Daddy’s Obsession

Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

Callahan Holdings occupied the top twelve floors of a glass tower overlooking the Thames.

Arcturus sat behind the wide black desk in his private office, sleeves rolled to the elbows, watching the city below with the same cold focus he brought to everything. The morning had been unpleasant. A rival logistics firm based in Hamburg had attempted a hostile maneuver on one of his smaller European subsidiaries—quietly buying up shares through shell companies, whispering to nervous shareholders about “instability at the top.” It was the kind of move that would have rattled most men.

Arcturus was not most men.

By noon he had already crushed it.

He had shorted their stock through three different intermediaries, leaked just enough damaging information about their debt structure to the right financial journalists, and personally called the three largest wavering shareholders. His voice on those calls had been soft, almost polite. The message underneath had not been. By the time the markets closed, the rival’s share price was in freefall and the attempted takeover had collapsed. Callahan Holdings remained exactly where it always was—untouchable.

He leaned back in the chair and turned his attention to the secondary monitor on the left side of his desk.

The screen was divided into four quiet feeds.

Vivienne’s bedroom. The sage-green walls. The tall plant by the window. The vanity where she had sat crying that morning.

She was there now, sitting cross-legged on the bed with a textbook open in her lap. International Business Strategy. Her red hair was pulled into a loose knot. She wore the same soft green dress from earlier. Every few minutes she would underline something, bite the end of her pen, then glance toward the door as if expecting him to walk through it.

Arcturus watched her without blinking.

He had installed the cameras years ago—small, expensive, invisible. At first it had been about control. Knowing where she was. Knowing she was safe. Then it had become something else. He had watched her study late into the night. Watched her smile at her phone when Rowena texted. Watched her, more than once, slip a hand between her thighs in the dark when she thought she was alone, soft little sounds muffled against her pillow while she touched herself and pretended it was someone else’s fingers.

He had never told her.

He smirked faintly now, remembering.

A soft knock sounded at the door.

“Enter.”

His secretary stepped inside. Thomas Hale was fifty-two, impeccably dressed, and had worked for Arcturus since the day he turned twenty and inherited the first pieces of the empire. The man knew when to speak and when to simply wait.

“The Hamburg situation is contained,” Thomas said. “The three shareholders have signed renewed loyalty agreements. Legal is drafting the formal notices.”

“Good.” Arcturus didn’t look away from the monitor. “Clear my schedule for the next three weeks. Starting Thursday.”

Thomas’s pen paused over his tablet.

“Three weeks, sir?”

“I’m taking Vivienne to Italy. The Positano villa. Full staff, but I want them invisible. No interruptions unless the building is on fire.”

“Understood.” Thomas made a note. “Shall I arrange the jet for Wednesday evening?”

“Yes. And cancel the board dinner on Friday. Send my regrets.”

Thomas nodded once. He had seen Arcturus cancel far more important things for far less. He had also seen the way the man looked at the girl on the monitors. He asked no questions.

“Will there be anything else?”

“No. That will be all.”

Thomas left as quietly as he had entered.

Arcturus stayed in the office until the sky over London turned the color of bruised steel. Only then did he shut down the monitors, collect his coat, and go home.

---

The house was quiet when he stepped inside.

No music. No television. Only the soft hum of the climate system and the distant sound of the city beyond the high walls. He loosened his tie as he climbed the stairs, already knowing exactly where he was going.

Vivienne’s door was locked.

He knocked once, firm.

A few seconds later the lock turned and the door opened.

She stood there in the green dress, barefoot, red hair slightly messy from lying down. The moment she saw him her eyes dropped to the floor.

“Daddy,” she said softly.

Arcturus’s gaze moved over her slowly— the modest neckline, the way the fabric clung to her waist, the pale line of her collarbone. Then he stepped forward.

Vivienne backed up on instinct. He followed, crowding her into the room, and closed the door behind him with a quiet click. Before she could speak he had her against the wood, one hand braced beside her head, the other gripping her waist.

