughts spun, one clear shard standing out in the chaos: this man is too strong, too strong for anyone, why the hell does he even need bodyguards?
I forced my head upright again, meeting his gaze through the ringing haze, my cheek burning, my jaw clenched so tight I thought it would splinter. "Is that it?" I rasped.
His grin spread slowly, predator's satisfaction curling over his features. "You want me to throw you out so badly, huh?" His voice dropped, dangerous, before twisting into a sharper edge. "No. I won't throw you out that easily. Not so you can crawl back to your loverboy."
Something inside me collapsed at the word, not broken but pulled under. My face faltered before I could stop it, the mask slipping just enough for him to see.
He caught it instantly. His voice rose, triumphant, each word slicing open flesh that wasn't visible. "What? Did I strike a nerve?" His teeth gleamed as he spat the next word. "You fucking slut."
"You didn't even deny it," Elias said, his voice jagged, his breath hot against my face as he dragged me upright by the collar of my shirt. The seams cut into my throat, choking me against the pull of his fist. His pupils were wild, the whites of his eyes streaked red. "You'd go running back to him the second I let you. That's what you're waiting for, isn't it?"
The heat in my chest swelled until it burned. I clenched my jaw so hard I thought it would snap, but no words came. Nothing.
That was enough.
His fist crashed against my cheekbone. My head whipped sideways, vision scattering into fractured white streaks. The floor rushed up at me, and I hit it on my knees, palms slapping against the polished surface with a hollow thud. My breath tore out of me in shreds.
"Say it!" he bellowed. His voice cracked like a whip as he circled me.
The kick came sharp and cruel against my ribs, a blade sliding between bone and muscle. My body folded, a hoarse groan ripping free before I strangled it back. Pain spread hot and cold at once, radiating down my side like fire caught in ice.
He crouched low, face level with mine, spitting the words through clenched teeth. "You think I don't see it? The way you change when his name slips out? Do you think I don't notice how your silence screams louder than anything you ever say?"
Blood welled in my mouth. I turned my head and spat it onto the floor, the red splatter stark against the pale marble. My hands shook as I pushed myself up just enough to meet his stare.
It only drove him further. His fist slammed into my lip, tearing it wide. A gush of iron flooded my tongue, thick and metallic, dripping down my chin. My vision flared with stars, my ears buzzing so loudly it felt like my skull was splitting open.
"You'd crawl back to him," he seethed, his voice trembling now, not from weakness but from a fury that had nowhere else to go. "You'd leave everything here the second he crooked his finger, and you don't even deny it."
I couldn't speak. Every breath was jagged glass, my chest rising and falling against the weight of his anger. My silence was survival, but it was also a curse—I knew what it sounded like to him. Admission.
His boot found my stomach again, vicious and unrelenting. My body flew sideways, my shoulder cracking against the floor as the air left me in one violent rush. I rolled, gasping, black creeping into the edges of my vision. My lungs seized, unable to pull in enough oxygen, every nerve alive with pain.
I forced myself onto my back, every movement scraping fire through my ribs. My lip was split, my cheek throbbing, my ear shrill with ringing, but I looked up at him. My eyes swam, wet with pain but clear enough to hold his gaze.
He stood over me, chest heaving, fists still trembling from the impact. His shadow stretched long and jagged across me, distorted in the glow of the overhead light.
"Pathetic," he spat, the word carrying more venom than all the blows combined. His grin returned, thin and feral. "All this time, and you still look like you're waiting for him."
I lay broken on the floor, blood pooling against the corner of my mouth, my silence the only shield left. It was not surrender, though it looked like it. It was the last scrap of defiance I had, refusing to give him the sound he wanted.
And he hated it.
Before I could even groan, his weight pressed down, pinning me flat. His hand clamped over my chest, his knee digging into my side, keeping me nailed to the ground like I was nothing more than an insect he'd caught between his fingers.
"The only thing keeping me from killing you right now, Treasure," he hissed, his lips brushing the air just above my ear, "is that I still have a soft spot for you. Take your time, reflect on your confusion. Otherwise…" His mouth curved into a grin I could feel without seeing. "…I have a very nice spot for you in the garden where we first met. Right beneath the flowers you once admired."
He leaned harder, forcing my ribs to scream. "You're nothing but a pathetic slut who knows nothing but how to use his body. Nothing, Treasure. And I can't believe I let you use me."
The last words cracked against me like another blow, only sharper, more poisonous. Then the weight vanished. He rose, the shadow of his figure cutting across the floor. I heard the slow, deliberate rhythm of his shoes moving toward the door, and then he was gone.
Silence swallowed the room.
I lay there, my cheek pressed to the cold floorboards, breath ragged, blood hot against my chin. I couldn't tell where it was coming from anymore—my lip, my nose, the corner of my brow—all of it blurred, smeared, running into itself until I couldn't separate one wound from another. My body felt loose, distorted, as if my limbs had been scrambled, as if nothing belonged to me anymore.
The door flew open, slamming against the wall. The light shifted, and I squinted against it, my head still heavy on the floor. I forced my eyes upward, blinking through the sting. A figure stood there, stiff, motionless for a moment before I made her out. Cassandra.
