The mansion was a tomb of silent, echoing marble that afternoon.
Seeking some kind of release from the jagged glass of her thoughts, Aria had lowered herself into the Jacuzzi.
She hadn't turned on the heater. She let the water stay biting and ice-cold, the temperature stinging her skin like a thousand needles. It was a physical pain she could focus on, a distraction from the hollow, shattered emptiness Ethan had left in her heart. Every time she blinked, she saw him the man she had loved handing her over to Anderson like she was a piece of unwanted luggage.
The sharp, digital trill of her Samsung phone vibrating against the stone floor finally shattered her trance. Shivering so hard her teeth rattled, Aria climbed out, wrapping her damp hair in a heavy towel. She pulled on a plush blue bathrobe and slid into her slippers, her body numb, though her mind was starting to burn with a new, confusing heat.
As she stood before the mirror blowing her hair dry, her eyes drifted to the gown hanging on the door. It was a deep, midnight navy blue, the color of a storm at sea. When she finally slipped it on, she froze. It was an off-shoulder design that exposed the elegant curve of her neck and the pale, fragile line of her collarbones, making her look extraordinarily, breathtakingly beautiful like a dark diamond pulled from the earth.
What shook her most wasn't the beauty, but the fit. It was perfect. Every seam, every inch of silk hugged her curves as if it had been molded to her skin. Anderson had never used a tape measure. He hadn't even touched her. He had simply looked at her once with those predatory, calculating eyes and known her exact proportions. The realization sent a shiver of comfortable attraction down her spine; it was terrifying how well a stranger already understood her body.
She walked downstairs, the scent of expensive cedar and cold rain announcing Anderson's presence before she even saw him. But he wasn't alone. Lillian was there, holding a silver earring and wearing a smile that didn't reach her sharp eyes.
"Aria! I had to come back for this heirloom," Lillian chirped, her artificial floral perfume cloying and suffocating in the air. As Anderson entered the room, Lillian's gaze shifted, turning hungry. She staged a "slip," her body tilting in a practiced, graceful fall toward him.
Anderson didn't move an inch. He watched with a face like granite as Lillian scrambled to catch herself, her heels making a desperate, screeching sound against the floor. The silence that followed was thick with the metallic taste of Aria's rising jealousy. When Lillian reached out to touch his arm, Aria snapped. She stepped forward, her cold fingers wrapping firmly around Anderson's scorching-hot wrist.
"I don't like it," Aria whispered, her voice raw with a possessiveness she didn't know she possessed. "I don't like her touching you."
Lillian's face contorted, but before she could speak, Anderson's voice cut through the room like a guillotine.
"You were told to leave, Lillian," he said. His voice was flat, devoid of any human emotion. He looked down at the hand Lillian had used to graze his sleeve. "If you ever step foot in this house again, or if your skin so much as brushes mine, I will have your fingers cut off. One by one. Do not test me."
Lillian went pale, the blood draining from her face as she turned and fled into the night. Aria stood there, her heart racing. She felt a strange surge of relief, leaning into the warmth of his side. She looked up at his handsome, straight face, thinking the threat was just his way of being dark and protective an extreme "CEO" exaggeration to scare a rival away.
She had no idea that to Anderson, it wasn't a threat at all. It was a promise.
"You're shaking," Anderson murmured, his dark eyes dropping to her exposed shoulders, his gaze lingering on her beauty with a hunger that made the room feel small.
"I... I didn't think you'd be that mean to her," Aria whispered, her fingers still curled around his wrist.
"I'm only 'mean' to things that try to touch what belongs to me," he replied. He stepped closer, his shadow consuming her, the scent of power and cedar wrapping around her like a cage she no longer wanted to escape. "And right now, Aria, you're the only thing I see."