Daddy's Dark Devotion

The Singapore air didn’t just touch the skin; it assaulted it. It was a thick, heavy, invisible hand of humidity that clung to me the moment I stepped out of the taxi, crawling under the thin straps of my black dress, gluing the silk to my back like a second, unwanted layer of sweat. Breathing was a chore. Every inhale brought the smell of asphalt steaming after the rain and the rotting sweetness of overripe orchids hanging from the fence. I hated this. I hated the humidity curling my hair into a chaotic mess. I hated the fact that I was here, standing in front of a gate that looked like the entrance to a modern concrete hell, instead of being in my bed.

But most of all, I hated the shoes. Aunt Mimi called them “elegant.” I called them amputation devices. The left heel was already gone, a victim of my run-in with an electric scooter ten minutes ago, leaving me balancing like a drunk, budget version of Cinderella.

My phone vibrated in my hand, aggressive and persistent. “Selene!” Aunt’s voice was shrill, a frequency designed to pierce eardrums. “Where are you?! First villa on the right! Clients are already arriving, and you’re missing!”

“I’m here,” I mumbled, wiping a bead of sweat sliding down my neck. “I’m at the gate.”

“Get in! Now! And for God’s sake, I hope you look decent. This isn’t your college, this is the elite.”

“I look...” I glanced down at my bare left foot, trying to hide it behind my right calf. “...like a survivor.”

I hung up before she could scream again. I took a deep breath, trying to calm the pulse hammering in my throat. The villa loomed before me. No, that wasn’t a villa. It was a temple of narcissism. A massive structure of dark glass and cold concrete swallowing the night sky. There was no warmth in those windows, just sharp, clinical lights slicing through the dark.

I approached the guard. He was bulky, his suit too tight around the neck, sweaty and utterly unimpressed by my presence. His gaze slid over me. Slow. Sticky. From my bare shoulders, over my cleavage, all the way down to my thighs where the dress ended. I felt dirty, as if he had touched me with his tongue, not his eyes. “Invitation?” His voice was dry, uninterested.

I handed him the cream envelope. Even the paper screamed money. Heavy, textured, with embossed gold initials RT shimmering under the streetlights. It smelled of sandalwood and something sharp, metallic. It smelled like power. The guard looked at the paper, then at me. He nodded. The gate opened with a low, electronic hum, like the mouth of a beast inviting me in.

The noise hit me the moment I stepped into the courtyard. The bass vibrated through the ground, climbing up my legs and settling in my chest. Thump. Thump. Thump. Rhythmic, hypnotic, deafening. The courtyard was packed. The pool glowed an unnatural blue, centered by a fountain shaped like a black dragon spewing water into the air. People were everywhere. Women in dresses that cost more than my tuition, skin tight and shiny like plastic. Men in tailored suits, whiskey glasses in hand, eyes scanning the room for the next victim or the next deal.

It was all one glittering, fake circus. I felt that familiar itch at the back of my neck. My survival instinct woke up, screaming a single word: RUN. But my bills, those real, paper demons waiting on my desk, whispered: Stay. Smile. Endure.

I limped to the outdoor bar, skillfully hiding my bare foot in the deep shadow of a high bar stool. The marble counter was cold under my palms, the only relief in this sticky night. “Champagne?” The bartender appeared in front of me. A young man with tired eyes and the practiced smile of a doll. “Unless you have something that erases shame and brings back lost heels... yeah,” I sighed. “Give me the champagne.”

He didn’t get the joke. Didn’t even blink. Just slid a crystal flute toward me. I lifted it. The glass was beaded with condensation, cold against my hot fingers. The first sip was liquid gold, sharp, fizzy, bitter. It slid down my throat, leaving a trail of fake courage behind. I closed my eyes for a second, letting the music wash over me, trying to ignore the pain in my foot and the knot in my stomach.

And then it stopped. The music didn’t stop. The chatter didn’t stop. The air stopped. The atmosphere shifted in a split second. It was as if someone had sucked all the oxygen out of my immediate vicinity. The temperature dropped. I felt it before I heard anything. The hairs on my arms stood up, one by one, in a painful warning. A chill slid down my spine, slow and menacing, forcing the Singapore humidity into oblivion. Someone was behind me. Not someone. Something.

