Chapter 2 - The Command In The Obsidian Room That Changed My Life Forever
The silence inside the Obsidian Room pressed against my ears like a physical weight.
I couldn't look into his eyes. Looking into Ronan Hayes's eyes felt like stepping into an open furnace. Instead, I stared at the silver tie bar pinned neatly across his black silk tie, my breath hitching in my chest with every agonized throb of my cracked rib.
“It was an accident, sir,” I lied, repeating the rehearsed script I had used with the emergency clinic nurse three months ago. “I tripped down the concrete steps behind the staff alleyway before my shift started. I’m clumsy. It won’t happen again.”
Ronan didn't blink. He reached out with one large, warm hand.
I flinched back so hard my spine slammed against the edge of the service credenza behind me. The sudden impact sent a white-hot flare of agony shooting through my torso, and a ragged gasp escaped my throat before I could swallow it down.
Ronan’s hand froze mid-air. His jaw clenched until the muscles along his neck stood out like iron cables.
“Vance,” Ronan said, his voice dropping an octave, addressing the giant bodyguard standing by the heavy door. “Call Dr. Miller. Tell him to meet us at the private penthouse elevator in twenty minutes. Have him bring a full portable trauma kit.”
My eyes widened in terror. “No! Please, Mr. Hayes, I don't need a doctor! I just need to finish my shift. I have to work tonight. If I don't work tonight, I won't get my tips. I need two hundred dollars. Please, just let me go back to the kitchen!”
Ronan stepped closer, closing the distance between us until there were only inches separating his chest from mine. He moved slowly, deliberately giving me time to see his hands so I wouldn't panic.
Gently, with an unimaginable lightness of touch for a man of his size, his fingertips grazed the side of my high collar.
“You’re protecting a coward,” Ronan murmured, his gaze darkening into something lethal. “A clumsy fall down the stairs doesn't leave five distinct fingerprint marks across the base of your throat, little bird.”
My breath caught. My hand flew up to my neck, realizing my collar had shifted when I hit the credenza. The purple bruises on my throat were exposed.
Tears spilled over my lashes, washing away more of the heavy makeup and revealing the full extent of Carl's brutality—the dark purple swelling around my cheekbone, the split skin near my hairline, and the yellowing remnants of last week’s abuse along my jawline.
“He will kill me if I don't go home,” I whispered, broken and exhausted. The fight drained out of me all at once. “You don't understand. If I disappear, if I miss my shift, he’ll find me. Carl always finds me.”
Ronan’s eyes narrowed into twin shards of steel. “Carl?”
I clamped my mouth shut, horrified that I had let his name slip.
Ronan turned his head slightly toward his bodyguard. “Vance. Carl. Find out his full name, his address, his criminal history, his associates, and where he buys his drinks. I want a complete dossier on my desk before midnight.”
“Already on it, boss,” Vance replied, pulling a sleek black smartphone from his breast pocket and rapidly tapping the screen.
“No, please don't do this!” I begged, grabbing the sleeve of Ronan’s suit jacket in desperation. “You don't know what he’s like! He has an illegal revolver under the mattress. He doesn't care about the police! If he thinks I told someone, he won't just hit me—he’ll put me in the river!”
Ronan looked down at my small hand clutching his expensive wool sleeve. He didn't pull away. Instead, he placed his warm, calloused palm over mine, his grip firm and steadying.
“He won't touch you again, Sadie,” Ronan said.
I froze. “How... how do you know my name?”
Ronan’s thumb brushed lightly over the brass name tag pinned above my left collarbone. “I read it thirty seconds ago. And from this moment forward, no one in this city lays a finger on you without answering directly to me.”
Before I could process his words, Ronan reached down, slid one powerful arm behind my shoulders and the other beneath my knees, and lifted me effortlessly into his arms.
I cried out in shock, bracing for the inevitable blinding pain in my ribs, but his hold was so meticulously careful, so perfectly balanced, that my injured side remained completely supported against his chest.
“Vance, open the private service corridor,” Ronan ordered, carrying me out of the Obsidian Room through a hidden doorway disguised as wood paneling. “Bring her bag from the locker room. If anyone asks, Sadie Vance has been reassigned to Hayes Enterprises executive security.”
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As the heavy door sealed shut behind us, cutting off the noise and lights of the lounge, I buried my face against Ronan’s chest, weeping silently as the terrifying reality set in.
I was no longer in the hands of Carl Jenkins. But I had just been taken by the undisputed ruler of the city's criminal empire.
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