The dress was a weapon. A column of liquid sapphire, it draped over her body like a second skin, the neckline a daring plunge that felt less like an invitation and more like an excavation. The silk whispered against her legs as she walked, a sound that seemed to scream pretender in the tomb-like silence of the hallway. She felt like a sacrifice wrapped in finery, being led to an altar of polished silver and starched linen.
Dinner was a quiet, excruciating performance in a dining room large enough to host a battalion. They sat at opposite ends of a table that could have doubled as a landing strip, the distance between them a chasm filled with the ghosts of his family. Portraits of stern-faced Crowes looked down from the dark-paneled walls, their eyes seeming to follow her every move. A man with Alistair's jawline and cold eyes — his grandfather. A woman with a fragile smile — a grandmother she'd never know. And a larger, central portrait, partially shrouded in shadow, of a man who could only be Alistair's father.
"The venison is from the estate," Alistair said, his voice cutting through the clink of silver on porcelain. He took a sip of wine, his eyes on her, dissecting her reaction to the opulence, to the silence, to him. "We have our own stock."
"Of course you do," she murmured, pushing a piece of the perfectly cooked meat around her plate. Her appetite had fled the moment she'd seen the sketchbook.
"Is the food not to your liking?" he asked, his tone deceptively mild. "I can have the chef prepare something else."
"The food is fine." Her voice was tight. "The company is… illuminating."
A ghost of a smile touched his lips. "The dead make for poor conversationalists, I admit. But they are excellent listeners."
His gaze flickered to his father's portrait, and for a fleeting second, the mask of the cool, collected billionaire slipped, revealing a raw, bleeding wound of a boy. It was gone in an instant, but she'd seen it. The realization was a shard of ice in her gut. Markus was right. This wasn't just about her. He was punishing a ghost. She was just the stand-in.
After the torturous meal, he dismissed her with a wave of his hand. "The library is down the west corridor. You may find it… stimulating for your work. I have business to attend to."
It was another command disguised as a suggestion. She fled the dining room, the sapphire dress feeling like a chain. The west corridor was a gallery of more ancestors, their painted eyes accusing her. But the library, when she found it, was breathtaking. Two stories high, with a wrought-iron gallery, it smelled of old leather, yellowed paper, and beeswax. Thousands of books stood in silent, colorful rows, a universe of knowledge and escape.
She trailed her fingers along the spines, the titles a blur. She wasn't here to read. She was here to hide. To breathe air that wasn't saturated with his presence.
Her wandering took her to a secluded corner, behind a large globe that depicted a world from a century past. Her hip brushed against a shelf, and she heard a soft, unexpected click. Startled, she turned.
A section of the bookcase, perfectly disguised, had swung inward a few inches. A hidden door.
Her heart thudded against her ribs. This was a line. Crossing it was an act of defiance he would not forgive. But the sketchbook had already crossed every line. What was one more?
She pushed the door open wider. It revealed a small, windowless study, shrouded in dust motes dancing in a single sliver of light from the main library. The air was stale, thick with the scent of neglect and old grief.
And it was a shrine to her ruin.
The walls were a chaotic mosaic of yellowed newspaper clippings. Her father's name was circled in angry red ink in every headline. 'VANCE EM BEZZLEMENT SCANDAL ROCKS WALL STREET.' 'CROWE PATRIARCH'S SUICIDE LINKED TO PARTNER'S BETRAYAL.'
Her breath caught in her throat, a strangled sob. She stepped closer, her legs weak. There were financial reports, charts with nosediving lines, all annotated in a sharp, familiar script — a younger Alistair's handwriting, seething with fury.
And in the center of it all, pinned to a corkboard like a captured butterfly, was a photograph. A younger, happier Alistair, his arm slung around the shoulders of a handsome, smiling man with kind eyes — his father. The man who had died. The man whose death she was accused of causing.
This was the engine of his hatred. This small, dusty room was the cradle of the monster who had drawn her into his web. This was the pain that had festered for a decade, the wound he was determined to make her bleed for.
A floorboard creaked behind her.
She spun around, her hand flying to her throat.
Alistair stood in the doorway, his large frame blocking the light from the library. He wasn't looking at the clippings or the photo. His eyes were locked on her, and in their depths was a storm of such pure, unadulterated fury that the air left her lungs.
He took a slow, deliberate step into the room, the dust swirling around his polished shoes. His voice, when it came, was a low, dangerous whisper that vibrated through the very foundations of the house.
"This room," he said, his gaze stripping her bare, "is the one place in this world you were never meant to be."