The scent hit me first. It wasn’t the cologne of the boys around me. This was dark. Heavy. He smelled of expensive tobacco, worn leather, and rain that has yet to fall, that electrified smell of ozone before a storm. He smelled like danger. “You.”

One word. Spoken quietly, in a deep baritone that didn’t reach my ears but vibrated straight into my bones. It wasn’t an invitation. It was a verdict.

I turned slowly, gripping the stem of the glass so hard I thought it would snap. The glass was my only shield. And then I saw him. My breath hitched in my throat, sharp and painful. He stood there, like a dark stain in this glittering world. He was tall. Too tall. His shadow fell over me, swallowing me whole. Dark hair was carelessly thrown back, not styled, but wild, as if he had just run his fingers through it in frustration. A few strands fell over his forehead.

He wore a black shirt. Sleeves rolled up to his elbows, revealing forearms mapped with veins and tattoos that vanished under the fabric. The shirt was unbuttoned. One button. Two. Three. Enough to see tanned skin, the definition of muscles shifting with every breath. But the eyes... The eyes were what pinned me down. They were dark. Almost black. Two abysses void of warmth, void of humanity. They looked at me with an intensity that made my knees weak. He wasn’t looking at me like a woman. He was looking at me like a target.

“Excuse me?” My voice cracked. I cleared my throat and lifted my chin. I wouldn’t show him fear. I couldn’t. He stepped closer. He was in my personal space now. His scent, that intoxicating mix of tobacco and power, filled my lungs, clouding my reason.

“I said,” he repeated, his voice like thunder rolling from deep underground, “out.” He tilted his head slightly to the side, studying me. His gaze slid from my eyes to my mouth, then down my neck, over my collarbone, to my cleavage. It wasn’t a sexual look. It was the look of a butcher assessing the quality of meat. “I have no patience,” he whispered, “for girls invited to ‘entertain’ the guests.”

Blood rushed to my face. The heat of anger mixed with the cold of fear. He thought I was an escort. He thought I was one of the paid ones. He looked at me with such disgust, such superiority, that my fear evaporated, replaced by pure spite.

“Sorry...” The word came out slow, honeyed, poisonous. I took a step toward him, entering his zone, tempting fate. “...Daddy...” I saw it. His pupils dilated. Just for a split second, the black swallowed whatever iris was visible. A muscle in his jaw ticked. Bullseye. “...but I don’t know who you think I am,” I finished, looking him straight in those dead, beautiful eyes.

The silence that followed was heavier than the air around us. “I know exactly what you are,” he murmured. His voice was rougher than before. He lowered his gaze. Slowly. Torturously slow. I felt that look like a physical touch. Like he was tracing a hot finger down my skin. He returned to my eyes. “Expendable goods,” he said.

Expendable goods. Those two words hung in the air between us, heavy and toxic. I felt my stomach clench, but not from shame. From rage. That cold, sharp rage that cleared my mind while my palms grew damp. He thought he could break me with two words? He thought I would shrink, bow my head, and apologize for breathing the same air as His Majesty?

I laughed. It wasn’t a polite laugh. It was a dry, sharp sound that surprised even me. Sarcasm was my armor. I pulled it on like a second skin, protecting the little dignity I had left with one shoe on. “Interesting,” I drawled, not moving an inch back, even though every instinct screamed to run from the predator standing before me. “So, you’re that type of man.” I tilted my head, pretending to analyze him with the same clinical disgust he used on me. “The one who deduces a woman’s worth based on heel height, which, by the way, I’m currently missing, and cleavage depth?”

His eyes narrowed. The darkness in them thickened. He wasn’t used to this. He was used to fear. He was used to “Yes, sir” and “Right away, sir.” My audacity hit him like a slap. “How original,” I continued, dropping my voice to a whisper meant only for him. “What’s the next step in your script, Daddy? You pull out that thick leather wallet and ask how much an hour of my humiliation costs? Or are you too cheap even for that?”

Silence. Absolute, deadly silence. His jaw tightened. I saw the sharp line of muscle flex on his cheek, right below the bone. A tendon in his neck strained. It was a warning. The quiet sound of a fuse being pulled.

