Chapter 2 - A Wolf in Bespoke Wool
The third-floor suite did not look like a prison, which somehow made it significantly more terrifying.
The carpets were so thick my bare feet sank into them like fresh snow. There was a king-sized bed with an ivory silk duvet, a marble fireplace with gas logs already glowing a faint, ambient blue, and an entire wall of floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over the manicured black lawns of the estate, stretching toward the jagged shoreline of Lake Michigan.
The only problem was the door.
There were two. One led to the hallway, and it was locked from the outside with a heavy, audible click thirty seconds after Luca had escorted me up here. The second door was a set of louvered French doors on the adjoining wall. Through the slats, I could see the soft lamplight of Adrian Voss’s private office.
He hadn't locked that one.
I sat on the edge of an emerald-green velvet armchair, wearing a heather-gray cashmere sweater and a pair of tailored wool trousers that had been brought to me by a tight-lipped, terrified maid twenty minutes ago. The clothes were brand-new, tags snipped, clearly meant for someone else—perhaps one of the many glamorous women who drifted in and out of the Voss social orbit. They were a little loose on me, the cuffs rolled twice, smelling of dry cleaning and cedar.
My wet uniform was gone. Taken away to be laundered, or more likely, incinerated along with any shred of my previous life.
A knock sounded on the connecting door.
I didn't answer.
It opened anyway.
Adrian stepped through, having shed his suit jacket. He had rolled the sleeves of his crisp white dress shirt up to his forearms, revealing corded muscle and a dark, intricate tattoo that curled from the inside of his right wrist up under his cuff—a snarling wolf entwined with thorns and Latin script. He was carrying a slim leather folder under one arm and a porcelain teacup in the other.
“You didn’t eat the sandwiches,” he remarked, glancing at the silver tray on the console table.
“I have a rule about eating food given to me by people who keep armed guards outside my bedroom,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest.
Adrian walked over and set the teacup down on the small table beside my chair. Steam curled from the surface, smelling faintly of chamomile and orange peel.
“If I wanted to poison you, Maya, I wouldn't waste the kitchen staff's Earl Grey,” he said, pulling out the desk chair opposite me and sitting down. He leaned back, his knees spread slightly, exuding an effortless ownership of the room, the house, and the air I was breathing. “Drink it. You were shivering for an hour.”
“I’m fine.”
He waited. Just sat there, his gaze pinned to mine, heavy and unyielding, until the silence grew so thick it felt like physical pressure.
Gritting my teeth, I picked up the porcelain cup. The warmth seeped into my icy fingers, and despite myself, I took a small sip. It was sweet, laced with honey, perfectly brewed. I hated how good it tasted.
“What am I doing here, Mr. Voss?” I asked, setting the cup down with a sharp *clack*. “You told your guard dog I was reassigned to you. Doing what? Dusting your secret files? Ironing your hit lists?”
“You’re here because you possess two rare qualities that make you uniquely dangerous to me right now,” Adrian said, opening the leather folder on his knee.
“My sparkling personality and my way with a bucket?”
“Your complete lack of self-preservation, and the fact that you saw something you shouldn't have.” He tapped a finger against a sheet of paper. “Maya Bennett. Twenty-four. Graduated from DePaul with a degree in art history that you couldn't afford. Your father, Thomas Bennett, was an independent mechanic who borrowed two hundred and fifty thousand dollars from a loan shark named Harry 'The Hook' Vance four years ago to keep his garage open during his chemotherapy.”
My heart seized. My hands gripped the arms of the velvet chair. “Don't talk about my father.”
Adrian didn’t even look up. “He died eighteen months ago. The debt didn't die with him. Harry Vance sold that paper to a collection outfit operating out of Cicero. An outfit funded, through three shell corporations, by the Moretti syndicate.”
He finally raised his eyes. The sharpness in them was surgical.
“You didn't apply for the housekeeping job here through an agency, did you, Maya? You took it because someone tipped you off that the Voss estate paid three thousand dollars a week in cash for domestic staff, and you needed to pay down twelve thousand dollars of interest by the end of this month or your younger brother’s dorm room at Loyola gets a visit from two men with crowbars.”
