The transition from the glass-and-steel heights of Jakarta to the suffocating silence of the mountains was swift and brutal. I sat in the back of the armored SUV, my wrists still stinging from where Adrian had pinned them hours ago. He hadn't spoken a word since we left the penthouse at three in the morning. He simply sat there, a dark god draped in shadows, staring at the tablet in his hand—monitoring my heart rate as if it were the morning's stock report.
The Obsidian Mansion appeared through the morning mist like a gothic ghost. It was a monolith of dark stone and reinforced glass, perched on a jagged cliffside. There were no neighbors here. No witnesses. Just the wind howling through the pines and the distant roar of the ocean below.
"Out," Adrian commanded as the car came to a halt.
