Married to My Enemy's Son

First Look, First War

The forty-second floor of the Voss Tower was nothing like what I had imagined.

I didn’t know what I was picturing, really. Perhaps something more... menacing. Black stone walls, maybe. Armed guards at the door. Lighting dimmed deliberately to create a dramatic effect.

What I found instead: light gray carpet, glass walls overlooking the Jakarta skyline, and a receptionist with her hair pulled into a neat bun who greeted me with a perfectly trained, professional smile.

"Ms. Ashford?" She already knew my name. Of course she did. "Mr. Voss is waiting in the conference room."

*Which Mr. Voss*, I thought, but didn't say.

I followed her through a hallway that was too clean, too symmetrical, and too quiet for an office that supposedly managed half of Jakarta's property portfolio. My low heels made no sound on the thick carpet. It was like walking on something that absorbed all noise. All resistance.

The receptionist stopped in front of a frosted glass door. Knocked twice. Opened it.

"Please, go in."

There were two people in the room.

The first, sitting at the end of a long table: Nathan Voss. I recognized him from the photos I’d seen in business magazines—hair graying at the temples, a dark gray suit, a face that held its expression with extreme precision. Like a mask that had been worn so long it had merged with his skin.

He smiled as I entered. A polite smile that didn't reach his eyes at all.

The second was standing by the window, back to the room, staring out at the city glittering under the scorching afternoon sun.

I had expected to meet a middle-aged man. Someone my father's age, perhaps. Someone I could easily hate from a safe distance.

The man who turned when the door closed behind me was barely thirty—broad shoulders in a black suit, a jaw that looked like it was used to being clenched, and a pair of dark gray eyes that immediately fixed on me in a way that left no room for pleasantries.

Those eyes weren't asking *who are you*.

They already knew who I was. And they were deciding what to do with that information.

One second. Two seconds. Three.

I stared back at him.

"Elara." Nathan Voss stood up, extending a hand. "Good to finally meet you. You’re exactly as Richard described."

I shook his hand. Firm, not hard. There is a difference. "Unfortunately, I can't say the same, Mr. Nathan. My father didn't tell me much about you."

Something shifted in the corner of Nathan's eyes—not offense, more like *interest*. Like someone who had just discovered a new variable in his calculations.

"This is Damian." He nodded toward the man still standing by the window. "My son."

Damian Voss didn't offer his hand. He simply watched me from about three meters away with an expression I couldn't read—not angry, not polite, not interested. Empty. Controlled. Like a screen that had been turned off on purpose.

"Ms. Ashford," he finally said. His voice was deeper than I’d imagined, and he pronounced my name like two syllables chosen with extreme caution.

Not a greeting. Not a question. Just... an acknowledgment of existence.

"Mr. Voss," I replied in the same tone.

Nathan Voss sat back down, a subtle cue for us all to take our seats. I chose the chair on the opposite side of the table from Damian—not out of fear, but because I needed to be able to see both their faces at once.

Tactical, after all.

"I’m glad we could meet in a... more personal setting," Nathan said, opening a folder in front of him. "I trust Richard has explained the situation."

"The situation." I nodded. "Yes. He explained."

"And you are willing."

Not a question. I noted that.

"I am here," I said. "Is that sufficient for now?"

To my right, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Damian shift his position. Very slightly. Almost imperceptibly. But I noticed.

Nathan smiled again. "Of course. Let's talk about the details—"

"Before that." I placed my hands on the table, fingers tight, a posture I’d acquired from three years of studying contract negotiation in London. "I want to know one thing."

Nathan waited.

"Why now?" I asked. "This debt has existed for twelve years. Damian—" I mentioned his name without the title, deliberately, to gauge his reaction. "—has been a grown man for years. Why choose to collect right now?"

Silence.

Not an awkward silence. A chosen one.

Nathan opened his mouth to answer, but the voice that came out instead was from my right.

"Because only now is there a reason."

I turned to Damian.

He was looking at his father, not me, with an expression that hadn't changed at all. But there was something in the corner of his eyes—something sharp and cold and not entirely neutral.

Nathan didn't look surprised by the interruption. But his smile shifted slightly. "Damian is right. Timing is always about context."