Her face was drained, her expression not composed, not cold, but frightened. Genuinely frightened.
I lifted my head a fraction, muscles screaming, blood sticking my hair to my temple. My voice came out as a rasp. "Is this why you changed five other security groups, you fucking bitch?"
Her eyes darted away, and without a word, she turned and rushed out of the room.
I let my head drop back to the floor. My chest rose and fell, shallow and uneven, and I closed my eyes, trying to center myself, trying to remember that my body was still here, that I was still breathing. The floor seemed to spin under me, dragging me sideways into dark currents. I didn't know if a minute passed, or an hour.
The door opened again. The sound of heels tapped closer, slower this time, deliberate. Then the door shut, quiet, final. I didn't bother lifting my head.
The warmth of her presence moved closer until I felt the air shift just above me. Cassandra crouched down, her perfume faint under the sharp sting of alcohol. Her hands slid under my arms, pulling me gently, her movements careful, as though she feared I would break further if she was too rough.
She adjusted me against the bedframe, pulling me upright piece by piece. My head lolled to the side, unsteady, my neck giving out, so she shifted until her back pressed to the wood and guided my head onto her chest. One arm circled around me, securing me in place, the other busied itself with a bottle and cotton.
The smell hit me first—alcohol, sharp, sterile, cutting through the fog. Then the cool dab of soaked cotton against my skin, stinging as it pressed into split flesh.
I let out a hiss through my teeth, and her arm tightened slightly, steadying me. I couldn't see her face from where I lay, but I could feel the controlled tension in her body, the quickness of her breath where my ear pressed against her.
Each touch burned, the sting of alcohol blooming over raw wounds, and yet the rhythm of it—the dab, the pullback, the dab again—began to slow the chaos in my chest. I drifted in and out, every nerve pulled between fire and numbness.
Her silence was strange. Not cruel, not smug, not the usual Cassandra. Just silence that held me, kept me propped upright, kept my head from sinking too far forward.
And through the blur, I realized: Elias left me in pieces, but she was the one trying to gather them back, even if only enough to hide the mess.
Her arm stayed firm around me, steadying my body against hers while her other hand dabbed at my face, my lip, the corner of my brow. Each sting of alcohol burned fresh through me, but I didn't pull away. My head rolled against her shoulder, too heavy to hold upright, and I let it stay there.
I'd always thought she hated me. From the beginning, with her clipped instructions, her sharp eyes watching me like I was already a liability. The barbed words, the subtle ways she dismissed me. I believed every bit of it, convinced myself she couldn't stand the sight of me.
But now, with my face pressed to her chest, her heartbeat thudding fast under my ear, I realized her fear wasn't for Elias, it was for me. Her hand trembled when she touched the split at my lip. Not anger. Not contempt. Fear.
It disoriented me more than the blows had.
I wanted to laugh, but the sound would've cracked in my throat. I wanted to spit something cruel at her, push her away, make it easier on both of us. But my body was spent, and the only thing I could do was stay there and let her hold me, her arm anchoring me in place as though I was worth saving.
Why? The thought gnawed at me as she kept working. Why now, why like this? You've watched me dragged through this house, scolded me, cut me down. And now your hands shake while you clean me?
I tried to lift my head to see her face, but it was useless. My neck gave out, and I sagged back against her. The cotton swab pressed at a cut near my ear, the scent of alcohol stinging my nose, mixing with the faint warmth of her perfume.
It was too much. Too intimate, too careful, too unlike the Cassandra I thought I knew.
I let my eyes close, my jaw slack with exhaustion. The pounding in my skull slowed to a dull throb, and I could feel her breathing against me, uneven, quick, as if she were holding herself together only because she had to.
The bitter thought still clawed at me: if she was truly this frightened for me, then maybe she hadn't hated me all along. Maybe she'd seen from the start what I refused to name. Maybe she knew this was the path every man before me had walked in this house.
And maybe that was worse than hate.
Her voice came to me in fragments at first, cutting through the haze of blood and ringing in my ears.
"You know what," she said, her hands steady, her breath just slightly uneven, "I never hated you. I just hated how naïve you were. You had this spark in your eyes that you were going to get somewhere. That eagerness, thinking you were actually special, or that you would get to be someone special to him."
Her words carved deeper than the alcohol she pressed into my skin. I wanted to look away, but her arm anchored me against her chest, her perfume mingling with the sting of antiseptic. I felt her hand trembling only when it brushed too gently across my cheek, but her voice didn't falter. If anything, the way she kept her hands moving, dabbing, pressing, adjusting, made it feel as if speaking this truth required constant motion, as though if she stopped she would unravel.
"This has happened before," she murmured. "But no one stuck around that long. I kept telling myself he'll certainly leave today. And then I'd wake up and find you mingling around like nothing happened. Like you were fine with this. At first I thought it was a fetish of yours. But then I heard you argue with him, and I couldn't understand. If this doesn't get you off, then why are you staying? He wasn't going to give you anything but a bruised heart, soul, and body. When your friend left, I thought you'd follow him. How could you not see that Elias didn't want him here? I tried to warn your friend—Devon—but he just left instead."
