BOUND BY DECEIT

CHAPTER TWO

SLOANE’S POV

The room is suffocating. Not in a physical sense, there's space, expensive furniture, and the soft glow of a lamp casting long shadows against the walls. But he's

there.

Luca stood just feet away, doing what I think is now his favorite thing to do. Watching her silently.

I felt his gaze like a weight, heavy, unyielding, dragging over me as if he were peeling me bare, layer by layer. He hadn’t spoken in seconds, but his silence said more than words ever could. He was waiting, waiting for me to break.

I wouldn’t. I couldn’t.

I straightened, wrists twisting against the restraints biting into my skin. "If you're going to kill me, can we just get over it? I have bigger problems to deal with.”

His lips curled with a hint of masked irritation. His dark eyes stare down at me, with so much, unreadable intensity. His eyes flicker down my body, taking in every detail. The ruined dress. The cuts on my skin from when he caught me. The way I keep trying to mask my exhaustion behind sharp words.

He doesn't answer right away, and somehow that's worse.

Luca steps forward, slow and deliberate. "Tell me, Emily.” His voice carried a smooth richness, laced with strength. “Do you always run your mouth, or is it only when you’re scared?”

I c**k my head slightly, my face giving nothing away.

"Maybe you just bring it out of me," I say, my tone laced with venom. "It's a gift."

He took another slow stride towards me.

I refuse to shrink back, even as my pulse pounds.

His close proximity feels lethal in ways I hadn't accounted for. Not just physically, but in how he pulls people in, manipulates them, and plays with them like they're nothing more than entertainment.

Like he's doing with me now.

His fingers reach out, and before I could think of flinching, they graze my jaw, his thumb pressing lightly against my pulse. Checking my reaction. Measuring. Calculating.

My body reacts to his touch making my breath lock in my throat.

"You lie well," he murmurs.

I force a smile. "You assume I'm lying."

His head tilts. "Am I wrong?"

“Yes. No. Maybe.”

I lift a brow. “Is that what you want to hear?”

His thumbs trace my skin, a lingering touch that twists low in my stomach. "I want the truth, Emily."

“The truth is always subjective."

His lips twitch again, and then, his fingers tighten.

Not painfully, but enough. Enough to remind me exactly who's in control. Enough to make my pulse stutter just slightly.

And he feels it too, making his gaze sharpen.

I clenched my teeth. He's trying to break me down, unsettle me, make me slip. And I won't, I can’t.

I force my voice to remain cool. “If scaring me is your goal, you’ll need to do better than that.”

Luca’s thumb lingers another second before he finally pulls back.

He moves to the bar across the room, pouring himself a drink. Like I’m not a problem. Like I’m not even worth rushing.

The silence stretches.

“You want to know something interesting?” he muses, watching the amber liquid in his glass swirl. “Innocent people don’t get this defensive.”

I scoff. “Oh? And how do they react?”

His gaze lifts, dark amusement flickering. “Less like they’re calculating an escape and more like they’re afraid.”

I shrugged. "Maybe you're just not as scary as you think"

Luca exhales a quiet laugh. "You think so?"

"Not sure yet."

His stare lingers too long. He's dissecting me again, pulling me apart without even touching me.

Then, finally, he moves. Fast. Too fast.

Before I could process it, he’s right in front of me again. The chair drags against the floor as he brings me closer, settling in with calmness that my knots stomach.”

At this distance, I pick up the subtle trace of how his high-end cologne scent, musky, earthly and expensive. It should repulse me, but it doesn't. And it pisses me off.

Luca leans in slightly. "You know what else is interesting?"

I raised a brow. "Your fascination with me?"

His smirk is slow, dangerous. "The fact that Damian did a background check on you, and guess what he found?"

My stomach plummets, with the adrenaline passing through my whole veins. I tried to school my face into perfect neutrality. “You won’t keep it to yourself.”

His gaze lingers another second before he exhales. “Nothing.”

A sharp exhale passed through me as they stayed silent.

"No past," he continues. "No history. No records. Just a pretty little void where life should be."

My fingers curl slightly against my sides.

“You get the issue, don’t you?” he murmurs, his tone softer now, no less dangerous. “People don’t just appear without a past.”

I forced myself to meet his gaze. "So what are you saying?"

Luca tilts his head slightly, considering me. Then he leans in, voice dropping to something almost intimate.

"I think you're a ghost, Emily."

I don’t react. Not even a blink. But inside? A slow, cold dread creeps in.

"A silly little ghost," he adds, his smirk barely there. "And you know what we do to ghosts in my world?"

My pulse pounds against my ribs.

I forced a smile. "What? Call an exorcist?"

Amusement flickers in his gaze, but he doesn’t bite, he moves.

He then pulls out a gun, making me stiffen, but he doesn’t aim it at me. Not yet.

Instead, he places it on the table beside him. Slow and deliberate enough for me to see.

“Tell me, Emily, he murmurs, voice deceptively soft. “Why are you here?”

Silence stretches, thick and heavy.

The gun sits there, a silent threat.

I could lie. I should lie.

But Luca is watching me too closely. Waiting. Expecting.

I swallow. I need to play this right.

So, I do the only thing I could possibly think of.

I ease back, tilt my head and let a smirk play on my lips.”

"Well," I say, voice smooth. That depends. Are you going to use it, or do you just enjoy putting on a show?” I say tilting my head toward the gun.

Luca's gaze flickers. Then he smiles.

And that’s when realization settles in.

I’m in a whole lot of trouble.