An answer that answered nothing.

I filed that question away in a place I would revisit later.

The next hour was about numbers, deadlines, and clauses read by Nathan’s lawyer in a monotone voice that would have put me to sleep had I not forced myself to record every word in my head.

I didn't bring my own lawyer. My father offered, but I refused. I had studied business law for three years—enough to know which clauses were fair and which weren't, and more than enough that I didn't need someone else to translate them for me.

Damian didn't say much during the session. He sat with one hand on the table and one hand on the arm of his chair, occasionally glancing at the documents, but more often staring at a point in space just above my head. Like a man who was physically present but had long ago decided he didn't want to be here.

That, at least, was one more thing we had in common.

"Article seventeen," the lawyer said, "stipulates that for the duration of the agreement, both parties are required to appear as a legitimate couple at all public and family events related to the Voss Group and Ashford Holdings—"

"The definition of 'appearing as a legitimate couple'," I interrupted, "needs to be clarified. Does this include social media? Public statements? Or is physical presence together sufficient?"

The lawyer glanced at Nathan. Nathan nodded.

"Physical presence and verbal confirmation when necessary," the lawyer replied.

"I want that explicitly included in the article, not assumed."

"Elara." Nathan's voice sounded like a warning wrapped in elegance.

"I studied law, Mr. Nathan." I smiled politely. "I know that assumptions are where disputes are most often born."

This time, a different kind of silence came from Damian’s direction.

I didn't turn. But I felt him watching me in a slightly different way than before.

The meeting ended at two in the afternoon.

Nathan shook my hand again at the door, mentioning words like *pleasure* and *family* and *a bright future* in a tone that made me want to check my purse once I left. I replied to every word with a smile I ensured reached my eyes—because a smile that doesn't reach the eyes is too easy to read for someone like Nathan Voss.

Damian didn't come to the door. He had already turned back toward the window while the lawyer gathered the documents.

I was halfway to the door when his voice sounded.

"Ms. Ashford."

I stopped. Turned around.

Damian was still facing away from the room, looking at the city below. "You didn't sign anything today."

"There was nothing to sign today," I replied. "This was an initial meeting."

"You know you’ll end up signing the contract anyway."

"Many things happen eventually." I shrugged slightly. "That doesn't mean we can't manage the process."

A brief silence.

Then Damian finally turned. And for the first time since I arrived, he didn't look at me with that empty expression—there was something else, something sharper, closer to something that might, if I really forced an interpretation, be called *surprise*.

"You’re not what I imagined," he said finally.

I tilted my head slightly. "I’ll take that as a compliment."

"Don't."

I smiled—the first smile I hadn't forced since entering the building. "Good afternoon, Mr. Voss."

I left before he could answer.

Inside the elevator descending to the lobby, I leaned against the cold metal wall and let the smile finally fade from my face.

My heart was beating harder than I wanted to admit.

Not because of fear. Not because of nerves.

Because Damian Voss, with all his silence and dark gray stares, was a much more complicated problem than I’d anticipated. I had come with the expectation of finding a man who was easy to read—arrogant, entitled, the type I could fight with arguments and a cold smile.

What I found was someone who was hiding something behind his emptiness. And worse than that—someone who seemed to be doing the same to me.

The elevator doors opened in the lobby.

I stepped out into the humid Jakarta air, took a deep breath, and reminded myself of one simple rule I had to keep from this day forward.

*Don't find out what he's hiding.*

*Because if you start getting curious about your enemy, you’ve already half-lost.*

But even as the taxi took me home through buildings reflecting the afternoon sun, I was still thinking about one sentence he had spoken.

*Only now is there a reason.*

He hadn't been answering my question.

He had been answering a different question—one meant for his own father.

And the tone he had used, quiet and flat and too controlled to be mere small talk, said one thing he likely hadn't intended to say in front of me:

Damian Voss was no happier about this marriage than I was.

But his reasons were *different*.

And that difference was what made it dangerous.

*Three weeks later, I moved into the Voss mansion in Menteng.*

*With one suitcase, one resolution, and one question I couldn't forget:*

*What does Nathan Voss actually want from this marriage—and why does his own son look like a man who wasn't told the full answer?*