Lashirah_Hash

> He saw her once—and that was enough.

Elena Rivers was just a waitress at a high-end gala she didn’t belong to, filling in for someone else's shift. She didn’t know her spilled glass of champagne would be the moment Damien Vale—billionaire, recluse, and dangerously obsessive—noticed her.

He never spoke to her. Not then. But he watched.

And when he wanted her closer, he made it happen.

Now, Elena is working directly under him, unaware that the life she thinks she controls is already entangled in the hands of a man who doesn't just want her—he needs her.

He’s patient. He’s powerful. And he’s been planning this from the moment she walked into his view.

OBSESSION IN SILENCE

Damien Vale didn't need to linger in a room to haunt it. His presence clung to the air like smoke, like heat left in the sheets after a nightmare you secretly didn't want to end.

Elena sat in her apartment, the silence stretching. Her fingers still trembled from earlier—from the cathedral, from him. She told herself it was adrenaline. Fear. But when her fingertips brushed her lips, she remembered the way he looked at her and the way her stomach had coiled—tight, hot, traitorous.

She hated herself for feeling anything.

And suddenly, she was back there again—standing in the cathedral's fractured light, his voice low and slow, wrapping around her like velvet dipped in danger.

She hadn't. Not really. But now it was like every locked part of her had started to open without her permission.

And that gift he'd left—the black velvet still unopened on her dresser—tempted her like a sin she hadn't yet tasted.

Elena stood slowly, her bare feet silent against the floor. One step. Then another. Her breath hitched. She reached for it, the velvet cool under her touch.

No—a collar. Sleek, thin, lined with soft leather and a single obsidian stone at the center. Elegant. Dark. Possessive.

Her heart thundered, a war drum in her chest. But beneath the fear, a whisper.

Not just the mask. Not the girl who ran. But the other version. The one she buried so deep even she forgot.

Elena backed away from the dresser like it might swallow her whole.

She should call someone. Tell someone. But she didn't.

Instead, she sat down on her bed, shaking, and closed her eyes.

And for the first time in years—

She imagined what it might feel like to give in.

Fracture