Elias's office didn't have walls, it had boundaries made of reinforced glass. It sat at the very top of the Blackwood needle, a transparent cage where he could watch the city crawl like ants below his feet. Entering it always felt like stepping into a vacuum. The air was thinner here.
He didn't look up when I walked in. He was standing by the window, his back to me, his hands clasped behind his bespoke charcoal jacket. The silhouette was perfect, too perfect. Like something carved out of obsidian.
"You're three minutes late, Seraphina," he said. His voice wasn't loud, but it had a depth that seemed to vibrate in my very bones. "In this building, three minutes is the difference between a fortune and a bankruptcy."
"The elevators were slow," I lied, my voice steady despite the way my pulse was hammering against my throat. I stood in the center of the room, refusing to take the seat in front of his desk. I wouldn't let him look down on me.
"Excuses are for the mediocre," he murmured. He turned then.
Elias didn't move like a man of forty-two; he moved with a controlled, predatory grace that made my skin itch. He walked toward me, the distance closing with a terrifying lack of urgency.
He stopped just inches away, too close for an uncle, too close for a colleague.
"Julian says you're becoming 'difficult' regarding the Henderson account," he said. He reached out, his hand moving with detachment, and straightened the lapel of my white blazer.
I froze. I hated that I froze. I could stare down a boardroom of angry investors, but the sensation of his thumb brushing against the fabric of my suit made me feel like a bird pinned to a board. His touch was warm, disturbingly so, contrasting with the absolute coldness in his eyes.
"Julian is sensitive about his failures," I managed to say, my eyes locked on his silk tie. I wouldn't look up. I knew what I'd find if I did.
"Look at me when you speak, Seraphina."
It wasn't a request. It was an executive order.
I lifted my gaze. Elias was looking at me with a terrifyingly focused intensity. It wasn't just that he was watching me, he was dissecting the micro-expressions on my face, looking for the tremble in my lip, the dilation of my pupils.
He was hunting for the fear he knew was there.
"You think you're sharp," he whispered, his hand sliding from my lapel to the back of my neck. His fingers were heavy, a possessive weight that forced me to stay exactly where I was. He wasn't gripping me hard, but the threat was there, the knowledge that he could. "You think because you share Silas's blood, you are safe in this house."
"I am a Blackwood," I hissed, my bravado feeling like a thin sheet of glass under a hammer.
"You are a girl playing in a forest full of wolves," he countered. He leaned down, his breath warm against my ear, mocking the predatory chill of his words. "And I am the one who decides who gets eaten."
He let his fingers trail down my spine, a slow, deliberate path that sent a jolt of pure, unadulterated terror through my nervous system. It wasn't a sexual touch, not purely. It was a demonstration of ownership. A reminder that while Julian might watch me from the doorway, Elias was already inside the room.
"The Henderson account stays," he said, pulling back just enough to look into my eyes again. He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. It was a sharp, clinical expression. "You did well to spot the liabilities. It showed... instinct."
"Then why the lecture?" I asked, my voice breathy.
"Because instinct without discipline is just a tantrum," he said. He walked back to his desk, the transition so sudden it felt like the floor had dropped out from under me. He sat down, immediately opening a folder, his demeanor returning to that of the detached CFO. "Friday night. Don't be late. And wear the pearls I sent to your room."
He didn't look up again. I was dismissed.
I walked out of that office with my head held high, my heels clicking a steady rhythm on the marble. But the moment the elevator doors closed and I was alone, I slumped against the wall, my breath coming in jagged gasps.
My neck still burned where his hand had rested. He was a monster, a cold, calculating machine that saw me as a piece of property. And the worst part, the part that made me want to scream, was that for a split second, when he'd whispered in my ear, I hadn't just felt fear. I had felt seen.
And in this family, being seen was the most dangerous thing of all.