The mention of his name cracked something inside me. I clenched my jaw hard enough to taste iron, forcing my eyes shut. The ice she pressed to my cheek burned with its coldness, but her words burned worse.
"I hated that you were always waiting," she went on. "Waiting for something to change, for something better. You were doing great at your job, but you caught his attention because you showed him how clueless you were. Your weaknesses, your soft spots, he knew where to stab you. You may be a great person, you may be someone else's special person. But for Elias? No one is special. And I mean no one. He's his own someone special. You dreamed so big, Treasure, so close to the sun."
I couldn't hold it anymore. The sting of the truth pressed harder than her cloth ever could. My teeth ground together, and still the tears escaped, hot and uninvited, streaking down my swollen cheek.
"I was someone's special someone," I whispered, my voice breaking apart.
The tears followed immediately. There was no pause to gather them, no dignity in stopping them. Just a spill I couldn't control.
She froze long enough to meet my eyes, really meet them. Her own glistened, her mouth pulling tight as though she had tried to swallow something unsayable. "Is it Devon?"
I nodded once. No words left. Nothing in me had strength to defend, explain, or deny. Just the smallest nod, a confession wrung out of me like blood from an open wound.
Her hand left the bandage for a moment, just to pat my shoulder gently. "Leave, Treasure. Please, leave. I'm telling you this because maybe you don't deserve this. Whatever you're convincing yourself of, you don't deserve it. Nobody does."
My throat closed. The only sound I managed was a rasp, the words spilling like shards. "Why are you staying with him then?"
She sighed, not in annoyance but in something heavy, something bone-deep. Her hand paused at my temple, then moved again, cleaning, fixing, keeping busy. "We go way back. I developed feelings for him along the way, but then he kept going after his staff. And then I realized it's better to stay professional. So I'm just minding my business. Getting paid, and that's all."
"There must be other ways to get paid," I muttered, bitterness sharpening what little strength I had left.
Her hand hovered at my brow. "It's a little too late for me."
Silence pressed around us, thick, almost unbearable. I could feel her breath against the crown of my head, could hear the faint hitch when she dipped cotton into alcohol again.
Finally, she smoothed a band-aid over the gash at my eyebrow, pressing it down gently, as though the care of it mattered. "I'll help you leave if you want to. And I promise you he won't come after you."
I wanted to believe her. Wanted to collapse into that promise and let it carry me out of this house. But I didn't even know if I had the strength to stand.
Her arm stayed tight around me, steadying me as though she'd hold me up until I found the will.
Her words sank into me like hooks. I'll help you leave. He won't come after you. A promise laid so plainly, so firmly, and yet my chest felt hollow with doubt.
Leave. The word should have sounded like salvation, but it rattled in my skull like an accusation. If it were that easy, why had I stayed so long? Why had I convinced myself night after night that maybe tomorrow would be different? That maybe Elias' sharpness would dull, his rage would taper, that he would remember I was here to protect him, not to be destroyed by him.
But he didn't forget. He never forgot. He just reminded me, over and over, of the leash I pretended wasn't there.
My head lolled on Cassandra's chest, the steady thump of her heartbeat filling the silence where my own thoughts refused to settle. My body ached in too many places to count, blood sticky under the cotton she kept pressing, and still my mind reached for him. Elias' face when he leaned over me, the venom in his words, the way his smile never reached his eyes when he promised to bury me in the same soil where we once stood as something like equals.
Was that all I was waiting for? A cruel echo of the first time? For him to touch me again, even if it was with violence, because at least it was a kind of attention?
I felt sick.
Cassandra's hand smoothed over my temple, careful not to hurt. She must have felt the tremor in me because she whispered, "Don't spiral. Don't start convincing yourself again."
But it was too late. My head was already filling with it. The way Devon's name had slipped out of Elias' mouth with such precision, like he knew exactly where to strike. And he did. He always did. He knew the shape of every weakness in me. He had catalogued them, kept them sharp.
Part of me wanted to take Cassandra's offer and run, to vanish and never look back. But another part—smaller, weaker, but no less present—still clung to the impossible thought that Elias might stop if I just endured long enough. That maybe he still needed me. That maybe, deep beneath the cruelty, there was something that kept him from discarding me completely.
That's what frightened me most. Not his hands, not his threats, not even his power. What frightened me was that I didn't know how to live without the weight of him pressing down on me. I didn't know who I was outside his orbit anymore.
I shut my eyes, pressing them against the heat of Cassandra's blouse, the smell of her perfume and alcohol swarming my senses. "I can't tell what's keeping me here," I whispered, my voice frayed. "I can't tell if it's fear or… or something worse."
She didn't answer right away. Her hand just stayed there, resting on the side of my head as though she could quiet the thoughts if she pressed hard enough.
When she finally spoke, her voice was quiet, flat, but not unkind. "It doesn't matter what it is. Whatever it is, it's eating you alive."
And she was right.