Chapter 2: A Risky Proposition
1325 Words
I stared up at the ceiling, lying awake in the gigantic bed.
Sleep wouldn’t come, no matter how many times I turned, tucked myself into the silk sheets, tried to quiet my racing mind. The reality was, my world had shifted in the course of a few hours, and I didn’t know what to do about that.
I was trapped.
A cage, albeit a luxurious one.
My fingers curled into the bedsheets. This wasn’t the life I expected to live. I had dreams. Plans. But now, I was just a pawn in a billionaire’s video game.
I was jolted by a knock at the door.
I hesitated. It was late. Who could be knocking at this hour?
“Come in,” I said, my voice wavering.
The door opened, and he walked through.
Damon Blackwood.
Clad in black slacks and a freshly pressed white dress shirt with the top button unbuttoned, he seemed like he had just stepped out from a late-night meeting or possibly a transaction that had made him another billion dollars wealthier. His icy blue gaze bore down on me, unreadable, calculating.
“What do you want?” I asked, sitting up and clutching the blanket around me.
His lips turned at my response, as if he found some amusement in my desperation to protect myself.
“You weren’t sleeping.”
I frowned. “How would you know that?”
Damon was leaning against the doorframe, his arms crossed over his chest.
“I had a feeling.”
I swallowed hard. This man, this dangerous man, seemed to have an uncanny ability to see through me.
“Can I help you? You’re in my room.” I willed my voice to remain steady.
His eyes darkened, and for a moment, I thought he wouldn’t respond. Then, he entered the room, shutting the door behind him.
“I want to clear some things up,” he said smoothly. “Because you seem to have a tendency to question my rules.”
Heat flared in my chest. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know I signed up to be your prisoner.”
Damon smirked. “You signed up to give birth to my child. That means you’re under my rules. No stress, no going outside without my permission, no communicating with the outside world unless I allow it.”
I gaped at him. “No contact with the outside world? Are you serious?”
His expression remained cold. “Does it look like I’m joking at all?”
My heart pounded. This was worse than I had imagined. Not only was he possessive—he was controlling.
I swallowed my panic and returned his gaze.
“And if I refuse?”
Damon c****d his head slightly to the side, his eyes glinting with something perilous.
“Then I’ll take away the choice from you.”
A shiver ran down my spine.
“Why are you doing this?” I whispered. “You could have selected anybody for this contract. Why me?”
Something moved in his expression, something near-impenetrable.
“Because I never leave anything up to chance,” he said in a whisper. “And you… you were perfect.”
He said it that way, and a strange thrill shot through me. The contract wasn’t the only thing that mattered. There was something more. A fact that I didn’t make sense of.
I should have been scared.
But most of all, I felt something much more dangerous.
Curiosity.
Damon moved closer, his presence overwhelming. He extended a hand, tucking a stray curl behind my ear. The touch was light, almost nonexistent, but it triggered a wave of heat to radiate through me.
“Get some sleep, Emilia,” he said softly.
Then, just as quickly as he came, he turned on his heel and left, leaving me breathless and feeling more trapped than ever.
The First Rule
The smell of coffee woke me up the next morning, but it was the disconcerting awareness that this was my new reality.
Damon Blackwood’s penthouse. His rules. His child growing inside me.
I slowly straightened, my head hazy from what had happened the day before. The way he looked at me. The briefness of his touch—deliberate but also dangerous, imbued with warmth that spread through my body.
I needed to get a grip.
Tossing off the blankets, I rose from the bed and stretched. The room was quiet, and for a moment, I thought I had exaggerated the threat I had overheard. That I could walk out of here and go back to my old life.
But then I heard voices in the hallway.
Curious, I padded barefoot to the door and cracked it open enough to see Damon standing by the kitchen, speaking to someone on the phone. He was facing away from me, his thick shoulders stiff.
“Zero mistakes,” he said, quietly but insistently. “I don’t care what it takes. Whoever leaked the contract should be found out.”
I froze.
The contract was leaked?
My breath hitched. Every time I heard the name Damon Blackwood, my heart stopped, because if the world found out Lindy Peters was pregnant with Damon Blackwood’s child, my life would be over.
The press would tear me apart. Online bullies would attack me. People would judge me as if they had the right—an obligation—to ruin me.
Panic bubbled up inside me.
I stepped back too quickly, and the door creaked.
Damon spun immediately, his piercing gaze slipping straight to my own.
Neither of us said anything for a second. The air between us crackled with electricity. He slipped the phone into his pocket and stalked toward me.
“You shouldn’t eavesdrop,” he replied coolly.
I took a deep breath, working to steady my voice.
“I wasn’t. I just—I heard you say something about the contract being leaked.”
His jaw clenched. “It’s being handled.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Damon drew in a sharp breath, eyeing me for a long beat before speaking.
“Someone wants to use you to get to me. But they won’t succeed.”
I flinched. Use me?
He moved in closer; I backed up instinctively, but he wouldn’t stop until I was pressed against the wall.
His voice dropped lower. “Let me be very clear about something, Emilia. No one touches what’s mine.”
I shook, partly in anger and partly in a nameless something else.
“I’m not yours,” I whispered.
There was no humor in Damon’s smirk.
“You’re carrying my child. That means you belong to me until this is all over.”
Inside me, anger flared, slicing through my fear.
“I’m not another possession for you to claim, Damon. I have a life. I have a family.”
“Which you agreed to suspend for the duration of this contract.”
His words were like a slap. I was familiar with the terms of the contract, but hearing them verbalized made it feel so much worse.
He leaned in close, so near I could taste his breath on my skin.
“I warned you from the first day, Emilia. I don’t take risks.”
I looked up at him with my heart in my throat.
“And then what happens when this is over?” I asked. “Do I just stop existing in your life like none of this ever happened?”
His expression wavered—for a split second. Then, the mask returned.
“That depends,” he murmured.
“On what?” I challenged.
Damon’s eyes went dark, dropping to my lips, then back up.
“On if you make me want to keep you.”
My breath caught.
And just like that, I knew.
This was no longer just about the contract.
This was about us.
And that was the most dangerous game of them all.
- Writer