The room seemed to shrink. The air grew thin. Every shameful, terrifying secret I had carried on my shoulders for the past two years was laid out on a single sheet of paper in this man's lap.
“How do you have that?” I whispered, my voice shaking with sudden rage. “Did you run a background check on me while I was drying my hair?”
“I run background checks on the people who trim my hedges,” Adrian said coolly. “You slipped through because my HR director looked at your clean police record and your mother’s church affiliations and saw a harmless girl. But you aren't harmless, are you? You have a motive to sell information. If Julian Moretti found out you were standing three feet from my port logistical routes tonight, he wouldn't kill you. He would pay off your father’s debt, give you a hundred thousand dollars, and tell you to leave my study window unlocked.”
“I would never—”
“You would,” Adrian interrupted, his voice dropping into that chilling, absolute register. “If they threatened your brother, you would hand me over in a heartbeat. And I don’t blame you for that. Loyalty to family is the only currency worth anything in this world.”
He closed the folder with a soft thud.
“So what now?” I asked, tears of frustration stinging the backs of my eyes, though I refused to let them fall. “If you know that, why am I not dead?”
“Because Moretti doesn't know you saw the map,” Adrian said. “And he won't. Because starting tomorrow, you aren't a maid. You are my personal assistant. You will be by my side twelve hours a day. You will eat your meals where I can see you. You will accompany me to the office, you will sit in the car when I travel, and you will sleep in this room.”
I stared at him, incredulous. “You're keeping me hostage.”
“I’m keeping you alive,” he corrected. “And in exchange, Miss Bennett, I will pay off Harry Vance.”
I froze. The words hung between us like a physical object. “What?”
“Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Plus the eighty thousand in compounded interest.” Adrian didn’t blink. “Paid in full by noon tomorrow. Your brother will finish his degree in finance without interruption. The garage in Cicero will be deeded to your name, free and clear, to sell or keep as you see fit.”
My throat felt bone-dry. Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It was a sum of money that had haunted my nightmares, that had driven my father into an early grave, that had forced me to scrape the vomit of drunk rich people off bathroom tiles at two in the morning. And Adrian Voss was tossing it across the table like pocket change.
“Nothing is free,” I said, my voice barely audible. “What do you want from me?”
Adrian leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. The distance between us evaporated. Up close, I could see a tiny, pale scar cutting through his left eyebrow, the rugged texture of his jaw, the faint shadow of stubble. He looked entirely like what he was: a creature carved out of Chicago's brutal underworld, polished with wealth, but fundamentally uncivilized.
“I want your eyes, Maya,” he said softly.
“My eyes?”
“You noticed the highlighters. You noticed the Aubusson rug. You noticed the specific layout of my war room within three seconds of falling through the door while holding a mop.” His gaze dropped to my lips for a fleeting, dangerous second before returning to my eyes. “You have a mind that observes details under extreme stress. Most people scream and freeze. You cracked a joke about school projects and grabbed my coat to keep from cracking your skull.”
He stood up, towering over me once more.
“There is a rat in my organization,” Adrian said, turning toward the French doors. “Someone who sits at that table. Someone who told Moretti which shipping containers were coming into Pier 42 last week. Tomorrow night, I am hosting an event at the Onyx Lounge. Everyone will be there. My lieutenants, their wives, the city officials on our payroll, and Julian Moretti himself.”
I stood up, unable to stay seated while he loomed over me. “And you want me there?”
“I want you holding my tablet. Taking notes. Bringing me drinks.” He paused at the door, glancing back over his shoulder. The light caught the amber flecks in his dark eyes. “People don't hide their faces from the help, Maya. They think the domestic staff are deaf, dumb, and blind. But you aren't blind. You’re going to watch them. And when you see someone make a move they shouldn't... you're going to tell me.”
“And if I refuse?”
Adrian’s expression softened into something almost mournful.
“You won't refuse,” he said quietly. “Because you love your brother. And because deep down, Miss Bennett... you know that the only thing keeping you safe from the monsters in this city is being held in the arms of the biggest one.”
The door shut behind him.
May you like
The click of the lock didn't come from his side. It came from mine—a realization that the cage he had built around me was gilded, warm, and entirely inescapable.
***
