Chapter 1
CHAPTER 1
Kelly never believed in fairy tales. Certainly not the kind where the damsel gets stolen away by a man who wears tailored suits, smells like danger, and carries the weight of death in his stare. But life had a wicked sense of humor. One moment, she was just a girl working late shifts at her father’s worn-down diner, and the next, she was property. His property. And his name was Frank.
The night it happened, the sky was black silk, stitched with silver stars, and the wind carried the scent of rain. Kelly had locked up the diner by midnight, her hands trembling around the keys. Maybe it was exhaustion. Or maybe it was the black SUV parked across the street, engine humming low like a predator watching its prey.
She should’ve known better than to walk home alone.
By the time she heard the footsteps behind her, it was too late. A gloved hand wrapped around her waist, and the other covered her mouth. “Don’t scream,” a voice hissed in her ear—velvet smooth, with the sharpness of broken glass. “Unless you want the whole street to see you bleed.”
She didn’t scream.
She didn’t have time to.
Within minutes, she was in the back seat of that SUV, heart pounding like a drum of war. Rain started tapping against the windows as the driver sped off into the night.
“You’re a pretty thing,” the man sitting across from her mused. He was impossible to ignore. Broad shoulders, dark hair slicked back, and eyes like the devil had carved them himself—Frank. She knew his name before he said it. Everyone in town knew Frank. The man who made grown men disappear. The kingpin of the underground. And now, the man who held her fate between his perfectly manicured fingers.
“W-why me?” she whispered.
He smirked, leaning forward until his breath kissed her cheek. “Your father owes me. More than he can ever repay. So I’m taking you instead. Consider it… a lease.”
Her stomach twisted. “A lease?”
“365 days,” Frank said, his voice curling around the words like smoke. “You belong to me for one year. And in that year, you’re going to fall in love with me. Or else.”
She could hardly breathe. “Or else what?”
His smile was all teeth. “Or else your father stops breathing. Simple.”
And that was how it began. Kelly, the girl who never believed in fairy tales, was now trapped in a dark one—except the prince was a monster, and the castle was a penthouse overlooking the city where sins were born.
The first night, Frank didn’t touch her. Not really. He left her in a room larger than her entire apartment, with walls of glass that looked down over the sleeping city. “Get some rest,” he said, loosening his tie as if they weren’t standing on the edge of her worst nightmare. “Tomorrow, the game begins.”
“What game?” she asked.
Frank glanced over his shoulder, his gaze slow and heavy like a hand down her spine. “The game where you try not to fall in love with me… and fail.”
She swore she wouldn’t. She promised herself she couldn’t.
But as the days began to bleed into nights, and the nights into stolen glances, forbidden touches, and whispered threats that felt too much like foreplay… Kelly realized surviving this year wasn’t just about keeping her heart safe.
It was about keeping her soul intact.
And Frank? Frank was the devil you didn’t just sell your soul to. He made you beg him to take it.
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