he city lights shimmered like a mirage behind Silas as he stepped out of the hotel suite, Camilla's perfume still clinging faintly to his collar. The night air was sharp, brushing cold fingers along his neck. But he welcomed the chill. It helped clear the haze of artificial comfort.
He walked.
Through silent alleys of Riverton, under the pale cast of streetlamps that flickered like dying stars. The world had quieted, but the noise in his mind only grew louder. Grace.
She was everywhere—in the arch of a stranger's back, in the swing of a woman's laugh, in the curve of moonlight on a car window. It wasn't enough. Fantasies weren't enough. He needed more.
Her face haunted him—not the public persona, flawless and untouchable, but the woman beneath—the enigma behind those piercing grey eyes. The way her laugh had sliced through the gala's tense air, laced with something sharp and dangerous. The sly curve of her lips when she spoke to Julian, as if hiding secrets meant only for her. Every detail looped endlessly in his mind, sharper and more vivid than the film footage he'd just left behind.
Needed her.
Silas didn't remember deciding to go. His feet simply moved, guided by the gravity of obsession. The same way he knew the names of her stylists, the coffee shop she hated, the man who kissed her hand at the last gala. All surface details, all planted trails. Grace had made sure the world only saw what she wanted them to see.
But tonight, he didn't want files or photographs. He wanted proximity.
Loneliness gnawed at him like a living beast. Surrounded by adoring fans and flashing cameras, yet he was hollow inside. That aching void had only one remedy: Grace.
Why her? Why now? The thought twisted inside him like a dark seed taking root. It wasn't just curiosity—it was obsession, the kind that clawed beneath his skin and burned through reason. She was a prize he hadn't known he wanted, a puzzle he was desperate to solve. And more than that—he needed her.
Silas's steps carried him without direction, pulled by some invisible thread until he stood beneath her penthouse tower. The glass giant gleamed coldly under the moon, a fortress of secrets perched high above the city. Grace's domain, untouchable and distant.
He tilted his head back and stared up at her window, black as the night itself. He couldn't see her, but he felt her presence, a weight pressing down on his chest. That feeling—that electric tension—sent a thrill crawling along his spine.
He did not need to see her tonight. No. The anticipation was more intoxicating than any sight could be. The thought that soon he would watch her every move, learn every hidden corner of her life, stalk her silently like a shadow—it thrilled him, twisted his mind into delicious knots.
Madness? Maybe. But Silas welcomed the madness. It gave shape to the emptiness, turned his sleepless nights into something alive. It gave his existence meaning beyond the surface, beyond the lights and the cameras.
He imagined himself slipping into her world, a ghost unseen but always present. Watching. Waiting. Knowing. She would never suspect the depths of his obsession, not yet.
The city buzzed around him, indifferent. Cars passed, lights flickered, but Silas remained rooted in place—a dark silhouette carved against the neon glow.
He whispered to the night, "Soon, Grace. Soon."
Because in the twisted dance of hunter and prey, Silas Vale was no longer just an actor with a charming smile. He was a man possessed, and Grace Laurent—the woman behind those cold grey eyes—was the prize he was determined to claim.