“Daddy, wait—”

He kissed her.

It was not gentle. His mouth claimed hers hard, demanding, the way a man kissed something he already owned. Vivienne made a small sound of protest that melted almost immediately into a soft, helpless moan when he bit down on her lower lip. Her hands came up between them, not quite pushing him away, not quite pulling him closer. He tasted the faint sweetness of the tea she must have been drinking. He felt the way her body softened against the door despite herself.

When he finally pulled back, her lips were red and parted. Her green eyes had gone glassy. A pretty flush stained her cheeks and the tops of her ears. She swallowed hard, staring up at him like she couldn’t quite remember how to breathe.

Arcturus looked at her for a long moment.

Then he took her hand.

“Dinner,” he said simply. “Come.”

He led her downstairs without another word.

The dining table had already been set by the staff before they left for the evening. In the center sat a covered dish of creamy lobster risotto—her favorite since she was sixteen—alongside roasted asparagus and a small salad of blood oranges and fennel. A bottle of white wine waited in a crystal cooler, though he poured her only a half glass.

They sat across from each other.

For a while the only sounds were the quiet clink of cutlery and the distant rain beginning to tap against the windows. Vivienne kept her eyes mostly on her plate. Every few bites she would glance up, catch him watching her, and look down again.

“You’re quiet,” Arcturus observed.

“I’m… trying to get used to this,” she admitted.

“To what?”

“To you acting like everything is normal.”

A faint smirk touched his mouth.

“It is normal now.” He took a slow sip of wine. “Eat. You’ve barely touched your food all day.”

She obeyed.

They spoke of small things after that. Her upcoming final-year modules. A potential internship he had already arranged for her inside Callahan Holdings. The weather in Positano this time of year. Vivienne answered when spoken to, her voice soft, her shoulders slowly losing some of their tension even as the underlying current between them never fully disappeared.

When the plates were cleared he stood and held out his hand again.

“Upstairs.”

She hesitated only a second before placing her fingers in his.

---

Arcturus’s bedroom was larger than hers, decorated in dark wood and deep charcoal. The bed was massive. The en-suite bathroom was all black marble and glass.

“Go run a bath,” he told her. “Hot. Take your time.”

Vivienne nodded and disappeared into the bathroom. He heard the water begin to fill. While she bathed he removed his watch, his cufflinks, his shirt, and sat in the armchair near the window with a glass of whiskey, listening to the quiet sounds of her moving behind the half-open door.

When she finally emerged, damp-haired and pink-cheeked from the heat, he had already laid one of his white long-sleeved polos on the bed.

She looked at it, then at him.

“I don’t have a choice, do I?”

“No.”

She turned her back to him while she dressed, though there was little point in modesty now. The shirt swallowed her the same way it had that morning, falling to mid-thigh, the sleeves covering her hands. When she turned around again he was watching her with that dark, satisfied expression she was beginning to recognize.

They sat on the edge of the bed and talked for a while longer—about her university workload, about a new acquisition his company was considering in Singapore, about nothing that truly mattered. The conversation was almost ordinary. Almost.

Eventually he stood, pulled back the covers, and waited.

Vivienne climbed in first. He followed, turning off the lights, and immediately drew her back against his chest. One heavy arm locked around her waist. His face pressed into the curve of her neck. The heat of his bare skin bled through the thin fabric of the polo.

Vivienne stared into the darkness of the unfamiliar room, listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing behind her.

Everything about this was bizarre.

She was sleeping in her stepfather’s bed, wearing his shirt, with the taste of his kiss still lingering on her mouth and the memory of his body still aching between her legs. In three days he would take her to Italy. After that, her final year would begin. And somewhere in the middle of all of it, the life she had known before last night had quietly ended.

Arcturus’s arm tightened slightly around her, as if he could sense the direction of her thoughts.

“Sleep,” he murmured against her hair.

She closed her eyes.

And eventually, surrounded by the scent of him and the solid weight of his arm, she did.