CHAPTER 14
The mansion was quiet again. Selene stood in front of her vanity, unpinning her hair. Her reflection stared back at her—drawn, pale, and restless. The events of the day clung to her like a second skin. The threatening note. The shadow in the hallway. The black car tailing them. None of it had been a coincidence.
Something was coming.
She turned away from the mirror and moved toward her bed, slipping under the covers, trying to summon calm. But sleep didn’t come easily anymore. Not in this place. Not with this man. Not with the chain around her neck—figurative and literal—tightening every day.
The lamp buzzed softly on her nightstand as she reached to switch it off.
Darkness swallowed the room. Then— A sound.
Too soft to be the wind. Too deliberate to be a creak of the old
