The elevator dropped so fast my stomach lifted.
Adrian hadn't waited for me to recover or breathe or think. He'd signed his name beside mine, snapped the folder shut, and walked out of the penthouse with the same cold certainty he'd brought into the room.
Now I was trapped in a glass elevator descending through floors of luxury like a prisoner being escorted to a cell.
Two guards flanked me. Silent. Expressionless. Wearing suits worth more than my rent.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. I wanted to do anything except what I was doing:
Walking toward a future I didn't choose.
When the elevator opened into the private parking garage, a black Maserati waited. Sleek. Predatory. The kind of car that only men like Adrian drove, power disguised as elegance.
The back door opened.
Adrian was inside.
Of course he was.
I slid in because a gun wasn't pointed at me, but the threat hung in the air anyway.
The door shut. The car rolled forward.
Silence wrapped around us like a second skin.
Adrian didn't look at me at first. He watched the city lights blur past the window, jaw tight, fingers drumming once on his knee like he was calculating seventeen different things at once.
I hated that I noticed anything about him.
Finally, he spoke.
"You're moving into my estate tonight."
"Tonight?" My voice scraped. "I need to go home. I need my clothes. My documents."
"You'll have new ones."
"I don't want new ones."
His eyes finally cut to mine, sharp, metallic, irritated.
"And I don't want a wife," he said. "Yet here we are."
Heat rose under my skin, anger burning through the fear.
"Then why force it?"
"Because it keeps you alive," he said simply. "And it keeps your brother alive."
My stomach twisted.
"Where is he?""
Adrian didn't answer immediately. The pause was deliberate.
Cruel.
"Safe," he said at last. "For as long as you do exactly as I say."
I clenched my jaw. "What does that even mean? You want me to play house? Smile in public? Pretend I'm proud to be owned by you?"
His gaze flicked to my left hand; the ring he'd slid there like it was a brand instead of jewellery.
"You will attend events," he said. "Stand by my side. Wear what's provided. Speak when spoken to. And you will not draw attention to anything… inconvenient."
"By inconvenient, you mean the fact that you're blackmailing me into marriage."
"You're dramatic," he said dryly. "It's not blackmail."
"What else would you call it?"
"An arrangement."
"A threat."
"A contract."
"Kidnapping."
He smirked. "Not yet."
I stared at him, pulse hammering. "You're insane."
"And you're alive," he replied. "Be grateful."
There it was, my trigger. That word. I looked away so sharply my neck hurt.
He noticed.
He just didn't care.
————
The car eased to a stop at a traffic light. Outside, London buzzed with nightlife; people laughing, drinking, living freely. And here I was in a moving cage beside a man who would probably burn down a city block if he thought it benefited him.
Adrian leaned back, studying me.
"You signed fast," he said. "Most people bargain. Cry. Beg."
"Most people don't have a little brother," I muttered.
His voice dropped. "You'd be surprised how many trade family for survival."
I turned to him sharply, ready to spit something back.
But his expression wasn't mocking.
It was… dark. Quiet. Like he was remembering something he wished he couldn't.
Before I could decipher it, his face shuttered again.
"My estate has rules," he said. "Break them, and your brother pays the price."
"Give me the rules."
He glanced at me once, then looked out the window again, reciting them like scripture.
"Rule one: You do not leave the property alone."
I bit the inside of my cheek.
"Rule two: You do not contact your father. If he reaches out to you, you tell me immediately."
That one made my stomach drop.
"Rule three: You attend every event I require. You smile. You behave. You do not embarrass me."
"And rule four?" I said, voice tight.
Adrian's eyes dragged over my face like he was memorising something.
"Rule four," he murmured, "is simple. You don't lie to me."
I laughed, dry, humourless. "You kidnapped my brother and forced me into marriage. But sure. Trust."
His jaw flexed, irritation flickering across his face.
"I didn't kidnap him."
"You literally showed me a photo of him tied up."
"That was security holding him," he said. "He wasn't harmed."
"And I'm supposed to just take your word for that?"
"No," he said. "You're supposed to obey until I give you proof."
"What proof?"
He didn't answer.
The car slowed again, but this time it wasn't a stoplight.
We turned through wrought-iron gates taller than a two-story house. Cameras tracked the car. Guards in black uniforms stood like statues.
The Vassari estate.
A mansion large enough to swallow people whole.
My lungs tightened as the car rolled down a long driveway lined with cypress trees and cold white lights. The place looked like it belonged to a man who didn't lose. A man who didn't forget. A man whose enemies ended up in rivers.
Adrian stepped out first. A guard opened my door.
I followed, legs shaking but refusing to show it.
Adrian walked ahead without looking back, forcing me to keep pace or fall behind.
Inside the grand entrance hall, marble stretched in every direction. Dark corridors. High ceilings. Shadows that felt alive.
"This is where you'll stay," he said.
"A gilded cage," I muttered.
"A marriage home," he corrected. "Try to pretend."
I faced him, anger finally overpowering fear.
"What do you get out of this? Really?
He stepped in close—too close.
His voice dropped to a whisper meant to scrape down my spine.
"Control," he said. "Stability. And you."
I swallowed hard, heat and dread tangling in my chest.
"You're not touching me."
"My interest," he said, "is not in your body."
He turned away, heading toward a staircase.
"Dinner is at nine," he said over his shoulder. "Don't be late."
As he disappeared up the stairs, the lights flickered to life, illuminating the ring on my finger.
Heavy. Cold. Unremovable.
A symbol of a marriage that wasn't a marriage.
A sentence disguised as a vow.
And somewhere in this house—or beyond it—my brother waited.
Day 1 hadn't even begun.
And already, I felt the walls closing in.