CHAPTER TWO
1422 Words
Elena
The uniform was beige.
Beige.
As if being shoved into a broom closet of a bedroom wasn’t dehumanizing enough, I now stood in front of the narrow wardrobe, staring at a neatly folded, polyester insult. Buttoned to the neck, modest to the knees, and stiff enough to make me itch just looking at it.
I’d once worn a vintage Valentino gown to the Black Orchid Gala. Now I was expected to dress like an extra in a 1960s boarding school drama.
Wonderful.
I tugged it on without ceremony and tightened the cloth belt around my waist. The mirror in the room was chipped, and the reflection was reflecting. Pale, angular face. Hair scraped back in a practical knot. Collar pressed to the throat. The only part of me untouched was my eyes. Storm-gray. Still simmering.
My phone buzzed.
Lena: Sophie’s fever broke. She ate applesauce and asked when you’ll be home. I told her you’re “at a job interview.”
Guilt knifed me.
Sophie had clutched my sleeve that morning with sticky fingers and sleepy eyes, whispering, “Promise you’ll come back.”
I hadn’t answered. I couldn’t lie to her. Not when I wasn’t sure what I’d become walking into this glass prison.
I typed back quickly.
Me: Give her a kiss from me. I’ll try to visit tomorrow night. Tell her Mr. Bumble will guard the pillow fort.
Her favorite stuffed bumblebee. One she’d sewn googly eyes onto with crooked stitches and declared a “honey soldier.” My fierce girl.
A knock interrupted the memory.
I turned, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Come in.”
It wasn’t Alex.
It was a man built like a steel door in human form broad shou, broad shoulders, buzzed dark hair, a faint scar curling down his jaw. Dressed in a dark gray suit and earpiece.
Security.
“Ms. Rossi,” he said, voice clipped but not unkind. “I’m Marcus Boone. Mr. Thorne asked me to escort you to orientation.”
“Orientation?” I echoed. “Are there PowerPoints involved?”
That earned me a flicker of a smile.
“This way.”
I followed him through corridors of black marble and whisper-quiet lighting. The penthouse was the kind of place you didn’t speak above a murmur in. Like the air itself had been trained to behave.
As we passed a wall of abstract art, soulless, expensive, and framed in cold chrome, I caught M Arcus glancing sideways at me.
“You knew him… before,” he said.
Not a question.
I kept my face blank. “Briefly.”
He nodded. “Wasn’t my place, but he hasn’t been himself since… then.”
Since he destroyed me? Since he left me bleeding on the steps of my father’s gallery while reporters snapped photos?
I said nothing.
He led me to a sprawling playroom with wide windows and minimalist furniture. Not a toy in sight.
“Where’s the child?” I asked.
“School.”
It was noon on a Tuesday. Made sense.
“Should I be taking notes?” I asked dryly.
Marcus glanced at the wall. “There are surveillance panels throughout the residence. Audio and visual. Mr. Thorne likes… transparency.”
I turned slowly. “You mean he spies on his employees.”
Marcus didn’t blink. “He monitors his property.”
“And I’m one of those now?”
His expression flickered. “Just watch what you say near the walls.”
I absorbed that.
The old Alex had once refused to let paparazzi near me. Now he has installed cameras in his nursery.
“What else should I know?”
“He’s particular about schedules. He doesn’t tolerate noise past ten. And don’t rearrange the art.”
“God forbid.”
Marcus paused at the threshold. “Just… try not to poke the bear.”
I smiled tightly. “I plan on gutting the bear. But thanks.”
He raised a brow and turned, boots silent against the stone floors.
I stood alone in the hollow of the penthouse, staring at the blank walls and empty shelves, and I realized something bone-deep:
There were no family photos.
No baby pictures.
No laughter etched into these walls.
Just silence. Just power. Just the sterile ache of loneliness.
This wasn’t a home.
It was a mausoleum built for a man still alive.
The afternoon crawled.
I was given a tablet with Sophie’s supposed “curriculum” (flashcards, social development plans, daily logs), even though I knew damn well this wasn’t a real nanny job. There was no child. Not yet.
This was a leash. A golden one, but a leash all the same.
By six p.m., I was done pretending to be busy.
I crept down the main hallway, past the dining area (all black glass and iron), past the kitchen (not a fingerprint in sight), and paused outside the double doors of what I knew was Alex’s home office.
I knocked.
“Enter,” came the voice.
I did.
Alex was seated behind a sleek ebony desk, tapping something into a touchscreen keyboard. The windows behind him framed a dying sun, casting fire across the skyline.
He looked up. Slowly. Like a predator indulging its prey.
“You’re adapting well,” he said.
“I’m adaptable.”
“To beige?”
I smiled without humor. “We all play our roles.”
He stood. Walked around the desk. “And what role are you playing, Elena?”
“The desperate mother. The disgraced ex. The paid ghost haunting your halls.”
His eyes flicked to mine. “You forgot ‘thief.’”
That old wound throbbed like a fresh slap.
“I’m not a thief.”
“Then where’s the money?”
“Why don’t you ask your mother?”
His jaw tightened.
Silence stretched.
Then he reached for something on the desk. A sealed envelope.
He handed it to me.
“What’s this?” I asked.
“Your first week’s pay. In advance.”
I took it slowly. Heavy. Thick. Too thick.
“I didn’t ask for pity,” I said.
“It’s not pity,” he said coldly. “It’s control.”
There it was again.
Honesty, brutal and bare.
I stepped closer, just a foot separating us now. “Why did you bring?”
He didn’t flinch.
“Because I wanted to see how far you’d fallen.”
The words hit like a slap.
“And?” I asked, voice shaking. “Satisfied?”
His expression didn’t change. “Not yet.”
I laughed. Low and bitter. “You always wanted power. You just never knew how to wield it without bleeding everyone dry.”
“And you,” he said softly, “always wanted someone to save you. But you’re not worth saving.”
My breath caught. The old hurt flared. But I didn’t cry.
Instead, I said the one thing that would slice deeper.
“You loved me once. That’s what you can’t stand. That someone like me was ever under your skin.”
His gaze darkened.
Then, without warning, he reached for me. Not with gentleness. Not with apology. Just brutal, aching heat.
His hand curled around my wrist.
I stiffened.
“I should throw you out,” he murmured. “I should drag you to the door and never look back.”
“Then do it.”
But he didn’t.
Instead, he stared at me, staring, whispered, “I don’t know why I can’t.”
The air between us thickened. A heartbeat. Two.
And then he let go.
“Get out,” he said, turning his back.
I did.
But not before I saw it.
The tremble in his fingers.
That night, I couldn’t sleep.
Not in the narrow bed. Not with the hum of cameras on the walls. Not with the ghost of his touch on my wrist.
So I sat in the dark with the envelope beside me and pulled out the cash.
Twenty crisp hundred-dollar bills. And something else.
A photo.
Old. Folded.
I, five years younger. Laughing. At the gallery. Alex’s arm was around me.
was
Why had he kept it?
Why now?
I stared at the girl in the picture. The girl who still believed in art and love and truth.
I didn’t know her anymore.
But maybe, just maybe, I could still fight for what she lost.
Not for him.
Not for me.
For Sophie.
Because if Alexander Thorne wanted a war, he’d get one.
But not the one he expected.
- Writer
