The Rolls-Royce moved through London's streets like a silent predator, its tinted windows reflecting the neon lights of the city. Seraphina sat rigid in the leather seat, acutely aware of Damien's presence beside her. He hadn't spoken since they'd left the academy, but she could feel his eyes on her like a physical weight.
"Where are you taking me?" she finally asked, hating how small her voice sounded in the expensive silence.
"Somewhere we can talk without interruption." His voice was velvet over steel. "You're going to want privacy for what I have to tell you."
Seraphina's fingers twisted in her lap. The events of the evening felt surreal—like a nightmare she couldn't wake up from. "That contract you mentioned... what did you mean?"
Damien reached into his jacket and pulled out an envelope, yellowed with age. "Your father wasn't just a suspected murderer, Miss Kane. He was also a very desperate man."
The car turned onto a private drive lined with towering oak trees. Through the windscreen, Seraphina caught her first glimpse of Blackwood Manor—a Gothic mansion that looked like it had been carved from shadows and moonlight.
"Seventeen years ago," Damien continued, "Marcus Kane came to my father with a proposition. He needed protection from some very dangerous people. People who believed he'd stolen something that belonged to them."
"Stolen what?"
"Information. About a series of murders that would have destroyed some of London's most powerful families." Damien's fingers drummed against the envelope. "The Ashfords weren't the only victims, you see. There were others. And your father knew who was responsible."
The car stopped in front of the manor's imposing front doors. Seraphina's mind reeled as she tried to process what he was telling her. "But if he knew who the real killer was, why didn't he—"
"Because the real killer was someone untouchable. Someone with enough power to destroy anyone who threatened to expose him." Damien's eyes met hers in the darkness. "Someone who's still very much alive."
A uniformed driver opened the door, and Damien stepped out, extending his hand to help her. Seraphina hesitated, every instinct screaming at her to run. But where could she go? Her scholarship was gone, her reputation destroyed, her future in ruins.
She took his hand.
The interior of Blackwood Manor was a testament to old money and older secrets. Dark wood paneling stretched up to vaulted ceilings, and oil paintings of stern-faced ancestors watched from gilded frames. Damien led her through corridors lined with priceless artifacts until they reached a study that looked like it hadn't changed in centuries.
"Brandy?" he asked, moving to a crystal decanter on the mantelpiece.
"I don't drink."
"Tonight, you might want to make an exception."
He poured two glasses anyway, setting one on the desk in front of her before settling into the leather chair behind it. The lamplight cast shadows across his face, making his features look even more severe.
"The contract," Seraphina said, unable to bear the suspense any longer.
Damien opened the envelope and withdrew a document written on heavy parchment. "In exchange for my family's protection, your father agreed to certain... terms."
"What kind of terms?"
"He placed you under our care. Permanently."
The words hit her like a physical blow. "He what?"
"You were three years old when he signed this. Old enough to be valuable as collateral, young enough that you wouldn't remember the transaction." Damien's voice was matter-of-fact, as if he were discussing the weather. "The arrangement was simple—my family would ensure your safety and provide for your education. In return, when you reached your twenty-first birthday, you would marry me."
Seraphina shot to her feet, the chair toppling backward. "That's insane. That's—"
"Binding."
The single word dropped between them like a stone in still water. Seraphina stared at him, searching his face for some sign that this was an elaborate joke. But his expression remained perfectly serious.
"You can't be serious. People don't arrange marriages in the twenty-first century. They don't trade their children like—"
"Like property?" Damien rose from his chair, moving around the desk with predatory grace. "Your father thought differently. He was quite specific about the terms. You would be educated at the finest schools, given every advantage, protected from anyone who might wish to harm you. And in return..."
"In return, I become your property." The words tasted like ash in her mouth.
"I prefer to think of it as a merger." His smile was sharp enough to draw blood. "Two bloodlines joining for mutual benefit."
Seraphina backed toward the door, her heart hammering against her ribs. "This is medieval. Barbaric. I won't—"
"Won't what?" Damien stepped closer, and she caught the scent of his cologne—something expensive and dangerous. "Won't honor your father's debts? Won't accept responsibility for the protection my family has provided all these years?"
"I never asked for your protection!"
"No. But you've benefited from it nonetheless." His voice dropped to a whisper. "Do you think it was coincidence that you received a scholarship to Blackthorne Academy? That your grades were always just high enough to maintain your standing? That every potential threat to your safety mysteriously disappeared before it could reach you?"
The room seemed to spin around her. "You're lying."
"Am I?" Damien pulled out his phone and scrolled through something. "Thomas Mitchell, age nineteen. Approached you outside your flat two years ago with less than honorable intentions. Currently serving time for assault charges he doesn't remember committing."
Seraphina's breath caught. She remembered Thomas—a university student who'd followed her home one night, making increasingly aggressive advances until he'd suddenly stopped coming around.
"Rebecca Thornton, age twenty-two. Your roommate's friend who decided to investigate your background for her journalism project. Accepted a position with a newspaper in Edinburgh rather suddenly, didn't she?"
"Stop." The word came out as barely a whisper.
"Jonathan Wright, age twenty-four. That charming literature professor who showed such particular interest in you last semester. Received a rather lucrative offer from Harvard that he couldn't refuse."
Each name hit her like a physical blow. All the people who'd gotten too close, who'd asked too many questions, who'd threatened to uncover her past—all of them gone.
"We've been watching over you your entire life, Seraphina." Damien was close enough now that she could see the flecks of silver in his gray eyes. "Protecting you. Investing in you. And now it's time to collect."
"I won't do it." The words came out stronger than she felt. "I won't marry you."
"Then you'll die."
The casual way he said it made her blood freeze. "What?"
"The people who killed the Ashford family, who framed your father, who've been hunting you for seventeen years—they're still out there. Still looking." Damien brushed a strand of hair from her face with deceptive gentleness. "Tonight's little performance at the academy? That was their opening move. Now that your identity is public, how long do you think it will take them to find you?"
Seraphina's legs gave out, and she sank into a chair. The brandy glass was still sitting on the desk, and she reached for it with shaking hands.
"There is another option," Damien said after she'd taken a sip of the burning liquid.
"What?"
"Help me find your father's killer. The real one. Help me destroy the people who framed him, who murdered innocent families, who've been pulling strings from the shadows for decades." His eyes were intense, hypnotic. "Marry me, and I'll give you something better than freedom."
"What's that?"
Damien's smile was all darkness and promise. "Revenge."
The word hung in the air between them like a poisonous flower. Seraphina stared into those pale gray eyes and saw something that terrified her—not just desire, not just possessiveness, but understanding. He knew what it was like to be trapped, to be used, to have your choices stolen before you were old enough to fight back.
"Why?" she whispered. "Why do you want to help me?"
Something flickered across his face—pain, maybe, or old anger. "Because seventeen years ago, they didn't just frame your father for murder. They killed mine too."
The glass slipped from Seraphina's fingers, shattering against the Persian rug. The sound seemed to echo in the sudden silence, mixing with the thunder of her heartbeat.
"The contract doesn't just bind you to me," Damien continued, his voice soft as silk and twice as dangerous. "It binds me to you. Your enemies are my enemies. Your pain is my pain. Your revenge..."
He leaned down until his lips were nearly touching her ear.
"Is my obsession."