My Sinful Desire

Flashbacks

Archie’s hand remained on my waist, its branding heat burning straight through the thin fabric of my blouse. The living room around us had gone utterly still. Even the air seemed to hold its breath.

My heart hammered violently against my ribs.

I forced myself to look up, and my eyes locked with his. The playful, mocking smirk he usually wore was gone. In its place was something darker, heavier. An intensity that frightened me far more than his teasing ever had.

“Why?” I whispered, my voice barely audible. “Why did you take a bullet for me, Archie?”

He didn’t blink.

His fingers tightened slightly against my hip, pulling me closer. A low, rough breath escaped him, brushing warmly against my cheek.

“I don’t know,” he murmured.

His gaze dropped to my lips before slowly returning to my eyes. There was something raw in his expression. Something strangely vulnerable.

“Maybe this attraction… the s*x I want to have with you… maybe it has turned to love.”

The word hung between us.

Love.

It felt awkward. Wrong, somehow.

I didn’t know what frightened me more—the fact that he had said it or the strange sensation that stirred inside my chest when I heard it.

A cold shiver ran down my spine, breaking through the heat of his touch. I placed my palms against his chest, feeling the hard muscle beneath his shirt, and gently but firmly pushed myself backward.

“Too bad I am your father’s wife,” I said, forcing the words past my trembling lips.

I crossed my arms over my chest, gripping my elbows as though I could physically hold myself together.

Archie didn’t back down.

Instead, he stepped forward, closing the distance I had just created. His eyes flashed with sudden, fierce anger.

“I don’t care if you are my father’s wife,” he snapped, his voice dropping into an intense hiss. “He doesn’t deserve you. Anyone with eyes can see that.”

He paused.

His gaze softened slightly as he studied my pale, tired face.

“And if I may ask… why did you marry my father? I can see you’re not happy being here. You look like a prisoner in this house.”

A dry, bitter laugh escaped me. It scraped against my throat.

I looked away from him, letting my eyes wander across the leather furniture, the massive crystal chandelier, and the heavy doors that always seemed to remind me of just how trapped I was.

“Well… it’s quite a long story,” I whispered.

My shoulders sagged beneath the weight of memories I had spent years trying to bury.

A small, gentle smile touched Archie’s lips. The dangerous edge in his expression faded, replaced by something almost warm.

He sank onto the edge of the leather sofa, wincing slightly when his injured shoulder shifted, but his eyes never left my face.

“I have all day, Mom,” he said, dragging out the title with that familiar, quiet irony. “Tell me about it.”

I closed my eyes.

For a moment, the living room disappeared.

The leather, the chandelier, the expensive furniture—all of it dissolved into the grey, freezing shadows of the past.

Five years ago, the world smelled of cheap bleach and dirty mop water.

I could still remember the rough wooden handle of the broom scraping against the blisters on my palms. I had been wearing a faded, oversized grey uniform, my hair pulled back with a cheap elastic band as I scrubbed the scuffed linoleum floors of a massive, sterile office building downtown.

It was one of the many shipping companies Matthew owned—a clean, legitimate front that helped conceal the dark, bloody machinery of his real operations.

Back then, I knew nothing about that side of his life.

To me, he was simply the terrifyingly wealthy boss who occasionally walked through the lobby surrounded by men in dark suits.

I remembered the exact feeling of cold sweat against my skin the day the phone call came from the county hospital.

The doctor’s voice had been flat. Exhausted.

And completely devoid of hope.

My younger brother, Leo, was dying.

A rare and aggressive heart defect was shutting his body down. The surgery cost more money than I could have earned in three lifetimes, and the hospital refused to schedule the operating room without a massive down payment.

Desperation turned my blood to ice.

I dropped my mop, soapy water splashing over my worn shoes, and ran straight up the grand marble staircase, ignoring my supervisor shouting after me.

I burst through the doors of Matthew’s private office, my breath coming in ragged, sobbing gasps.

Matthew sat behind a massive glass desk, calmly counting through a thick stack of crisp hundred-dollar bills.

