Chapter 2

LUCIEN POV.

She shouldn’t have gone near that door. I watched her the whole time barefoot on the carpet, hair falling loose, her fingers hovering over the brass handle like she didn’t realize what kind of thing she was about to wake.

My men had warned me before she arrived.

“Too young.”

“Too pretty.”

They were right. But none of them mentioned she’d be this… distracting.

The feed flickered across my screen a grainy image of her, small and trembling, running back down the corridor. Her chest rose and fell like she’d been caught between fear and something far less innocent.

Her blouse clung to her back. Her skirt rode up just enough to test my restraint.

I leaned forward in my chair, eyes fixed on her on Poppy.

The name fit too well. Soft, fragile, sweet… the kind of sweetness that could ruin a man if he took too much.

I’d seen women come and go through this house. Dozens of them. Each one eager to please, to beg, to be remembered. None of them were. They blurred together after a while.

But not her.

She doesn’t even realize what she’s doing the way her eyes linger too long, the way she hesitates like she’s both afraid and curious at once. She hasn’t learned how to hide her thoughts yet.

And she looks into mirrors as if she knows someone’s looking back.

Defiant. Unaware. Tempting.

The camera in her room shows her now pacing, wringing her hands, whispering to herself. She keeps glancing toward the corner lens, pretending not to. Every time her skirt lifts, I catch a flash of pale skin. She doesn’t know. Or maybe she does.

It doesn’t matter.

She came here for work. But she walked straight into my house, my world, without knowing whose name it carries.

She doesn’t know who I am.

But she will.

And when she does, she’ll understand why this house has rules.

Because curiosity is never free.

And soon… she’ll pay in full.

POPPY POV.

I didn’t mean to run. It just happened like my body knew something I didn’t. I hadn’t even touched the door, just looked at it. That shouldn’t count as breaking the rules, should it?

But as soon as I turned away from the west wing, my heart wouldn’t calm down. I could still feel something behind me. Something that followed me up the stairs, all the way back to my room.

Watching.

The camera blinked in the corner. Quiet. Patient.

I sat on the bed and gripped the sheets to stop my hands from shaking. My mind told me I was being ridiculous it was just a house. A strange, echoing, beautiful house. But my body didn’t believe it. My body was sure I wasn’t alone.

When I finally started to undress, the air felt too thick. The blouse slipped from my shoulders, and a chill ran down my arms. My reflection in the mirror looked different flushed, uncertain.

My gaze flicked toward the camera.

Did someone really watch?

Of course they did. Security, they’d say. Protocol. The master keeping an eye on what’s his.

Except the thought didn’t feel safe.

It felt… intimate.

Heat bloomed in my cheeks. I turned away quickly, climbed into bed, and pulled the covers over my head like a child. But it didn’t help. The thought of that voice that low, calm voice from the hallway kept circling in my mind.

“Do you always touch what isn’t yours?”

The memory made me shiver. I hadn’t even seen his face properly, just the outline of a tall figure and the weight of his stare. But his voice…

It was deep. Controlled. Dangerous.

And the worst part was how it made me feel.

Like I was in trouble.

And part of me wanted to be.

When morning came, another note waited under my door.

Clean the library. Stay in the east wing and no unsupervised hallway movement after dark.

That last line made my stomach tighten.

They knew.

He knew.

Someone had been watching me the entire time.

And I wasn’t sure if the fear in my chest was real…

or if it was turning into something else entirely.