And then he laughed. But that sound... God. That wasn’t a laugh. It was a dark, raspy noise rising from the depths of his throat, a sound that promised violence. It didn’t touch his eyes. The eyes remained dead. “You have balls,” he said quietly. His voice was like velvet wrapped around a knife blade. He stepped toward me. His shadow swallowed me completely. “I respect that,” he murmured, “but I despise disobedience.”

He raised his hand. I thought he would hit me. I didn’t blink. But his hand didn’t go for my face. It went for my shoulder, fingers curling into a claw, ready to grab me and toss me out like a trash bag. “And you have an ego the size of this villa,” I spat out, my heart beating like a wild bird in the cage of my ribs. “I ignore that.”

He was a millimeter away from touching me. I could feel the heat radiating from his palm. And then the salon doors burst open with a crash.

“SELENE!”

The voice was shrill, panicked, full of horror. The bubble of tension we stood in shattered into pieces. His hand froze in mid-air, just above my collarbone. He didn’t move, didn’t flinch. He just slowly, eerily slowly, turned his head toward the source of the sound.

My Aunt Mimi was running toward us. Heels clicking on the marble, face pale beneath layers of flawless foundation, eyes wide with terror. “Oh my God! Mr. Tan!” She stopped in front of us, gasping for breath, hands shaking as she fixed her blazer. “I’m sorry! Please, forgive me!” She looked at me, then at him, then at his hand still dangerously close to my neck. “That’s my niece. Selene. She... she came to help with the setup. She’s not...” Aunt swallowed hard, her voice dropping to a whisper full of shame. “She’s not one of the girls. You know... not for entertainment.”

The silence returned. He didn’t move. He didn’t even look at my aunt. Slowly, he dragged his gaze back to me. His hand lowered, but he didn’t step back. He remained in my personal space, a tall, dark wall. His eyes scanned me again. But this time, the look was different. It wasn’t just disgust anymore. It was... calculation. Like he just realized the prey he wanted to crush was actually a rare, poisonous species.

“Your niece?” he asked. His voice was deceptively calm, flat, emotionless. Aunt nodded, too many times.

“Yes. Yes, sir. Art student. Just helping.”

I felt that crazy, self-destructive urge to speak again. To poke him one more time. I looked him in the eyes. Into that darkness. “Imagine that, Daddy,” I whispered, low enough so only he and the devil could hear. The corner of his mouth twitched. “Educated,” I continued, sweet and toxic, “legal... and definitely not on your payroll.”

Time stopped. Mimi let out a small choking sound. And he... His expression shifted. The sliver of control he held like a shield cracked. The corner of his lip lifted into a slow, dangerous, predatory smirk. He showed teeth. It wasn’t a smile of amusement. It was the smile of a wolf that just smelled blood.

“Interesting,” he drawled. Finally, he turned to Mimi, but I still felt the weight of his focus on me, as if he’d painted a target on my forehead. “Keep her.” It wasn’t a suggestion. It was a king’s command. Mimi blinked, confused.

“Excuse me?”

“Not as help,” he continued, his voice dropping deeper, darker. “As staff. I want her close.”

My heart skipped a beat. Not from happiness. But from pure, primal warning that froze the blood in my veins. This wasn’t a job offer. This was a trap. “But, Mr. Tan... she has no experience...” Mimi tried. Rafael cut her off with a look. “Unless you want that bonus we discussed, of course.”

Blackmail. Pure, simple, elegant blackmail. Mimi shut her mouth. She nodded faster than he finished the sentence, selling me for the promise of extra zeros on a check. “Of course, Mr. Tan. Selene...” She turned to me, voice fake-cheerful, but eyes screamingshut up and listen. “Selene, darling, go change into a uniform. Mr. Tan is right.”

I wanted to scream. I wanted to say no. But I looked at my aunt. I saw the fear in her eyes. She needed this job. I swallowed my pride. It tasted like ash. I turned to leave, to escape his orbit. But I didn’t get to take a single step.

“Not so fast.” His voice stopped me cold. Mimi had already rushed toward the kitchen, leaving us alone. Again. Just me and the beast in Armani.