The papery sound of the money filled the quiet room.

“Sir,” I gasped.

I dropped to my knees on the plush carpet, clasping my hands so tightly that my knuckles turned white.

“Please, sir. My brother is really sick. He’s in the hospital, and he could die anytime. I need money for his surgery. Please, sir, help me. I’ll work for free for the rest of my life. Just save him.”

Matthew didn’t even look up.

He finished counting a bundle, snapped a rubber band around it with a sharp crack, and finally lifted his eyes to me.

There was no sympathy in them.

Not even a trace.

His face was a mask of pure, unbothered cruelty.

“Do I look like your father?” he asked, his voice completely flat.

“No, sir,” I whispered.

A tear slipped down my cheek.

“Then get out of my sight.”

He turned his attention back to the next stack of bills as though I had ceased to exist.

He waved a dismissive hand toward the door.

“Guards, take her out.”

Two men in black suits appeared from the shadows of the doorway.

Their heavy hands closed around my upper arms. Their fingers dug so deeply into my skin that I knew they would leave bruises.

They dragged me backward across the carpet, my toes scraping helplessly against the floor.

I screamed.

I begged.

I pleaded until the doors slammed shut in my face.

An hour later, the hospital corridor smelled of old floor wax, rubbing alcohol, and the stale, lingering scent of despair.

I sat on a hard plastic chair outside the intensive care unit with my face buried in my hands.

The rhythmic electronic beep… beep… beep of the heart monitors inside the room felt like a clock counting down my brother’s life.

Then the door opened with a soft swish.

Dr. Stephan stepped out, pulling off his surgical mask. His eyes were heavy with pity.

“Elena,” he said softly, placing a hand on my trembling shoulder.

I looked up at him.

“Your brother has barely forty-eight hours left. The fluid is building up around his lungs. If the surgery is not carried out within that window, I’m afraid you will lose him.”

My breath caught.

“I advise you to hurry up and find a way as soon as possible.”

His words struck me like a physical blow.

Forty-eight hours.

Two days.

That was all I had.

I couldn’t think.

I couldn’t plan.

I simply ran.

I rushed out of the hospital lobby as the glass doors slid open into a curtain of pouring rain. I hailed a yellow taxi, climbed inside, and watched my soaked clothes stain the cracked vinyl seat.

I gave the driver the only address I could think of.

Matthew’s.

Weeks earlier, I had secretly looked at his private file in the office directory.

I had never imagined I would need that information.

Now, Matthew was my absolute last hope—the only man I knew who had enough money to buy my brother’s life.

When the taxi finally stopped at the high iron gates of the estate, rain came down in blinding sheets.

The mansion loomed in the distance like a dark stone fortress.

There were security officers everywhere.

They wore heavy black slickers, their hands resting ominously near the holsters at their hips.

The moment I scrambled out of the cab, splashing through the deep puddles, three guards stepped in front of me.

Their faces were grim and unyielding beneath the flashes of lightning.

“Get back!” one of them shouted over the roar of thunder. “No visitors. Leave the property immediately.”

“Please!” I screamed.

Rain stung my eyes, mixing with the hot tears streaming down my face.

“I need to see Mr. Matthew! It’s life or death! Let me in!”

I tried to push past them, grabbing desperately at the cold iron bars of the gate.

One of the guards seized my shoulder and spun me around.

Another drew his weapon.

The dark metal of the pistol gleamed beneath the storm.

The barrel pointed directly at my chest.

For one terrifying second, I thought I was going to die there.

Standing in the mud.

Alone.

At the mercy of men who carried no mercy in their hearts.

Then, before the guard could pull the trigger, a sharp, crackling sound came from the intercom mounted on the stone pillar.

“Let her in.”

Matthew’s voice boomed through the static, cold and dry despite the raging storm.

The guards lowered their weapons immediately.

The heavy iron gates groaned open with a slow, mechanical whine.

I didn’t wait.

I ran.

I raced up the long, winding driveway, my breath burning in my throat, rainwater streaming down my face.

Until finally, I reached the grand stone porch.