Behind Glass
1212 Words
AUTHOR’S POV
A FEW DAYS BEFORE THAT
Rowan sat in his office, his pen gripped tightly in his hand, not writing anything.
He had been sitting like that for a while now. Thoughts piling on thoughts, and one kept pushing to the surface no matter how many times he shoved it back down.
He set the pen down, stood up, and buttoned his jacket.
“Cancel all my meetings for the day.”
His PA barely had time to respond before he was already walking out.
He drove himself to the club. No driver, no entourage. Just him and the road and the silence he was trying to fill.
When he walked in, Daniel spotted him first.
“Oh, the man of the hour finally shows up.” Daniel grinned, leaning back in his seat.
Rowan didn’t respond. He dropped into the chair across from them, elbow on the table, chin resting in his hand. His jaw was tight. His eyes were somewhere else entirely.
“Didn’t you say you had back-to-back meetings today?” his other friend, Marcus, asked.
“Cancelled them.”
Marcus raised a brow. “All of them?”
“All of them.”
Daniel and Marcus exchanged a look. Neither said anything for a moment.
Then Rowan lifted his hand, palm open, and held it out toward Daniel without even looking at him.
Daniel sighed, reached behind him, and dropped a thick file onto Rowan’s palm.
“You know I can’t keep doing this,” Daniel said. “Having someone follow her around, pulling pictures, sending reports. You know that right?”
Rowan was already opening the file.
Inside were photographs. Printed, arranged, dated.
Rhea at school.
Rhea walking across campus with her bag hanging off one shoulder.
Rhea laughing at something, her head thrown back slightly.
Rhea sitting outside with a book she clearly wasn’t reading.
He went through them slowly. One by one.
His whole body unwound, his shoulders dropping from where they had been locked near his ears. A small smile moved across his mouth before he could stop it, quick and quiet, gone almost as fast as it came.
“You know what your problem is?” Marcus said. “She is literally living under your roof and you are sitting here looking at printed pictures of her like some kind of—”
“She is an antique,” Daniel cut in, amused. “To be seen and preserved. Admired from a safe distance. Our friend here does not touch his prized possessions.”
“That is not admiration, that is a problem,” Marcus muttered. “You don’t want her but you don’t want anyone else to want her either. That is not normal.”
“He is a possessive control freak.” Daniel muttered.
Rowan ignored both of them. He was in the last picture now. She was wearing a yellow dress and she was smiling at her phone and something about the image made his chest feel strange.
He closed the file.
A girl in a bikini appeared at his side not long after, carrying a glass of whiskey on a small tray. She stopped in front of him and turned slowly, the way someone does when they want to be looked at.
“Do you like it?” she asked softly. “Same design you requested.”
Rowan looked up.
He bit down on his lower lip, the memory flashing through his head again. Rhea in that bikini. The moment she walked into the pool. The water slid down her skin in tiny droplets, the slow sway of her waist as she moved.
He swallowed hard and pushed to his feet.
“Come with me,” he said, pulling the girl along behind him.
What followed soon after were muffled moans, heavy breaths, and low grunts echoing through the night.
⸻
Days passed and nothing got better.
If anything, it got worse.
He sat through meetings that ran for hours and absorbed nothing. Words went in and disappeared before they could settle. He found himself pausing mid-sentence during calls, losing his place, irritated at himself in a way he couldn’t explain to anyone around him.
And avoiding her.
That was the part that cost him the most.
He had started leaving earlier than necessary in the mornings, before the house fully woke up. Taking the back staircase when he heard her moving around the kitchen.
Once, he had been coming down the hall when he heard her voice from the living room, talking to one of the house staff about something small.
He had stopped walking.
Stood there for a full minute.
Then turned around and went back the way he came.
He was not avoiding her because he didn’t want to see her.
That was exactly the problem.
⸻
One evening, after a very confused day, he ended up at the club again without quite deciding to go there.
He was standing by the bar, one hand wrapped around a glass of whiskey, the other pressed to the back of his neck. He wasn’t drinking it. Just holding it.
Daniel and Marcus sat nearby watching him the way people watch someone they’re slightly concerned about but don’t know how to say so.
Marcus gave up first.
“Someone is in a bad mood.”
“I am not in a bad mood,” Rowan said. “I needed a drink.”
“He is not in a bad mood,” Marcus said to Daniel very deliberately. “He is going quietly insane over a college girl he refuses to admit he wants because admitting things is beneath him apparently.”
Rowan turned and looked at him.
Marcus looked away immediately.
“Are the girls ready?” Rowan asked after a moment.
Daniel nodded slowly. “Private room.”
They walked back together.
The room was large and dim. A line of girls stood near the far wall, heads slightly lowered, dressed carefully.
Rowan walked the line slowly, unhurried, pausing at each face, tilting some of them up to look properly.
He reached the end.
Stepped back.
“This is all?” He asked.
“Last group,” Daniel said from behind him. “Unless you want us to start looking at cosmetic alterations to get closer to what you have in your head.” He said it like a joke.
Rowan didn’t laugh. “Why haven’t I thought of that?”
“Stop encouraging him,” Marcus said under his breath.
Rowan walked the line again. Slower this time. He wasn’t looking for beauty — he was looking for something specific. Something in the eyes, the jaw, the way a face sat. He stopped in front of one girl near the end. She was closest. Not identical, but closest.
He picked up a folded dress from the table beside him and held it out to her.
Then he reached out and held her jaw lightly, just long enough to look at her properly.
“You’re Rhea tonight,” he said, his voice low and commanding.
The girl nodded immediately.
“What’s your name?” Rowan asked, his eyes fixed on her.
“Rhea,” she answered softly.
A slow smile tugged at Rowan’s lips.
“Good.”
- Writer
