Ardyn's Pov

I turned nineteen today.

There was no cake. No candles. Just the sound of a bolt locking behind me, and the click of heels on marble as I was led through the halls of a place women never left untouched.

The brothel was nothing like the gutter I'd grown up in. Velvet curtains, chandeliers dripping in crystal, and the air thick with perfume and lust. But I knew what it was the moment I stepped through the door. A whorehouse for the powerful. A showroom for the desperate. And I... I was the new doll on the shelf.

I didn't cry. That part of me died years ago.

I just stood there, wearing the black silk slip they gave me. Thin enough to see the curve of my breasts, the shape of my nipples, the hard points of my thighs. One of the women tried to do my makeup-red lips, smudged liner-but I wiped it away the first chance I got.

I didn't want to look like a whore.

Not when I hadn't even been touched yet.

They said virgins fetched a higher price. That men paid fortunes for the privilege of being the first. I wasn't naive enough to believe I'd be special. I was property now. Owned. And I hated that some dark, twisted part of me liked the feeling.

I stood in a line of girls, all of us barely legal. Men in tailored suits circled like predators. They stared. Whispered. Placed bids.

Then he walked in.

He didn't look at anyone. Not at first.

Tall, sharply cut suit in charcoal black. Black gloves. A face carved from ice-angles, shadows, and a mouth that looked like it had never smiled. His eyes... God, his eyes. Pale silver like moonlight, empty and dangerous.

When his gaze landed on me, the air left my lungs.

He didn't blink. He didn't speak. He simply raised his hand and pointed.

"That one."

The owner-a bloated man named Vass who smelled like cigars and rot-coughed. "She hasn't been touched, Mr. Thorn. Are you sure?"

The man-Thorn, they called him-glanced at me again. "That's exactly why I want her. Wrap her up."

No negotiation. No bidding war.

He just bought me.

I didn't know if I should be relieved or terrified. I didn't even get to say goodbye to the girls. One moment I was a product on display; the next, I was shoved into a black car with windows so dark I couldn't see the city outside.

No one spoke on the drive. Not the driver, not the bodyguard with the scar across his mouth. And definitely not the man who owned me now.

I stole glances when I thought he wasn't looking.

He never moved. Never fidgeted. Just stared out the window, his jaw clenched tight, the vein in his temple twitching like he was holding back something feral.

When we arrived, I thought it was a hotel.

It wasn't.

It was his mansion.

Marble steps. Wrought-iron gates. Massive doors that opened into cold luxury and darker silence.

He walked ahead of me, not once checking if I followed.

Inside, a housekeeper appeared out of nowhere. Older, strict. She bowed to him and handed me a folded bundle of black clothes.

"She's to wear this," he said. His voice was smooth but sharp-like velvet stretched over a blade. "She'll be kept in the east wing. She is not to enter my private quarters. Ever. She will obey. She will be silent. She will not lie."

"And if I do?" I asked before I could stop myself.

He turned to me then.

The heat of his eyes wasn't lust. It was command. Pure, total dominance that made my thighs clench and my breath hitch.

"If you lie, little girl," he said, stepping closer until I had to tilt my head to look up at him, "I'll make you beg for the punishment."

My skin flushed. Not with fear.

With want.

He turned away. "Welcome to your new life, maid."

That night, I lay in the narrow bed in the room they'd given me. Stark walls. Thin sheets. No phone. No clock.

Only my thoughts.

Only the sound of his footsteps down the hall.

For days, I cleaned. Polished. Dusted shelves that probably hadn't seen sunlight in years. He never spoke to me again. Not directly. He gave orders to the staff, and they relayed them to me. But I watched him. Every chance I got.

He always wore gloves. He never smiled. And he never brought home guests.

Until one night... he did.

I wasn't supposed to be near his wing. But I couldn't help it. I wanted to see what kind of man he was behind those heavy doors.

So I crept down the hall, barefoot, holding my breath as I pressed my ear to the thick wood.

Voices. A woman's moan. Then silence.

I dared a glance through the crack in the door.

He stood behind her-blonde, tall, flawless. Naked. Bent over the armrest of a black leather chair.

He didn't fuck her. Not really.

He touched her like she was beneath him. Gloved fingers between her legs, working her open while he whispered something I couldn't hear. Her moans grew desperate, wild, as if she didn't even care he wasn't inside her. He didn't kiss her. Didn't undress. Just watched her break apart under his hands.

When she came, she cried out his name-Caelum-and he didn't even flinch.

He just walked away while she collapsed onto the floor, used and shaking.

That night, I touched myself for the first time.

I couldn't stop thinking about the way his hand moved. The way his voice sounded like power and sin and ice.

But it wasn't enough.

I wanted to be the one moaning. The one he watched.

The one he ruined.

I became obsessed. I started lingering in the halls longer than I should. Watching him from shadows. I learned his routines, the way his jaw ticked when he was angry, the slight smile he gave when one of his businesses succeeded.

And every night, I touched myself to the memory of that cold, beautiful man who owned me.

Until tonight.

It had been a long day. He'd been in meetings. I'd spent hours scrubbing floors, my knees aching, my dress clinging to sweat-slick skin. The staff was asleep. The house was quiet.

So I snuck into the bathroom on the second floor. The one with the glass walls and heated floors. The one I wasn't allowed to use.

The water was scalding hot. I let it beat down on me, washing away the filth, the rules, the shame. I closed my eyes and slid my fingers between my thighs.

I pictured him. His hands. His mouth. The way he made that woman fall apart with a single touch.

I moaned.

Soft, quiet.

But I didn't hear the door open.

I didn't hear him come in.

I only opened my eyes when I felt the cold draft of air hit my back-and the heavy silence behind me that didn't belong.

I turned slowly.

There he was.

Standing at the edge of the shower. Fully dressed. Hands behind his back. Watching.

His eyes didn't blink. Didn't waver.

I was naked. Wet. Flushed. Fingers still between my thighs.

He stepped forward.

And I couldn't breathe.